Tag: Constants and Variables
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Why only v’
Listening to the Strange as it seems episode on the origin of the Star-spangled Banner. The characters are singing the song as it first appeared in a Baltimore paper, and their father tells them it’s not new at all. He then sings Anacreon in Heav’n and orders his daughters to stop singing an old bawdy…
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Graphing the era
Elaine Low at the Ankler is discussing the modern absolute dependence on SHARE VALUE in connection with the writers strike. = = = = = START QUOTE: Broadly, the sense is that the town cares what investors and bankers think far more than it did over 15 years ago, the last time the writers put…
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Silly chemicals
The latest OCD craze is “atrazine makes you gay”. Apparently RFK is pushing this one. I don’t know what Atrazine is. You don’t need any details to dismiss ALL these trace chemicals. Water supplies have an infinite variety of trace chemicals, different from city to city and day to day. We only test for a…
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Two inflection points
Ryan Burge discusses the shifting correlation between party and religion. One of his graphs agrees with what I’ve seen. ‘The Partisanship of White Christians’ shows a flat line until 1980, when Christians abruptly turned Repooflican. I saw this change close up. Lee Atwater converted Christians from Americans to Israelis. Former hippies were suddenly Reaganites because…
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Vague observation on usefulness
My courseware work is sort of half-time by average. 1. I put in roughly one year of fulltime work on a new version. 2. Then I sit back and let the royalties roll in for one or sometimes two years. This provides a constants/variables observation for my feelings when actually working and completing stuff versus…
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When Harry met Seagully
It’s well known that dogs want to eat what their human friends eat. Dogs get confused and frustrated when offered a human favorite food that tastes awful to the dog, like lemons. What about non-domesticated animals like seagulls, who enjoy stealing human food? Are they influenced by our favorites? A British study says yes, and…
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C and V
Liel Leibovitz writes a wonderful exercise in Constants and Variables. RFK appeared on Jon Stewart’s TV show in 2005 and said the same thing he’s saying now. Stewart had a civilized and well-informed conversation on the subject. Now, of course, all discussion on all scientific topics is Leibovitz goes into the forgotten details of the…
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One advance
This 1950 episode of Hollywood Byline is in my bedtime OTR playlist. It happened to be playing when I woke up after a much-needed heavy sleep. The guest in this episode was Celeste Holm, and the discussion at the moment of waking was postwar economics in Hollywood. In the sleep/wake transition state, I thought it…
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Dove stops the itch
Latest from Kirn: None of the myriad products being boycotted now are products I buy anyway. It’s as though I knew something, but I wonder what it was. Avoid all goods that are heavily advertised? I suppose it was this. Yup. I feel the same itch. Living a simple life means (1) I don’t buy…
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One variable
For some reason I was thinking back to public school. Which years were tolerable and which years were hell? Exactly one variable. Gym class. In elementary school we had recess, which was only partial hell. The team leaders never chose me, and the teacher had to force them to take me on pain of detention.…
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Brinkley’s ghost is pissed.
Polly on Rumble is discussing the Transhumanist and Effective Altruist types who want to live forever so they can continue ruining the world forever. Several of them, including Thiel, are into ‘young blood’ transfusions as a way of reversing their age. The ‘young blood’ doctor received FDA approval for his craziness. Doc Brinkley’s ghost is…
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Astrology
Looking back through my previous interest in those ancient offices, I noticed that my items around that time also included a writer who grasped tenure. Here’s the connecting point, from June 12, 2017. The item about the ancient offices came the next day, triggered by purchasable prestige vs real aristocracy. = = = = =…
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Wrong end of the variable
From Above The Line: = = = = = START QUOTE: For weeks, multiple studios and streamers have been planning to use AI to generate scripts based on books and other IP that is in the public domain, with lists of titles making the rounds among development executives, multiple insiders have told Above the Line.…
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Controlled experiment in stupidity
I’ve learned over the years that I’m incurably stupid about politics. Fake populists will fool me every damn time, no matter how often I temporarily “catch on” to their fakery. I’m much harder to fool in economic and scientific areas of life. Just noticed a neat Constants And Variables. When Bukele took over El Salvador,…
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Feedback returns in one area
Americans are fairly smart about corporate brands but hopelessly dumb about political brands. When a corporation goes off the cliff for ESG, lots of people stop buying its product. We exert meaningful negative feedback, and now that the QE free money is gone, the negative feedback has some effect. We don’t respond in the same…
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