I got nothing for you, today. It's been a bit busy, lately. So here's a stupid joke.
My kids are making me join a Twelve Step Program…
It's for incessant talkers and we call ourselves "On and On Anon."
[daily log: walking, 7.5km]
Category: Found Online
Caveat: Crazy Frog
Yesterday I had some minutes at the end of my CC class, and wanted to show the kids something Christmas-themed. This is only vaguely Christmas-themed, but they found it quite entertaining. I did too.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Ovid, you can go home now
I guess the ancient Roman poet, Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso, 43BC-17AD), was exiled from his hometown of Rome at some point. Apparently the city council in the city of Rome recently passed a motion revoking his exile. I'm sure his ghost is super happy to hear this.
Est deus in nobis; agitante calescimus illo:
impetus hic sacrae semina mentis habet.
- from Fasti, VI.
There is a god within us.
It is when he stirs us that our bosom warms ; it is
his impulse that sows the seeds of inspiration.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Aim High
I was looking at my ceiling last night. I certainly don't think it's the best…
… But it's up there.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Aesthetica in vivo
What I’m listening to right now.
A Capella Science, “Evo-Devo (Despacito Biology Parody).” This song is truly awesome. It’s evolutionary biology. It’s poetry. It’s music. It’s all in a package, like the miracle of life, itself. For the prototype of which this song is a “parody,” see here.
Lyrics.
EVO-DEVO
Huxley
B. Mac.
Oh Carroll, Carroll
Gould, Stephen Jay yeah
D-D-D-D-Davidson and Peter
See
One cell divide and decide on a thousand fates
Did you ever figure how they know?
B. Mac.
We
Are built of modules combined in a planned out way
Each new piece must be told where to go
Oh
Now there’s a science helping us to understand
How our cells encode this architectural plan
Signalling each other with genetic tools oh
Oh yeah
Wow
Phenotype the interface for mouse and man
Genotype the files and the subprograms
What then are the switches, circuit boards and boot code?
Evo-Devo
Looking at the logic in the ways that we grow
Every gene directed by a signal key code
Proteins that can activate, enhance or veto
Evo-Devo
Signals are controlled by other genes that signal
Calculating in a network labyrinthal
Where the heart and liver and the hands and feet go
Signal mapping tells each region what it ought to be yo
With circuits so deeply built upon
They’re older than the Paleo
The Paleozoic Era baby
In a crucial pathway changes tend to get torpedoed
Where they go calamity goes
As this cyclopic sheep knows..
See down they cascade like a domino
Like you and I drosophila
The path that makes us optical
Was laid a long long time ago
Back before we blew up the cambrian like a bomb bomb
Now my eye protein can make you see out of your bom bom
And Hedgehog and its relatives like Indian and Sonic
Set up set up in a gradient on segments embryonic
Split forebrains and asymmetric parts depend upon it
Flipping on genetic switches and logic
From devo to evo
Adult and embryo
Mostly don’t evolve in the genes of the genome
Safer the mutation aimed at regulation
Keep the building blocks and swap their activation
From devo to evo
Parts have alter egos
Homologs evolved from repeats in the schema
Switch a couple bases in the proper places
You’ll be watching flies grow legs out of their faces oh yeah
Evo-Devo
Stick around for Modern Synthesis the sequel
Only by combining can a new theory grow
Evolution and development amigos
Evo-Devo
Signals trigger patterns of complexity so
Switching up the switches of a signalling node
Gives a modular and simple way to evolve
Look at how our spinal segments generate a neat row
Built on a molecular clock
One cycle, one vertebra
One vertebra one vertebra baby
Speeding up its rate is snakes’ developmental cheat code
That and where a lizard’s feet grow
They turn off distal aminos
Evo-Devo
This is how we go from single cells to people
Every generation and in life primeval
Life in variations endless and beautiful
Badaboom
From devo to evo
Larva to mosquito
Patterns are resolved as the signals proceed yo
Map out a gene with a glow tag
Kill it with a morpholino
Short oligo morpholino baby
From devo to evo
Voyage of the Beagle
Body plans evolve when proteins steer the genome
In this manner life’s beauty grows
Aesthetica in vivo
Evo-Devo
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Guy walks into a bar…
… he says "ouch."
