This is an approximately monthly collection of random not-very-mathy/techy links and commentary. This post covers approx the past July and the first part of August.

I decided to continue writing these link collections posts as a way of … reflecting(?) on things I read on the internet. I don’t know if its useful to anyone but it’s … dunno, not exactly fun but rewarding?

Cool Pictures from Jupiter and Great Red Spot

[space.things, space.jupiter, space.redspot, technology.spacecraft]

SpaceFlight Now. Also twitter.com/peachastro/status/885566452681625600.

More at Juno Mission Pages.

Internet As An Existential Risk

[technology.internet, random.existential_risk]

So argues Ralph Koster in his blog.

Thoughts:

  • Is internet that special compared to e.g. electricity? Everything that (as Koster points out) will be connected to internet tomorrow, already depends on electricity today. That does not make Koster’s warning any less scary, though…
  • Note: Inside Ukraine’s Power Grid Hack, Wired March 3, 2016.

Year of the Linux on (Windows) Desktop

[software.linux, culture.linux, culture.microsoft]

Or rather, GNU/Linux sans Linux. Now on Windows Store.

Better Without Laptops in Class

“Students are Better Off without a Laptop in the Classroom”. Scientific American, July 11, 2017.

Excellent comment on HN:

I think its a double edge sword; not just paper > laptop or laptop > paper. As many people have already stated, its about engagement. Since coming back for my PhD, I’ve subscribed to the pencil/paper approach as a simple show of respect to the instructor. Despite what we think, professors are human and flawed, and being in their shoes, it can be disheartening to not be able to feed off your audience.

Matches my personal experience.

Random Programmer Humor

[culture.nerds, culture.programming]

Very Useful Gist.

Finnish Literature Classics on Yle Areena

[culture.finnish, culture.literature, things.audiobooks]

Waltari’s Sinuhe as an audiobook.

Teach Yourself C++ in 21 Days

[culture.programming, software.cpp, software.education]

The universally acclaimed official and definite guide, by Abstruse Goose.

Nasa Does Not Have Budget to Land Astronauts on Martian soil

[space.mars, things.nonexistent_budgets]

Ars Technica. One can dream.

Worldcon 75 Happened

[culture.nerds, culture.worldcon, culture.science_fiction, culture.fantasy, culture.fandom]

Publications. Was fun enough. Afterwards I heard there was a minor LARP crisis.

Nancy Kress Calls For Harder Science Fiction

[culture.science_fiction]

Very short read. Tor Forge Blob

Remembering Card Catalogs

[history.libraries]

Michael Lindgren. “What libraries lost when they threw out the card catalog.” WaPo, July 10 2017.

Technology aside, the book also summons the specter of a bygone American faith in the ability of institutions of government to work for a common good. The idea of the Library of Congress implementing a nationally standardized system to classify and track the nation’s collective publication history is now as surely a part of the past as steam engines or top hats. Looked at this way, the card catalogue stands with other great ­20th-century works of civic architecture as testament to the potential of what a society — and a government — can achieve, an especially discouraging reminder in our current era of reduced expectations.

Consider the relation to the possible implications argued in the Internet as Existential Threat. Possibly counterpoints:

  • It suffices to have a solar panels / diesel generator, off-line backups, and old computer in a cupboard.
  • A seasoned librarian with pen, paper and some time can work out a rudimentary catalog out from memory.

Related: Fancy handwriting for card catalogs

Regarding Mastodon / Matrix.org / IRC / halp

[technology.social_media]

I’ve been (mostly) lurking at mathstodon.xyz some time now: Not sure what to make of the experience. Also recently found out that there’s various contending other ‘federated social media services’ around.

Relevant XKCD.

Memories vs Self

[cogsci.general, cogsci.self, philosophy.mind]

Michael Shermer advertises his new book and argues in a short op-piece that there’s difference between “memory-self” and “point-of-view self”. (The concept coined by Kenneth Hayworth.)

“Why the “You” in an Afterlife Wouldn’t Really Be You”. Scientific American, July 1, 2017.

Maths for ML

[applied.math, stats.data_science, applied.ML]

One opinion spotted on Quora.

Excellent Read on Machiavelli and Borgias

[history.renaissance, history.machiavelli, history.italian_city_states, history.general]

A series of articles by Ada Palmer.

First, on Historicity of two Borgias TV series.

One quote:

Why would sex-&-violence Showtime tone things down? I think because they were afraid of alienating their audience with the sheer implausibility of what the Renaissance was actually like. Rome in 1492 was so corrupt, and so violent, that I think they don’t believe the audience will believe them if they go full-on. Almost all the Cardinals are taking bribes? Lots, possibly the majority of influential clerics in Rome overtly live with mistresses? Every single one of these people has committed homicide, or had goons do it? Wait, they all have goons? Even the monks have goons? It feels exaggerated. Showtime toned it down to a level that matches what the typical modern imagination might expect.

Then there’s also a series of more in-depth essays on Machiavelli, the influence of Borgias in his thinking, and why The Prince was such a big deal (and still is). You will also learn about Petrach.

Part I, Part I.a Part II, Part III, Part V

The Princewas far from the first Handbook of Princes. To the contrary, it argued against a long tradition of manuals of etiquette and collections of heroic maxims which were a common literary form, especially in an age when authors made money from their books only by dedicating them to patrons, who were often more inclined to reward books which seemed directly useful to themselves and their heirs.

