2023-10-21
Readings
We’re alwayes finding ways to replicate (or just follow similar paths) chemical processes found in nature; it’s a solid source of inspiration and partial solutions to a variety of engineering challenges. This describes the production of methane from water and CO2: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsengineeringau.3c00034
A better prosthetic hand: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-10-bionic-merges-user-nervous-skeletal.amp
Bioengineered silkworms for production of incredibly strong silk: https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S2590-2385%2823%2900421-6
A provocative view (that I’ve shared for decades) from David Attenborough that humans should leave more space on the planet for nature; I think we shoullimit both human population growth and certainly human population spread, leaving vast swathes of the planet as permanently natural. Good to see advocacy towards that: https://amp.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/oct/17/david-attenborough-claims-the-amount-of-planetary-space-humanity-takes-up-is-selfish
NASA’s work on better rocket nozzles: https://phys.org/news/2023-10-nasa-rocket-nozzle-paves-deep.amp
We produce far too much plastic that gets used once (if at all - a lot of delivered plastic silverware never gets used) and is then thrown away. For some reason we’re not likely to fix our bad habits, so finding ways to survive them with more eco-friendly plastics for it is a persistent challenge. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-class-recyclable-polymer-materials-day.amp
Thoughts
The urge to “be seen”, and efforts to accommodate it, provides unfortunate side effects alongside the making people feel better. While some people are just starving for a mention, others want favourable press or things that make them feel special. While this is natural (healthy even) in small-numbers social relations, I’d like to find ways to exclude it as a consideration from the largest scale parts of society
Joining the radical openness social movement was an interesting part of my youth, but I now think it resembled a kind of cultural autism and that unlearning its habits is important for people to work well with society. Given that I made it out, like with many other subcultures I’ve wandered through in my youth, I don’t regret the journey, but the journey would’ve been bad had I remained. A few common views that I’ve had to reestablish in myself in adulthood:
You don’t need to correct every misconception out there
You don’t need to be entirely understood by people around you
It is okay to tell white lies (the movie “Big Fish” is great for this)
And an idea I never bought into but some people from that social movement do/did: It’s important not to squick people out by entering certain topics that require buy-in to broach (e.g. sexual preferences)
Jon Stewart lost a lot of his luster for me in the gap between his show (which I liked) and his radio show (which I never got into); when the Liberal-Progressive fault lines widened, he landed more on the Progressive side. Still, like with John Oliver, I’m glad he’s out there. It’s unfortunate to see Apple’s political sensitivities on China be the cause of the end of his show though; while I’m not reflexively anti-China, the country has serious problems relating to its shoddy political system, and I don’t want American cultural producers to make editorial choices based on China not getting free speech and not taking criticism well. https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/20/media/jon-stewart-apple/index.html
Current Events
The Russian invasion of Ukraine continues, with Russia continuing to attempt a symbolic win in taking over a destroyed town in the east. Ukraine continuing otherwise to break Russian lines in a number of places, and NATO patrolling some parts of the Baltic Sea.
Israel-Palestine - Israel is continuing its efforts against Palestinian forces in Gaza, while also surprisingly courting regional war by launching attacks on Lebanon.
In the US, echoes of the Israel-Palestine war have led to enormous public pressure to conform to pro-Israel narratives and avoid protests on behalf of the Palestinians, with companies and universities toying with restricting free speech of their employees/students if they express the wrong views (in my view, it is generally inappropriate for political speech to result in workplace consequences or consequences for students). Donors and owners are weighing in, often leading to messiness along political fault lines in American society
Poland held elections, with the ruling party losing enough seats that an opposition coalition government (that will end up being pro-Europe) is likely to replace it, sweeping culturally far-right Kaczynski out of the PM position.
Ecuador held elections, electing Daniel Noboa (centrist) to the presidency over his (left) competitor.
Argentina faces the possibility of electing an exciting idiot, Javier Milei, next week.
With the illegitimate junta government of Niger not likely to be displaced soon, France is withdrawing from the Country; the junta has announced that it does not intend to let the country’s president leave
Pakistan tested a missile delivery system for its nuclear weapons: https://www.defensenews.com/global/asia-pacific/2023/10/21/pakistan-test-fires-ababeel-nuclear-missile/
Polls
Pew Poll ( https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2023/10/18/how-americans-view-data-privacy/ ) on how worried Americans are about information corporations and the government have on them; I am more concerned about corporate use than government use (I tend to trust our government most of the time because of all the safeguards in it, while corporations have far fewer) and I am not a particularly private person, but I get that if someone is concerned (rationally or not), the degree of power could feel very frightening; perspective is everything when it comes to privacy.
