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Complex Numbers A complex number is expressed in the standard form a + bi, where a and b are real numbers and i is defined by i^2 = -1 (that is, i is the square root of -1). For example, 3 + 2i is a complex number. The bi term is often referred to as an imaginary number (though this may be misleading, as it is no more "imaginary" than the symbolic abstractions we know as the "real" numbers). Thus, every complex number has a real part, a, and an imaginary part, bi. Complex numbers are often represented on a graph known as the "complex plane," where the horizontal axis represents the infinity of real numbers, and the vertical axis represents the infinity of imaginary numbers. Thus, each complex number has a unique representation on the complex plane: some closer to real; others, more imaginary. If a = b, the number is equal parts real and imaginary. Very simple transformations applied to numbers in the complex plane can lead to fractal structures of enormous intricacy and astonishing beauty. ![Merit Badge in Quill Award
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| In August and everything after You get a little less than you expected somehow —Counting Crows I usually do these archaeological expeditions on Sundays, but, as I noted yesterday, all of next week will be (or at least should be) taken up by entries for "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2024"  [13+].The past, imperfect, goes all the way to April of 2007 today, for a short entry about consumer automation: "Meet George Jetson" My wife wants a robot. Yes, this was long enough ago that I was actually married. No, not for that. I haven't been replaced by a machine yet. Or, well, maybe I have; her friends have been holding a lot of schtupperware parties lately. "Schtup" is a Yiddish word for sexual intercourse. Her friends had these get-togethers where the host would demonstrate various "toys" (mostly made of plastic) and get some sort of commission on sales. It would have been impossible for me not to make a pun on Tupperware parties. By "demonstrate," I don't mean what you're thinking. Get your mind out of the gutter, please. But specifically, she wants a robot she saw that travels around the house, cleaning it. A few years back, my housemate got a Roomba. It was a massive pain to organize around, since neither of us is naturally organized. There's barely enough open floor space for it to do its thing, and I can't be arsed to do all the work it would take to possess less stuff. It collects dust now, on top rather than inside. Now, overlooking for the moment the years of therapy our cats will have to endure if we actually get this little slice of science fiction... Also, the cats were not amused. Yes, I've seen those videos of cats sitting on the damn things while they scoot around, but my cats are different. ...glossing over the price (which, really, is probably comparable to an Oreck vacuum cleaner)... The house is, and was, uncarpeted except for one single room. Not worth spending that kind of dough. Then I'd be the sucker instead of the vacuum cleaner. ...and even forgetting for the moment how this little gadget confirms my theory that if necessity is the mother of invention, laziness is the milkman... Huh. I've been saying that for at least 17 years. I had no idea. ...aside from all that, there's something fundamentally wrong here: There exists a household cleaning robot, and I still don't have my flying car. Every time I complain that I don't have a flying car, two responses come soaring in, as if jerked by knees: 1) Flying cars do exist (generally accompanied by a link to a video); 2) People can't drive in 2D; imagine the chaos if they tried it in 3D. For 1, I say "Okay, they exist. Fine. They're not production models and, more importantly, my complaint is not that they don't exist, but that I don't own one." For 2, my response is that I don't give a good goddamn if anyone else has one; I'd be perfectly happy being the only owner of one. I was promised a flying car. It was right there at the 1939 World's Fair: Flying Cars are the Future. The far future, apparently. Point is, how come she gets a household robot, and I'm still stuck driving a vehicle that never leaves the ground (except maybe when I'm being chased by Roscoe P. Coltrane)? Spoiler: she didn't get a household robot. I'm not saying that the lack was a proximate cause of our divorce, but it probably didn't help. There follows a link to a Popular Mechanics article (I presume from the URL), but the link doesn't work any more and I have no idea what point I was trying to make with it. Nor can I be arsed to search it out. And just to forestall another assumption: it's not like I expected her to do all the cleaning. We both did that. Not that I would have done as much if I'd been single, as evidenced by the fact that these days, I hire a maid service, which is almost as much an organizational pain in the ass as the Roomba was. |
| I expect to participate in "Blog Week Birthday Bastion 2024" [13+] every day next week, and this will likely be the last link I comment on for a while. So savor it. Which should be easy enough, because it's about food. Do You Really Need to Bake With a Scale? I am legally obligated to tell you the truth, even if you don't want to hear it. You're probably better off baking with an oven, I think. So listen to me, your baking therapist: You need to stop the negative self-talk. It’s not you—it’s your measuring cup. And it’s letting you down! Which is what I've been saying. But no, I get it, I'm not an expert. My advice is that taking my advice isn't always a good idea. But I've railed on this numerous times, most recently here: "Waxy Scaley" When I tried using measuring cups on five separate occasions. I got five totally different weights. This! Is! Not! Okay! I think we get the point without all the bangs. We all measure flour differently. Some of us dip-and-sweep, others fluff-and-spoon, a few of us live on the edge and simply tilt the bag over the measuring cup, hoping for the best, and there are those who shall not be named who use liquid measuring cups (please don’t). No mention of sifting? Shame. With a baking scale, however, 125 grams of flour (the generally accepted standard weight of 1 cup all-purpose flour) remains 125 grams no matter where and who in the world you are. I could quibble about this. Unless you're using a balance scale, you're measuring weight, not mass. The same mass weighs a different amount depending on where you are on or off the planet. But I won't. Accuracy is indeed important, as is precision, but it's possible to take it too far. The trick is knowing when you're taking it too far. Why am I so focused on flour? Because every crumbly cookie, sunken cake, or leaden bread that made you believe you’re a bad baker can almost always be traced back to too much or too little flour. Not mentioned in the article: the kind of flour you're using can also be important. You know why biscuits (American biscuits, not what the UK calls cookies) are better in the South? It's not because we're better bakers. It's that the proper flour for biscuits is generally only available in the American south. This scientific study supports my assertion; also note their use of grams, not cups (though their mixing of SI and Imperial units made me twitch).But the measuring thing holds true for other ingredients. Baking soda is an essential ingredient in many baked goods, and it works because of a chemical reaction, and chemical reactions are usually driven by mass, not volume. Flour has a structural purpose in baking; given enough moisture and heat it forms a protein network that lends physical shape to your treats. That protein network is mostly gluten. This is one reason why gluten-free baked things taste like mushy ass. The benefits of a baking scale go far beyond flour, though. Ever come across measurements like “a scant ½ cup”? (I’m sorry, what?). It’s never an issue when a recipe is written with weights. I don't think I've ever seen that (in my defense, I don't bake often). But what I have seen is stuff like "heaping tablespoon." Come on. Or how about measuring sticky peanut butter or molasses or honey? Which was the focus of the last blog entry I did on this, the one I linked up there. Or what about when a recipe calls for chocolate or nuts? With so many variables—mini chips vs. regular chips vs. fèves, finely chopped vs. coarsely chopped nuts—a scale is the only way to ensure consistency. While I agree with this, there are some ingredients, like chocolate chips for the eponymous cookies, where the actual quantity is more a matter of personal preference. The point remains, though: a standard cup of Hershey's Kisses (not great chocolate, but they're basically giant chocolate chips), if you can even measure something that bulky in cups, is not going to weigh the same as a cup of mini chocolate chips. This has to do with solids vs. air voids, but that's just on a bigger scale (pun intended) than the flour problem. Even if a favorite recipe doesn’t list weights, you can use this immensely handy conversion chart from King Arthur Flour to figure them out yourself. Half my work in cooking seems to be finding these conversions online. As an aside, it doesn't matter if it's grams or ounces. As long as you're on Earth, it's close enough. Just don't confuse weight ounces with fluid ounces. Once you understand the life-changing magic of baking with a scale, you may never, ever use measuring cups again. Hold onto those spoons, though: For very small amounts, like teaspoons, I prefer to stick to volume measures. Most scales measure in 1-gram increments, so they just aren’t sensitive enough to pick up the nuances of something like ¼ teaspoon baking soda. I used to have a 0.01-gram kitchen scale. Bought it from Amazon. Later, I realized that this probably put me on a drug-dealer watch list. No, assholes, I'm just using it to get the precise amount of cornstarch measured out. By "used to have," I mean it fell off the counter once, and I replaced it with a scale that's less precise but has greater capacity. And is more durable. The article ends with a link to a hamantaschen recipe, for which we are in the wrong time of year. But that's never stopped me before. |
