Jacques Ellul wore many hats: sociologist, philosopher, humanist, theologian, law professor. He studied the work of Karl Marx and embraced a good deal of Marxist theory, which he did not consider in conflict with his religious beliefs. The son of an atheist father and Christian mother (.pdf), he was raised without religious training. He became a Christian at 22, and his strong faith — Ellul defined himself as a Christian universalist — underpinned all his work.

In his cosmopolitan family, Ellul grew up with a distrust of statism, which partially explains his attraction to Marx. His dislike of the state did not prevent him, however, from taking an active role in the French Resistance during World War II.

He was the rare French intellectual who remained a provincial all his life. He did not beeline it for Paris, as most of his contemporaries did, choosing instead to remain in the seaport town of Bordeaux, where he was born. He was a professor at the university there for most of his career.

Ellul's ambivalence toward technology was grounded in large part in his religious and social convictions. He believed that "technological tyranny," represented by the increasing encroachment of modern technology into our private lives, posed a threat to both human freedom and faith.

He wrote widely on the subject, including the 1964 book, The Technological Society, which is considered his most important work. Ellul was not critical of technology per se, but with the ways it is used by some to impose their will on others. He was especially critical of the mass media, which he believed is completely manipulated by powerful and generally antagonistic special interests.

He wrote:

One has to wonder what Ellul, who died in 1994, would have made of the internet's long reach.

Source: Various

Most wars last just a few years. But the unexploded mines, shells, and bombs they leave behind can last decades. Getting rid of these lurking killers can be painfully slow and prohibitively expensive. That's why Joe Trocino established the Golden West Humanitarian Foundation with the mission of helping locals dispose of ordnance using inexpensive, easy-to-find materials. Here are three of its ingenious techniques.

Mr. BIP (Blow in Place)
Cost: $20

Sometimes explosives are close to people or buildings. That's where Mr. BIP comes in. Just place an inverted tire rim over the bomb, secure it with rebar stakes, surround with sandbags, drop in an explosive charge, and detonate.

Bullet Barbecue
Cost: $245

Construct a steel box, fill with small-arms rounds, and seal shut. Apply heat to the container using a propane, coal, or wood fire. Rather than exploding, the gunpowder slowly "cooks off"—leaving only inert metals, which can be recycled.

Kinetic Extractor
Cost: $15 per pipe

Unexploded tank rounds and scrap metal pipe are common in conflict zones. Luckily, they can be a disarming combo: Drop the explosive round down the proper diameter pipe and the lip of the shell catches, separating the projectile from the explosive primer.

Illustrations: Nate Van Dyke, Photos: Swiss Foundation for Mine Action

Pyrethrin and Pyrethroids
These poisons cause the ion channels in nerve cells to remain open too long, which makes neurons fire repeatedly, resulting in paralysis and death. Pretty vicious given where they come from: Pyrethrin is obtained from flowers of the asteraceae family (including daisies and chrysanthemums); pyrethroids are just synthetic pyrethrin. While both are especially toxic to insects (alas, even bees) they are supposed to be among the least deadly pesticides to mammals. Still, keep Raid away from kitty: Cats' livers can't process pyrethrin fast enough to keep from, you know, dying.

Piperonyl Butoxide or N-Octyl Bicycloheptene Dicarboximide
Not poisons on their own, these so-called pesticide synergists block the enzyme that breaks down pyrethrin in insects. Basically, bugs don't have a chance.

Isoparaffinic Hydrocarbon Solvent
The patent recommends Exxsol D60, a proprietary goo concocted by ExxonMobil Chemical and described as an "aliphatic hydrocarbon"—a hydrocarbon without aromatic ring molecules. Here it serves as an oily poison delivery system that coats the insect's exoskeleton, helping to get the toxins into the pest's pores.

Fragrance
Unscented Raid smells like a kerosene spill in a nerve gas factory. Lemon Scent Raid smells like a kerosene spill in a nerve gas factory with a hint of lemon.

Sorbitan Monooleate
Older spray pesticides were up to 80 percent hydrocarbons, toxins that aren't the greatest chemicals to be spraying around your house. Raid's current formula cuts the amount of hydrocarbons in half, replacing it with water. Surfactants like sorbitan monooleate help the H2O and hydrocarbons stay mixed properly.

Sodium Nitrite or Sodium Benzoate
These substances (particularly sodium nitrite) can be toxic in high doses, but the amounts present here are only enough to prevent the metal can from corroding.

Liquefied Saturated Hydrocarbons
Raid uses a mix of propylene, butanes, and butylenes as propellant. These are flammable and can cause breathing difficulties; you might want to stub out that Marlboro Light before spraying indoors.

The Mercury and Gemini programs had put Americans into Earth orbit. Apollo had been to the moon seven times — landing four times — and would return to land twice again later in 1972.

But NASA wanted a reusable rocket ship to explore Earth orbit and to supply and staff a space station. Nixon gave the go-ahead:

NASA director James Fletcher's remarks referred once again to the shuttle's "modest budget" and reduced complexity. The plan was to make 48 flights a year (.pdf) at about $50 million per launch ($250 million in today's money).

