Category: Uncategorized
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Hypothesis
Denyse discusses an evocative and important question which is triggering new research: = = = = = START QUOTE: How can a person living with advanced dementia abruptly communicate in a clear manner? Many wonder what mechanism underlies this phenomenon and if it might be a key to mitigating—or even reversing—neurodegeneration. It’s also a mystery…
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Responsible media would…
I’ve seen several threads like this on Reddit. Chase Bank suddenly withdrew about 100 billion dollars from this guy’s account. More precisely, they withdrew the difference between his actual balance and 100 billion. He’s totally befuddled and can’t get answers from the bank. Other commenters have been through the same experience and figured it out.…
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Chinese FD
As usual Ankler provides a thoughtful discussion. Why is Hollywood losing its connection with China? Most of the reasons are well known. Xi is switching back to China’s 5000-year norm of internal isolation. The middle kingdom is the only kingdom. After 40 years of commercial connection and student spying, China has acquired all of our…
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Metaground
Kirn is getting credit for a brand new idea: In @palladiummag, a fascinating idea from @walterkirn that the spectacle of news, social media, changing mores, etc. is designed to prevent memory formation. Not new at all. This was the POINT of 1984. Room 101 was not about lies and propaganda, it was explicitly and obviously…
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Zenith’s hearing biz
Following on three previous Zenith items: Zenith receivers. Zenith’s Cobra-matic. The origin of the company. Zenith didn’t “belong” in the hearing business. Zenith had always built radio receivers and TV receivers. They added phonographs and clocks to their radios, but never branched out into audio systems or clocks. They never made instrumentation or lab equipment…
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This is why
These two Christian “philosophers” don’t see a problem with AI stealing art and text from working creators, and forcing other working creators out of their jobs. What’s the trouble with AI? It might ease the suffering of unpopular people. We can’t let that happen! Unpopular people must suffer so popular people can get all the…
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William does WPA
A hereditary aristocracy has a much better chance of producing sane and decent rulers. The “election” system rarely serves civilization. The odds are stacked heavily in favor of power-hungry monsters. Prince William is giving us a modern example. DailyMail mentioned his ‘Homeward’ project. Looking up the primary source, it’s pure FDR, following in the footsteps…
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The old Hollywood
The folks at Ankler are discussing the Barbie/Oppenheimer pair, observing that it breaks out of the Tech Tyrant model and restores the old Hollywood way of working. Rushfield notes that the techies were trying to create algorithmic certainty by running endless remakes of reliable ‘brands’. Entertainment doesn’t work that way. Semiquoting: We’re SHOW people. We…
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Monkeys down the drain
Pointed by Denyse, this article by Arlie Coles is an excellent clarifier of AI. = = = = = START QUOTE: To find a math map between inputs and targets, neural networks need a lot of examples of input-target pairs. If you give people a puzzle like, “you want to turn two into four, and…
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Specific suckerdom
Listening to something about Altman’s brazenly dystopian Orbs To Capture Your Soul. Deepstate is perfectly open now. First thought: Not new. Deepstate and undercover agents have always been open to their victims, though not quite as publicly visible as now. Second thought: Good old Sucker Filter. Make outrageous claims to pull in the suckers who…
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When didn’t it matter?
Rob Lowe’s latest piece takes the long way around to plead for less fussiness by the unions. I think. During the long trip he makes a point that seems automatic but maybe isn’t. He’s talking about what entertainers call continuity, the small details that some people notice immediately but most people don’t see at all.…
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Unions understand Mach
There is only one law. RULERS DO WHAT THEY WANT. Rulers, whether government or big corporations, do NOT change their behavior in response to “laws” or “elections” or “protests” or “open letters”. All of those gimmicks are PROVIDED BY THE RULER to keep us occupied and distracted, to maintain our delusional myths about power. Well,…
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Work done.
Done with this edition of courseware. Probably a bit more debug, but I’ve checked all I can check, sorted all I can sort, and submitted. Now I can return to full-time fun for a while, and try more analog MAKEFORCE. Reusing a very old work-done animation…
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Worthy reprint
Looking at the statcounter for the old blog. I haven’t changed it in 18 months, but the readers there are more varied and “purposeful” than the readers of this new WordPress version. I still don’t know why. Is it something about the format, or am I just dumbed down after three years of NAZI TORTURE?…
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Clavecin Oculaire, useless edition
American Radio History has a new issue of a 1925 Gernsback magazine. It starts with an article about a Color-Music Piano, which seems to be a vastly less usable repeat of the color harpsichords in the 1700s. = = = = = START QUOTE: This apparatus, as constructed hy the Ernemann Works, comprises two main,…
Polistra's Mill 