| I have a couple of articles about this, from different perspectives. This one, from Ars Technica, gets a little, well... technical. Researchers figure out how to keep clocks on the Earth, Moon in sync A single standardized Earth/Moon time would aid communications, enable lunar GPS. I'm pretty sure I've talked about this sort of thing in here before, but if so, that was before they'd figured this out. I found one example: "Luna Ticks" Our communications and GPS networks all depend on keeping careful track of the precise timing of signals—including accounting for the effects of relativity. From what I understand, there are two opposite effects of relativity with GPS. One is the relative speed of the satellites; the other is their elevation. While opposite, they inconveniently don't cancel each other out. You also have to account for distance from receiver to each satellite, because of the speed of light. I mention this because while the lag time to satellites in low earth orbit is small, the moon is about 1.3 light-seconds away, and a second and a third (pun intended, of course) is a long damn time for some things. It's relatively easy to account for that on the Earth, where we're dealing with a single set of adjustments that can be programmed into electronics that need to keep track of these things. But plans are in place to send a large array of hardware to the Moon, which has a considerably lower gravitational field (faster clocks!), which means that objects can stay in orbit despite moving more slowly (also faster clocks!). No mention here of accounting for the variable gravitational field of the Moon, which I've seen described as "lumpy." I trust they've figured out how to deal with that, but if not, I'm certain we'll hear about it in an "oopsie!" article in the future. It would be easy to set up an equivalent system to track time on the Moon... I think this author has a different definition of "easy" than I do. I might have chosen "straightforward," instead. ...but that would inevitably see the clocks run out of sync with those on Earth—a serious problem for things like scientific observations. Relativity put a dagger in the back of the concept of "simultaneous;" two space-time events that seem to be simultaneous for one observer can be asynchronous for another. This is generally not an issue on Earth, and doesn't matter to our day-to-day lives (as long as we're not physicists), but I expect it makes a difference when dealing with separate worlds. So, the International Astronomical Union has a resolution that calls for a "Lunar Celestial Reference System" and "Lunar Coordinate Time" to handle things there. Yawn. Come on, you can do better than that. "Loonie time" is right there on top of my brain. Give me a few minutes (and a few drinks), and I might even come up with some forced acronyms, like "Lunar Uncoupled Normative, Asynchronous, Temporal Isochronic ClockS." And that's without benefit of beer. Anyway, We're getting ready to explore the Moon. Son, we've been exploring the Moon since before I was born. Just not very often by way of humans visiting the place. We'll have an increasing set of hardware, and eventually facilities on the lunar surface. Or under it, as I noted in another entry: "Cave People" All that could potentially be handled by an independent lunar positioning system, if we're willing to accept it marching to its own temporal beat. But that will become a problem if we're ultimately going to do things like perform astronomy from the Moon, as the precise timing of events will be critical. Thing about lunar astronomy is... well, it's obvious that not having an atmosphere helps a lot with observations, but we have space telescopes for shit like that. No, the thing is, to the best of my limited understanding, you can put a telescope on the Moon and one on Earth and one out in space, and what you get is effectively one big giant telescope, able to resolve distant objects to greater precision. That is, if all your you get all your ticks and tocks lined up right. As always, it's possible I got something wrong there, but the point is, I can see how synchronization would be important when doing astronomy between Earth and some other world. What does this look like? Well, a lot of deriving equations. The paper's body has 55 of them, and there are another 67 in the appendices. So, a lot of the paper ends up looking like this. If you want to get heart palpitations, go to the article to find out what "this" is. Still, using their system, they're able to calculate that an object near the surface of the Moon will pick up an extra 56 microseconds every day, which is a problem in situations where we may be relying on measuring time with nanosecond precision. This sort of thing is why I strongly object to airy "time is an illusion" proclamations. Nothing that can be calculated to that degree of accuracy deserves to be reduced to "illusion." It may not be fundamental, sure, and it's probably an emergent property, but so is temperature. If time is an illusion, then it's time (pun intended) to revise the definition of "illusion." And the researchers say that their approach, while focused on the Earth/Moon system, is still generalizable. Which means that it should be possible to modify it and create a frame of reference that would work on both Earth and anywhere else in the Solar System. Mars or bust! |
| I promise I have more articles in the queue from not-Cracked than from Cracked, but sometimes, the RNG likes to cluster things. I should probably mention that there are images in the article that may get you called in to HR at work, but that'll probably happen anyway, just from wasting your time reading this blog and a dick joke site. 5 Simple Science Questions We Bet You’ll Get Wrong What is a day? What is the Earth made of? You don’t really know Yeah, I get it. There's a lot I don't know. There's probably even some stuff I get wrong, though I try to fix that when I become aware. Phrasing aside, though, as usual, the article has an interesting take on things. Between time travel, fusion reactors and the brain transplants we hear are happening any day now, science can sound like an intimidating set of disciplines. I don't know about brain transplants, but I did see something recently about a brain implant for thought-to-text. No, not Muskmelon's crazy stunt; this one seems legit.Of course, I immediately saw the potential to reverse this so that advertisers can pay to have their product beamed directly into our brains. And you know damn well that's going to happen, along with people using it for porn. Today, however, let’s set aside the most complicated theories and applications. Porn isn't that complicated, unless you're doing it in space. 5. How Many Minutes Does Earth Take to Rotate Once? Oh, I know this trick question. A solar day is not the same as a sidereal day. The Earth takes 1,436 minutes for each rotation. Or, it takes 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4 seconds. The article explains this in good-enough detail, but the simple explanation is: that's how long it takes for the same distant star (that is not the one we're orbiting) to reappear in the same place in the sky, relative to any point on the earth's surface. But also, that sort of knowledge makes people like me fun at parties, but doesn't much matter for our 24-hour-everyday lives. 4. Would It Be Sexy to Have X-Ray Vision? No. 3. What Color Is the Sun? Another trick question, and also involving the accursed daystar. The Sun is yellow, say most people with eyes. Except when it's red or orange. People who know more about space might offer a different answer. The Sun is actually white, they’d say. Again, details in the article, but basically, white is what happens when you mix a full spectrum of light colors together. And of course the sun has a full spectrum, else we wouldn't sometimes see rainbows. (I may be mixing up cause and effect; our eyes evolved to see that range for reasons). But to confuse us even further, physicists refer to the kind of photon emissions from the sun as "black-body radiation," for reasons I won't go into but you're free to look up. So maybe the sun is "actually" black. 2. What Is the World’s Most Common Substance? Oh, that's easy: Stupidity. What is the most abundant material on Earth — or rather, what is the most abundant material on or in Earth? Um... advertisements? Is it rock? Sure, but you’re going to have to be more specific than that. Anything can be considered rock. Well, maybe not smooth jazz. The most common substance in the world is in fact... bridgmanite. We’ll forgive you for never having heard that word before since scientists only got around to naming it within the last decade. Yep, okay, you got me. Never heard of it before this. My knowledge continues to expand, thanks to a juvenile humor website. 1. Should You Shoot C-4 Explosives, for Fun? I'm a big fan of doing lots of things for fun, so... yes? On the other hand, if you answered “yes” because explosions are cool, we have bad news. The C-4 will not explode, so shooting it might be quite boring. Awww. Yeah, my understanding was the whole point of C-4 was to have a stable explosive. Which sounds weird, but you want it to blow up when you want it to blow up, not while you're transporting it to the thing you want to blow up. So it requires a detonator or whatever. Shooting Tannerite, now... yeehaw! |
