respectful free expression of ideas (11. 513)

Via Kottke via are directed towards a timely and rather transcendent think-piece that we missed when it was originally published back in December from McSweeney’s contributor Andrew Patrick Clark in this message from the chancellor on the recent student protests to the university community.

“…We will not look back and regret this decision. Although we were wrong about not admitting women, abolishing racial quotas, US involvement in Vietnam, and divesting from apartheid South Africa, we are confident that this time is different.

Rules are rules, and the rules never change…

This recent protest is different. These students will never inspire change. Fifty years from now, we will definitely not pretend that we agreed with them the whole time.”

The brief missive is one to be read in full, particularly in light of recent events but speaks to the legacy and spirit revolution in general.

synchronoptic

one year ago: Wes Anderson deja vu, the Cosmati Pavement plus the founding of Audi

two years ago: a classic from Steely Dan, the feast of St Mark plus Ukrainian commemorative postage

three years ago: your daily demon: Barbatos, taxation in Rome, a Roman holiday, more guerilla gardening, the first map of the New World plus St Maughold

four years ago: more COVID conspiracies, the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope (1990), Elbe Day plus another phantom island

five years ago: CAPTCHA technology, the invention of the bicycle plus rebuilding Notre Dame

 

a frontier research problem (11. 511)

Trained on “publicly-available” text scrapped with or without consent from billions of human authored, English language websites in the hopes of informing accurate or at least confident language models, the rather nascent AI boom might be facing a bust as it is running out of data to mine. Previously we’ve looked at the phenomena of recursive AI as generated content begins to saturate the internet, but conversely as vast as the web seems industry experts estimate that AI—to presumably get better at delivering right and desired responses with minimal intervention by exposure to countless right answers and only learning through brute iteration—needs far more information than has been thus far produced in order to advance. Exuberance, nonetheless, is undeterred and growing, notwithstanding immense energy demands, threats to labour and intellectual property even given a spotty record of actual adoption and the dangers of citing less than authoritative sources—the original sin of artificial intelligence, exhausting the sum of human knowledge, only really came to light not by complaints of plagiarism but rather from competitors trying to shield warehoused content from the clearing house and our actions may be propping up something adversarial and degenerative. More from Ed Zitron at the link up top.

word salad (11. 510)

We rather enjoyed this omnibus posting of rare and unusual English terms, which contained many we’ve encountered before but quite a few new words to us. We especially found useful to deacon, from Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women for careful product placement, arranging the top-shelve items up high and hiding the cheaper, lower quality merchandise below, snaste (from the archaic snite—to blow one’s nose—or snuff, as in a candle) referring to the burnt part of a wick, vestry (another non-church related terms though could appear otherwise) meaning the “smiling of [infants] in their sleep,” degombling (a backronym—see also—that comes courtesy of arctic explorers) for removing clumps of ice and snow, dextrosinistral describing a naturally left-handed person taught to use their right for writing, something sesquihoral lasts ninety-minutes, the perfect length for a movie, resistentialism from the belief, half facetiously, that inanimate objects will express spite towards their human users and witworm, coined by Ben Jonson—possibly with some meta-irony—for a someone’s else cleverness as a surrogate for their own. Much more from Mental Floss at the link above.

 synchronoptica

one year ago:  an experimental Nazi-era nuclear reactor plus assorted links to revisit

two years ago: politics of a monetary union (1972), the Trojan Horse, the UN body for the under-represented (1991) plus revisiting airships

three years ago: a rendition of a Daft Punk classic, preserving artefacts of the pandemic, indoor gardening tips, the Situationists plus a survey of map projections

four years ago: China enters the space race, more on eggcorns, signs of social-distancing, dancing mania, a new song from the Rolling Stones plus COVID misinformamtion

five years ago: effervescence, mortgage-backed securities, the tradition of telling the bees plus more logophilia

true facts (11. 476)

Via Super Punch, we thoroughly enjoyed this list of natural history events that could be mistaken for aggressively trashposting by dent of their apparent incredulity. Beginning with the unsourced footnote, “when mice first arrived in New Zealand, [indigenous] people had never seen them before and called the ‘Henriettas’ after the ship they came from,” the colonial brig the Elizabeth Henrietta, the thread is a growing one and reminds me of the unbelievable detail about woodpecker cranial anatomy and how their tongues wrap around their skulls to protect their brains from violent vibrations. Do you have a favourite to share?

