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Rights and the Moore method
Last month I lambasted the Moore Method of math teaching, after seeing that my old calc teacher was famous for advocating it. The Moore Method was just a stricter version of normal American math teaching, which starts and ends with axioms and theorems. Today somebody is praising the 1776 gang for using strict Euclidean thinking…
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Rights vs duties, 2026 rehash
I can’t think or sleep while the demonic mad bombers are having their annual Arsonfest, so might as well run my annual Gouvernour Morris version of the 1776 tax evasion. Rehashed from several 2018 items. = = = = = Background: Two of the episodes in the best radio series ever, ‘Strange as it seems’,…
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2038 bug starting to appear
After the Y2K hubbub was calmed down by intense and NECESSARY programming work, the next date problem will be in 2038, when the number of seconds since Jan 1, 1970 overflows a 32-bit integer. Newer systems store time in a 64-bit integer, which won’t overflow for hundreds of billions of years. This item in the…
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Fun with fonts
I’ve been following Daniel, one of the few remaining REAL pressmen. He’s been working with large display fonts to create art with a proof press. Now he’s designed a digital font in the same spirit. I bought it and tried it out in my 1930s Lynwood neighborhood model. The font is suitable for store signs,…
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Did Eyman retire?
The latest idiotic “anti-tax” referendum is operated by hedge fund billionaire Brian Heywood. He wants to repeal a 9% surcharge on income over a million passed by this year’s state “legislature”. Shockedshocked etc. Sarc off: I truly don’t know why rich assholes play the referendum game. It calls attention to them, costs extra money, and…
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TIL: SNAKES!!
Cute headline: Rattlesnake wanting to read is found outside Auntie’s Bookstore Customers told an employee that a snake was slithering around parked cars. The employee went out to see, and sure enough it was a rattler. She tried calling all the usual wildlife-related agencies, and as fucking usual none of them were “able” to deal…
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Just be Pew
There’s a lot of pointless soul-searching by the humanities: anthropology, sociology, philosophy, etc. They’re wondering why normal humans no longer want to pay for the fine points of quasi-post-Rawlsian pseudo-Carnapism. The natural conclusion is that normal humans are illiterate non-self-aware numbskulls, so the humanities need to crank up our name-dropping and arrogance to a more…
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Why so early?
Just putting this down so I won’t forget it…. I’m always asking Why So Late? In this case the puzzlement is reversed. Why were horseless carriages licensed so quickly? Horses and buggies had not been licensed. It appears that state licenses for cars began around 1905. Horses were still completely dominant. A typical city might…
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Sweet and sour largesse
Tech demons are hammering us with Sweet and Sour sides of an argument. The Sour tech demons, aided by Philosopher MacAskill, tell us straight out that we must lose our jobs and die for the good of future generations. We must be exterminated because we are non-self-aware inanimate objects. After we have been disinfected from…
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Another Martian dream
Odd parallel with a Martian dream last summer. = = = = = Today’s dream: I was attending an arts fair. Noticed an old lady selling typewritten manuscripts about her experience with Martians, who taught her their system of government called optothecy. I told her I was curious and asked to hear more. “Well now,…
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It’s about cheating
The Supremes have firmly ruled that boys can’t cheat by muscling into women’s sports. Good. Both “sides” are missing the point as usual. It’s not about “rights” because “rights” don’t exist. It’s not about Trump because this shit started long before Trump was in politics. It’s simply and solely about CHEATING. Pre-college sports are unique…
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Spies don’t spy
I was noticing yet again that spy agencies have switched from senses to muscles. Spying is a necessary part of life. Every living thing uses its senses primarily to detect what’s happening around it, and secondarily for advance warning of competitors or predators. When governments use spies properly, information helps to avoid war. We stopped…
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Infringement calling infringement black
I’ve always had an uneasy feeling about Retraction Watch and the ‘replication crisis’. Like the AI em-dashers they’re working on the wrong end of the problem, trying to clean things up by sorting out a few especially bad-looking products. Reminds me of Porkbusters Coburn and Proxmire who ridiculed “silly” government projects, mostly agricultural because aristocrats…
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More infill harmony
Here’s another example of architects creating a pleasant harmony with existing houses. The lot to the left of this house has always been empty. It’s a triangle with no practical frontage, so it probably wasn’t enticing to builders. (Google makes it look wider.) A few months ago a builder put up a duplex in the…
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Not scary
Scare headline in Verge: The war against ‘woke’ could end US science as we know it YES! PLEASE! DO IT! MORE! MORE! MORE! US science as we know it is FUCKED and LOST and RUINED by 80 years of tenure and competitive Deepstate grants. China is winning for two reasons. 1. China doesn’t give the…
Polistra's Mill
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Polistra's Mill 