| In a twist of cosmic coincidence, today's article is also from Cracked and is also about opposites. 5 Words That Mean the Exact Opposite If You Go to England Jack Reacher makes no sense, and to understand why, you need to understand British English Clearly meant for an American audience. If a British rag had written this article, it would have been "5 Words Yanks Get Backwards." England is a strange land, where they speak a language known as English. You might have trouble understanding what anyone there is saying. Strewth. For example, you might hear someone described as “mean,” and you think that refers to how they say cruel things. You later realize it really refers to how they’re stingy with money. In fairness, those traits often go hand in hand. 5. Tabling an Issue In America, when someone says, “Let’s table that discussion,” they mean, “Let’s stop talking about that for now.” Except these days, you'd say "let's put a pin in that and circle back later." In Britain, when someone wants to table something, it instead means they want to discuss it right now. And this nicely illustrates the hazards of verbing nouns. "Take it off the table" or "put it on the table" would be close equivalents, and less ambiguous. 4. Public School If you went to public school in the U.S., that means you went for free, in a school set up by your local government. Generally badly. In England, however, the term “public schools” refers to the most elite schools in the country, places like Eton and Harrow... They’re run by private institutions and charge fees. I've known about this difference for a while, and I gotta say, in this case, I'm going to side with the US. But it's not like either side of the pond is going to change its usage soon, so it's just important to know there's a difference. The way I remember it is that a pub, originally public house, is also privately owned. 3. The Doughnut Effect One of the few delicacies that doesn't have a different name in the two Englishes. We say cookie; they say biscuit. They say donut too; they just don't use the lazy spelling. However, this item isn't about delicious treats, but about how cities grow rings around them... differently in each country. Oh, just read it.. 2. Luck Out If you luck out, that means you stumbled into some good luck. That is, obviously, the US version. As one should expect by now, the UK version is the precise opposite. Though the character Reacher is American, the author Lee Child is British. It appears here that the author is using “luck out” in the exact opposite way from how Americans do. I'm mostly just including this because the subhead up there called out Jack Reacher. And this is not an invitation to discuss the literary merits, or lack thereof, of the Reacher books. Which I've never read, but I've enjoyed the Amazon adaptation so far. 1. A Moot Point When I was a kid, I read books in both American and British English, which is why I'm largely bilingual now. But I gotta admit, this one confused me for the longest time. If a British person says a point is moot, they mean it’s up for debate, while when an American says it, they mean it’s closed for debate. The article actually goes into some of the semantic reasons for that, which is one reason I read Cracked. This one's similarity to the "table" one is, however, too obvious not to comment on. But the article did that for me, too. |
| Today, we have a bit of linguistic education from that well-respected teaching site, Cracked: 5 Words That Switched Meaning Because Everyone Used Them Wrong ‘Entitlement’ now means you don’t deserve something, which is absurd There are way more than five, but we have to take tiny attention spans into account, here. Some words mean two things that are complete opposites. “Cleave,” for example, can mean both splitting something apart or joining two things together. This is known as a contronym, and I've discussed them before: "Contronyms" . But that was almost five years ago, and today's bit isn't exactly about contronyms.5. ‘Steep Learning Curve’ And already, we step out of theme: that's a phrase, not a word. A steep learning curve indicates a process that’s easy to learn, with production rates rapidly increasing over time. With a shallow curve, on the other hand, rates increase more slowly, indicating a process that’s harder to learn. Though, as the article so helpfully points out, a lot depends on how you define your graph's axes. Ask me, it's probably best to do as they suggest and stay away from "learning curve," especially since that borders on corpspeak. 4. ‘Mystery Box’ If you’re a normal person, you may go your whole life without hearing about mystery box storytelling. If you’re a nerd, however, you know the term well. Mystery box storytelling is when a series lures you in by dangling a bunch of mysteries, mysteries to which the writers themselves do not yet know the answers. Well, I'm a nerd, and I think I know a few things about writing, but I'd never heard that particular phrase. (Again... phrase, not word.) The name “mystery box” comes from a TED talk that J.J. Abrams gave in 2008, initially inspired by people asking him what the island in Lost is. The real mystery box here is how one director can fuck up so many different franchise movies, while still continuing to get hired as a director. If I were inclined toward conspiracy theories, I'd say Paramount (the owner of Star Trek) hired him as a double agent to ruin Star Wars for Disney. It’s a bit odd, though, to call them mystery box shows after Abrams’ choice of theme for one TED talk. Because he used the box to talk about so many different concepts, and because mystery boxes are an actual thing, with one specific mystery: What’s inside, and is it worth the price you paid? But the point here isn't to slam Abrams as a director (I liked a lot of his stuff, just not all of it); it's to show how the phrase got to be misused, and for that, there's lots more background in the article. 3. ‘Entitlement’ Hey, look! A single word, unattached to others! An entitlement is something you’re entitled to. That’s what it means. That’s how nouns work. In the U.S., federal benefits programs are called “entitlements,” based on the assumption that recipients are entitled to them. Some of these programs, like Social Security, are contributory, which means you personally paid into them. Others, like nutrition assistance, are non-contributory, paid from the government’s discretionary budget, but by calling them “entitlements,” the government is still saying recipients are entitled to them. This has bugged me for years: people calling contractual or legal obligations "entitlements" like it's a bad thing. We’ve now reached the point when advocates for entitlements argue it’s insulting to refer to these programs as entitlements: Shit, I've been there for at least a decade. Maybe longer. Maybe less. My relationship with duration (durationship?) can be tenuous. 2. ‘Low Man on the Totem Pole’ And we're back to phrases. You probably think the “low man on the totem pole” is the most junior person in an organization. They have not ascended very far, and they lack power. But have you considered what sort of person would manage to be the bottom figure in a human totem pole? They would need to be strong enough to support everyone else. Well, workers *are* the most important people in an organization. In a totem pole, the bottom figure isn’t some peon being squashed by the important figure on top. They’re the figure in the pole who’s been carved with the most detail, and they may also be the biggest. Eh, I avoid the phrase anyway, for cultural reasons. But now I'll never see it in the same way again. 1. A Special Note on ‘Literally’ Oh, hell, I'm going to hate this part. The dictionary now notes that the word has a second definition, which essentially means “not literally,” and this inclusion attracted a lot of controversy online around a decade ago. "The dictionary" (misleading, as there are several entities competing in that space) is descriptive, not prescriptive, at least the English ones. It pretty much has to base its definitions on how people are using words... even when that usage is objectively wrong, as with emphatic uses of "literally" or any use of "decimate" to mean something other than "remove one-tenth of." Literally doesn’t serve here as a synonym for figuratively, a disclaimer clarifying that they’re joking. It serves as emphasis. In fact, it emphasizes their statement by declaring it’s literal. You know it’s not literal (again, from context), but they’re telling you it is, and therein lies the sentence’s humor. Okay, so, by framing it as comedy, you're moving me to your side. Waltz's Second Law states: "Never let the facts get in the way of a good joke. Or a bad one. Especially a bad one." So, people generally don’t use “literally” as a synonym for “figuratively.” But they used to. Go through classic novels from a century or two ago, and you’ll find many authors doing so. Huh... okay. Despite the criticisms that young people misuse “literally,” using it as a replacement for “figuratively,” doing so now comes across as a very formal or outdated way of speaking. The word did change meaning, but it reversed in the opposite way to what people think, becoming more literal. And there it is, folks: proof that I can be persuaded, given enough evidence. And comedy. |
| Today's trip through the Wonka tunnel of time takes us back about five and a half years, to the end of February, 2019. Or about a month after my last Revisited entry. Random numbers will do that. The entry itself, "Journeys" , was mostly just a personal update, utterly uninspiring and uninspired. This happens sometimes, too.Finally, the last day of the hated month of February. I don't remember when I first noted to myself, "You know? I really, really hate February." But clearly, it was over five and a half years ago. Unfortunately, the weather report here indicates more cold days ahead, and possibly s**w. But at least the end is in sight: three weeks to the equinox. Not a big fan of winter in general. If I can make it that far without straying too far from my healthy-eating-and-exercise plan, begun on the solstice, I'll consider it a win. Then it won't feel so bad when I inevitably fail. See, this is why I'm a pessimist: I can smugly assert that I totally expected to fail, so I was right, and I love being right. There follows a couple of links to WDC activities, one of which is currently inactive, the other of which is, as I understand it, on its final round. I'm starting to get antsy for travel again, too. Part of that, though, is the crappy weather we've been having (normal for February in Virginia, but still crappy), so we'll see if I still have the urge in, say, April. I don't remember, and can't be arsed to look up, if I actually went anywhere in 2019. That long ago, in the Before Time, stuff starts to blend together into some kind of idyllic swirl, an innocent's last gasp before everything went to shit a year later. It's nearly the end of August now, and already I'm mourning the end of summer. Oh well. Soon, Oktoberfest beers will be available, and those always make the transition to autumn more tolerable. And, of course, I have a journey to look forward to. |