 synchronoptica

one year ago: the prices of eggs in California, the palatial estates of Manhattan plus assorted links to revisit

two years ago: Russia’s imperial proclivity

three years ago: MST3K is back for another season, an underwater observation platform, sofagate in Ankara, a planned Martian colony plus maximalist interiors

four years ago: cartoonist Winsor McCay, Trump threatens to withhold funding from the World Health Organisation plus everyday carry

five years ago: more links to enjoy plus Ancient Roman fast food

rush week (11. 449)

We thoroughly enjoyed this detailed review of the 1978 ABC made-for-television movie The Initiation of Sarah by Robert Day and starring Kay Lenz, a retreating wallflower (see also) over shadowed by her popular sister (Morgan Brittany) who discovers her latent paranormal powers after being admitted to the sonority on campus with less prestige, ΦΕΔ—referred to by the members of ΑΝΣ (Alpha-Nus) as “pigs, elephants and dogs”—with the encouragement of house matron, Shelly Winters. Discovering that the hazing ceremony will involve a human sacrifice, Lenz uses her telekinetic abilities to disrupt the initiations for the rival sonority as well as her own. Much more from Poseidon’s Underworld at the link up top.

a brain, a beauty, a jock, a rebel and a recluse (11. 447)

Taking place according to the teen coming-of-age movie on this day, a Saturday, in 1984, The Breakfast Club by John Hughes, featuring the acting talents of Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy, Molly Ringwald, Paul Gleason, Emilio Estevez and Judd Nelson. Relating the encounters of five individuals from different high school social cliques being punished with a weekend detention overseen by an authoritarian vice-principal with the assignment to write a thousand word essay on who they think they are as punishment, with instructions not to talk or interact with their fellow classmates, all strangers to one another from different social groups. Hiding from their minder, they break the rules and pass the time gradually opening up and sharing their circumstances with one another. Considered the quintessential 1980s movie (in general release about a year after the events in the movie timeline occurred) and with a stellar soundtrack, film poster, a “family shot” ensemble of the cast was photographed by Annie Leibovitz.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the Lassie finale (1973) plus an ominous sign in the heavens (1345)

two years ago: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1952)

three years ago: the Potato Decree (1756), Donkeyskin, Moscow on the Hudson plus an alternative keyboard format

four years ago: International Tuberculosis Day plus a long fight ahead

five years ago: Meshes of the Afternoon plus marijuana etiquette

insatiable birdie (11. 433)

Via Miss Cellania, we not only learn the rather elegant physics and chemistry behind those sippy bird toys but also that researchers have given it an upgrade as a device to generate energy.

Sometimes mislabeled as a perpetual motion machine, the thirsty mechanism is a heat engine, two evacuated glass bulbs linked by a tube pivot on a crosspiece and turns the temperature gradient along the body into a pressure difference that translates to the mechanism. Water evaporates from the head (usually adorned with something absorbent like felt) and lowers the temperature and pressure and causes some of the vapour in the chamber to condense (usually ether, alcohol or chloroform) and the liquid is forced up the neck, causing it to tip forward. The ambient air temperature warms the bottom bulb and causes the cycle to repeat. The toy, originally called a Pulshammer was a German invention improved by Benjamin Franklin, after seeing one in action around 1768 and illustrates the principles of capillary action, wet-bulb temperature, heat of condensation as well as several laws of thermodynamics and idea gases and with the latest modifications also demonstrates the triboelectric effect (static electricity), harnessing it to power small appliances and seems overall like a pretty good educational apparatus, provoking thought while charging.  Who knew? More technical details and a video demonstration of the prototype at the link above.

 

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links to revisit, Yugoslavian fashion plus climbing Everest (1923)

two years ago: more links to enjoy, two probes passing in the night, more shibboleths plus Arnold Schwarzenegger makes an appeal to the people of Russia

three years ago: RIP Yaphet Kotto, more links worth the revisit, Motown on tour (1965), mourning rings, fear of covering up plus the fashions of Birgitta Bjerke

four years ago: an iconic photograph from the battlefield (1942)

five years ago: Transit Driver Appreciation Day

format cells (11. 430)

Though once deemed too dangerous to release to the public—though the verdict is still out—GPT-2 has been crammed into a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, as an AI heuristic tool offline and running locally to teach developers how large language models work and hopefully inspiring the next phase of improvement. Still working off the autocomplete, next token prediction principle that underpins all present chat applications, users input prompts in adjacent fields and the algorithm tries to triangulate a response, and interesting in a way that’s constrained and self-contained so that those experimenting might be able to debug themselves or understand how the sentence building went awry. The other uses that people have shoehorned into the accounting software are always pretty fascinating and the binary file is free to download. More technical details and a tutorial are at the file’s link and at Ars Technica at the link above.

