2024-03-19

Worthy

• A Society That Lost Focus

  The root problem is that, for the first time in human history, our brain is the bottleneck. For all history, transmitting information was slow. Brains were fasts. After sending a letter, we had days or months to think before receiving an answer. Erasmus wrote his famous "Éloge de la folie" in several days while travelling in Europe. He would never have done it in a couple of hours in a plane while the small screen in the backseat would show him advertisements.

  There’s no silver bullet. There will not be any technological solution. If we want to claim back our focus and our brain cycles, we will need to walkaway and normalise disconnected times. To recognise and share the work of those who are not seeking attention at all cost, who don’t have catchy slogans nor spectacular conclusions. We need to start to appreciate harder works which don’t offer us immediate short-term profit. Our mind, not the technology, is the bottleneck. We need to care about our minds. To dedicate time to think slowly and deeply.

• "Pinnipeds sealed their fate" Occasional paper: When Armor Met Lips — Crooked Timber

  What happened halfway through the Age of Mammals? Well, here’s one clue: the nautiloids’ long retreat showed a pattern. It wasn’t everywhere and all at once. They disappeared first in the northern arctic regions; then in the Antarctic; then in temperate zones; finally across most of the tropics except that one small patch. This pattern suggested a culprit: a warm-blooded predator that evolved in the Arctic and then spread around the world.

  A seal can grab a shelled prey, and puncture the shell with sharp strong teeth — and then just schlorp out the tasty meat inside. The technical term for this is “suction feeding”. Pinnipeds generally are good at it, and some are so good that they prefer to eat shelly prey — clams, crabs, mussels, whatever — and don’t eat much else. Stuff that lives on or near the ocean floor — clams, crabs, lobsters, and such — could evolve various defensive and avoidance strategies. But free-floating armored cephalopods? All they had was a quick burst of speed, and that wouldn’t help much against a hot-blooded predator that could maintain high speeds much longer.

  And everything else matches, too. Pinnipeds evolved about thirty million years ago. They showed up first in the colder parts of the northern hemisphere, then in the Antarctic, then in temperate zones. Even today, although there are some tropical species, they’re mostly cold-to-cool water creatures.

etc

• (Video) PGA golfer penalized after putt dangles 40 seconds on hole rim

• (2015) Garage Door Torsion Spring Replacement

Horseshit

• The Rise of Western Individualism

  WEIRD people are hyper-individualistic, self-obsessed, nonconformist, analytical, and value consistency. We try to be “ourselves” across social contexts and prize “authenticity.” In addition to valuing behavioral consistency, WEIRD people are more likely to feel guilt than shame. In contrast, non-WEIRD people are more likely to experience shame as opposed to guilt. Shame is the result of not living up to the expectations of one’s community. Guilt is a private emotion that results from falling short of our own expectations, rather than the community’s.

  Delayed gratification also appears to be more prevalent in WEIRD societies. When researchers offered WEIRD people the choice between a smaller monetary payment up front, or a larger sum later, they tended to choose the larger sum. In contrast, most non-WEIRD people preferred the immediate, smaller, reward.

Boeing

• FAA Audit Finds Boeing 737 Mechanics Using Hotel Card and Dish Soap as Tool

• United's string of scary safety events likely has nothing to do with Boeing

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Ex-Ford CEO warns of 'real financial trouble' for EV startups

• Why EVs are now almost as cheap as gas cars

• Hertz CEO out following electric car 'horror show'

• Most People Don’t Trust Autonomous Vehicles.

Obit

• Astronaut Thomas Stafford, commander of Apollo 10, has died at age 93.

Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering

• How Trump’s Allies Are Winning the War Over Disinformation - The New York Times

  Those involved draw financial support from conservative donors who have backed groups that promoted lies about voting in 2020. They have worked alongside an eclectic cast of characters, including Elon Musk, the billionaire who bought Twitter and vowed to make it a bastion of free speech, and Mike Benz, a former Trump administration official who previously produced content for a social media account that trafficked in posts about “white ethnic displacement.” (More recently, Mr. Benz originated the false assertion that Taylor Swift was a “psychological operation” asset for the Pentagon.)

• On Today’s Absurd New York Times Hit Piece - by Matt Taibbi

  The Times implies both the Twitter Files reports and my congressional testimony with Michael Shellenberger were strongly influenced by former Trump administration official Mike Benz, whose profile occupies much of the text. Benz is described as a purveyor of “conspiracy theories, like the one about the Pentagon’s use of Taylor Swift,” that are “talking points for many Republicans.” They quote Shellenberger as saying meeting Benz was the “Aha moment,” in our coverage, and the entire premise of the piece is that Benz and other “Trump allies” pushed Michael, me, and the rest of the Twitter Files reporters into aiding a “counteroffensive” in the war against disinformation, helping keep social media a home for “antidemocratic tactics.”