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]
Caveat: Ice Cream In Hell
Sometimes, it can be interesting to try to look at the world from a truly different perspective. For example, how does ice cream see the world? How about ice cream that's dropped a few hits of acid and suffers some kind of mental disorder?
Warning: Do not watch this video if you are easily annoyed.
[daily log: walking, 1km]
Caveat: on the other hand…
"Unless life also hands you water and sugar, your lemonade is gonna suck." – found online.
[daily log: walking, 5km]
Caveat: Te perdono …/… Thank you
La sirana y el pescador
La sirena se levantó del mar
para verl el mundo seco.
Ella encontró a un pescador en la playa,
esta pez guapa sin red.
Ella tenía la cola reluciente; las escamas
que cubrieron el pecho, los brazos, la cara;
la estala de las olas contruidas de encaja.
El pescador agarró la cola de sirena
y la cortó por la mitad.
"Ahora," él le dijo a ella, "tienes piernas.
¿Por qué no caminas?"
La sirena empezó a cantar al mar
para ayuda, su sangre transformando
la arena de la playa en los arcoiris.
Ella cantó al pescador, "Te perdono,
te perdono, te perdono."
– — –
The mermaid fled the ocean
searching for a better world.
A fisherman found her on the beach,
this pretty fish with no home.
He noted her oily tail; the scales
that covered her breasts, arms, and face;
the frothing waves in her wake.
The fisherman was seized with pity,
and made the mermaid a pair of legs.
"Now," he told her, "you have legs.
Will you walk with me?"
The mermaid began to sing, telling the sea
of her good fortune, transforming
the sand of the beach into rainbows.
She sang to the fisherman, "Thank you,
thank you, thank you."
– Elisa Chavez (American poet, b. ?)
It was posted at a blog by someone who only goes by the online identity "featherquillpen." I don't know much about the poet, and was unable to find much online.
This poem, and its "translation" by the same author, are, together, actually a single poem, because the translation is a painfully inaccurate, deliberate mistranslation. The Spanish part is quite sad, and is essentially the description of a brutal assault by the fisherman on the mermaid. The English part makes it seem like a voluntary experience for which the mermaid is grateful. As others commented (here), the poem is thus a kind of portrayal of the cultural disconnect between Latin American perceptions of Anglo-neocolonialism and the Anglo world's own perception of what they've done. It also is a kind of representation of the ways that American culture (broadly) is currently quite unable to grapple with sexual violence – people can't even agree on the terms of the discussion (i.e. there's mistranslation going on).
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: My Awkward Relationship with Mortality
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Fictional Victorian Doppelgängers for Famous Men
There is a category of things that could be called "Fictional Victorian Doppelgängers for Famous Men." It has at least one member: Wilhelm Heinrich Sebastian Von Troomp. You can read about it at Politco Magazine. These works of childrens' literature by author Ingersoll Lockwood seem very bizarre, but not that different in genre from the subsequent Oz books, really, though apparently of lower quality. But the name of the protagonist is discomfiting.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Paperclips
I did something yesterday that I haven't done in a long time: I became immersed in a rather mind-numbingly stupid game.
In fact, I was led to this game from a philosophical discussion of the AI Paperclip Maximizer problem, in a blog I often read. I suggest you read that, first (it's short).
The game is called, naturally, "Universal Paperclips." It's in the genre of what are called "clicker" games – basically, just webpages with a few clickable controls that allow one to manipulate a kind of limited universe.
The object of the game is to fill the universe with paperclips. You start making one paperclip at a time. Click. Click. Click.
After some time, you develop automation, and then an artificial intelligence to do work for you. And then space exploring-drones, matter-to-paperclip conversion technology, paperclip-to-drone conversion technology. Etcetera. It's entirely text-based. And I spent 10 hours yesterday, filling the universe with paperclips. I believe the specific number of paperclips I produced was on the order of 30,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (30 septendecillion = 3 x 10^54). Perhaps that's current best guess as to the mass of the universe, in grams (and maybe each paperclip weighs about a gram, right?).