π (11. 420)

As our faithful chronicler reminds, today marks the annual celebration of the mathematical constant pi, expressed in US calendar conventions 3.14 (we also get the chance on the twenty-second of July, Pi Approximation Day, from the notional fraction known from the time of Archimedes—first observed in 1988 by physicist and curator of the the San Francisco Exploratorium Larry Shaw, and since designated by the US Congress and UNESCO as the International Day of Mathematics. Activities include learning about the irrational and transcendent number and its properties, memorising and reciting its digits, called piphilogy and relies on mnemonic techniques, such as composing so called piems—a portmanteau of the Greek symbol and poem in which the letter count of each word equals the corresponding digit: to the fourteenth decimal place, “How I want a drink, alcoholic of course, after the heavy chapters involving quantum mechanics,” and eating circular foods. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology also traditionally dispatched its college admissions decision letters to applicants on this day.

free to be… you and me (11. 414)

Courtesy of our faithful chronicler, we are reminded on this day in 1974, ABC first broadcast the award winning children’s television special conceived and produced by Marlo Thomas and friends, adapted from a record album with activity book published sixteen months earlier. The songs and stories sung or acted out by contemporary celebrities including Carol Channing, Dustin Hoffman, Roberta Flack, Diana Ross, Alan Alda, Harry Belafonte, Cicely Tyson, Rosey Grier, Shirley Jones, Michael Jackson and Mel Brooks champion values of inclusion, individuality and comfort with one’s identity and reject gendered stereotypes, hailing that anyone can achieve anything, despite or because of the circumstances of their birth and was inspired by an uncomfortable incident in a bookstore where Thomas wanted to show her niece that it was acceptable and encouraged to flaunt traditional roles but only found materials reinforcing then—namely in a picture book that suggested boy grown up to be pilots and girls stewardesses, doctors, nurses, etc. Though predictably it drew criticism from certain circles at the time for indoctrination and emasculation, but the special and recording have endured, garnering both an Emmy and Peabody award, going Platinum within two years of release. A sequel, co-produced in the both the Soviet Union and the US—the first such primetime variety show collaboration, Free to Be… a Family, aired in 1988—featuring a new cast including Robin Williams, the Muppets, Lily Tomlin, Russian children’s television host Tatyana Vedeneyeva, JonBon Jovi and the magicians Penn and Teller.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links to revisit, Queen Anne’s army plus the Lend-Lease Act of 1941

two years ago: The Kick Inside (1978) plus a pioneering photographer

three years ago: your daily demon: Dantalion, more links to enjoy,  a Van Gogh up for auction, Oprah interviews other princesses plus a gallery of bad and misleading book covers

four years ago: more phonetic spelling alphabets plus more links worth revisiting

five years ago: a flag supercut, even more links plus scripturiency

9x9 (11. 406)

harmonisation: Albanian government using AI to try to speed accession to European Union by rewriting local legislation to fit the block’s regulatory framework—via Marginal Revolution  

the once and future sex: enduring medieval views on female anatomy 

géodésie: more on the Paris Meridian and how Greenwich ultimately won out 

walk without rhythm and you won’t attract the worm: Christopher Walken, portraying Padishah Emperor Shaddam Corrino IV, unaware of his epic choreography in “Weapon of Choice” references Dune  

mcmxxiv: a curation of photos from Alan Taylor—via Kottke  

here there be tygers: animated adaptations of Ray Bradbury’s science fiction by Sergei Bondarchuk  

the world is a cat—i can’t unsee that now: a geopolitical map drawing challenge  

the school of venus; or the ladies delight: self-pleasure in the seventh century  

circling the wagons: Sweden accedes to NATO as its thirty-second member state after a wait of two years—while holdout Hungary visits Trump