| This week, the agent got back to me with dates for travel. I still don't have tickets in hand (or, more likely, email), so things might still change, but right now my trip's scheduled for about 9/21 to 10/10. As a bonus, she came in under my budget, even with my refusal to fly steerage. Finally, hallelujah, eureka, etc... wait. That's just four weeks away. Shit. Snuck up on me. Fortunately, there's not much else to do. I still want a travel laptop or tablet, but that's easy enough; I just have to venture (shudder) into a local retailer. Staples, maybe. Or Breast Buy. I already have a plug adapter. Maybe visit another store to buy some other clothes, but that's easy enough, too. It did occur to me that at one point, I'd heard the EU was going to start requiring visas (or visa-like applications) from US travelers, so I looked that up. {xlink:https://www.cntraveler.com/story/americans-will-need-visa-for-the-eu}Pushed back to 2025. Whew. Seems to me the travel agent would have told me if that was required, but one never knows. I think I've figured out the best way to get cash there: ATM card. Problem: I haven't used an ATM in well over a decade, so I don't actually possess a debit card. It's rare that I actually need cash, as I pay for almost everything with a credit card. The reaction to this usually surprises and disappoints me, and look, I'm hard to disappoint because I'm a pessimist. I usually get comments like "I hate credit cards" or "you must have a really low interest rate" or "wow, your debt must be crushing" or some other response about the inherent peril of using credit cards. Thing is, no, I don't pay extra. I choose cards that feature cash-back promotions, so they pay me. And funny thing about credit cards: at least for now, if you pay off the balance in full when it's due, the amount of interest charged is zero. So I basically use it like a debit card. But there's one drawback (besides needing to make an effort to stay on top of things): if you use the credit card to get a cash advance, that grace period of zero interest goes right out the window, at least for the portion of the balance that was the cash advance. I don't know exactly how it works, because I've never gotten a cash advance, but I can see that fucking up my budget for months, because it accumulates interest during the period between taking the cash advance and paying it back. Does that interest then garner further interest? I don't know, and I don't want to find out the hard way. Point is, I called my bank and asked for a debit card. I also made them give me a PIN for my primary credit card (same bank) because, apparently, some European merchants use chip-and-PIN systems instead of tap-and-signature. Ask me, that's a more secure system anyway, and I don't know why we can't adopt it here. The bank rep didn't instill a lot of confidence in me, though, because she kept saying things like "PIN number" and "automatic ATM machine." I think I reached their Department of Redundancy Department. The idea is that I expect to pay for most things in Europe with the CC, but there are some situations where cash is useful. I don't want to carry a lot of dollars, pay someone to convert them to euros, then pay someone again to convert them back to dollars as I return. At least I won't have to worry about tipping... right? Right? Back in the old days, we used traveler's cheques, but I don't think that's a thing anymore. And most of the countries I've visited up until now were cool with taking US money (though at an unfavorable exchange rate). Apparently, there's a 1% fee for using the debit card at a foreign ATM, but I think that's still cheaper (and easier) than currency exchange. Which I might still have to do on the return, but whatever. That is, unless one of you more seasoned international travelers have any better ideas. I'm open to suggestions. |
| Today's link isn't a podcast. I don't do podcasts. Shouldn't they call them something else now that the iPod is no more? Anyway, from Vox, a collection of stuff from a bunch of podcasts: 17 astounding scientific mysteries that researchers can’t yet solve What is the universe made out of? How should we define death? Where did dogs come from? And more! The key word in the headline there is "yet." “Whatever we know is provisional,” Priya Natarajan, a Yale physicist, told us about research on dark matter. But the sentiment also applies to science overall. “It is apt to change. What motivates people like me to continue doing science is the fact that it keeps opening up more and more questions. Nothing is ultimately resolved.” This is, of course, a good thing. But "nothing is ultimately resolved" can be misleading. Unexplainable isn’t about how scientists don’t know anything. There's a tendency in humans to indulge in binary thinking. That is, believing that since science can't tell us everything, then it can't tell us anything. This is, of course, arrant nonsense. We’re drawn to questions because they are optimistic. They invite us to dream of a better world in which they are answered, where the gaps between questions and our capabilities to answer them are smaller. Ugh. Optimistic? Maybe I should stop asking questions. Besides, finding out that the universe will definitely end is hardly optimistic. I mean, what's the point of doing anything if it's just going to wind down and stop one day? I mean, sure, trillions of years from now, but that's not so long, is it? Here are some of the questions that astounded us the most. I won't list all of them. That would take too long. Just ones I have comments on or can make jokes about. 1) What is the universe made out of? String. String theory: the Universe is a big ball of string, and God is a cat. (Okay, this section is actually about dark matter, unsurprisingly, but my string theory pun is funnier.) 2) How did life start on Earth? Lots of people think it started elsewhere and migrated to Earth. I have another article about that in the queue. Which is fine and may be a testable hypothesis, but, either way, it doesn't get at the real question, which is how did life start, query, full stop. 3) How did dogs evolve from wolves? That's not the best-phrased question. It's not like wolves haven't been evolving for the past 20,000 years or whatever. Though that's hardly long enough for a lot of natural selection to take place. Artificial selection, sure, which is why we have both chihuahuas and Great Danes and call them both dogs. It's like the idea that we evolved from chimps: no, we and chimps (and bonobos) share a common ancestor. 5) What will animals look like in the future? I'm guessing the answer is "animals." 10) Is there anything alive in the human poop left on the moon? You know, I get that this question is academically important. It is also unique on this list because while we don't know the answer, we know precisely how to find the answer, and all it'll take will be another trip to the moon, this time carrying pooper-scoopers. 11) Was there an advanced civilization on Earth before humans? I know it's kinda vogue-y to ask that question right now, but the simple truth is, if there were, we'd know. We might not find their artifacts or other archaeological remnants, but any "advanced" civilization worth that adjective is going to need energy and produce waste. That waste would show up all over the globe, just like our waste is doing now. Besides, if there had been, all the oil would have been gone before we started digging for it. No. There wasn't. 12) What is the definition of “life”? Yeah, that's not a science question so much as a philosophy question. As I've noted before, though, science can inform philosophy. 14) What did dinosaurs sound like? I hope they figure this one out, and it turns out they meowed. 17) How will everything end? With some questions as yet unresolved, I'm sure. |
| Here's SciAm with an article that's all for nought: I'm sure lots of people wanted to make something out of nothing. Sūnya, nulla, ṣifr, zevero, zip and zilch are among the many names of the mathematical concept of nothingness. As well as, of course, nought, which is why the proper term for the first decade of this century is the noughties. Historians, journalists and others have variously identified the symbol’s birthplace as the Andes mountains of South America, the flood plains of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, the surface of a calculating board in the Tang dynasty of China, a cast iron column and temple inscriptions in India, and most recently, a stone epigraphic inscription found in Cambodia. I'd never heard the Andes one. It's also such a useful concept that I wouldn't be surprised if more than one culture came up with it independently. For a country to be able to claim the number’s origin would provide a sense of ownership and determine a source of great nationalistic pride. Kind of like how Russia and Poland claim to be the inventor of vodka. In this case, though, it's bragging rights to say "We're Number Zero!" Throughout the 20th century, this ownership rested in India. All the symbols we call Arabic numerals? Yeah, turns out they're of Indian origin. But we're still not completely sure about 0. I've read an entire book on the subject and came away with nothing. Pun intended. However, a series of stones in what is now Sumatra, casts India’s ownership of nothingness in doubt, and several investigators agree that the first reference of zero was likely on a set of stones found on the island. I think part of the problem here is that records set in stone or clay tend to last longer than those on papyrus or paper. Any art or math done on a more ephemeral medium is long gone, and the invention may have preceded its carving into stone. Researchers at the Center for Civilizational Dialogue at