John L. Taylor @johnnylogic@qoto.org

The science behind the self-organizing beauty of snowflakes.

#Beauty, #Nature, #Physics, #SelfOrganization, #Video

This is a fascinating documentary about the Antikythera mechanism, a 2,000-year-old mechanical computer. I was aware of the mechanism and its place in computing history, but this documentary tells of the intellectual adventure of the mechanism’s initial discovery, and the gradual discernment of its origins, operations, and purpose through the combined efforts of mathematicians, archeologists, astronomers, radiologic technologists and historians of science. Highly recommended if ancient technology, the history of computing, or scientific sleuthing is your thing.

#Antikythera, #Computing, #Greece, #History, #Technology #Video

Yoel Roth, the former Head of Trust and Safety for Twitter, shared his thoughts on Musk’s handling of Twitter and the reasons for his departure while speaking at a Knight Foundation conference. He largely just confirms what we all know from following the debacle, though he does demonstrate a good practice for personal and professional life– defining clear boundaries:

“Before Musk took over Twitter, Roth wrote down several commitments to himself that would trigger the decision to quit. One limit, he said — one that was never reached — was that Roth would refuse to lie for Musk. Another limit, one that was ultimately reached and drove his decision to resign, was ‘if Twitter starts being ruled by dictatorial edict rather than by a policy.’”

#Boundaries, #Safety, #SocialMedia, #Technology, #Trust, #Twitter

Key changes in popular music have virtually disappeared in the last fifteen years. This article discusses the factors at play.

#Data, #Music, #PopularMusic

This visualization attempts to represent Elon Musk’s extreme wealth, and it is frankly obscene.

#Inequality, #Musk, #Wealth

One of the great pleasures of my regular park walks is running into wildlife like this barred owl. The photo looks a bit painterly because I had to zoom in on a low-quality camera phone.

#Nature, #Owl, #Walking

“[The] Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities… Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”
– Robert F. Kennedy, Remarks at the University of Kansas

#Economics, #GDP, #Measurement, #Quote, #Quotes, #Values

As John Tyler Bonner, a professor of ecology put it, slime molds are “no more than a bag of amoebae encased in a thin slime sheath, yet they manage to have various behaviors that are equal to those of animals who possess muscles and nerves with ganglia – that is, simple brains.”

#Biology, #Learning, #SlimeMold

Slime molds are fascinating. They can live as single-celled organisms or work together as a colony that differentiates functions and exhibits learning behaviors without having anything like a brain. Training one slime mold and then allowing it to fuse with another transmits the training with the new slime mold.

#Biology, #Learning, #SlimeMold, #Video