the league of extravagant grannies

Via the fabulous Messy Nessy Chic, we learn about the design duo of Osbourne Macharia and Kevin Abraham who invent, lavishly embellished, and then document fictional scenes and sub-cultures in their native Kenya. Check out more of their uplifting and fun work here.

a halo darkly

Via the always interesting Kottke (who’s sporting a spiffy new look) we learn that tiny, dwarf galaxies as they age can attain a higher concentration of dark matter than the apparent universal constant of one part to five (in favour of the weakly reacting sort of matter rather than the one, baryonic, that we experience) because normal matter is much more flightly and prone to erosion by more massive galactic neighbours.
As counterintuitive as it seems, that much was at least expected and could be a sort of lens for getting to better understand the unidentified nature of dark matter, but astronomers were astounded to detect a wholly new class of galaxies—first spotted in the faint and shy wall-flower called Dragonfly 44. The galaxy appears to be almost entirely composed of dark matter (whether there’s a totality of dark energy as well in the mix is not mentioned) but it’s roughly the same size as the Milky Way. Imagine a galaxy our size but instead of four-hundred billion, there’s only a paltry four to eight billion stars knocking together out there—suggesting that there is something very flawed in the way we think galaxies coalesce and evolve, since those lonely stars ought to be pulled apart and absorbed into other star systems. Researchers are hoping to find more of these big, “empty” galaxies looming closer to home and perhaps observe dark matter and its properties directly.

arraignment or computer says no

Thanks to the discerning eye of Nag on the Lake, we are directed to very important back-pocket thought that’s really in the forefront of things, presented in a quite clever and accessible way. First reading the title of this offensive called “Weapons of Math Destruction,” I took it initially as a needed critique on the poor state of mathematical literacy and how easily people can be manipulated by bald statistics that someone along the telephone-tree didn’t understand or made up altogether—which was not the thesis—but I think a part of it does fall to us as the creators of, contributors to Big Data to take a responsibility for our own leavings and to try to dispel confirmation-bias (which comes honesty to machines by end-users’ trust in incomplete scenarios). The responsibility is ours no matter how powerless and misused we might feel since it is our measureable actions and reactions that school our trial by algorithm.  Naturally, as we feel the stare of prying eyes that have reduced privacy and disengagement as a potential customer to a rare commodity, we can anticipate the next level when we potential face condemnation and punishment for our actions before we do them. 
While it is certainly a mixed-bag of results and hard to gauge the true benefits we’ve gotten by bearing our souls and movements and preferences to a human moderated internet, there is good to be had out there, not forgetting we are responsible and heir to any and all outcome.  As machines learn at a rate that outstrips our ability to react, the formulæ that govern our credit-worthiness and interest will unfold into something larger to affect notions of free-will and executive-agency. It is unacceptable surely that anyone is judged and sentenced for pre-crime, but it may come in forms more unintentionally insidious than that, if we’re not careful. Without ill-will, the Internet of Things may conspire against you to discourage you from pursing that job-application, ballot or travel plans, thinking it is doing you a favour by sparing you the disappointment. What sort of strength of character does it take to survive in a world where not only that corrects one’s spelling or makes recommendations based on one’s purchasing history but to face a systematic and coordinated battery of disengagement and discouragement?  Or alternately, support and cheerleading?  One’s history could just as easily suggest that one is not worth the effort medically or won’t be buying anything anyway and ought to be banned transit as facilitating pathways to success, and I think that that takes a critical eye, just like dharma and motivation in the real-cum-virtual world. Are we prepared to have that built into our infrastructure, as we might experience the Universe as sending us messages? What do you think? 

cassis

Though not persuaded to go out and “taste the rainbow” and draw the comparison myself, I found it pretty interesting to learn that whereas purple coloured candies and drinks for American palettes might be conditioned to expect a grape taste (natural and artificial flavouring), for Europe and elsewhere, purple signals blackcurrant, as Atlas Obscura informs.
Although I had only ever heard of it as a fancy infusion for imported vodka, I think they are delicious—I might be a bit partial since it is called (Schwarze) Johannisbeere in Germany—and are kind of a super-food. The shrubs were kept out of the Americas for a long time because it was thought that they carried botanical disease agents, but the moratorium is being relaxed because there’s little scientific evidence of this correlation. “Grape-Drank” might no longer be the default for those in the States.

fahrradtour: baderland

H and I took a little bike trip from Bad Karma, our fair city, through Bad Kissingen to Bad Bocklet to have a drink and rest for a minute before heading back in the twelfth century palace, Schloss Aschach.
Biking along the flood plain of the Fränkische Saale, a tributary of the River Main, we got to see Bad Kissingen from a new point of view and saw sites that we didn’t know where there, like a regional airport, mainly for hobby-gliders, and this fascinating Salien, a saltern—that is an installation constructed for extracting salt by evaporation, and has been in operation since before the year 800.
It was a pleasant day and not too hot but the blast of cool, salty air emanating from the was more amazing than the best, optimised air-conditioning system.
A bit further on, we passed the bore-fountain (Bohrbrunnen) called Luitpoldsprudel. Named after the Bavarian Prince-Regent of the early 1900s, it produced naturally carbonated water (Sprudel) for decades.

open-house

As part of a European-wide Heritage Days, this weekend in Germany marks der Tag des offenen Denkmals (Day of Open Monuments), when historic attractions which are not normally open for public inspection (due to lack of funds, etc.) are made accessible and often special exhibitions and excursions are included. Sometimes parts of museums and great houses usually off limits are open as well and is also a vehicle to highlight and promote little known histories. If you are out and about this weekend, be sure to pay special heed to local lore to support this movement and the conservation of heritage.

colossus and curio

After reading about Iowa County Wisconsin’s House on the Rock, a sprawling labyrinthine campus of connected wings built in the late 1940s by an eccentric collector to house an expansive and random collection of artefacts (whose provenance and authenticity could not always be vouched for, so there are no more labels or signs)—which includes the world’s largest indoor merry-go-round, an “infinity room” that juts off the edge of the cliff it’s perched on, a mock Victorian street, wax-figures, elaborate Glockenspiel and other musical automatons, besides displays of historic dresses, chandeliers and Santa Claus figurines, I was reminded of the time we visited the Colossus of Prora on Germany’s Baltic coast and spent a day in its museum.

The four and a half kilometer long compound hugging the beach was to be a monumental retreat for Nazi party members and service-members on shore-leave, a resort with accommodations for twenty thousand and available to all at nominal prices—but was never completed and abandoned.

The East Germany army had used a small portion of the building up until Reunification, when it was wholly deserted. When we visited, one could wander the neglected and graffiti-spattered but sturdy corridors freely, and there was only one central column that was put to any use at all, hosting a youth hostel and a museum, curated by a local family.
Being that Seebad Prora has been refurbished and sold off as luxury condominiums, I doubt the museum with its random exhibits of taxidermy, mock-ups of East German Command and Control and the typical resort room plus the typical East German living-room, geology, motorcycles, grade-three’s artwork, some exhibits defying explanation, a lot of Ostalgie and a Viennese café are there any longer.

It does make me sad to think that there was no room for someone as passionate about history (and wanted to make sure that that place and those times did not fall into total obscurity) as the individual who commissioned the House on the Rock above—and despite the chaos, I do remember that every item was well researched and documented—but maybe all these artefacts got to stay together, somewhere.  That rugged and quiet beach is probably again off-limits to the all-comers as well.

Here are all the images of Prora that I could find from our visit and exploration back in the summer of 2010.  One ought to really visit such places when one has the chance, since one can never say if it will always be accessible to the curious public.