Homework

This is a part of the homework feature of my blog, which is an ongoing conversation with my mate S.F.

Hey mate. Lovely to see you again, as always.

The Standard Model is our best quantum theory, not a new wave punk band.

Psychogeography is the exploration of urban environments that emphasizes interpersonal connections to places and arbitrary routes. It involves the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals. One of the key tactics for exploring psychogeography is the loosely defined urban walking practice known as the dérive.

Mind-blindness is a theory that autistic people lack a Theory of Mind, which can lead them to a lack of empathy. This is discussed by Dave Plummer, over here: Mindblindness.

The fucking UX got fucked. Speaking of UX, I recently picked up this Complete Web Design and UX Mastery Bundle from Humble Bundle.

The Joker is a fascinating and dark character.

My theory about cynicism is that it leads you to the truth something like 99% of the time. The extra 1% is a rounding error, but that’s where the good stuff is, a cynic might miss it.

Can’t Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds is a famous book by David Goggins, an athlete and soldier. I haven’t read this one yet, but I’ve heard about it.

M*A*S*H started in 1972 and continued until 1983 releasing 256 episodes (a nice binary number!).

This Town looks pretty interesting! It premiered on 31 March this year (2024) and tells the story of a band’s formation against a backdrop of violence.

Entrapment should be illegal. In some jurisdictions, it is!

The expression from the river to the sea is a political phrase that refers geographically to the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, an area formerly known as Palestine. The implications of the phrase depend on who is saying it and what they mean.

The two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict proposes to resolve the conflict by establishing two nation states in former Mandatory Palestine. The implementation of a two-state solution would involve the establishment of an independent State of Palestine alongside the State of Israel. The two-state solution is widely supported in the international community, as well as by the Palestinian Authority; however, Israel rejects the creation of a Palestinian state. One of my friends told me that they used to think this was a good idea, but now don’t believe it would be workable. I personally am not well informed enough to have an opinion on this one.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised is a satirical poem and Black Liberation song by Gil Scott-Heron: Gil Scott Heron – The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.

The Smashing Pumpkins are an alternative rock band from Chicago, USA. Their album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness featured significantly in my adolescence. We discussed their song 1979. Cool track.

The Holocaust is an example of when the bureaucracy didn’t save us. It was perpetrated by a bureaucracy. The essay on bureaucracy that I typed up is here: Inside Bureaucracy.

Homophily is a concept in sociology describing the tendency of individuals to associate and bond with similar others, as in the proverb “birds of a feather flock together”. The presence of homophily has been discovered in a vast array of network studies: over 100 studies have observed homophily in some form or another, and they establish that similarity is associated with connection. The categories on which homophily occurs include age, gender, class, and organizational role.

She’s all kinds of fucked up, but she’s fucking cool.

If you don’t know where to start, just start anywhere!

Hypocrisy Is the Greatest Luxury is an album featuring the track Television, the Drug of the Nation.

I’m not a criminal, I just want some drugs.

I have done a little crypto programming (Programming Lore says you should never do this, because it is fraught with peril). I have a PHP library called kickass-crypto which aims to make using PHP encryption library facilities a little easier. Not sure I succeeded. My blowfish implementation for JavaScript and PHP known as pccipher got listed on Bruce Schneier’s website, one of my triumphs in life. :)

Good name for a beer: No Alarms. (I think maybe that was the beer talking? I suspect this remark was inspired by Radiohead – Karma Police)

The xkcd comic I mentioned is this one: Dependency. It indicates how flimsy some of our practices are.

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH is awesome. I will get you a copy. <3

You can use the pulse reflection method to locate a fault in a cable. A pulse induced at the starting end of the cable reaches the cable fault with a speed of v/2 and then is reflected back toward the starting end of the cable. The elapsed time multiplied by the diffusion speed v/2 gives the distance to the source of the fault.

I think I’m paranoid (lyrics).

Judith Lucy wrote a few books. I read Drink, Smoke, Pass Out (because for me that title was clickbait) which was fun.

You mentioned Metallica: Some Kind of Monster again. I still haven’t got around to watching it!

“Existential angst” and “existential dread” mean the same thing. They refer to the horror and unease one can feel when they become aware of their temporary place in a vast universe and the responsibility they have for their own actions.

We discussed Adele – Hello, hello from the other side.

And to wrap up I have a note here that says “Colorize”. And that’s all it says. I can’t remember what that was about..?

Homework

This is a part of the homework feature of my blog, which is an ongoing conversation with my mate S.F.

Hey mate. Lovely to see you again, as always.

You must watch this: Mark Osborne’s MORE (the homepage is here).

Death is the ultimate holiday. Never have to work again!

One of the most belligerent things you can say to someone is “you’re belligerent.”

The washing machine is a machine.

Aphyr is one of those one in ten thousand type geniuses, just next level. Also openly gay and into BDSM. He did this fantastic creative writing riffing on witch craft and programming interviews which I have made notes about over here. I don’t think you need to be a programmer to appreciate this, maybe give the first one a read.

