2024-02-17
Readings
An exploration of certain assumptions (that I don’t entirely buy - the need for organics from the surface to reach the subsurface ocean seems unnecessary) about the viability of life on Titan: https://www.space.com/titan-ocean-saturn-moon-inhospitable-life-earth-study
UPenn chip fab experiments on optics-based computing: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41566-024-01394-2
An alternative to CRISPR: https://phys.org/news/2024-02-toolbox-genomes-crispr.html
This is not, as described, actually (just) a set of marketing tricks, but rather general business tricks that people should be aware of:
An explainer on Haiti’s political mess:
A story of how people can get seduced into cults:
Challenges in DNA repair specific to telomeres (only abstract available w/o institutional access, sorry): https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adn7791
Current Events
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues, with Ukraine having secured a security deal with Berlin and Paris, and with the ruins of Avdiivka abandoned by Ukraine’s army; worries about the US’s longstanding support for international norms and Ukraine have been raised by former President Trump’s irresponsible statements suggesting he’d give Russia the green light to do whatever it wants and attack NATO allies. Russia saw Putin critic Navalny die in prison, while Russia passed a law allowing for confiscation of assets of people critiquing the military (technically “spreading false information” about them, but that charge routinely is used against critics)
Israel’s invasion of Gaza (and incursions in Lebanon) continue to create misery, sour relations with the west, and create protests within Israel. The planned attacks on Rafa, at the Egyptian border, leaves civilians with few places to go
In a close election, Stubb (centrist coalition) was elected president of Finland
In Indonesia, Subianto (center-right) was elected president
Polls
Pew sees a growing consensus ( https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/02/15/how-americans-view-the-situation-at-the-u-s-mexico-border-its-causes-and-consequences/ ) on immigration issues in the US, with little sympathy for open-borders stances (common among Progressives and many Libertarians); the idea that we need to fix it seems to have also played out in our congressional politics, although Republicans seem to prefer having it as an issue than solving it; Biden’s ask of having legislation allowing for a tighter border was rejected by congressional Republicans because they didn’t want the issue to go away (amusing that he was offering to throw Progressives under the bus, where they belong on this and many other issues).
Gallup finds a shift to the left in the US, but a strongly demographically-tied one ( https://news.gallup.com/poll/609914/women-become-liberal-men-mostly-stable.aspx ) - I don’t like their preferred terminology here (I think they’re using Liberal to mean general-left-thinking, rather than distinguishing various camps on the left like Liberals and Progressives). It’s interesting to see the differences by both age and gender.
Marist did a poll on diversity, DEI, and things like that ( https://maristpoll.marist.edu/polls/diversity-equity-and-inclusion-in-the-united-states/ ); on the first premise, I’m neutral on the idea that a mix of races/ethnicities/religions makes the country stronger because that’s hard to quantify and mechanisms seem hard to pin down. I’m not opposed to diversity, but also not actively interested in it. And like the not-28-percent mentioned there, I don’t strongly support DEI training for US workers; I oppose DEI training entirely (mandatory or otherwise); I don’t think it produces good results and I think it usually produces bad results of varying magnitudes and specifics
Policy Focus
I consider NYC’s Mayor Adams’ recently-announced lawsuit against social media companies for fueling a mental health crisis ( https://www.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/125-24/mayor-adams-lawsuit-against-social-media-companies-fueling-nationwide-youth-mental-health#/0 ) to be bad policy and a misuse of the legal system; the complaint makes few claims that are clearly harms that amount to a tort; they’re just complaints (and shaky ones at that).