the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur have been investigating the history of early numeration systems of Southeast Asia. Their findings further strengthened Sumatra’s claim, to which we, the authors, agree. The article goes into some detail about who found what and when. I should mention, though, that the concept of zero shouldn't be confused with our symbol for zero. Earlier efforts might have rendered it as a dot or dash or some other symbol; the important thing is that some symbol was used to designate the lack of something. Like in our number 107, the 0 indicates the lack of a tens place. While the issue requires more deliberation and historical examination, this discovery of a possible nothingness symbol is intriguing. Could zero have been conceptually conceived of and utilized in an ancient and barely known Southeast Asian society? And why not? Just because it's barely known now doesn't mean it wasn't a major power in its own time. And if there's anything major powers need, it's to keep careful records; zero helps with that. Did the use of zero spread from this region westward into India and finally into Europe? Seems to me I've talked about Europe's reluctance to adopt the zero in here before, but damned if I can find it. We have Roman numerals because zero wasn't a thing to them. Nor does one appear in ancient Hebrew, which obviously inspired later Roman and European culture in general. There might have been religious reasons to resist the concept, in addition to the same sort of cultural inertia that keeps the US from adopting SI: "this is the way we've always done things; why change it now?" Is the credibility of the term “Hindu-Arabic” numerals under serious threat? Eh, maybe. Maybe not. I'll leave that for the experts, of which I am not one. But, again, don't confuse numeral with number. It's entirely possible that India didn't invent the concept of zero, but maybe was the first to make the symbol for it look like an empty circle. It's important to note that one of the authors of this article is Malay; he may be biased due to the whole "bragging rights" thing. I mean, come on, don't they have a footy team? That seems to be other countries' main source of national pride, for reasons still unclear to me. Me, I have no dog in the fight and, in the end, it's not like someone can, you know, patent the concept or issue l'appelation controllée like with champagne. The matter is, to me, purely of historic value, though it's usually satisfying to know the truth about something. And sometimes, nothing is something. |
| I figured it'd be important to read this Cracked article, because I'd like to avoid running afoul of the gendarmerie when I go there. 5 Normal Family Activities That Are Illegal in France Want to take a paternity test? Nope. Straight to jail France’s official motto is “Liberté, égalité, fraternité.” They’re a little iffy on the liberté part of that, at least by the standards of places who really care about freedom. Um, have you seen the US? For example, France bans public school students from wearing religious symbols. From what I've heard, there were good reasons for the ban. In the U.S., it would be unthinkable to have any national law on what schoolkids can wear. Um, not the same thing. France is comparable in size to one of our larger states. Smaller than Texas but bigger than California. Texas and California have state guidelines for schools. That particular ban isn't in place there, but we have other quirks. But several strange French laws concern families and kids... I'm absolutely certain that other countries find some of our laws just as strange. 5. Paternity Tests In France, a court may order a paternity test as part of a legal proceeding, but short of that, they forbid citizens from testing paternity. Not my problem and, again, we have weirder laws. 4. Naming Your Kid What You Like In France, courts can rule that parents named their child wrong and order the name changed. In 2015, for example, a court learned that parents were naming a child “Nutella,” and the court renamed the girl “Ella,” to spare her from derision. Yeah, no, I'm gonna side with France, here. 3. Changing Your Surname In France, however, there is no simple process for changing your last name. You can petition a court to change your name, if your motive matches one of the few acceptable ones, but you can’t just fill a form and change your name because you feel like it. This just in: different countries have different laws and customs. Who'd have thought? 2. Disinheriting Your Children In most places, if you die without a will, your money goes to your next of kin, but you can instead write a will leaving your money wherever you like. Not in France, where you must leave money to your children, no exceptions. Eh, I don't see this as much different from estate taxes. Either way, there's a law concerning the disposition of a portion of your estate; the only difference is who that has to go to. But I can see this becoming especially enraging for some men if they spent the kids' entire lives not knowing if they were genetically related, as per #5 above. 1. Swimming Trunks You may have heard tales of French nude beaches, where every part of your body can go proudly on display. From these, you might think France is a lot more free than other countries when it comes to what you can wear when swimming. It's not just France. I think the US is one of the outliers here, also known as "the strange one." When you go to a French pool, you are not allowed to wear swimming trunks. You instead must wear swimming briefs, or what we’d call a Speedo, giving everyone a proper look at the contours of your bulge. I started adding "Speedos" to the shopping list for my upcoming trip, then crossed it out and wrote NO SWIMMING. You're welcome. On the other hand, if you want to show off much more of yourself and wear a thong, nope, pools ban that as well. In summary, lots of rules that make sense in one culture seem strange to others. Part of the reason to travel is to experience these differences. But it's a good thing to have fair warning beforehand, so you don't, say, bring chewing gum to Singapore and end up getting caned. |
| This one's from Forbes, and to me is an exercise in suppressing my confirmation bias, because it's saying the same shit I've been saying, only by an actual mental health professional. Being a professional in a field doesn't mean you're always right; thinking that's the case would be another fallacy. Still, I think the article is worth contemplating. Whether my comments are is an open question. Self-care has become a buzzword in wellness culture and for good reason—it’s essential for our mental, emotional and physical health. Assertion without evidence can also be a problem. These practices can work wonders, but when chasing positivity turns into an obsession—it can lead to what researchers call “toxic positivity.” Which I've ragged on in here before, repeatedly... though not so much as to have exhausted my patience with the topic. In essence, toxic positivity invalidates negative experiences by promoting the idea that one should always maintain a sunny outlook, regardless of circumstances. I believe I've used examples of that before like "My dog died." "That's great! Now you can get a new puppy!" Here are three specific examples of how self-care can slip into toxic positivity and end up doing more harm than good. As this is not Cracked, the list actually counts up. 1. The Social Media Mantra—“Good Vibes Only” While surrounding oneself with positivity can be uplifting, the insistence on “good vibes only” creates an environment where negative emotions are not just unwelcome but are seen as personal failings. I'm not sure this is so much an insistence on toxic positivity as a desire to not get your own vibes harshed. Like, you're at a party, and everyone's having a great time, and one of your friends staggers in late and bleeding. "Got in a wreck," she moans. Normally, you'd probably be there for your friend, call an ambulance for her, maybe even wait in the ER with her. But you're at a party. How dare someone turn it into an emergency! 2. Oppressive Optimism—“Everything Happens For A Reason” I've railed against that duck-billed platitude before, and I'll do it again. Optimism is crucial when coping with negativity... Another assertion without evidence. ...but the belief that everything happens for a reason can invalidate genuine feelings of fear and uncertainty. This is related to "it's all part of God's plan," though that one's more specific to certain religious people. 3. Affirmation Overload—“I Am Strong, I Can Handle Anything” Picture someone going through a tough divorce, constantly telling themselves, “I am strong” and “I can handle anything” to keep up their confidence and stay positive. While this might seem helpful, it might stop them from sharing their pain and struggles with loved ones, out of fear that admitting vulnerability will make them look weak or uncertain about their decision. And maybe that no one wants to be around them if they're not going to give off good vibes. There's not much more to the article, really; the conclusion boils down to "seek help," which is fine advice, but what I'd need help with would be finding a shrink. Too much work. I'll just stay over here and be grumpy by myself. |
