2022-04-02
Readings
Concrete is bad for the environment (particularly WRT CO2 emissions), but we’re (for now) stuck using it for a lot of construction. There may be ways to integrate some benefits into it as a design choice; this covers a paper (sadly journal-paywalled) on the topic of recycling tires into concrete, which can give it some usefully different properties: https://phys.org/news/2022-03-lab-slab-rubber-concrete-flexes.html
I wasn’t aware of the concept of zero-knowledge proofs before; doing so takes some work and may be limited to certain problem domains, but it’s a very neat idea (and there’s a neat paper mentioned that I’ll need to read carefully)
Promising approaches to understanding how HIV replicates in the human body, and genetic variation that may affect that: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2022-04-crispr-hiv-technique-human-blood.html
The concept of Mojibake has a lot of interesting cultural baggage and practice tied to it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mojibake
Unprompted Thoughts
One of the things we might or might not get to do, as a species, is to plumb the limits of reality - with a million years of civilisation, assuming it maintains the ability to do science, how mutable (or mistaken) are the current apparent limits to our presence, our ability to reshape our environment, and perhaps even things that seem to be constant (or unreal) like mathematics? Would a million years of decent scientific and technological advance let us move faster than light, or rehape reality itself, or are those hard limits that our future selves would need to deal with? I don’t see a way to know this without making sure we last that long, and as an individual I know I won’t exist long enough for answers. There are the usual “safest bets” that we have - to go by mainstream scientific consensus for every field, but that’s mostly necessary for pragmatic reasons and topics - things nearer what we should do now. Over such expanses of time and future knowledge, I think it’s less reliable a means.. And time isn’t a guarantee of progress - a new dogmatism may own future eras, perhaps even a productive one, that limits our ability to understand some things.
I did a video of my thoughts on various Star Trek series:
Current Events
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has stalled, with Ukraine beginning to retake territory around its capital and elsewhere, and Russia attempting to refocus on holding ground in Ukraine’s east. I remain frustrated at a western unwillingness to join the war on Ukraine’s side, as Russia looks to be bringing in external militia. In the meantime, Russia has been trying to use its oil pipeline and space station to lessen sanctions, doing face ceasefires, and demanding cities surrender in order not to be shelled
I was disturbed to read that heart monitors in chess matches started to become a thing about five years ago and are now fairly common; I find it creepy, invasive, and think it’d probably be best if chess federations were to ban the practice - https://en.chessbase.com/post/players-heart-rate-in-chess-broadcasts
Serbia and Hungary are both undergoing big elections, with the next French presidential election about a week away. In the latter, Macron seems to have a reasonable lead, but I am troubled to see Marine Le Pen and Melenchon are the next two alternatives in the rankings; it doesn’t seem to be a healthy sign for French politics that extremists are so prominent and potentially close to the office (in my view, it would be a relief if Macron and Pecresse were the two primary choices)
Reviewlets
Weird West (video game) - I ordinarily don’t go for realtime strategy games with a top view, but the sense of humour and adventure so far is carrying this for me. What they’re trying to do is jam together a lot of genres, and it works (although inventory management is, predictably, a drag). It reminds me a bit of West of Loathing (another comedic take on the western genre, and a spin-off to venerable online game Kingdom of Loathing). I’m not very far in (and will likely start over a few times while I figure out the mechanics and maybe not spend lots of time burying everyone who dies - the game is full of actions that are probably pointless). Good so far.
Pu Singling - Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio (short story collection) - This is a set of short stories from Chinese folklore, some about a paragraph long, some a few pages. It’s enjoyable, although for many of them I wish they were a little longer. The flavour of the stories varies a lot - some are horror, some are weird anecdotes.
Leonardo Sciascia - A ciascuno il suo - I’ve had this on my bedtable for ages - it’s a piece of weird italian political/detective satire that’s another one of those antidotes to the bad plots the Catholic League of Decency shoved into American fiction (primarily film, admittedly) - the critique of human character is continual and delicious
Amusements
Very cool video demonstrating a trinket that creates a smoke flow that resembles a waterflow:
An opinionated and funny review of (mostly British) teas:
A great april fools, where Luke Ranieri does a variant of his occasional “speak Latin to Italians” to talk to Italian ducks:
The tension between high cuisine and popular cuisine gets skewered a bit:
Recent Music
Letters to Cleo - Co-Pilot - This feels like it’s pop music that’s secretly country music with a kind of 40s diner feel.
Dave Brubeck - Unsquare Dance
Muse - Plug In Baby - I admire the ability to transition from the great intro to the main body of the song - it wouldn’t be obvious that the two parts of the song need each other, but they reuse the feel of the intro for some of the later transitions in the song
They Might be Giants - Snail Shell - I’ve had this song stuck in my head for decades - gently but persistently