December 14, 2016
GM Mosquitoes: What Could Go Wrong?
Inside the insectary - "These gene drives, they're able to copy themselves. So instead of half of the offspring inheriting the gene drive, almost all of them do. So what happens is that it spreads and it spreads and it spreads. And this is the fantastic thing. Because it allows that gene to be selfish in a population. And in a very short amount of time you can actually transform an entire wild population into a modified population. It's powerful." (previously: 1,2,3)
“You wake up thirsty.”
This Is Your Life, Brought to You by Private Equity [The New York Times] Since the financial crisis, the private equity industry has become hugely influential. As part of our series on what that means, here’s how the industry’s influence plays out in your daily life. [more inside]
Hallelujah
Pentatonix We can spend this time debating "best versions", or we can enjoy the diversity... This one made me smile...
Laissez Prayer: When American business got religion
So a bunch of American business leaders go to a meeting in a fancy New York City hotel. They don't know that they're about to become warriors for the salvation of the American economy in a battle against the forces of the New Deal, but there they are: the newly-minted Christian-Libertarian soldiers of Rev. James Fifield's Spiritual Mobilization movement. It's 1940, and this is what happened next. [more inside]
Do you take cream and sugar in your goatse?
McDonald's is challenging Starbucks this year, not with a new coffee drink but with an unfortunate cup design. And if you poke a hole in the cup, it becomes—well, let Fake Morgan Freeman show you. [more inside]
“Leaks do not invalidate government secrecy; they depend upon it.”
What’s striking… is that the man who defined the modern category of whistle-blower was the sort who gave career advice to Henry Kissinger. Ellsberg was an insider—and that fact puts him in stark contrast with the man who has come to be seen as his heir, Edward Snowden.
Writing for The New Yorker and heavily referencing David E. Pozen’s HBR paper “The Leaky Leviathan”, Malcolm Gladwell compares and contrasts the “leaker” and “hacker” attitudes of these two activists and how their choices fit the politics of their moments: “Daniel Ellsberg, Edward Snowden, and the Modern Whistle-Blower”
Writing for The New Yorker and heavily referencing David E. Pozen’s HBR paper “The Leaky Leviathan”, Malcolm Gladwell compares and contrasts the “leaker” and “hacker” attitudes of these two activists and how their choices fit the politics of their moments: “Daniel Ellsberg, Edward Snowden, and the Modern Whistle-Blower”
"California will launch its own damn satellite."
With Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson as one of the few people in the incipient Trump Cabinet who even acknowledges climate change, and Trump planning to shut down climate science, and building enemy lists of federal workers, California Governor Jerry Brown stands up at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union to proclaim that "truth will prevail". And promises a California space program if necessary. Video.
Romance and 'Romantic Fantasy' in Tabletop Roleplaying Games
"What I want to call attention to is this: for almost eight hundred years, English used the same word for 'a fantastical tale of true love' and for 'a fantastical tale of magic and adventure', and that word was romance." [more inside]
I'm designed to be superficially damaged.
[Audio Link] "You Had One Job" by Scott Brown is a short story about MILES (Mobile Intermediary Legate - Extreme Situations), a cheerful bomb disposal robot who likes helping people. The story was read by Jeremy Shamos as Act 3 of the December 2 episode of podcast This American Life, "Once More, With Feeling." SPOILERS for "You Had One Job" inside. [more inside]
It's not cold outside; you just don't know how to dress
How do humans deal with and survive extreme cold? Your best defense is knowing how to dress. "The Protective Combat Uniform emphasizes durability and functionality and has been described as the best cold weather clothing system ever developed. The primary operational theory for how it works requires some understanding of physics, so buckle in." [more inside]
Simply Having a Ghost-Induced Nervous Breakdown
Action star Lunge Dolphin counts down his favorite Christmas films to help you get in the holiday spirit. (SLYT)
Brain, Word, and Man: Machine
The story of how Google Brain improved Google Translate using neural networks. In nine months, the new technique was able to improve translations more than a team of human engineers had managed in ten years. This article describes how this was possible, and what it means for the future of artificial intelligence. Featuring a crash course in the history of A.I.; supercillious cats; and a cameo by John Searle. (SLNYT).
