Tag: Entertainment
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Did you know?
Janelle at AIweirdness.com pointed to this endless cup of computerized silliness. CookingFlavr.com is a set of human questions answered by AI. Judging by the language and focus of the questions, it’s probably made in India. The top menu is food-oriented, but if you click on any of the questions you’ll see more categories, which are…
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Harmless hooey
According to the date guide, today is Skeptics Day. Hmm. Is that right? I looked it up and first found sources saying that the real Skeptics Day is Jan 13. Hmm. Is that right? Other sources say the real Skeptics Day is Oct 13. Hmm. Is that right? The fact turns out to be more…
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If we assume (part 2)
I’ve been imagining that the ‘standard’ UFOs were living things and their equipment. An ancient tribe of small winged humans developed a technology based on waves and electric fields. They weren’t limited by theories of atomism and particles, so they figured out how to materialize and dematerialize. They continued existing in and around the Earth,…
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Already answered, but missed a point
Okay, we know that “journalists” have stopped serving any function. That’s tired territory. Batya is covering it thoroughly and usefully. Purpose-based question: If reporters DO have a real function, the function should be definable in a basic biological way. It should be the same for a beehive or a tribe or a city or a…
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Keinpeilempfänger
Fifth in a vaguely defined series on obscure secret electronics, after SCR-268 and Tenzor and Peilempfänger and Kleinstpeilempfänger. = = = = = American Radio Library has uploaded new issues of the British Post Office Engineering Journal. Why did the GPO have an engineering research facility? Because the GPO managed ALL communication in Britain. It…
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If we assume….
UFOlogists have tried to explain the timeline in various ways. The larger type has been documented for thousands of years. The smaller discs were first publicly described in WW2, with both sides seeing flocks of discs and each side blaming the other. There was a postwar ‘pulse’ of the bigger type in ’47, then another…
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Explicit tag
I’ve been using the Entertainment tag on the UFO and Fortean items lately. I should make the connection more explicit. The Forteans were trying to pull science back into the realm of entertainment and mystification and fascination. Their constant theme, starting with Charles Fort himself, was that Big Science is no longer observing Nature with…
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Barking UFO
Yesterday I proposed or imagined that the larger UFOs might belong to an ancient tribe that figured out how to LITERALLY harness electricity, a tribe that wasn’t spoiled by atom theories. They know how to organize charge patterns for massless or massed appearances. The sightings of small discs flying in groups have a different flavor.…
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More Tur(k)ing test
A few weeks ago Eric Holloway set up a fiendishly clever machine vs human test, essentially proving that one of the major AI engines is partly or mostly human. Now he’s done it again. Here’s the sequence leading up to the crucial moment. 153 EMH: what is a belief? 154 GPT-3: A belief is a…
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Classy Spokane
Bank robbers in the meth era just don’t measure up to the old Dillinger standard: Uhaul trucks have governed engines. You can’t achieve a “high rate” in a Uhaul, unless they mean a “high rate” of absurdity.
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Placing a small bet
The flurry of “news” about Elon’s “battle” with Twitter reminded me of my Follies theme. Sometimes a rich man’s toy advances science. Elon superficially resembles Ned Green, who inherited his evil mother’s criminally acquired fortune and tried to turn it toward enjoyment of science. The spaceflight competition among Elon and Bezos and Branson also has…
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Tenzor
Continuing a vaguely defined theme of obscure and peculiarly clumsy secret equipment. = = = = = = = = = = Soviet spies were working in Oklahoma and Kansas in the ’50s, as evident in the correct local pronunciations on their maps. Every city and province has its secret shibboleths, its own tests for…
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Huge exception to an old rule
This is a completely trivial criticism of an old obscure TV show, but it seems to be what I need to write today. Maybe there’s a reason, maybe not. The show was ‘Man of the World’, one of many British James Bond imitators. Other shows in this genre gave us remarkably accurate dramatizations of facts…
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Pithy point, pithy counterpoint
Kirn’s latest pithy point: If history is any guide, the books that the ideological arsonists disappear first are likely to be the very books needed to spark a renaissance later. Most of the commenters are thinking of fairly modern dystopias, but that’s clearly not where Kirn is going. 1984 wouldn’t spark a renaissance. Purpose-based thinkers…
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First American radar
Rehashing from two weeks ago: This early radar installation appeared in a 1945 issue of Electronics magazine, which turned out to be the same issue that momentarily revealed part of the atom bomb before clamping down again. The issue includes a significant editorial on the whole subject of clamping and releasing. = = = =…