• Supreme Court To Hear Arguments In Biden Admin’s Censorship Of Social Media Posts | ZeroHedge

  The U.S. Supreme Court will soon hear oral arguments in a case that concerns what two lower courts found to be a “coordinated campaign” by top Biden administration officials to suppress disfavored views on key public issues such as COVID-19 vaccine side effects and pandemic lockdowns.

• Supreme Court social media case pits disinformation against censorship

• Oz: Social media giants must report efforts against terrorist and extremist content

TikTok

• As We Debate TikTok, We See CIA Was Using Chinese Social Media Against Their Gov

Musk

• The Elon Musk interview that got Don Lemon's show canceled

• Musk Says His Ketamine Prescription Is in Investors' Best Interests

• Elon Musk has replied to Ian Miles Cheong 82 times in the last 30 days

• Elon Musk's xAI releases Grok source and weights, taunting OpenAI

• Elon and the Daleks

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• Study: "Woke" attitudes linked to anxiety, depression, and a lack of happiness

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• 94% of Stanford's Elevators Have Expired Permits

• What the Data Says About Pandemic School Closures, Four Years Later - The New York Times

  Today, there is broad acknowledgment among many public health and education experts that extended school closures did not significantly stop the spread of Covid, while the academic harms for children have been large and long-lasting. While poverty and other factors also played a role, remote learning was a key driver of academic declines during the pandemic, research shows — a finding that held true across income levels.

• The 16 worst-paying college majors, five years after graduation.

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Apple Must Face Suit Claiming AirTags Are Weapon of Stalkers

• Lossless Audio Does Not Sound Better Than MP3

• AT&T says leaked data of 70M people is not from its systems

• Sony's PS5 Pro is up to three times faster, may arrive holiday 2024

• Encyclopaedia Britannica Seeking $1B Valuation in IPO

• LinkedIn plans to add gaming to its platform

• FCC Still Trying to Prevent Anti-Competitive Landlord – Broadband Monopoly Deals

• YouTube now requires to label their realistic-looking videos made using AI

• Pornhub pulls out of a Seventh State, Texas

• Publishing Models That Rely on Gig Workers Are Bad for Everybody

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• Pi calculated to 105T digits, smashing world record

• The return of the frame pointers | Hacker News

• RP2040 Boot Sequence

• The F Number On A Lens Means Something? Who Knew!

  • comment:

  A hour in the library could have saved her months in the lab.’ Next she will spend more months in the lab before learning how CCDs control exposure and how that relates to shutter speed and equivalent ISO#. Datasheets are your friend. Generally speaking ‘too much light’ is not an issue. Just push the CCD closer (if possible) and speed up the exposure. Use a faster scanning CCD if you have to. Use an aperture to gain depth of field,

• C++ creator rebuts White House warning

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• Doctors are turning medical generative AI into a booming business

• Once "too scary" to release, GPT-2 gets squeezed into an Excel spreadsheet

• Chinese and western scientists identify ‘red lines’ on AI risks

  A group of renowned international experts met in Beijing last week, where they identified “red lines” on the development of AI, including around the making of bioweapons and launching cyber attacks. In a statement seen by the Financial Times, issued in the days after the meeting, the academics warned that a joint approach to AI safety was needed to stop “catastrophic or even existential risks to humanity within our lifetimes”.

• Nvidia unveils flagship AI chip, the B200, aiming to extend dominance

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• The US government seems serious about developing a lunar economy

• While Earth enjoys an eclipse, a NASA probe is ready to ‘touch the sun’

Crypto con games

• The more complex crypto seems, the higher the pyramid schemes can go

Economicon / Business / Finance

• U.S. economy faces 1970s-style stagflation as inflation sticks around.

• Why auto insurance costs are rising at the fastest rate in 47 years.

  “In general, the numbers of crashes, injuries, and fatalities are up, and inflation has made the cost of repairs more expensive,” AAA spokesperson Robert Sinclair told Yahoo Finance.