| This bit from The Guardian is a couple of years old, but that's okay. Just remember it's British. If #1 isn't "stop reading fluffy internet advice articles," it fails. 1 Exercise on a Monday night (nothing fun happens on a Monday night). Oh. Oh, no. Shit. It's going to be one of those articles. 3 Tip: the quickest supermarket queue is always behind the fullest trolley (greeting, paying and packing take longer than you think). Except when the person pushing that cart is the kind who still pays by check, and goshdarnit, I know that checkbook's in here somewhere, hang on... 5 Consider going down to four days a week. It’s likely a disproportionate amount of your fifth day’s work is taxed anyway, so you’ll lose way less than a fifth of your take-home pay. Taxes don't work like that in the US, and I wasn't aware they worked like that in the UK. 10 Always bring ice to house parties (there’s never enough). Be sure to leave it in the living room, preferably on the couch. 12 Sharpen your knives. Damn, I hate that there's one I absolutely agree with. 14 Buy a cheap blender and use it to finely chop onions (it saves on time and tears). Sure, if you want onion purée. And an extra mess to clean up. Also, what's the point of having finely-sharpened knives if you can't use them to chop an onion quickly? 16 Set aside 10 minutes a day to do something you really enjoy – be it reading a book or playing Halo. No. Set aside 23 hours and 50 minutes a day to do what you really enjoy, and devote the rest of the time to work. 23 It might sound obvious, but a pint of water before bed after a big night avoids a clanger of a hanger. True, but if you're drunk enough, you won't wake up when that pint has been processed, if you know what I mean. 29 Eat meat once a week, max. Ideally less. I believe the expression is, "Sod off, wanker." 39 Send postcards from your holidays. Send them even if you’re not on holiday. This has the added benefit of pruning your friend list, which in turn means fewer holiday gifts to purchase and fewer birthdays to remember. 41 Buy a plant. Think you’ll kill it? Buy a fake one. I don't think I'll kill it; I know I'll kill it. Yes, even if it's a fake one. 42 Don’t have Twitter on your phone. This one's three words too long. 46 Read a poem every day. Technically, limericks are poems. 49 Buy in person! Fuck off! 51 If something in the world is making you angry, write (politely) to your MP – they will read it. This sentence is the only one on the list that I find impossible to translate from British to English. I mean, sure, our congresscritters are the rough equivalent of British MPs, but it's the last phrase after the emdash that broke my brain. 56 Call an old friend out of the blue. Drunk-dial an ex. 62 Go to bed earlier – but don’t take your phone with you. Why? If you're getting the same amount of sleep either way. 65 Instead of buying a morning coffee, set up a daily transfer of £2 from a current into a savings account and forget about it. Use it to treat yourself to something different later. How can I do that if I've forgotten about it? 72 Always use freshly ground pepper. Dammit, how dare they put in another one I'd have to agree with! 76 Ditch the plastic cartons and find a milkman – The Modern Milkman has a comprehensive list. This is some sort of euphemism, right? 89 Politely decline invitations if you don’t want to go. 90 If you do go, have an exit strategy (can we recommend a French exit, where you slip out unseen). Pretty sure that's known in France as la sortie anglaise. 93 Do that one thing you’ve been putting off. Then find something else to put off. 100 For instant cheer, wear yellow. Look at the stars. Look how they shine for you. And everything you do. |
| Today's cruise on the river of time takes us back to the end of January, 2019. This was a 30 Day Blogging Challenge month, and for context, my current daily blogging streak wouldn't start for another ten and a half months. And, of course, it was before everyone's lives got disrupted. The entry itself, "Challenge Complete" , featured the kind of prompt I came to expect for the final entry into that challenge:Write a list of at least 5 blogging prompts to add to the Challenge War Chest to be used for future rounds of the 30DBC. Then, use one of your own prompts to write your entry. I've never really enjoyed coming up with prompts. Scratch that; I do enjoy it; it's just that when I'm expected to create one, my mind goes blank. I know this sounds odd from someone who's been judging "The Writer's Cramp" [13+] and therefore coming up with a prompt almost every week for nearly two decades, but there you have it. I just think of it as another challenge for myself.The actual prompt list I came up with is uninspiring to me even now, and I won't quote it here. It's there at the link if you want. I'll just address some of the other things I said in the entry. I don't know who coined the term "bucket list," and I can't be arsed to find out. Unlike most words and phrases, they've traced that phrase in its "things to do before you die" sense to a precise moment. I do know that it became the title of a moderately interesting movie with Jack Nicholson and God. According to that link I just did, the phrase's origin and the movie title came from the same place. While I've been known to use the phrase from time to time, I usually call it my "fuck-it list." This is because I've already done most of what I set out to do, and have given up on the rest. Good to see my attitude hasn't changed in five and a half years. It's come to my attention recently that life is much less frustrating if you can separate "things that I cannot control" from "things that I can control," and to focus on the latter while letting go of the former. This is something akin to the infamous Serenity Prayer, which I resent because a) it's a prayer and b) it's associated with AA, and AA is for quitters. That's not my actual problem with AA, but it made a decent joke. I've been walking every day for the past 5 weeks, which is, like, a new record for me for exercise. I should have kept track of my record for "days without formal exercise." It'd be a lot longer. Say I want to take a trip to space. How can I make that happen? Well, probably by paying Virgin Galactic a very large sum of money to fire me into a suborbital trajectory that technically takes me 100km up for a fraction of a minute, thus putting me, by definition, in space. I think that particular venture never took off (pun intended). Branson lofted himself into a suborbital trajectory, but his maximum altitude was somewhat less than the accepted boundary of "space." Pretty sure I wrote about it in here at the time. Then Virgin declared bankruptcy. Or something. I can't keep up with all the rocketing these days. Honestly, even if I were a billionaire, this would strike me as a colossal waste of money. While I accept that other people wouldn't find it so, paying any amount of money for fame and bragging rights. So here's the real example: I want to be published. Yeah, not so much anymore. Not much else of note. Kind of a boring entry, even now. Only one joke that I could find, and it wasn't even original. Can't be "on" all the time, I suppose, but some challenges are never complete until the day you kick the bucket. |
| Still no settled schedule for my voyage. It's kind of hard to plan when I don't know when I'll be leaving or returning. The agent emailed me on Wednesday to say they'd get that to me by the end of the week, but, well, here it is Saturday. This week, I looked at computer/tablet options for the trip. See, I'm not going to bring my expensive gaming laptop. One, I would be devastated if it got lost, stolen, or broken; two, I'd be tempted to use it for its primary function instead of, you know, looking at Europe or whatever. I will bring my mobile phone, but if I want to write blog entries, or notes about the wines I taste, or whatever, I'll want something with a keyboard. It's gotta be able to connect to the internet in Europe, and run basic programs like Word, but it's not like it has to run Starfield or whatever. Something like a Chromebook, maybe, or similar. So, I started looking into tablets. The kind that flip into mini-laptop mode. I got frustrated quickly. I don't know what half the numbers mean, or how to compare them. A lot of the shit out there is cheap-ass junk. I don't really care how much it costs; I just want it to be somewhat reliable, and one cannot rely on internet reviews for that sort of thing. But some of them are surprisingly cheap, less than $200. Which, well, how do I know if I can trust that? The idea is to get something I can use on the trip, but also be a backup computer if my main one crashes suddenly, which they've been known to do. Right now, the only backup is my mobile, and I hate typing on a screen. Not enough tactile feedback. It might be that I have to go (shudder) outdoors and (gulp) talk to someone at a (shiver) retail store who can point me in the right direction. Or, hell, maybe the travel agent has recommendations, since I already ventured out to talk to them. As long as it doesn't take them another month to get back to me on that. |
| With a Blue Moon coming up on Monday, this BBC article seems appropriate to talk about. It's a good thing it's the BBC, and not, say, the Daily Fail. Because the latter's headline would be something like "Cave discovered on Moon could be home to a space alien civilization" I mean, that's technically true, for infinitesimally tiny values of "could." Scientists have for the first time discovered a cave on the Moon. We expected there would be caves, but it's good to confirm. Otherwise we show up on the moon with spelunking gear, only to find there wasn't a cave after all. At least 100m deep, it could be an ideal place for humans to build a permanent base, they say. This author's definition of "ideal" obviously differs from mine. To me, the ideal place for humans to build a permanent base is Hawai'i. But, okay, I get that it's a suitable location on the moon. In case you're wondering why caves are good: Countries are racing to establish a permanent human presence on the Moon, but they will need to protect astronauts from radiation, extreme temperatures, and space weather. They'll be useful on Mars, too, for the same reasons, plus dust storms. And don't forget meteoroid impacts. Those craters didn't form themselves. Quibble: if you're going to live at a permanent Moon base (even temporarily), should you still be called an astronaut? They don't call the people living in Antarctica polar explorers. Helen Sharman, the first British astronaut to travel to space, told BBC News that the newly-discovered cave looked like a good place for a base, and suggested humans could potentially be living in lunar pits in 20-30 years. And reliable fusion power is 20-30 years away. Has been for 80 years. But, she said, this cave is so deep that astronauts might need to abseil in and use “jet packs or a lift” to get out. With gravity 1/6 that of