I was pleased to find that a majority of Americans, according to a recent Pew Poll ( https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/10/17/most-americans-dont-closely-follow-professional-or-college-sports/ ), are uninterested in sports. Pleased mostly because it’s a commonality (I have zero interest and don’t follow sports), but it’s complex because these things lead to social cohesion and too little of that leads to problems. I’m frustrated when sports or celebrity end up hogging the news though; if we could see less of that..
Gallup reports ( https://news.gallup.com/poll/512861/media-confidence-matches-2016-record-low.aspx ) that trust in Media continues to decline in the US, which I see as worrying; I think broad trust in society’s institutions is important to keep society working, and that decreased trust breeds radicalism (on both the right and the left - the people reading Jacobin and the people watching OANN are the sampe symptom). Trust must be justified to be worthwhile, but I think what we’re seeing is low trust for institutions that are broadly trustworthy (same with courts, police, law, and so on)
Policy Focus
I’m not generally opposed to gentrification, but it’s interesting to see collective land ownership advocated as a way to limit it in the US; I’m still thinking through the positives and negatives of this mechanism:
The Wall of Shame
Neuroscience News falls into mysticism and nonsense, in the particular flavour (a problem worldwide, with ever varying specifics) of seeking to boost the self-esteem of those tied to backwards “indigenous knowledge” (see also Hindutva and Maori “knowledge”). https://neurosciencenews.com/indigenous-consciousness-24948/
Reviewlets
Lords of the Fallen (video game) - An entertaining and worthy soulslike (so far). Some cool ideas, but otherwise it feels a lot like Dark Souls 3 in terms of the game engine and general feel (so far). Elden Ring has advanced Soulslikes in ways that LOTF hasn’t caught up on (no surprise given that it was in development before ER’s release. Having fun, enjoying the innovations, but on some level I wish I were playing Elden Ring when I’m playing it.
AC Mirage (video game) - Surprisingly a lot better than most recent games of the sort - it’s shorter (I played all the way through already), focused, and with improved mechanics. The game has some educational bits that are nicely integrated and encouraging, and near the very end of the game it digs into the series lore (which otherwise is absent throughout the game). It still suffers from the series problem of helping the player far too much, but so long as not too many other companies follow Ubisoft’s lead, that’s not a problem
The Women and the Warlords (Hugh Cook fantasy novel) - I’m now really invested in the author, this world, and his storytelling, but I can see why the low fantasy (particularly the ugly parts of human nature it drags through) wouldn’t be for everyone. This book in particular has little fantasy (so far, at least), being mostly a medieval slog in a made-up world.
A Certain Justice (legal philosophy) - This gets into the differences in philosophy and public perception between the western legal systems I’m familiar with and those of China; I’m still early into it, but I already found some insights and key facts that I like. One thing that may be an error and may be something they’ll get into later is lack of consideration of the role of the pardon and administrative leeway in law enforcement/interpretation in Western societies, something that at least as of now might be a partial counterexample to the author’s points. I admire the author for managing to step back enough to really see some difference in the roots of common perception on these topics though (for example, the relationship between law and justice).
Amusements
A nice article about the minilanguage inside Elden Ring, and the difficulty of cross-language humour: https://www.ign.com/articles/elden-ring-messages-memes-translation-fort-night
Armstrong and Miller’s take on old school vampires having trouble adapting to modernity:
A touching and funny sponsored long-term animated skit on Lords of the Fallen (see videogame above) from Joel Haver:
Renfield laughter comparison from Mel Brooks’ Dracula and the 1931 inspiration:
Old TV switchover to colour broadcasting:
Recent Music
Queen of Hearts - Kill Shelter - Really, really voice-heavy for its kind of goth-industrial. The song’s a bit of a mess and rough to listen to twice in a row, but it’s interesting and surprising that it kind-of works
Good Help is So Hard to Find - Death Cab for Cutie - A more upbeat song than their usual (the sadness is in the lyrics), it also has a music video that’s almost unrelated to the lyrics but sad in an entirely different way. I like that the different parts of the song feel like they’ve constructed instruments out of sound sequences (foregoing some variation that most songs don’t use anyhow, to allow for cohesion of each meta-instrument).
Super Silent - Nathan Hall and David Bernabo - Sparse jazz, meditative.