sea-monkey kingdom

One internet giant and mobile phone distributor had a strange, complex notion to put little aquariums inside the phone-casing that held living, hardy tardigrades—also known as water bears, as Super Punch informs. As tough as these little beasties are (capable of being boiled, frozen, irradiated and the vacuum of space), they couldn’t take the spotlight of the camera that magnified their tableau so their owners could watch them, and realising that these weren’t virtual pets but actual living creatures and not just existing for our temporary amusement, plus mounting technical set-backs, the project was eventually called off.

fm (no static at all)

Due to the finite nature of the speed of light, denizens of TRAPPIST-1d would be just learning about the final football game of Pelé, the Red Army Faction hijacking of a Lufthansa flight to Somalia, Miss Oklahoma and ill-will ambassador Anita Bryant is pied for her homophobic platform and the eradication of smallpox—plus witnessing the beginnings of the Space Shuttle programme, disco and the launch of Voyager 1 and perhaps hear Earthlings’ surprised reception of the Wow! signal that they dispatched such a long time ago. Excuse the lateness of our reply. Also on the air waves in the fall of 1977 were the musical stylings of newcomers The Sex Pistols and veterans Queen, Billy Joel and Steely Dan and M*A*S*H* plus One Day at a Time, the Norman Lear sitcom that’s been rebooted recently.

standardised position description or all your jobs are belong to us

Via Marginal Revolution, Oxford economist Daniel Susskind that the disruptive—and hopefully welcome—effects of machine-learning on the labour market is far, far underestimated. Humans assume that the routine tasks that robots will take first are the dull and boring ones—and not just the more complex but rather straightforward and easily articulated ones.
Robot desk-mates are already learning new tasks by observing and copying behaviours, even if their mentors think what they do defies explaination and that it the time it takes to spell it out… Moreover, the bigger element that humans aren’t considering is the assumption that machines ought to work in ways that replicate the processes that we’ve invented to reach a goal. They’d assuredly be gobsmacked at some of the dismal inefficiencies and pretenses based not in gainful, meaningful employment but rather busyness and making sure there’s no loitering about. What do you think? In the service of man, robotic lorries would displace many truck-drivers, for example, but the centralised warehouse and just-in-time inventory mightn’t have been the way to go and an alternative exists that we can’t see because we’ve just always done things in one way. Machines would probably re-write the rules of economics as a first order of business as well, making (if we allow it) the notion of a robot taking one’s job not a frightening prospect but a happy one that we are grateful for—leaving us to other, more noble pursuits and free from toil and attachment.

5x5

bewitched: a mass hexing occurred outside of Trump Tower last night

easier said than done: Kurzgesagt invites us to ponder the human rights we’d be conferring on sentient robots

swen or inga: a few very clever, impressive English language anagrams plus further resources—(a: Norwegians)

cat o’ nine tails: feline armourer Jeff de Boer, via the always marvellous Nag on the Lake

thrills await: NASA celebrates the discovery of the solar system TRAPPIST-1 with a series of retro travel posters  

upward spiral

As much as the brain choreographs that neurotic self-destructive waltz by interpreting dwelling on negative thoughts, worry and anxiety on par with positive emotions and mindful behavior, we are just as capable of flipping the script—so to speak.
Feelings of shame, guilt and apprehension are the stuff of the chemical rewards that the brain craves as much as pride and bravery (we don’t have words for all emotional foils), and the conscious mind prefers any engaging activity to none at all. Writing for The Big Think, Tony Birrer offers four practical tips for little mental nudges—of course we all know this stuff already but the small reminders can keep us going without becoming dogmatists and can sometimes be eye-opening—that we can adopt to help side-step the cycles that get us in a funk.

everybody has their little… the denizens of the deep and all that

At PfRC we have perhaps an unfair aversion to listicles that purport to educate but are really just vehicles for multiply advertising opportunities, but we’ll make exceptions for anything that claim to have affinity with film-maker David Lynch. We did not regret the decision and we’ll owe that we knew very little about the enigmatic and profound strange director and it was no catchpenny slideshow.

reefer-madness

Having installed an Attorney General who once quipped that he thought the Ku Klux Klan were acceptable until he found out that they smoked pot, Dear Leader’s administration seems to be poised to reverse his stated position of respecting states’ rights not only on telling people whose company that they can use the facilities with but also when it comes to recreational marijuana use.
In the interest of perpetuating the scapegoat narrative of rapists and drug-dealers and reefer-madness, the federal government may weigh on the wisdom behind the decisions of Washington, DC, Maine, Massachusetts, Oregon, California, Nevada, Alaska and Colorado to allow the use legal use of the substance for enjoyment and for medical research. I’m sure that at least pharmaceutical companies and the prisons industries would benefit from the migration of cannabis production from a taxed, regulated regime back to cartels and smugglers. I anticipate a whole raft of alt-truths and questionable science articles to attack and discredit the dope fiends amongst us. What do you think? People are already awake—and sleepless, and while there are numerous other priorities to protect in the environmental and social justice arenas, I wonder if this might be the contravention that pushes Americans to truly rebel or secede.

6x6

give me a bouncy c: harmoniously, bumble bees buzz at a specific frequency to coax flowers to open up fully and make it easier to get at hard-to-reach nectar

one does not simply walk into Mordor: a map generator for fantastic realms

compound lens: a pin-hole camera comprised of a bundle of thirty-two thousand drinking straws that provides a rather buggy outlook on the world

that’ll be perfect for our delicious Roquefort cheese: dedicated fans and show emeritus revive Mystery Science Theater 3000

psa: a friendly nudge to visit the weird and wonderful and very risqué world of Liar Town, USA—an old favourite

apple-core, Baltimore: Mister Trash Wheel and cohorts are working to clean up the Delmarva Bay