• Tech Job Seekers Without AI Skills Face a New Reality: Low Salaries, Fewer Roles

• US Volkswagen workers file for union election to join United Auto Workers

• Former Sam Adams brewery employees suing to overturn noncompete agreements

• Once America's Hottest Housing Market, Austin Is Running in Reverse

• Telegram raises $330M fresh capital through bond sales

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• Congressman Apologizes After Voting for TikTok Ban, Wants the Yelling to Stop

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Niger Severs Ties With US Military After Alarm Raised Junta Will Supply Uranium To Iran | ZeroHedge

• 5-year study finds no brain abnormalities in 'Havana Syndrome' patients

  • New Havana Syndrome Studies Find No Evidence of Brain Injuries - The New York Times

World

• Uber to pay $272M to Australian taxi operators

• Cubans in eastern city of Santiago protest blackouts and food shortages

• Egypt sells off its land and infrastructure to Gulf countries

• Battle over deep-sea mining heats up

• Filipino police free slaves toiling in romance scam operation

• Damaged undersea cables disrupting Africa's internet will take weeks to repair

• Commercial Bank of Ethiopia glitch lets customers withdraw millions

Israel

• Israel under pressure to justify its use of AI in Gaza

• Israel asks ICJ not to order new measures over looming famine in Gaza

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• New Tech Scare over NATO Ally After Russian Tapping Fiasco

• Russia's air strikes on Ukraine aimed using satellite images from US companies (Archive)

• West decries Putin's election win, China, India vow closer ties

• Putin Warns Of 'Full-Scale WW3' If West Sends Troops To Ukraine | ZeroHedge

• NATO personnel already in Ukraine for arms control, intelligence operations

• Volkov attack signals Russia's return to cold war-era spying in Europe

China

• China Working on Giant Rail Gun to Shoot Astronauts Into Space.

• Largest solar manufacturer to cut one-third of workforce

Health / Medicine

• Our bacteria are more personal than we thought, new study shows

• Mystery in Japan as dangerous streptococcal infections soar to record levels

• From anxiety to cancer, the evidence against ultra-processed food piles up (text only)

  A study published in the British Medical Journal finds people who consume high amounts of these foods have an increased risk of anxiety, depression, obesity, metabolic syndrome, certain cancers including colorectal cancer and premature death. The data come from more than 9 million people who participated in dozens of studies, which researchers analyzed as part of umbrella review. "Taking the body of literature as a whole, there was consistent evidence that regularly eating higher – compared to lower – amounts of ultra-processed foods was linked to these adverse health outcomes," says study author Melissa Lane, of Deakin University in Australia.

  • "evidence piles up" well of course it does. Who is paying for studies to show the benefits of processed foods? The time individuals don't have to spend preparing their meals, the energy they don't buy and the fuel they don't burn to cook these items; surely those social and environmental factors should be added to the balance, when we weigh the costs and benefits? Imagine someone does start studies to publicize the benefits of industrial foods. Imagine the NPR headlines about "Science for Sale" and how the industry is buying propaganda.

• Does MSG cause headache?: a systematic review of human studies

• Online orders begin for first over-the-counter birth control pill in the US

• Intermittent fasting linked to a 91% higher risk of cardiovascular death

• Breast self-exams aren't recommended anymore. Here's why.

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• Successful Reforestation Is Keeping the Eastern U.S. Cooler

• The US Needs Wildland Firefighters More Than Ever, but Government Is Losing Them

• Scientists can now remove nanoplastics from our water with 94% efficiency

• Potty Trained Cows Are No Joke for the Climate

  While grand experiments around the world are being tested to prevent disastrous global warming, including giant machines sucking up CO2 and large-scale seagrass restoration, the researchers from the University of Auckland and Germany’s Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN) say that potty training — or as they term it, “learned control of urinary reflexes” — is an “original and hitherto unrealized opportunity” in the fight against global warming.

  scientific modeling carried out by Dutch researchers has found that capturing 80 percent of cattle urine in latrines could lead to a 56 percent reduction in ammonia emissions. Researchers say that if 10 or 20 percent of global cow urinations were collected, it would significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and nitrate leaching.

• New tool takes the globe's "pulse" as temperatures rise

• Harvard has halted its long-planned atmospheric geoengineering experiment

• New EU directive will make companies legally liable for environmental damage

• EPA bans asbestos, a deadly carcinogen still in use decades after partial ban

  • EPA bans the most common form of cancer-causing asbestos - The Washington Post

  The federal ban comes more than 30 years after EPA first tried to rid the nation of asbestos, but was blocked by a federal judge. While the use of asbestos in manufacturing and construction has declined since, it remains a significant health threat. “Folks, it’s been a long road. But with today’s ban, EPA is finally slamming the door on a chemical so dangerous that it has been banned in more than 50 countries,” said EPA administrator Michael Regan.

  • Chrysotile asbestos banned in the US after decades of EPA efforts

• Climate change is fuelling the US insurance problem

• Global ocean heat has hit a new record every single day for the last year

• Saudi Aramco CEO says world should abandon 'fantasy' of phasing out oil

• Where the wild things went during the pandemic

• Beach erosion has Atlantic City casinos desperately seeking sand by summer