But then the game told me I had run out of matter. So I had to stop. Fortunately, it was bedtime.
It was addictive, but it was mostly a one-shot experience, I think – once you've filled the universe with paperclips, you feel satisfied but there is little incentive to keep repeating the experience. That means I don't feel bad recommending the experience to others.
[daily log: paperclips, 30,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000]
Caveat: Confused Poemifying
There was a young man
From Cork who got limericks
And haikus confused
I don't know the origin of this… poem… but it's circulating on the internet. I found it quite funny.
Another unattributable internet-sourced quote, somewhat humorous:
"I have a computer in my pocket that lets me instantly access the entirety of human knowledge. I use it to look at pictures of cats."
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: On The Tasks One Sets For Oneself
[daily log: walking, some distance]
Caveat: Duck Dodgers
What I'm watching on a lazy Sunday.
[daily log: walking, 1.5km]
Caveat: Cold, Colder, Colder… Hot!
Who knew? It turns out that Antarctica has a fire department.
[daily log: walking, 7.5km]
Caveat: Kim Jong Donald
I present this image, which captures current Korean geopolitical angst, without comment. I'm not sure about its origin – somewhere on the internet.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: the life of the Trumpenproletariat
Actually, in the moment, I have nothing much interesting to say. I'm trying to get ready for my departure, Saturday. I have a lot of things to do, because I procrastinate a lot. So my focus is poor.
Meanwhile, for your entertainment, I recommend this humorous and insightful article about the current state of the US political economy (in the vaguely post-marxian sense, I guess), vis-a-vis culture.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: What Bilingualism?
The satirical linguistics website, SpeculativeGrammarian, publishes all kinds of crazy stuff.
This one struck me as particularly funny – it addresses the question of "bilingualism in the Rio Grande Valley" (i.e. southern Texas) – an issue that has seen much attention in the history of sociolinguistics. But of course, this particular satirical approach reaches quite strange results. See if you can detect their fallacious assumptions.
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]
Caveat: Stick with it
Mildly entertaining…
"An Ode to Love" by Brown Bag Films.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: 17776
I ran across a very weird bit of avant-garde science fiction that has been created on a sports news website (SBNation), of all places. This seems unexpected. Anyway, it's a very strange thing – it's not a straightforward sci-fi story, but rather a kind of multimedia "text" in the postmodern sense. Nevertheless, it has a narrative, and the genre is definitely sci-fi.
If you don't like unexpected animations and fiddling with your mouse to make things happen, I don't recommend it, but if you don't mind those things, give it a try: link.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: NATO Chinese Fighter Jets
My selection of ideas for blog posts remains slim.
Here is a bit of bizarre geopolitical trivia: Which NATO air force has mostly Chinese Aircraft? Albania.
Geopolitical winds can shift – sometimes in surprising ways.
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]
Caveat: I am not immune
Apparently, I am not completely immune to that internet thing known, collectively, as cat videos.
This cat's behavior is interesting. How much of this is training, and how much of this is its own cleverness?
[daily log: walking, 8km]
Caveat: This sacred text has been brought to you by the letter ‘A’
Someone has created a version of the first part of the Biblical Book of Genesis using ONLY words that start with the letter 'A.'
1. An advent: ancient archangels architect abstract astronomy and arid asteroids.
2. All asteroids are amorphous and absent; And all asleep across aquatic anarchy. And astral angels advanced across area.
3. And Almighty asked," Appear." And all appeared aglow.
4. And Almighty approved. Aura and absence: an antagonistic arithmetic.
5. An afternoon and aurora, an aeon.
6.And atmosphere and all awash abscinded.
7. Astral air above; aquatic area abased. All as Almighty asserted.
8. Angel's abode appeared. Another afternoon, another aurora. Another aeon.
9. And Almighty authored aquatic archipelagos. Arable acreage appeared.
10. And Almighty approved.
In fact, it's quite poetic.