The Wall of Shame
(a lot of these this week)
Body-positivity is an unhealthy social movement (started, as these things often go, to the unhealthy excesses of generally healthy distaste towards obesity). Now that we’re entering the era where medications can help reduce obesity, body-positive movements are an impediment to a now-available route to better living for those of us (I am mildly obese and am exploring some of these meds to improve my health and appearance) who need it. https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/of-interest/2024/02/14/ozempic-body-positivity-influencers-weight-loss-drugs/
Company acquisitions rarely work well for consumers; at best they can make a company solvent through either sweeping out bad management or by turning transactions that used to be between businesses more efficient internal transfers; more often we see acquisitions where a lot of people are let go and a year later product lines are killed. Often they’re anticompetitive (but in a slow-walk fashion less visible to regulatory concern). Sony’s acquisition of Crunchyroll, an anime distribution network, is no exception, as they’re set to shut down customer access to content they’ve purchased (possibly with refunds, possibly not) on Crunchyroll’s streaming platform. https://arstechnica.com/culture/2024/02/funimation-dvds-included-forever-available-digital-copies-forever-ends-april-2/
The details of this story have clarifying for a time; the Hugo Awards lost a lot of face from their 2024 event earlier this year where Dave McCarty and others looked through nominees’ statements for anything that might be deemed offensive to China and disqualified them for consideration.
Mark Jacobson, professor at Stanford, used shady legal tactics to stifle critique of his shoddy work, fortunately was forced to pay legal fees of his victims (still shame to him though): https://retractionwatch.com/2024/02/15/stanford-prof-who-sued-critics-loses-appeal-against-500000-in-legal-fees/
Bruce Perens, who did foundational work for the Opensource movement, has stepped away from his original vision to bring on concerns for money flow, proposing new license classes that are not free in order to ensure financial viability for developers (this misses the point of Opensource software - that we don’t need to worry about this kind of thing): https://devclass.com/2024/02/08/preserving-the-magic-of-free-new-types-of-licenses-will-not-solve-open-source-business-model-says-percona-founder/
Reviewlets
The Wounded Sky (Star Trek novella) - I remember this from my early teens, and recently-ish bought a digital copy; having reread it over the last two days, it doesn’t age well. It’s full of ideas that are fine for a kid who doesn’t understand the universe and the place of thoughts in it, but it mistakes the ephemera of human experience for things meaningful to the universe (probably its biggest literary sin, repeated endlessly). It also imagines a universe that’s far more fragile to the prodding of intellect than would be sustainable - if it were canon its universe would fall apart because making superweapons that would destroy stars or large parts of the galxy would be trivial. It still plays with some interesting ideas though; with some moderate it could be cured of its faults. Although nobody probably cares enough about these things but me to bother thinking about that.
Westside Market sushi - I sometimes make my own avocado rolls - it’s possible to prepare the rice exactly how I like and make a lot of them; premade boxes of rolls are a lazy option with a lot less to manage (eating a full avocado’s worth is a lot for one meal, but avocados store badly before they’re cut and far worse after). So these are okay, if a little bland. I have no experience with the varieties that have meat, which is probably not helpful for most people, but this still review still meets my tendency to judge things and contribute to consensus on even very dull things
Lands End 400NI pillowcase - I wasn’t sure how good pillowcases could get and was curious if I could tell the difference. I can’t. It’s just a pillowcase. The pillow beneath still is what really counts.
Amusements
Amusing (yet somehow fascinating) to see this depiction of deep horror:
Daydreams of falling into one of the gaseous planets in the solar system make for good Youtube content, even though to do it well requires a decision on how realistic to be; no craft yet designed would survive much beyond the top part of such a descent (heat, pressure), and even the materials involved would limit how much the remnants would sink (buoyancy); if we just want an uninterrupted tour of the bowels of these bodies, dreaming that we’re descending as an insubstantial ghost or similar would do the job. This video does close to that (although it stops when hitting a true solid):
Speaking of hitting a true solid, a skit about RPGs and bathroom use:
Deep thoughts on speed and time:
A cool and weird NASA program for a simulated Mars mission (one needs a masters degree in a STEM field though): https://phys.org/news/2024-02-martians-nasa-simulated-yearlong-mars.html
Recent Music
Don’t Stare at the Sun - Bad Lip Reading - This is a parody of high school glee club shows (a weird genre of TV), and it is joyous, shameless, and funny. It has a video which has some weird stuff in it if you pay attention
Hooked - Eleisha Eagle - Cabaret style singing, the song composition reminds me of No Doubt