8x8 (11. 396)

a bridge too far: German authorities pledge investigation into embarrassing leak of confidential military talks about Ukrainian aid  

heteronyms: the Portuguese writer Fernando Pessoa with seventy pen-names  

solar symbology: a survey of the various cartographic representations of North America’s upcoming total eclipse  

phrixus and helle: newly excavated fresco in Pompeii retells the myth of the Golden Fleece  

re:design: Jason Kottke unveils his new website with fresh 2024 energy—maybe we could all use a face-lift  

replevin: Trump fraudulently overvalued his Scottish golf course and resort by £200 000 000—see previously 

club remix: annual competition that invites doctoral candidates to dance their dissertation 

airdrop: US begins aid delivery to a beleaguered Gazan population on the verge of famine

 synchronoptica

one year ago: TIME magazine (1923) plus assorted links to revisit

two years ago: more links to enjoy plus the largest capacity cargo plane

three years ago: more links worth the revisit, an artist’s message to get vaccinated plus Rocket Man (1972)

four years ago: the French version of the Dallas theme, Super Tuesday, Nigerian contributions to English plus more on the Human Interference Task Force

five years ago: graphic designer Alvin Lustig, Apollo IX (1969), an example of Celtic Revival architecture, McLaren’s Imperial Cheddar Club Cheese plus artist Pokey LaFarge

11x11 (11. 380)

sure, write stuff for free—but write it for yourself: maintaining one’s creativity in the bleak media sector brickwalling and the loss of journalistic records  

rage-baiting: viral Tik-Tok couple troll influencer culture with such precision most don’t realise it’s satire—via Super Punch  

the paint explainer: a primer on the twenty-seven amendments to the US Constitution—via Memo of the Air 

dark dimensions: there’s a new theory about where dark matter might be hiding  

the sony smartwig: a 2016 patent granted for a connected hairpiece one pairs with their phone for tactile feedback 

the navel on an orange is a mutation that created a conjoined twin: weird information to dispense on a first date—via Nag on the Lake’s Sunday Links 

the riker manoeuvre: small towns with monuments to Star Trek characters—via Marginal Revolution  

selectric funeral: the Boston Typewriter Orchestra hopes to appear in NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert with this submission  

awful yet lawful: US Supreme Court to entertain grievances on social media moderation for deplatforming hateful and dangerous content  

multi-level marketing: a supercut of huckster Donald Trump’s merchandising scams 

you can out-buzzfeed buzzfeed after all: media group in takeover talks with UK’s The Independent—see previously

cognitive offloading (11. 376)

Via Good Internet, whilst there have always been panics over new technological extensions of the human mind leading to decline and atrophy from platonic criticism of the written word to the “boob tube” to the toxicity and tribalism of the web, one researcher with the University of Monterrey fears that the capacity of artificial intelligence for mimicry goes beyond facilitating study and investigation with instant answers and unverifiable connections (possibly beneficial—yet to be seen and the verdict is still out—for navigating a native digital environment for things like programming and debugging and those onerous tasks, and jobs, that only exist because systems don’t talk to one another and integration is difficult) that might make us lazy and less critical but poses a real threat in supplanting our executive functions. Rather than stimulating and enhancing thought and examination, ready answers, verging towards dogmatism when it comes to nuanced and complex ideas, these shortcuts, short-circuits could make judgment and creativity an increasingly rare commodity.

welcome to my ted talk (11. 371)

Founded on this day in 1984, the first Technology, Entertainment, Design conference of the US-Canadian non-profit media organisation—freely distributing “ideas worth spreading—featured futurist Mickey Schulhof demonstrating the compact disc, invented some eighteen months prior, and the Apple Macintosh with presentations by mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot, Nicholas Negroponte (with some rather prescient predictions, see also) and Whole Earth Catalogue’s Steward Brand. Broadening to scientific, cultural, humanitarian and academic topics, the main symposium has been held annually in Vancouver with other events interspersed throughout the year hosted globally and has been available universally under a Creative Commons license online since 2006.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links to revisit, Civilisation plus number names

two years ago: more on the Royal Order of Adjectives plus London’s courting of oligarchs

three years ago: Quo Vadis (1951), the names of chess pieces plus Unworter of the Year

four years ago: more links to enjoy, ending NDAs, a superspreader event plus leap days

five years ago: a visit to the Neroberg

vielecke u. vielflache (11. 368)