Alliteratively amazing, actually.
You can read the rest here.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Jumping Out of the Sky
In 1960, a guy name Joe Kittinger jumped out of a high altitude balloon and fell to Earth. I don't think I could ever have the nerve to skydive, but this activity has always fascinated me. I suppose this is the ultimate in skydiving.
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]
Caveat: Smashie O’Smasherson Jr is possibly the most powerful goldfish in all of history
A conceptual artist named Neil Mendoza has created a combination of gadgetry and software that allows his pet goldfish, named Smashie O'Smasherson Jr, to interact with his surroundings with a robotic hammer. I'm not sure the fish is really in on the joke, but some stuff definitely gets smashed. Here is a link. I've embedded the video below.
Perhaps if several generations of goldfish were allowed to grow up in this environment, they'd evolve some interesting behaviors – I could imagine fish going on smashing rampages when hungry, for example.
Surely with technology like this, our future is bright.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: 끌 수 없어
A few days ago, I mentioned the popularity of “dance covers” in Korea. Then yesterday I ran across a very interesting case of cultural diffusion: apparently dance covers of Korean pop music videos are a popular thing in Latin America, especially Mexico. The idea of South Korea exercising cultural “soft power” in Mexico intrigues me, in part due to my longstanding interest in both countries, but also because it’s just so strange, from a broader historical perspective.
Here is a group of Mexican women from the city of Monterrey, doing an almost professional-level dance cover of the Korean group Blackpink’s song “Playing With Fire.” Note that they are even lipsyncing the half Korean half English lyrics. This seems remarkable to me.
Blackpink, “Playing With Fire,” dance cover by Joking Crew.
The original…. What I’m listening to right now.
블랙핑크, “불장난.”
가사.
우리 엄만 매일 내게 말했어
언제나 남자 조심하라고
사랑은 마치 불장난 같아서 다치니까 Eh
엄마 말이 꼭 맞을지도 몰라
널 보면 내 맘이 뜨겁게 달아올라
두려움보단 널 향한 끌림이 더 크니까 Eh
멈출 수 없는 이 떨림은
On and on and on
내 전부를 너란 세상에
다 던지고 싶어
Look at me look at me now
이렇게 넌 날 애태우고 있잖아
끌 수 없어
우리 사랑은 불장난
My love is on fire
Now burn baby burn
불장난
My love is on fire
So don’t play with me boy
불장난
Oh no 난 이미 멀리 와버렸는걸
어느새 이 모든 게 장난이 아닌 걸
사랑이란 빨간 불씨
불어라 바람 더 커져가는 불길
이게 약인지 독인지 우리 엄마도 몰라
내 맘 도둑인데 왜 경찰도 몰라
불 붙은 내 심장에 더 부어라 너란 기름
kiss him will I diss him I
don’t know but I miss him
중독을 넘어선 이 사랑은 crack
내 심장의 색깔은 black
멈출 수 없는 이 떨림은
On and on and on
내 전부를 너란 불길 속으로
던지고 싶어
Look at me look at me now
이렇게 넌 날 애태우고 있잖아
끌 수 없어
우리 사랑은 불장난
My love is on fire
Now burn baby burn
불장난
My love is on fire
So don’t play with me boy
불장난
걷잡을 수가 없는 걸
너무나 빨리 퍼져 가는 이 불길
이런 날 멈추지 마
이 사랑이 오늘 밤을 태워버리게
whooo
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Maximum Grift
The explanation:
First, take this final quote from a 1980 interview with Rona Barrett:
Rona Barrett: If you lost your fortune today what would you do tomorrow?
D****d T***p: Maybe I’d run for president. I don’t know.
Now, add:
his ongoing refusal to release his tax information.
Voilà: President T***p.
… Let's read between the lines:
He lost his fortune. He ran for president. Maximum Grift, QED.
[daily log: walking, 7.5km]
Caveat: and, but no
This made me laugh, quite a bit.
