la terre est habitée

As a little kid, I remember distinctly seeing this short animated that posited extra-terrestrials observing Earth might be forgiven for assuming that automobiles were the dominant life forms of the planet with human beings just some parasitic infestation (though parasites, despite their reputation aren’t lower life forms) and being quite alarmed at the idea that we might be overlooked while the scouting-party compile an ethnographic account based on what they can extrapolate about car culture and society and make informed guesses on cars’ grooming, feeding, mating and funerary rites. Our appreciation to Fancy Notions for showcasing this feature and letting us experience it again. What on Earth! (ou La Terre est habitée!) is a creation of the Canadian Film Board by Les Drew and Kaj Pindal and was first released in 1966 to critical acclaim. I wonder what visiting aliens might make of Earthlings if they came today to throngs of screen-gazers, communicative and engaged by not necessary in outward appearance or with those in closest physical proximity. Maybe such customs would be too inscrutable for outsiders to interpret.

What on Earth!, Les Drew & Kaj Pindal, provided by the National Film Board of Canada

mouse potato

Quartz makes an interesting study on how the maturing fears and foibles of a society are reflected in their neologisms through a dictionary tool that records the year when new terms began to be appearing in print, making a fairly direct correlation between what people were experiencing by what they hadn’t quite the words for and needed redefinition and nuance.  Like with other examples, it’s surprising to learn that what one might regard as a contemporary nonce word is actually somewhat older and just returning to common-parlance: cisgender (1994), humblebrag (2002), carbon-footprint and meh (1992) to date a few. The term mouse potato describes someone who couldn’t get enough screen time was coined in 1993 (the same year as metrosexual, unfriend and binge-watch) but never caught on. Maybe its time has come around again.  Visit Quartz at the link up top for more words and to conduct your own year-by-year lexical survey.

canopy or mind the gap

Kottke introduces us to a growth pattern that some types of trees display called crown shyness that will have us looking up. Why and how the trees stop short of touching each other is somewhat a mystery and it can happen in stands of trees that are the same and different species, but botanists suggest it might be a defence mechanism to prevent the spread of pests, wind-abrasion or perhaps just out of respect for personal space.

call and response

Frighteningly, the president of the United States of America can unilaterally order the launch of nuclear missiles in roughly the time it takes to compose a tweet and while the world can only hope and pray that the bluster and provocation of the present regime will be shown to be just that, it seems unwise to signal a belligerent posture on a social media platform that’s made subject to influence by mob-rule—especially once household atomics are brought into the picture. The sabre-rattling from North Korea isn’t new and the people of South Korea and Guam seem relatively unfazed by the latest threat, and the North has long had the ability to launch a devastating first-strike on the peninsula and Japan with traditional weapons.
It is the reaction of America that is more vexing.  In a stand-off, such as the one Dear Leader has provoked with fairly vague pledges of retaliation to which North Korea responded with a specific plan to demonstrate their capability by firing a volley of missiles into the ocean around thirty kilometres off the coast of the US territory of Guam. There is a grave potential for a miscalculation and collateral damage—not precluding that the US might attack North Korea for the provocation pre-launch. Meanwhile, China has stated that it will do nothing should North Korea be the aggressor and America presumably responds in kind. The strategic presumption being that North Korea will strike first because there is no option of a second since it has a limited arsenal. Thing’s tend to escalate quickly. Of course, it’s devilishly difficult to define what it means to strike first from all points of view, and China reserves the right to intervene should the US be the first to act. I’d like to think that Dear Leader wouldn’t even consider actions that would endanger the people of the region—especially the families of US service-members stationed in South Korea and other American assets. No military option seems tenable and all would result in death and destruction and signal a dangerous willingness to use nuclear weapons that could embolden other armed powers, like Pakistan and India or Israel against the rest of the Middle East, to play out their bellicose fantasies. The fact that evacuations are not yet underway and China’s assessment was put out there makes me think that the ratcheted-up rhetoric and the beating of war drums on social media will be unable propel the regime towards making a grave miscarriage of might. Maybe this is all a ploy on the part of China—allied perhaps with Russia—to rid themselves of two problematic autocrats in a single blow.

the birds and the bees

Though I take a little exception with the assertion that humans are the only beings to have recognised the connection between sex and babies (even considering the gestation period does put a lot distance between conception and birth), I had never really appreciated how profound reproductive awareness and how defining that hallmark of humanity can be.
Evolution and our genes drive us to procreate and perhaps, achieved though realising that the consequences of the act of mating, we’ve ritualised courtship and matrimony in such ways that transcend and indeed run counter to our genetic self-interests. Certain cultural norms and taboos that are contemporary and abiding may have their origins in more socially nebulous but just as focused times and civilisation accommodates. What do you think? Was this the revelatory epiphany that led us outside of the moment and ourselves and informed our cogitative abilities? I’d suspect that a lot of thoughts and feelings, especially the repulsive and unwelcome ones of fear and anxiety, are also genetic baggage developed during far more fraught days. The ability to understand outcomes and plan for the future (even if the biological process remained a mystery and prone to superstition and visitations from the gods) girds the imagination and allows humans to not only work on their own pedigree but also to practise animal husbandry and agriculture—another subversion of natural selection—and advance to the point (we still need to be humble and recognise that we’re quickly getting into uncharted, untested territory) where we can create wholly synthetic beings.

a more perfect union

From the conclusion of World War II through the Cold War era there were fears of occupied Germany—both divided and reunited—becoming too powerful and growing resurgent with its domineering tendencies and in part the European Union and its antecedents were created as a framework to contain Germany, but we had never come across this radical, radial proposal to politically unite central Europe by parsing it into twenty four cantons.
Each ray contained one major city each on the continent and emanated from a central capital, Vienna reflagged as Sankt Stephan after the city’s landmark cathedral, but no member was a nation state in the traditional since as the bands included parts of at least two countries and in most cases took in a broad spectrum of language, culture and heritage. The map and model government, which called on for a rotating presidency and shared administration of colonial lands, were proposed in 1920 as the world was still coming to terms with the horrors of World War I, with the authors confident that allowing boundaries to be drawn along ethnic lines (their Esperanto-speaking utopia broadly classified four constituent tribes of Europe: Teutons, Slavs, Magyars and Romans—and each canton was configured to mix the groups) was an obstacle to lasting peace.

back catalogue

Delightfully true to its roots, Nintendo continues to sell the traditional card and board games that the company got its start with in 1898. In addition to decks of Western-style playing cards, mah-jong sets and go games there are the traditional hanafuda cards that were the first company’s first popular product. While the kanji characters that make up the company’s name (任天堂) probably does not translate to “leave luck to heaven” without taking a lot of license with the language, this examination into why it’s most likely too good to be true is a fascinating romp through the company’s history and a good primer for traditional gaming culture in Japan

surplus to needs

Writing for McSweeney’s Ben Kronengold (via Waxy) delivers the perfect point for point lambasting of that misogynistic screed circulated through the offices of one internet giant, which got the author summarily dismissed by advocating that women don’t belong in the tech industry and arguments to the contrary were harmful to morale and workplace cohesion, by suggesting from the point of view of a robot that believes humans are biologically unfit to have jobs in the sector.
…Furthermore, just when we started to catch on to Captcha codes, we had to face new tests: the “check-this-box-to-prove-you’re-not-a-robot”—talk about hurtful language—and the “click-all-the-boxes-that-contain-street-signs.” The latter recently cost my friend a job in Ad Sales when he bet it all on “Yield” being a type of tree…

Be sure to visit McSweeney’s at the link up top to read the diatribe in its entirety and discover more humorous, pitch-perfect articles.