Curiosity Pill #19
On the future of computing, the nature of the California wildfires, missing universal human experiences, Google searching and the origins of domesticated cats
Our computers are limited by their rock-based architecture
What is a computer, but a complex mixture of minerals animated by electricity and language. Also, the fact that it’s components cannot go smaller and its parts require materials that are rare means we have to look somewhere else for advancement in computing, consider nature as an architect and inspect mould as a replacement for minerals.”The research folders on my very rock-based computer are crammed with papers on plant leaf computing; computing driven by the billiard ball-like collisions of droplets and marbles; the problem-solving algorithms of lettuce seedlings; computing systems built around the behavior of blue soldier crabs, rushing between shade and sunshine on a beach.”
https://massivesci.com/articles/slime-computers/?utm_source=DamnInteresting
Fire Historian on the West Coast Wildfires “California Is Built To Burn"
A great interview with the fire historian and former firefighter, Stephen Pyne, in which we find out why the wildfires in this state are caused mostly by its geography and a sprinkle of global warming.“Fernow also brought with him his Central European convictions. The problem was that the place he grew up in is a temperate climate. It's very unusual in the world because it does not have wet and dry periods regularly. So, the only fires that occur in your part of the world are ones set by people. So, fire was seen as a social problem, a problem of social order and disorder. Fernow looked at the American fire scene and declared that it was all a problem of "bad habits and loose morals.” Well, that’s a great phrase. But it was totally inappropriate.”
What Universal Human Experiences Are You Missing Without Realizing It?
A great rumination on what we can add or detract from our list of daily gratitudes: the ability to imagine things,taste food, smell, enjoy making love, see colors. “I even sort of noticed myself not having emotions, but dismissed that as an odd thing to happen and probably other people were just being really overexuberant about things. Later I learned emotional blunting is a commonly reported side effect of SSRIs and I was probably just really not experiencing emotions. When I came off them it took me several years to get used to having normal-intensity feelings again, but it wasn’t a sudden revelation, like “Wow, I was missing a fundamental human experience for the past several years!” Just a sense of things being different which was hard to cash out.”
dorking (how to find anything on the Internet)
A two minute guide on how to improve your skills on how to use Google’s advanced search in order to find any webpage, emails, info or secrets. Very useful, in many lines of work, and in our everyday browsing.”operators are components of a search query that narrow the results down. You can combine as many as you want in one query. ”
https://www.alec.fyi/dorking-how-to-find-anything-on-the-internet
A Brief History of House Cats
Since when were cats domesticated? While the oldest fossil of a cat found near human settlements(located in Cyprus) dates back to 9000 years ago, it is most likely that cat domestication started nearly 12000 years ago when humans quit their hunter gatherer job and started to farm the land. “The cats invited themselves in, and over time, as people favored cats with more docile traits, certain cats adapted to this new environment, producing the dozens of breeds of house cats known today. In the United States, cats are the most popular house pet, with 90 million domesticated cats slinking around 34 percent of U.S. homes.”
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/a-brief-history-of-house-cats-158390681/
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Video Pill
Can Slime Mould Solve Mazes?
Posters of East Asia | Video Essay
Internet Expert Debunks Cybersecurity Myths
Podcast Pill
Taking the Biscuit: How a long-life ration became the quintessential British comfort food, Podcast: The Food Programme
But there is more to the humble biscuit than comfort. This is a food that helped shape wartime rations, that was front and centre of Britain's factory revolution, that formed the basis for an industry that employed thousands and shaped neighbourhoods
Critic Charles Finch on Reading Hundreds of Books a Year, Pocast: Working
An interview with a book writer and critic on the impact of platforms like Goodreads (where anyone can be a critic) and explains why it’s so hard for people to make a living writing book reviews
https://player.fm/series/series-2355372/critic-charles-finch-on-reading-hundreds-of-books-a-year
Design Pill
Bernhard Lang - Stahlwerk 014
Poetic Pill
We Don't Have to Share a Fate By Gillian Conoley
“...through the words
I address to you, my hand
pressed to yours visibly
much paler
than before, an orchid
offered beneath a warring sky,
an orchid that yawns
and cracks open and falls apart
unexpected in a bed of soft clothes,
where your shoulders became two steps,
dawns fruits rivers and knives,
full glottal, wide lens
and your hands became two countries,
and my legs murmured like grass,
a dumb love,
a tether to all dreams of enduring,
long convoy between two powers
killing the mockery of words
while daylight floats,
orchids, white dogs stretched out between the slow-burning lanterns.“
https://poems.com/poem/we-dont-have-to-share-a-fate/#featured-poet
Underground Pill
Sa-Roc - The Black Renaissance (feat. Black Thought)
“The atom splitter, dark matter, enigmatic figure
Dwell in shadow, then emerge when my genetics triggered
The sleeping giant, the ether supplier, keep 'em wired
So when every verse hit their circuitry, make repeat required
Who fired a live round outta the cartridge?
The foul words written on parchment
High and exalted, police and fire department main culprit
A glimmer in the eye of the target, the mind of a marksman
The word sorceress, preferred source of that black magic
The same orifice that feigned voiceless, then spat acid
The dream eater, the grim reaper, sixteen killer
The sonic boom when an MC and Elohim meet up
The cypher, the grim reaper, the gatekeeper, the late creeper
The street sweeper that think deeper, the complete speaker
The Svengali, went from reefer in the alley
To freakin' with a Somali on the beaches of Malawi
Now he the luminary, the heavy pituitary
Knew it very early on, I'd be the legendary
Hot as Assata, my vocabulary contemporary
Personally autographing every obituary for y'all“
Dictionary Pill
glottal = relating to or produced by the glottis (= an opening in the throat that is closed when you swallow or make particular sounds)
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