Enigmas, Logogriphs, Charades, Rebuses, Queries and Transpositions
It is thus confidently hoped, that the volume now offered to the public will prove an interesting and cheerful companion for a Christmas fire-side, and be employed among the innocent and rational of Christmas festivities...Selections from The Masquerade collects hundreds of riddles and literary word puzzles from the late 18th and early 19th century. [more inside]
A public service announcement
One Room
Make a game in 48 hours, by yourself, from scratch. Or as a team, in 72 hours. Ludum Dare 37 ran last weekend, on the theme of "One Room". Thousands participated, from seasoned developers to complete novices. Some common topics included Roombas (123456) and Donald Trump (123). See inside for recommendations... [more inside]
ḌȰỌꟽ ƦɆᶊůƦƦΣℭȾΣƉ
Noclip made a documentary about the challenges of making Doom 2016: To Hell and Back 🕱 Designing a First Impression 🕱 Guns, Guitars & Chess on Mars
Programs aren’t models of the world but takes on the world
Programming is Forgetting: Toward a New Hacker Ethic - Allison Parrish
In the process of programming, or scanning or sampling or digitizing or transcribing, much of the world is left out or forgotten. Programming is an attempt to get a handle on a small part of the world so we can analyze and reason about it. But a computer program is never itself the world. [more inside]
Homo erectus has clitorises, too.
You've probably heard that humans are lacking a penis bone, the baculum. But did you know that we also lack a clitoral bone?
Made in China 2025
China has launched a high-tech revolution: Beijing has devised an industrial masterplan named "Made in China 2025" and is investing billions to turn China into one of the leading industrial countries by 2049. As the latest MERICS Paper on China shows, China's ambitious strategy is starting to bear fruit. Industrial countries like Germany and the United States have to be prepared for strong competition.
Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?
Pigs!!!! In!!!! Spaaaaaaaaace!!!!!!!!! For the first time in over 20 years, First Mate Piggy, Captain Link Hogthrob, and Dr. Julius Strangepork come back to the screen with an all-new adventure that will get under your skin.
The Destruction of the Kelp
Kelp is a large seaweed that grows in underwater forests along temperate coasts, sustaining many marine species in turn. The Kelp Highway Hypothesis postulates that Pacific Rim kelp forests and the wealth of fish, mammals and birds that they supported sustained maritime hunter-gatherers spreading into the New World 16,000 years ago. Kelp species play an important role in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean cuisines, and fuelled the production of soda ash in the Scottish Highlands and islands until the industry's collapse in the 19th century, which in turn fuelled emigration to North America and beyond. Charles Darwin wrote of the kelp forests of Tierra del Fuego that "if in any country a [terrestrial] forest was destroyed, I do not believe nearly so many species of animals would perish as would here, from the destruction of the kelp". [more inside]
Cicada 3301 is a years-long internet enigma
The journalistic what, who, when, where, why are mysterious here. It might be a game or a puzzle or a recruitment tool. There is a website. The first clue was in January of 2012. There have been clues posted, mostly in January, mostly on internet discussion boards although in 2016 it was on twitter. Mark Molloy in The Telegraph on 16 January 2016 might have the best two minute summary: Who is behind Cicada 3301? A brief history of the hardest puzzle on the internet. [more inside]
4-4 should happen twice before the end of the world
Jon Bois, America's greatest living poet, presents a more analytical piece from his "Chart Party" series: Scorigami, or the story of every NFL final score that has ever happened. [more inside]
"I remember being impressed with myself."
How to Be Cool — A comic by Meghan Lands
Christmas Songs You Won't Hear At The Mall
This seems like a good start. I'm sure we can add to the list!
Texting W. V. O. Quine...
'Death in L.A. can be an odd undertaking'
"So here you are, dead and alone. Chances are you didn’t want this, but your wishes were ignored. Whatever happens to the part of you that you recognize as somehow quintessentially you (call it soul, self, spirit, spark), the other part isn’t finished yet—the fleshly part, the limbs and guts that ached and pleased you in so many ways, the meaty bits that you vainly or grudgingly dragged around for all those years. That piece is still of interest to the bureaucrats. It is still a potential source of profit. In your absence its journey is just beginning." ~ What Really Happens After You Die?
I Wanna Be In the Thread Where Data Analysis Happens
« Previous day | Next day »