timorl @timorl@qoto.org

two kinds of dwarf fortress fights:
- the -cotton ball- fractures the skull, bruising the brain!
- 50-year long colossus siege

Sketch of The Analytical Engine invented by Charles #Babbage.

The notes of #AdaLovelace are really REALLY something any programmer should read.

In particular, the famous Note G first lines are prophetic.

```
It is desirable to guard against the possibility of exaggerated ideas that might arise as to the powers of the Analytical Engine. In considering any new subject, there is frequently a tendency, first, to overrate what we find to be already interesting or remarkable; and, secondly, by a sort of natural reaction, to undervalue the true state of the case, when we do discover that our notions have surpassed those that were really tenable.

The Analytical Engine has no pretensions whatever to originate anything. It can do whatever we know how to order it to perform. It can follow analysis; but it has no power of anticipating any analytical relations or truths. Its province is to assist us in making available what we are already acquainted with. This it is calculated to effect primarily and chiefly of course, through its executive faculties; but it is likely to exert an indirect and reciprocal influence on science itself in another manner. For, in so distributing and combining the truths and the formulæ of analysis, that they may become most easily and rapidly amenable to the mechanical combinations of the engine, the relations and the nature of many subjects in that science are necessarily thrown into new lights, and more profoundly investigated. This is a decidedly indirect, and a somewhat speculative, consequence of such an invention. It is however pretty evident, on general principles, that in devising for mathematical truths a new form in which to record and throw themselves out for actual use, views are likely to be induced, which should again react on the more theoretical phase of the subject. There are in all extensions of human power, or additions to human knowledge, various collateral influences, besides the main and primary object attained.
```

http://www.fourmilab.ch/babbage/sketch.html

I will be talking tomorrow at 6pm CEST about data colonialism, and how data extraction affects commonality in and outside of technological practice.
https://www.mybehavioralsurplus.org/projects/howtostaywiththetrouble

Gisteren heeft het Europees Parlement de verordening over #chatcontrol aangenomen: een trieste dag voor iedereen die vertrouwt op vrije en vertrouwelijke communicatie en advies, waaronder slachtoffers van misbruik en journalistieke bronnen. #surveillance

Zo hebben de fracties in het Parlement gestemd:

"From 2015 to 2019, #Iceland ran the world's largest trial of a shorter working week. An analysis of the results was finally published this week, and surprise! Everyone was happier, healthier, and more productive. Please pretend to be surprised."
https://mashable.com/article/iceland-four-day-work-week-trial

🇮🇸

lmfao

panic! at the .unwrap()

@mary Why would copyright apply to a collection of subcooled particles in a Bose-Einstein condensate, whose current state we can't know unless we make a measurement, in which case the potential copyright infringing particles will lose their copyright infringement status?
I'm sure we'll find a way, the quest for copyright enforcement is too important to be left to the fundamental laws of nature.

Happy I took time to study some topology this summer. Algebraic topology is all the things I hoped for.

I am not sure I quite get it yet, but a topology of something seems to be usable as a definition to a lot of geometric notions. All of analysis work seems to just be applied topology. And with homotopy type theory, all sorts of data science, machine learning, and statistics work could be made easier and more precise.

Cubical type theory, (a computation friendly HOTT) is not even 2 years old. It is going to be big.

https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~cangiuli/thesis/thesis.pdf

@georgia We. Have. Magic.

>magic: The application of rituals or actions, especially those based on occult knowledge, to subdue or manipulate natural or supernatural beings and forces in order to have some benefit from them

I am typing this on a slab of glass that glows, buzzes, sings, and sees because we taught a sand golem how to think. A collective of thousands of mages, warlocks, witches, and all sorts of sorcerers contributed to the tomes upon tomes of knowledge and intricate spells that keep this pocket golem alive. I use it to write minor enchantments of my own.

If you think fantasy magic would look any different from what we have discovered and invented today, you are ignoring human nature. The same structures and processes you see with our technology are the exact same that would have developed with bona fide fantasy magic. Microsoft and Apple would exist, and they would build magic mirrors for businesses, and little nice-looking enchanted slabs for rich people. They would curse you if you tried to discover their workings, as that's Microsoft or Apple's intellectual property. Google would exist, and it would offer you a free crystal ball that shows you ads half of the time, all while Google's own golems looked back through it to record what you like. @chj0 would be summoning deprecated types of imps just to try and get them to do some weird trick. I would have studied the creation and maintenance of the magical channels that connect our various charms and trinkets. Opal would constantly be mad at how clunky the existing spells and rituals are, and vowing to write her own from scratch. Textbooks and papers would be written to fill the asinine magical theory circlejerk that modern math and science have become, and academic publishers would keep them locked up just like they do now. Most people would still be ignorant of the inner workings of the tools they use. A butcher doesn't care if he rings up your pound of ham on a magic record book or a cash register, so long as he can see how much he sold, and he doesn't need to figure out the taxes in his head.

You flip a light switch. The light comes on. There is no functional difference between some ethereal force powering it, and electricity.

straight up I am in love with water fountains. whenever I look at a public water fountain I go "this is literally a monument to a functioning civilization." when I look at a public water fountain I think about all of the technology, all of the water filtration and pipes and infrastructure that came together to provide Me drinkable water in a public space
some urban designer built Me a fountain to drink from because I might be thirsty. Literally the opposite of hostile architecture.

#sxmo on the #pinephone is one of the coolest and most empowering computing experiences i had in a long while!

A tiled window-manager on a mobile computer sounds crazy? not as much as the unified uni-dimensional logic of mobile interfaces, all trying to mimick android/iOS...

The ethos of sxmo/pmOS is of minimalism (shell scripts, suckless, dwm, etc.) and user empowerment. So easy to build interface/menus/scripts that suit your need!

Never thought i'd be excited by computers so much again :)