This 1900 study of polyhedra by geometer Johannes Max Brückner, who taught at a Gymnasium (a secondary, preparatory school) in Bautzen after earning a degree in mathematics and physics from the Universities of Leipzig and Heidelberg and earned his teaching credentials for constructing many models of stellated shapes, compounds of the Platonic solids projected outward until the result in a new uniform and congruent three dimensional figure (see also), is not only noted for its aesthetic and inspirational value (M C Escher’s work was largely informed by exposure to this publication) but is considered among the foundational proofs of the field, documenting all the then known possibilities. In 1930, Brückner’s collection of models were donated to the institution in Baden-Württemberg, which in turn awarded him with another honorary degree. More at Present /&/ Correct at the link up top.

8x8 (11. 364)

moses j robinette: for US Presidents’ Day, researchers find that Lincoln pardoned Biden’s great-great grandfather  

we are a nation in decline, a failing nation: with an incredible lack of empathy or courage, Trump compares the murder of Alexei Navalny to his own legal and political woes—see more  

you never forget your first: the evolution of the holiday that started as a celebration of the birthday of George Washington—see up top

first wives’ club: searching for the likeness of Martha Washington and AI creative chaos

ask not what the drama can do for you, but what you can do for the drama: Real Housewives catchphrases for the American presidents 

stats: scholars access American administrations—Lincoln still number one, with FDR displacing Washington—and Biden ranked in the top fifteen, via Miss Cellania 

non-interventionism: America’s isolationist’s policy on the up-wing—see previviously 

i cannot tell a lie: George Washington’s parents are rather upset he chopped down that cherry tree

8x8 (11. 358)

compound interest: Trump’s accumulated lawsuits amount to over half a billion dollars  

vivi o preferibilmente morti: Poseidon’s Underworld reviews a 1969 Spaghetti Western  

epistolary doll: Kafka, a little girl and her beloved, lost toy—via the New Shelton wet/dry 

the wonderful night of hercules brown: a 1968 short film guiding a young boy through his dreams with the help of muppets and puppets 

millions of cats: Wanda Hazel Gág’s 1928 children’s book—the oldest American title still in print  

leaning toward more grasshopper, less ant: raising children on the eve of the AI revolution—via tmn  

hero’s journey: a video poking fun at the tropes and archetypes of found in every epic quest—see previously  

never surrender high-tops: Trump launches gold trainers line, goes public with his social network in order to earn cash to pay for his legal judgments—see previously

anniversary edition (11. 320)

Found in the archives of redditor ForeverMozart7, we enjoyed browsing this extensive gallery of screen-grabs from 1990s edutainment computer games. A lot of the titles are stand-alone adventures but quite a few from the late nineties had ties-ins with established PBS programmes and children’s literature. There’s some impressive graphics and renderings to appreciate, even if one is not familiar with the characters and premise—most of the ones I was exposed to were in the classroom computer lab and not commercial software for home use.

 

synchronoptica

one year ago: Karma Chameleon (1984), long walkies plus an archive of 1980s graphics

two years ago: text-placeholders plus the Latin motto drawn by fate

three years ago: your daily demon: Haures, quite a backdrop, the evolution of the day-bed, Facebook launched (2004), schools ban Simpsons t-shirts plus what withstood the explosion in Beirut’s harbour

four years ago: forced equivalence, the Yalta Conference (1945) plus the feast of Hrabanus Maurus

five years ago: the Cleveland museum of art shares its collection online, art on yachts, an official state cryptid, failed prophesies plus California lieutenant governor Mike Curb

paula of rome (11. 295)

Born into one of the richest and most powerful senatorial families, gens Furii—claiming descent from legendary Mycenaean king Agamemnon—and as recorded by later companion St Jerome, lived a life of luxury and intellectual pursuits, but when widowed at the age of thirty-two, Paula turned her interest towards religion and pilgrimage. While touring the Holy Land, Paula visited monastic communities and eventually settled in Bethlehem and established a spiritual retreat of her own—hostel for travellers connected to a monastery for men and a convent for women. Regarded as the first nun, abbess and Desert Mother, and re-examined as not just a patron but also a co-contributor to Jerome’s scholarship and translations, Paula is venerated on this day on the occasion of her death in the year 404, fêted as well by the Anglican Communion (along with her daughter Eustochium) on 28 September.