Lockpicking Lawyer

Short videos. Reminder that no lock is impenetrable. Also, April Fool’s Day videos are very special.

Kaptain Kristian

Video essays. No longer in production, high-quality reviews of some cultural artifacts. He’s moved his operation to Curiosity Stream. Made me realize it’s worth it to pay creators directly for their work rather than having advertisers and platforms like YouTube. Now, if only I had money to pay these creators. Aye, there’s the rub.

Every Frame a Painting

Expert film analysis. If it’s not, it sure looks like it is.

CGP Grey

Snarky educational. Fun! The best damn flag contest, best takedown of first-past the post voting, and best reflection on how to go forward after hitting YouTube fame. I still want to know if he and Roman Mars have talked flags.

Kutiman ‐ Thru You

Classic YouTube. 15 years ago, mans took a bunch of other YouTube videos and remixed them into each other, producing meta tracks.

1000 Days. 19 November 2024.

Each of these is run on donations and subscriptions.

Canadaland is moving into the news space, adding to their media criticism roots. Though, I’m uncertain why Karyn Pugliese left. This thread on r/canadaland has the only clues I’ve been able to find.

Democracy Now! is my go-tonfor daily news. Amy Goodman may just be the journalist I trust the most in the world.

I know that there are problems with Substack. However, Mehdi Hasan is building something pretty special with Zeteo.

I guess we are going to have to disagree. The writing style and, as I perceived it, motivations within the text were clearly not of the Western tradition. It’s true, in lending the benefit of doubt, I may have enjoyed it more precisely because I disregarded standard writing mores, tropes, and conventions because it was a translated work.

I’m curious: Did you also try Murakami’s 1Q84? I found that I had to suspend expectations there in much the same manner.

I think I’d agree with you wrt. short species lifespans after developing telecommunications, space flight, and highly concentrated energy sources. The leap in capacity for attendant social distortion — and extortion — has brought us to the brink of global destruction many times since Signal Hill in 1901. The Kardashev Scale comes to mind here. The leap from about Type 0.73, ostensibly where we are now, to Type 1.0 is fraught.

As for the communications we have sent, the early ones were low-power and, over a distance of 100 ly, would significantly degrade against background EM radiation. At a range of 50 ly, where our first, more powerful and higher fidelity digital transmissions have reached, there are relatively few star systems — about 1300 (source). This source uses data from 1991, so there may be more, but not many, that are magnitude 6.5 or brighter.

I’d read that David Brin reviewed something similar in '83, but I didn’t chase it down to Saberhagen.

In following the links provided in the Wiki article, for the Berserker Hypothesis, there is the following:

The Berserker hypothesis is distinct from the dark forest hypothesis in that under the latter, many alien civilizations could still exist provided they keep silent. The dark forest hypothesis can be viewed as a special case of the Berserker hypothesis, if the ‘deadly Berserker probes’ are (e.g. due to resource scarcity) only sent to star systems that show signs of intelligent life.

So, silence is survival in the Dark Forest. The Berserker Hypothesis seeks and destroys.

e: Nice call on BSG as well! Though, that considered only human and Cylon life.

And, for my part, Cixin Liu’s second book was a really solid read. The first book, Three Body Problem, suffered all of the hallmarks of the pains taken to establish a story and a world. The last book, Death’s End, while mostly good, also suffered in needing to bring the grand story to a close.

Here’s one more:

Dark Forest Theory as a solution to the Fermi Paradox.

In 2016, the number of bacteria was reviewed, and the estimate reduced from 300 trillion to about 38 trillion microorganisms.

Cronenberg is a countryman. I’ll hand him a pass on that one.

The data is skewed. All of the functioning systems we use reward concentrations of power.

Thereby, systems of rule must distribute power and contest the concentration of power. It literally takes a village to save us from ourselves.

David Graeber and David Wengrow introduced me to historical examples of non-hierarchical societies in The Dawn of Everything.

I’m glad someone put the prions in here. As a biology student, there was only one thing more terrifying than retroviruses — prions.

Heres two:

The ratio between cells of your body that belong to you vs. cells on or in your body that are microorganisms is about 1:1 — slightly favouring the bacteria.

If the Sun were destroyed, we would not know about it until more than 8 minutes after it happened.

Act to honour and recognize all humans as human. This is Said’s Law.

Act to sustain human security. This is Cura’s Law.

Act to accept responsibility for each action, especially where it guides future actions. This is Sartre’s Law.

I also think that, perhaps, you and anyone who does his or her or their own taxes is more an adult than I.

I let my MIL do my taxes. I’ve done them myself in the past, but, I guess, I’ve regressed.

No… two different scenarios. Knowing how to file your taxes is one thing — a higher order of thinking and problem solving.

Knowing that they need to be filed is another. It is the basic acceptance that this is a non-negotiable responsibility (at least in Canada).

I think that each is its own step toward adulthood.

You know to file your taxes.

Nicely done.

Was that the kettling incident? G20 in Toronto. The only time I’ve seen a police car set on fire in Canada. And the first use of tear gas in the City of Toronto.

Allegedly, “black bloc” troublemakers, started the property destruction. Whether this was done with tacit approval by police is an open question. Needless to say, police responses to protests on the days of the sunmit were found to be lacking.

Oh, btw, still, fuck John Baird and definitely fuck Tony Clement. My introduction to fuckery in Canada’s politics came from watching these two refuse to answer questions in Parliament for months. The one person I saw trying to hold these two Harper cabinet ministers to account was good ol’ Charlie Angus.

That said, fuckery is now status quo and Charlie Angus has said he’ll not seek re-election.

Bought the book. It’s the only dictionary I’ve enjoyed reading.

Inequivocal yes! Grew up with Batman:TAS.

Legit question. Wasn’t that episode 1?