To summarize, one Palmer’s major point is that Machiavelli was the first person (or the first notable person that we remember) who wrote a book that (in short) the prince would be successful by playing power politics (playing ruthlessly) instead of cultivating Christian and Roman virtues. As, Machiavelli notes, handily demonstrated by the Borgias and the politics of Italy revolving around them. (Of course, one is tempted to assume the successful politicians have always internalized that lesson: Mesopotamian backstabbing. Roman backstabbing. But maybe Machiavelli was the first one to acknowledge it aloud?)

However, I’m not fully convinced that consequentialism was totally unknown mode of thought before Borgias. I find it plausible that it was not fashionable, and poorly thought out among the learned Western philosophers and theologians. But totally non-existent even as a folk opinion among the rules savvy enough to survive as rulers? I wonder.

But as a not-a-professional historian, it certainly sounds plausible that “Machiavellian consequentialism” way of thinking rose to prominence around that time. One coincidence I find fun: the organization that was later painted by some Protestant authors as the epitome of the “end justifies the means” kind of thinking was born around the approximately same timeframe. (in addition to the very Lutheran Z. Topelius in Välskärin kertomuksia, I’m also thinking about Alexandre Dumas and 20 years after / The Vicomte of Bragelonne.).

On Beccaria

[history.enlightenment, history.general, philosophy.voltaire]

Stil more excellent essays by esteemed prof. Palmer? Yes please!

How, exactly, did the ideas like “innocent proven guilty” (and the various implications / justifications) arise? Often they are collaboratively attributed to the Enlightenment (and often you can just guess ‘Voltaire’); however, in this case, there was a writer called Beccaria.

On Bacteria

[things.bacteria, random.mosquitoes]

Is this science fiction or is this a reality: Google has a Life Sciences unit and they want to release bacteria-infected mosquitoes? TechCrunch reports, 2017-07-14.

Financial Panics of The First Century AD

[history.rome, history.economy, econ.history]

I encountered a mention of “financial crisis of 33 A.D.” and set out to find out more about it. Found two pieces:

“The Financial Panic of 33AD”, by blog (?) Armstrong Economics.

Wikisource on The Influence of Wealth in Imperial Rome by William Stearns Davis.

Names and Software

[things.names, software.general]

Old classic. “Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Names”

Demoscene Approach to Music

[culture.music]

Music from very short programs by Ville-Matias Heikkilä. 7 min YouTube video of fascinating music. 2011.

See also blog posts “Algorithmic symphonies from one line of code – how and why?”, “Some deep analysis of one-line music programs.” at countercomplex.

Consciousness and Evolution

[cogsci.general]

Michael Graziano. “A New Theory Explains How Consciousness Evolved”, The Atlantic.

Concerning a thing called “the Attention Schema Theory (AST)”.

The theory suggests that consciousness arises as a solution to one of the most fundamental problems facing any nervous system: Too much information constantly flows in to be fully processed. The brain evolved increasingly sophisticated mechanisms for deeply processing a few select signals at the expense of others, and in the AST, consciousness is the ultimate result of that evolutionary sequence. If the theory is right—and that has yet to be determined—then consciousness evolved gradually over the past half billion years and is present in a range of vertebrate species.

I have no idea how to judge if AST is true, but fascinating things to learn: cortex, tectum, wulst, and their possible(?) role as “control mechanisms”.

Bees Are Alive?

[random.bees]

Bloomberg. Bees Are Bouncing Back From Colony Collapse Disorder.

Spotify and Loudness War

[culture.loudness]

Motherboard / Vice

At the end of May, Spotify made a change to its music files that went unnoticed by almost all of the service’s listeners. What was apparent, however, to sound engineers and studio wizards was that the volume had been reduced on every Spotify-hosted track.

The Valerian Film Wasn’t Very Successful

[culture.films, culture.comics]

“Why Didn’t Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets Find Its Audience?”. Emily Yoshida for Vulture.

I don’t think, though, that the failures of films like Valerian and Jupiter Ascending disprove the idea that American audiences want more original stories.

Also, Tähtivaeltaja had a scathing review, Reijo Valta was more positive (in Finnish). Inverse compared it disfavorably to The Phantom Menace.

As of August, it’s still in mainstream theaters in Finland (Finnkino). Probably not worth watching though.

Risingshadow is Alive?

[culture.fantasy]

Risingshadow.net in English, .fi in Finnish.

Game Theory Introduction by Games

[math.game_theory]

The Evolution of Trust, by Nicky Case, July 2017.

Most of the lessons will be familiar from game theory textbooks: tit for tat is highly effective in repeated PDs, and thus contender as an explanation for altruism. Likewise, the particular payoffs (zero-sum vs non-zero-sum) matter a great deal. Likewise the chance of miscommunication.

However, what are the potential implications that people nowadays have less personal friendships (and thus repeated interactions) than they used to have?

See also Axelrod’s Evolution of Cooperation. (There’s a bunch of other literature on this subject.)

History of Finnish SF Fandom

[culture.science_fiction, culture.fandom]

Worldcon-related. In Finnish, by Juhani Hinkkanen

Imgur/Tumblr(?) Scifi Concepts

[culture.science_fiction]

Humans Are Weird. Humans are Orcs. Star Trek Implications

Synchronous Fireflies

[random.fireflies]

There’s a thing called synchronous fireflies. Intro on a relevant US National Park website. YouTube has videos.

Moon Origins Theories

[space.moon]

Some of the new proposals are quite wild. Donuts in space?

“What Made the Moon? New Ideas Try to Rescue a Troubled Theory”, August 2, 2017, Quanta Magazine