Starting in 1981, the shuttles have made 124 space flights in 28 years, averaging four or five missions a year. The years immediately following the Challenger and Columbia disasters saw no flights. 1985 had a record high nine missions, and 1990 to 1997 averaged eight flights a year.

University of Colorado researcher Roger Pielke Jr. calculated in early 2005 that the shuttle program to that point had cost $145 billion, or about $1.3 billion per flight. (Based on a 1995 midpoint, that's about $1.9 billion per flight in today's dollars.)

The Apollo program cost a total $19.4 billion from 1960 to 1973. That averages almost $2.2 billion for each of the nine lunar missions. (Based on a 1967 midpoint, that would be about $13 billion each today.)

So, space shuttle flights have certainly been less expensive than Apollo lunar missions. But even adjusting for inflation and despite their many achievements, shuttle launches cost seven or eight times what was promised.

Source:Various

10. Stanza
A book reader that grabs free titles from public domains, Stanza has soared in popularity — making the iPhone a worthy competitor to Amazon's Kindle. And if those free books aren't enough, Stanza recently expanded to incorporate a store to purchase commercial titles. The app did a good job pleasing Wired.com's Charlie Sorrel, who modified his Moleskine notebook so he could embed his iPod touch in it. (That way, he could read e-books at the cafe while exuding an aura of pretentious artiness, instead of pretentious geekiness.) Download Stanza (Free)

9. SayWhere
You get used to typing on the iPhone after some time, but punching in addresses to look up directions is by far the biggest drag. DialDirections was the first to introduce speech-recognition capabilities to the iPhone with SayWhere, which translates users' speech into queries for Google Maps, Yelp, Traffic or Yellow Pages. It's a nifty app, especially for keeping drivers' eyes on the road rather than the iPhone's virtual keyboard. Download SayWhere (Free)

8. Tweetie
Twitter, a new form of micro-blogging, became more legitimate when it broke the news of the deadly Mumbai attacks. And Tweetie is the best app we've found to follow your Twitter friends. The app neatly separates Twitter feeds into categories, and the interface resembles the bubbly iChat interface that most of us have come to love. It even lets you search Twitter and save those searches for later. A must-have for Twitterholics.  Download Tweetie ($3)   

7. NetShare
This app is so cool you can't have it anymore. Nullriver's NetShare, an application that turns your iPhone into a wireless modem, disappeared from the App Store shortly after its release. Later, we learned Apple banned the app because NetShare violated AT&T's terms of service agreement. So only a lucky few (including some Wired.com staff) got the benefits of unlimited iPhone tethering, which normally costs about $30 a month, for a one-time price of $10. Bummer!

6. Shazam
Everyone's familiar with this scenario: You hear a really catchy, unfamiliar song on the radio and you have no idea what it's called. You hum it to yourself repeatedly and attempt to memorize the lyrics, only to forget it after slamming a few shots at the bar. Shazam will never leave you struggling to recollect these thoughts again: Hold the iPhone up to a speaker playing the unknown tune and the app will identify it — album, artist and song title — just like that. Download Shazam (Free)

5. Ocarina
The hottest music app in the App Store, Ocarina thought beyond the iPhone's touchscreen and found a unique way to use the handset's microphone. Blowing into the mic simulates the experience of tooting into a flute; you play around with four virtual "holes" on the screen to change the note. Ocarina users around the world can even hear what you're playing in a globe mode. It takes a while to get a hang of it, but Ocarina gives away just how creative iPhone apps can get so long as developers have enough imagination. Download Ocarina ($1)

4. TapTapRevenge
You'd have to be living on a different planet (or a retirement home) if you haven't heard of Guitar Hero, the game that gets players to twitch their fingers compulsively along with the beat of their favorite songs. Developer Tapulous took the same idea to make an extremely addictive rhythm game called Tap Tap Revenge. Tapping blinking lights on a screen to catch tunes isn't exactly the same as rocking out on plastic guitars and drum pads, but it's still highly addictive. And Tap Tap Revenge is so popular it's even offering the option to download new tracks to tap to, similar to Guitar Hero and Rock Band's music stores. Download TapTapRevenge (Free)

3. Trism
Trism is such an addictive and appealing game that it blessed its developer Steve Demeter with $250,000 in profit in just two months. And deservedly so, because the game's really well designed and plays something like a Bejeweled with an accelerometer to move around the puzzle pieces. It wouldn't be fair to call it one game, either: There are three different modes to keep you hooked. Download Trism ($3)

2. Pandora
Whoa whoa whoa — free downloaded music on a portable device? You don't say. Pandora's alternative music distribution made this happen, and the app is cool as hell on the iPhone. Add a station for an artist you like, and the app will play that artist's music as well as similar tunes you might like. What better way to find new music with the wealth of new bands out there? Download Pandora (Free)

1. Google Earth
When Steve Jobs called the iPhone "Your life in your pocket," he probably didn't expect Google to deliver the world in your pocket. Well, virtually. Displaying satellite imagery around the world in a 3-D globe, Google Earth is one of the most intense, mindblowing apps that truly shows off the powers of the iPhone. If you want to impress your grandmother with a demonstration of just how far technology has come since she was a girl, this ought to do the trick. Download Google Earth (Free)