Earth, I'm sure the clever loonies will think of something. Lorenzo Bruzzone and Leonardo Carrer at the University of Trento in Italy found the cave by using radar to penetrate the opening of a pit on a rocky plain called the Mare Tranquillitatis. It is visible to the naked eye from Earth, and is also where Apollo 11 landed in 1969. Today, in Pronouns with Ambiguous Antecedents: Mare Tranquillitatis is visible from Earth (it's one of the big dark splotches). Not the pit. It was made millions or billions of years ago when lava flowed on the Moon, creating a tunnel through the rock. I'm pretty sure scientists know whether it was "millions" or "billions." Also, I wasn't aware that the Brits started using "billion" to mean a thousand million, like Americans. It used to mean a million million there. What we call a billion was called a milliard or something, because all those terms were borrowedstolen from French, likely because the Brits didn't have enough fingers to count that high. Once Prof Bruzzone and Prof Carrer understood how big the cave was, they realised it could be a good spot for a lunar base. “After all, life on Earth began in caves, so it makes sense that humans could live inside them on the Moon,” says Prof Carrer. I realize it's in a quote and not the author's words, but that sentence has so much wrong with it that I hardly know where to begin. That could open the door to finding evidence of life on Mars, because if it did exist, it would almost certainly have been inside caves protected from the elements on the planet’s surface. I'm not sure about that one, either. Is the author talking about finding fossilized evidence of life on Mars? Because that could very well be on the surface, especially in places where water once covered. Existing life on Mars is still entirely speculative, but I'd agree that if it did exist, it'd be underground. In any case, I find it amusing that we think of early humans as "cave people," and here we are making plans to encave ourselves on other worlds. |
| We all know I'm a fan of science. Science is the reason I'm alive right now. Science is the reason you're reading this. But, as this Cracked article points out, we could have been even farther along with scientific developments by now. 5 Dumb Stumbling Blocks That Held Science Back Apparently, we'd have crystal spires and togas if we only let our scientists drink more. Oddly, all 5 aren't "religion." Well, sort of. We can all name one big factor holding science back: People’s petty morality, which interferes with our plan to create an army of cyborgs. That is, indeed, a downside. And you know I saved this article especially for this first section: 5. Prohibition All of which means that some — but not all — counties in the U.S. stopped serving liquor starting in 1920. And when we look at those counties that stopped doing so, we see something surprising: People in those counties filed fewer patents than immediately before this time, which is a drop we don’t see in other counties. On the flip side, there was a meme circulating a while ago that pointed out that, in the Wikipedia article about Irish inventions, you had a few inventions, then "whiskey," then a 300-year gap before anything else. here's a link  to the meme, and hopefully it works.The shortfall in patents was somewhere between 8 and 18 percent, compared to right before Prohibition. Evidently, alcohol stimulates all inventors’ inspiration. Necessity is the mother of invention. Laziness, I say, is the milkman. Booze, then, would be the midwife. 4. One Guy Abstaining from Speed Other illegal substances similarly fuel the scientific mind. Consider mathematician Paul Erdös. Well, math isn't science. It's an integral (pun intended) part of it, but it's a different universe. Still, advances in math often lead to advances in science, so I'll allow it. This guy is so celebrated that mathematicians today measure how cool they are by how many degrees of separation they are from him. If you write a paper with someone who wrote a paper with someone who wrote a paper with Erdös, you have an Erdös number of two and are the envy of your whole town. You might be familiar with this concept as analogous to the Bacon number, which calculates an actor's degree of separation from Kevin Bacon. As far as I know, only one person has both an Erdös number and a Bacon number, and that's Natalie Portman. Erdös worked on mathematics for 19 hours a day. He was able to sustain this pace thanks to a diet of amphetamines. While most of us can be forgiven for thinking this is a Bad Idea, well... maybe for Erdös, but, it turns out, not for society in general: Some people think daily drug use is bad for you, so a friend challenged him to give the stuff up for one month. Erdös lasted the full 30 days, and he won money on that bet. And at the end, he told his friend, “You’ve showed me I’m not an addict. But I didn’t get any work done. I’d get up in the morning and stare at a blank piece of paper. I’d have no ideas, just like an ordinary person. You’ve set mathematics back a month.” 3. Excel Running Out Oddly, this one has nothing to do with morality and everything to do with technology. It's a case of technology holding technology back. The issue was that an Excel fie (.XLS) can hold a total of 65,536 rows and no more. As they input more and more rows, the doctors were accidentally deleting old ones and leaving the total unchanged. Or, in this case, the issue might have been fixed with a workaround or, and bear with me here, actually updating your software occasionally. 2. One Man’s Ransomware Plot Lone Asshole Theory: all it takes is one person to ruin everything for everyone. See also: the Tylenol cyanide scare, or every mass shooting ever. 1. Fear of Corpses We have one more epidemic to bring up — Paris’ cholera outbreak of 1832. It killed Nicolas Carnot, a physicist whose work had great influence after his death. You know our concept of absolute zero, and of measuring temperatures from that value? That came from Carnot’s work. Or what about this whole idea we have called entropy? That, too, originated from Carnot. Lots more to his career than that, but okay. When scientists came up with those ideas based on his writings, they were, of course, interested in checking out everything else he’d written. But they couldn’t. Nearly all of it had been buried with him. People thought that was safest, since his corpse had had cholera, and surely all his papers did as well. In reality, cholera’s transmitted through water and food but not from person-to-person and certainly not from papers-to-person. There was no need to dispose of his writings. To be fair, our knowledge of disease transmission was fairly limited in 1832. What discoveries did we lose thanks to this paranoia? Did Carnot figure out how to convert waste heat into fuel perhaps? No, and for the reason I know it's "no," well, we can thank Carnot for that. Or did he create a time machine? Or, ooh, I know, maybe he created a death ray! One that only affects the British. Anyway, while science is neutral, it can be used for things we consider both positive and negative. We have nuclear power, but also nuclear missiles. We have the internet, but we also have social media and what's misleadingly labeled artificial intelligence. We have beer, but we also have studies saying drinking is bad for you. I don't blame the science, though. I blame the people involved. |
| No link today, just a rant. I have a calico cat, Zoe (named after an ancient Doctor Who companion, not Zoe Saldana) who just turned 11. A while back, she got diagnosed with a thyroid issue, for which the vet prescribed medicine to be smeared inside her ear twice a day, 5 mg per dose. It's like a pen with a twisty clicky thing on the bottom that dispenses the correct dose. I can never remember the name of the medicine, but it starts with "meth," which has nothing to do with methamphetamine except the one CH3 group I assume is in both. But I digress. As you might imagine, Zoe isn't very pleased with having me hold her down and stick something inside her very sensitive ears. Still, it's more reliable than the alternative, which is in pill form. Ever try to pill a cat? There are whole comedy routines about it. This is definitely the lesser of two ear-vils. Everything was fine for a few months, and then they did a blood test and, behold, her whatever-numbers were still too high, so the vet changed the prescription: 5mg twice a day plus one half-dose of 2.5mg. So, now, two separate pens are necessary, and I have to label them with permanent marker that wears off after three days. This routine doesn't offend only the cat, but also my sense of symmetry, as it means I have to dose her twice in the morning and once in the evening. Or vice-versa; doesn't really matter; just needs to have some consistency. Still, I'm OCD enough that this bugs me. Plus, it's a pain in the ass for whoever takes care of her whenever I fuck off to some distant land. So, two weeks ago, at their request, I took her in for a blood test (catching the cat and stuffing her into a carrier is another formidable task; she senses when a vet visit is coming up and gets creative in finding hiding spots). A week later, they call me to say that their magic numbers were fine with this higher dose, and I informed them that I was nearly out of meds. They said they'd call in new prescriptions but it would take a few days. Fine, I still had a few days left. Last week goes by, nothing from pharmacy. I call them. "We never got a prescription from the vet." Great. At this point, the vet's closed, so I have to wait until Monday. Now, I should note that I've been going to this vet's office for two decades. They've been pretty reliable. I trusted them with end-of-life care for two of my previous cats (another got very sick on a weekend and had to be euthanized at an emergency vet). But this time, they dropped the ball of yarn. Monday: "We'll need her to come in for blood work." "Um, she got the blood work two weeks ago." "Let me call you back." So I got a call back, not from the receptionist, but the actual vet, who usually has Mondays off. He spent the next 10 minutes reiterating the same