at arm’s length or (personal) space invaders

Via the always brilliant Nag on the Lake, comes an excellent primer on the fascinating topic of proxemics, the study of the non-verbal narrative that is dictated by proximity and confines and is as culture specific and as richly limned as language.
First introduced as a branch of sociology by American anthropological researcher Edward T Hall in the mid-1960s, the research and received terminology not only was the compass for describing the circles that define an individual’s spheres of comfort for various interactions—territories from intimate to public and how that physical space is reflected in the virtual too—but also informs the surrounding (or underlying) architecture, hygiene and group norms. Just think how cubicles might effect on the job etiquette or the boundaries that are thrown up once we feel violated. These sorts of different nudges and cues, which beforehand went unarticulated, are pretty engrossing to think about. Find out more and see a video demonstration at the links above.

tonkin ghosts or mess-o'-potamia

Finally released seven years after the beginning of the investigation and five years after its conclusion, with publication delayed several times, the Chilcot Report (or the Iraq Inquiry) brought back a surge of memories and is confirmation of what many if not most of us suspected:
diplomatic solutions had not been exhausted, Iraq presented little imminent threat beyond its neighbours and the actions of the US and the UK undermined the United Nations’ authority through the unilateral determination, the case for war of their leaders. Legality and thus the ability to indict or exonerate anyone of war crimes was outside of the scope of the investigation, and thirteen years on it is difficult to conceive how a world with or without Hussein might be. The forces that rushed in to occupy that void in power does seem rather like a hydra instead of any improvement, and prosecuting regime-change under once dubious and now patently false fears and scaremongering seems beyond regrettable.  Sadly, this publication will not vindicate the suffering of Iraqis or service members that have been pained by this pretext, and I wonder if the political fall-out will be momentous and haunting enough to ensure that such adventures are not embarked upon again.  The world’s threshold and memory sometimes seems woefully inadequate.

game on or it’s dangerous to go alone – take this

Just as the soundtracks to video games are scored to be memorable and catchy and to motivate on to persevere and hone one’s attention for a specific goal, our arcade friends and familiars (and play in general) is far from a frivolous activity and could in the broad sense teach us resilience and give us a quiver of tools for success.
Recently, I found out about the existence of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) of an unusual sort, a forum called SuperBetter for a technique that a games researcher developed when she resolved to use her academic passion to work through a rough patch her own life. Resolving either to give up or turn her challenge into a sort of Sanity Quest, peopled with level-bosses and power-ups that were allegories of her own daily challenges, and other players, companions that she could surreptitiously recruit for her personal mission. Transforming one’s goals into a game allows one to be more pragmatic while still attached and recognise the potential outcomes of incremental moves and be less discouraged by set-backs. Modifying the programme—just a brilliant way of thinking really and not tethered to any specific venue other than to share success stories and hearten other players, to fit one’s own aims has seen some pretty amazing and enduring changes in behaviour and attitude.

interferometry or duel aperture

This September China’s just completed gargantuan radio telescope will be brought on-line.
Twice as big as the observatory of Mount Arecibo, the Five-Hundred Meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST), I appreciate how the article reprinted the unsourced scalar comparison that if the dish were filled to the brim with wine, it would be enough for five bottles for every man, woman and child on Earth—a rather distracting analogy, though, since all I could think about afterwards was, “Hmm—wine.” Magnitude aside, the telescope will enhance the search for extra-terrestrial life and the study of the strange phenomena of the Cosmos that don’t fall within our visual spectrum.

protocol and perfidy

No wonder Oslo withdrew its candidacy for the 2022 Winter Games, leaving it to Beijing and Almaty, Kazakhstan to duke it out amongst themselves for the dubious honour of hosting the Olympics, given this rather unappetizing list of demands hurled at them by the steering committee.
Via the always brilliant Boing Boing, we are given a taste—and mind you, this catalogue is not on behalf of the athletes and does not even begin to address larger matters like venues, onerous security and logistics, just the bed and board for the organisers—of what the queen bees had expected, causing Norway to laugh them out of the country:

• The hotel bar at their hotel should extend its hours “extra late” and the minibars must stock Coke products.
• The IOC president shall be welcomed ceremoniously on the runway when he arrives.
• The IOC members should have separate entrances and exits to and from the airport.
• During the opening and closing ceremonies a fully stocked bar shall be available. During competition days, wine and beer will do at the stadium lounge.

two-by-four

The always engaging Everlasting Blört shares a gallery from Popular Mechanics of some of the finest timber structures from around the world—including a couple that only exist as blue-prints so far. We haven’t visited any of these select sites yet (but the Borgund stave church ought to have made the cut, in our humble opinion)—and surely for the modern buildings, we wouldn’t have appreciated that they were made of wood, but I think from now on we’ll be on the lookout. Given the changing tastes for building materials and construction approaches, it’s rather nice that architects are rethinking traditional methods and willing to challenge the assumed limitations of lumber, with a wooden skyscraper slated for London’s skyline to rival the Shard.

vis-à-vis

We thought that this chart illustrating from the perspective of the Americas of what’s across the oceans was pretty nifty, especially considering how our place in the world and our relation to others is easily skewed and sometimes we loom much larger in our heads than is advisable. Click the images to enlarge.  Day-dreaming on the beach is probably a far more effective tool to ground oneself and also to connect across continents, but—curious, I wanted to see if there was an African/Eurasian centered map that might better show what we might be facing on the shores of the Bay of Biscay.
Latitudinally, it’s comforting to know that beyond the horizon (the line dividing sea and sky only pushes out one’s gaze on flat land only about five kilometers before the curvature of the Earth overtakes us, distance≈3.57 x √height) lies Nova Scotia. It’s pretty noteworthy, too, that Chile has an unobstructed view of itself.

twinkle, twinkle

Via Dark Roasted Blend’s latest edition of Biscotti Bits, we discover that the inspiring flickering flame of a candle and the light it gives becomes something even more poetic and romantic through rigorous chemical analysis, from a battery of experiments conducted in the summer of 2011.
The wick burning through the medium of tallow or wax generates different carbon allotropes (the known arrangements of the element: soot, graphite, and the crystalline form) as the flame rises and heats up to eventually bind with the surrounding air as carbon-dioxide—reclaiming the intermediary by-products, but one short-lived but ongoing episode of the chemical history of a candle—as Michael Faraday lucidly presented to the curious public in an 1860 lecture, couched in the same glittering and poetic language that feeds the fire and our imaginations, sees the creation of millions of tiny particles of diamond ash, destined to be consumed at the peak and hottest part of the flame. It is really amazing what fundamental mysteries are just being solved, and how there’s more questions in those answers. I wonder if the soot of the flame is transmogrified into the more exotic forms of carbon as well—like graphene and bucky-balls, and if the tiny diamonds are winked out of existence if there’s no up or down for the candle, were it burning in the micro-gravity of space.