I did a write up of Inside Bureaucracy by Anthony Downs. It’s long and High Modern. The five types of bureaucrats he identifies are: Climbers, Conservers, Zealots, Advocates, Statesmen.

The cargo cult phenomenon is truly bizarre and also quaint and understandable. During WWII a lot of native tribes saw cargo planes arriving full of supplies. After the war when the planes stopped coming the tribe members setup faux runways and did elaborate pantomimes with aircontrollers and radiomen etc in an attempt to mimic what they had seen the westerners do in order to bring the cargo back. Now “cargo cult” is used as a term to describe when people are doing the things they they will bring success because they think those activities will lead to success (but those activities won’t by themselves lead to success).

RE my hair: I can clip! I can clip! </Seinfeld>

This bloke Derek Muller has a video blog known as Veritasium. Recently he did a fun video about 37.

I would definitely recommend you get Authy and set it up on your phone so you can use it for 2FA (two-factor authentication).

TPM stands for Trusted Platform Module. It’s a hardware security feature which is probably in your computers. Apparently it is required by Windows 11 as explained by Microsoft over here: What is TPM?

Two fun quotes from the YouTube comments on my channel recently:

  • Lol, bald Jimmy Neutron, but its so cool
  • Look at this absolute chad flexing on all of us with his swag lab setup. Steady on king.

The 80/20 rule is known as the Pareto principle which states that for many outcomes, roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes (the “vital few”).

Do Dogs Have Belly Buttons? (Spoiler: they do!)

Software is one form of hyperreality.

Thank you for loaning me your copy of Travels In Hyperreality by Umberto Eco, I will return it soon, along with a copy of GEB for you!

Crash Test Dummies – Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm.

Matchbox Twenty – 3AM.

There is a full length version of Elegia from New Order, it’s an instrumental tribute to Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis. It’s a seriously moving piece of music. It’s the soundtrack to Mark Osborne’s MORE (linked above). The words elegia and eulogy are different but they connote something similar.

Substance is a compilation album by English alternative dance band New Order. It was released in August 1987 by Factory Records and reissued in 2023. Here is Disc 1.

On a related note, the 2007 film Joy Division is a documentary on the British post-punk band Joy Division.

More from 2007, Control a British biographical film about the life of Ian Curtis, singer of the late-1970s English post-punk band Joy Division.

The Jesus nut is a slang term for the main rotor retaining nut or mast nut, which holds the main rotor to the mast of some helicopters.

Fucking boat people.

The 2004 film Metallica: Some Kind of Monster is a documentary film about American heavy metal band Metallica.

Metamodernism refers to a number of related discourses about cultural developments that move beyond postmodernism by means of postmodernism. There is a fun video on the topic over here: The Rise of the Meaning Economy – A major paradigm shift is coming, this will reshape life and work!.

It’s a simple silly little temporary thing.

Chicks man, fuck.

So there’s this American bloke out there Andrew Bustamante running EverydaySpy with his wife. They have heaps of videos on YouTube, you can get a taste over here: Leave The USA Before 2030? – CIA Spy On World War 3’s Timeline | Andrew Bustamante.

Eben Moglen is an American legal scholar and orator who is professor of law and legal history at Columbia University, and is the founder, Director-Counsel and Chairman of Software Freedom Law Center. In 2019 he spoke on the 10 year anniversary of the FreedomBox: Eben Moglen: “FreedomBox Turns Ten” (Nov. 2019) .

There is a kickass documentary featuring Bunnie Huang over here: Shenzhen: The Silicon Valley of Hardware (Full Documentary) | Future Cities. Bunnie has done some cool things, not least Hacking the Xbox. Here’s an interesting talk from him: An Alternative to the American way of Innovation | Andrew ‘bunnie’ Huang | TEDxPickeringStreet.

Homework

This is a part of the homework feature of my blog, which is an ongoing conversation with my mate S.F.

I found OWC Docks & Hubs. This Thunderbolt 3 Dock looks pretty good.

The stomping kitties video I mentioned is Rathergood – Communist Kittens sing Tanz Mit Laibach by Laibach but unfortunately it’s been taken down for copyright reasons. :(

There are some notes about uniforms on Wikipedia, there are also a bunch of books on the topic of the history of uniforms over on Amazon.

I found a preview for Metallica: Some Kind of Monster. Might try and grab it on iTunes some time.

The Foo Fighters track that I said I thought was pretty good was The Pretender. But on listening to it again now it’s not about what I thought it was about when I thought it was pretty good! :P

The expression jamais vu is a sense of unfamiliarity with, or of never having experienced or seen before, something that should be familiar. Like when you walk into your bedroom and have the feeling like you’re seeing it for the first time.

The Prisoner’s dilemma is an interesting thought experiment from game theory.

Never forget Hits from the Bong from Cypress Hill.

The quote about how to fly from Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything is:

“The Guide says there is an art to flying”, said Ford, “or rather a knack. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.”

I’m gonna put The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Omnibus: A Trilogy in Five Parts on my wish list.

Also there is quite a lot of material on the subject of psychological boundaries.