discussion we'd had the prior week: to continue with the two 5mg doses plus one 2.5mg dose. Twitch. I said, "Question about that. That's 12.5mg daily." (In case you've ever said, "When in my life will I ever need to know math?" that's your answer.) The vet seemed surprised that I wasn't innumerate. "Yes, that's right." "And we're getting this filled at the compounding pharmacy, so would it be possible to get one pen with a 6mg dose, to use twice a day, instead of the one 5 twice a day plus the one 2.5 once a day?" (As an aside, yes, that means 12mg daily instead of 12.5 mg, but these things really aren't that precise, anyway.) He paused. "I didn't think of that," he said. Facepalm. "We usually think in terms of pills, and the pills come in 5 or 10 milligrams," he continued. And I'm thinking the pills have those little score marks for breaking in half to provide the 2.5mg dose, but whatever; it's not like I'd be able to force pills down this cat's gullet. So that was Monday, and the pens were ominously close to empty. I get a call from the pharmacy later. "We won't be able to fill this until Thursday." (That would be tomorrow, now.) No way will the current pens last until then. Zoe's just going to have to go with a smaller dose, I was thinking. And watch the vet blame me for not following through. Well, yesterday, Tuesday, just before the pharmacy closed, I get the text from them that the meds are ready. Okay, great, there's probably exactly one more dose left (it's hard to tell with these things), so she got that one last night. When I'm done posting this, I'm going to head over there (it's not far from me) and get the new prescription. It's fortunate that they were able to fill it earlier than expected, but, ever the pessimist, I fully expect the dose to be wrong. If so, well, the vet's office is a few short, angry stomps from the pharmacy. And there's a microbrewery in between. And two more right across the street. You know, just in case. I still get to go out there tomorrow, too. My other cat, the void named Robin, needs her annual shots. Now I gotta wonder how they'll manage to screw that up. |
| I vaguely remember a time before these things became ubiquitous. The Shockingly Relevant History of the Barcode Mired in consumer protests, legislative battles, and nearly devastating setbacks, the pioneering technology provides a roadmap for others to survive—and even thrive. Sadly, "barcode" doesn't refer to a way to get the best deals at drinking establishments. The hype about new technologies often follows a predictable pattern. We’re told a new technology is about to change the world, and then it’s often labeled a failure when it doesn’t make an immediate impact. Take Google Glass, which promised a bold and slightly dorky vision of the future—but ultimately failed in embarrassing fashion. Oh, that was nothing compared to the rise and fall (pun intended) of the Segway. However, some of the most successful technologies in the world followed that same pattern but survived what the research firm Gartner calls the “trough of disillusionment,” and people tend to eventually forget about those initial struggles. Few examples illustrate that pattern more clearly than the modern barcode, a technology that celebrated its 50th birthday in 2023. In reality, it could only have "celebrated" it if it were sentient. Is it? Before barcodes became so embedded in our lives that we barely noticed them, they went through a dramatic “trough of disillusionment” filled with major consumer protests, legislative hearings, and moments of near-catastrophic failure. I also vaguely remember the controversy, the most idiotic of which involved invocations of "Mark of the Beast." On June 26, 1974, the first UPC barcode was scanned on a pack of Wrigley’s gum at a grocery store in Troy, Ohio. Yes, a milestone to etch into the monuments of history, right next to the Wright flight and Apollo 11. Despite years of consulting with various stakeholders, the ad hoc committee had neglected one group in particular: consumers. And? They never consulted consumers before, and hardly ever did again. See also: New Coke. The major controversy about barcode adoption focused on an issue that might seem a bit strange in retrospect: item-level pricing. Before barcodes, every item in a grocery store had a price tag. Tagging each item required significant labor, and one of the primary reasons grocery stores developed the UPC barcode was to remove the labor costs required by item-level pricing and instead put product prices on shelves. Grocery stores might actually be profitable if they didn't have to pay those pesky employees. See also: self-checkout (a technology that, obviously, relies heavily on barcodes). Early barcodes and computerized checkout systems were massively expensive and cost roughly $250,000 per store to install. Which, if my memory of 1970s prices and wages is correct (it probably isn't), could have paid the salaries of 10 employees for 10 years, or 1 employee for 100 years. Barcodes survived the struggles of the 1970s. Consumer backlash mostly disappeared by the turn of the decade, likely in part because Tucker-Foreman—who had become the national face of the protests—left her job as the head of the CFA to become the assistant secretary of agriculture at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. You might need to read the article for the context on that, but basically, the main opponent of barcodes up and joined the enemy. As for my own experience, I was just a kid then and didn't do much grocery shopping. Mostly, I remember the issue of Mad that poked fun at barcodes. It was from 1978, and it looked like this. (I hope that works. If not, just do an image search on "mad magazine barcode cover."Speaking of comics, though, the barcode backlash extended at least into the 1990s there. Comics publishers such as Marvel and DC printed two covers for a while: one with a barcode and another with a box that would normally contain a barcode, which usually sported some action superhero in silhouette. The latter were shipped to direct sales outlets (comics shops) while the former hit racks at newsstands and grocery stores. So, I guess, you could always tell who was the serious comics collector from that era: the one with all the non-UPC rectangular cutouts on the covers. Lately, of course, the ubiquity of the UPC barcode has been supplanted by the even more ubiquitous QR square, which helpfully leads smartphone users to malware. But the UPC code has one great benefit for me: I like to keep track of what beers I drink, and it's easier to use my beer-tracking app to scan the barcode than to search all the different possible permutations of the beer's name. And that's why barcodes are actually awesome. |
| Maybe you think you already know the answer to this headline question. Maybe you're even right. Why Do People Toss Shoes Over Power Lines? ‘Shoefiti’ is everywhere—but not everyone agrees on what it means. Some suspect it's innocent, while others ascribe darker meanings to a dangling pair of kicks. Odd as it may seem, power lines have become a somewhat popular source of urban fascination. That's because the power companies are too cheap to bury the lines. People have wondered why they sometimes sport brightly colored balls... I always figured it was so the line locations would be visible to pilots. ...why chunks of trees sometimes hang from them... Because a tree broke and happened to get caught on a power line? ...or why birds love to use them as perches. Who the hell knows what goes on in a bird's brain? But I'd guess "visibility." I could click on all the links they provided, but I didn't. Why do people often see pairs of shoes dangling from power lines? Because they happen to be looking up at the time? Lauren Cahn of Reader’s Digest covered a few possible reasons, and not all of them are benign. The first urban legend I heard was definitely not benign: that it was a gang killing memorial. I've also heard it's a prostitute signal (like a bat-signal, but for whores), or that it indicates a drug dealer's location. One time, driving through the outskirts of Seattle, I saw what must have been two dozen sneakers, each pair laced together, clustered on a power line like smelly, dingy grapes. I just figured a gang killed someone as he was buying drugs while banging a prostitute. One popular theory holds that the shoes may be a signal that there’s gang activity in a given neighborhood... Plausible? Sure. But Cahn couldn’t find any police departments that would confirm. That's because police are basically another gang. Other stories echo the idea that the shoes could be an impromptu memorial. Gosh, if you repeat something often enough, it must be true. Other sources cited nothing more than juvenile mischief. Sure, but no one wants to believe something that innocent. The most innocuous explanation? That it’s simply a rite of passage. One columnist for Hidden City Philadelphia wrote in 2012 that the practice was common in the 1970s as a way of discarding old or outgrown sneakers. Getting a pair of tied-together sneaks to hit an overhead line in such a way as to snag them on it takes skill and/or patience. Or so I'd expect. More recently, students at the University of Michigan observed that the act was simply commemorating their graduation. What, they don't let 'em throw mortarboards into the air? There’s likely no one motive for the shoe-tossing. It may, however, be in decline. Given the price of sneakers, I'd bet people are wearing them until they fall all the way apart. Also, aren't a lot of them Velcro now? Whatever the motive for tossing them, the shoes pose a risk of interrupting the power line's performance. I suppose if there are multiple lines and the shoes touch both and they're not rubber-soled and they get wet... My best guess? Different reasons in different regions. It's not like all the shady characters in the world got together on the internet and said, "Okay, from now on, shoes thrown over power lines means "drug dealer within one block." I mean, they could. But that's just asking to get them monitored by a better-funded gang. |
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