First they came for the verbs, and I said nothing, because verbing weirds language
Then they arrival for the nouns, and I speech nothing, because no verbs
Then they for the descriptive, and I silent because verbless and nounless
Then they for me, and, but no
This very humorous bit of linguistics-based humor has been circulating on the internets. Attribution is vague – the best I could find with google is an attribution of the first two lines to Peter Ellis (whoever that is). I first ran across it mentioned the All Things Linguistic blog, and that links to another tumblr page (tumblr is a kind of social media "lite" blogging host – in fact, the All Things Linguistic blog is in that medium, but I guess its settings are more blog-like and less social-media-like). Finding attribution on tumblr is like jumping down a rabbit hole, and without an active tumblr account mostly I get bombarded with requests to sign up, and I'm not interested in going there. So if whoever actually made this up finds this here without attribution, please don't get upset – I did my best.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Oklo-Boom!
I'd always wondered about this idea, which I recently ran across: a natural nuclear reactor.
Of course, if you understand the principle for how uranium fission works, you know that if enough uranium gets together in one spot, you get what's called 'critical mass' and you will get a fission reaction. So there's no reason, in principle, why it couldn't happen entirely by accident, in the natural world – some uranium deposit getting too dense, by natural geological forces, and, bingo, fission! I just assumed, based on my quite limited understanding, that the odds were too low for it ever actually happen. Yet apparently, it has, and it has been scientifically confirmed. I found some links that led me to this article, at an architecture-related blog I read sometimes. It all seems quite remarkable.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Where to go from here?
"Self-driving cars" are all the rage in certain Silicon Valley circles as an up-and-coming technology.
A conceptual artist explores the shortcomings of relying on not-so-smart robot-minds to try to drive a car. He has actually engineered his own self-driving car, using bits and pieces of existing technology. Then he proceeded to "trap" the car by exploiting its reliance on highway markings to decide where it is OK to drive.
[daily log: walking, 7km]
Caveat: Cause for Optimism
I ran across this quote. I suppose it summarizes my own reasoning as to why I am optimistic about the whole concept of development – in the sense that peoples and nations have no predestination in matters of whether their society develops or not, and to what degree, because policy decisions actually matter. You can't be pessimistic about improving the lives of people in the world, when there is proof that it is more than just random chance, and that decisions taken in a society, by individuals, can lead to substantial differences in outcomes.
"I’m not convinced with these arguments about some nations being predetermined in their development and alien to the concept of democracy and the rule of law.
"The reason I’m quite comfortable with this denial . . . We can move from theory to practice. While we can talk about history and certain influence of historical events to modernity, we can look at the places like Korean Peninsula. The same nation, not even cousins but brothers and sisters, divided in 1950, so that’s, by historical standards, yesterday." – Garry Kasparov, in interview with economist Tyler Cowen.
I guess Kasparov is responding to the idea that Russia is somehow predestined to be authoritarian. Clearly he is rejecting that notion. And I agree. I live within the most stunning example of this line of reasoning. Indeed, it is probably one of the reasons I choose to live here – it imbues me with optimism about human character and destiny.
[daily log: walking, 6.5km]
Caveat: a sufficiently obfuscated version of the UBI
I have long thought that the direction we should be going, in terms of social welfare policy, is what is called a "Universal Basic Income." Switzerland recently flirted with the idea, via its referendum process – my recollection is that it didn't pass (but I'm to lazy to find out if I'm wrong about this).
This strikes me as something we need to talk more about, in the context of cultural sustainability and US politics. I saw this on the marginalrevolution blog a while back (great blog, but for your sanity, don't read the comments). The quote that drew my attention:
[Patrick] COLLISON: Do we just need a sufficiently obfuscated version of the UBI [Universal Basic Income] and then we’re fine?
[Tyler] COWEN: We call it "disability insurance."
In fact, this thought had occurred to me, almost exactly as Cowen phrases it, many years ago when I was still living in the US. It is flattering to have a world-class economist validate my idea – not that I would try to take credit – I only have my own memory of thinking this.
[daily log: walking, 7km]