Mars in 4K, The Laws of Pessimism, The First GOAT, etc.
In which we will now return to our regularly scheduled program.
🕹Take a few minutes out of your day to watch the Super Mario Bros. theme played on a variety of instruments, including the xylophone, hammered dulcimer, stylophone, chimes and vibraphone.
🛰 See footage of Mars in 4k. “The footage, captured directly by NASA’s Mars rovers — Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity, and Perseverance — unveils the red planet’s intricate details. These rovers, acting as robotic geologists, have traversed varied terrains, from ancient lake beds to towering mountains, uncovering Mars’ complex geological history.”
🧮 MIT asks, why does AI being good at math matter? “Complex math, such as geometry, requires sophisticated reasoning skills, and many AI researchers believe that the ability to crack it could herald more powerful and intelligent systems. Innovations like AlphaGeometry show that we are edging closer to machines with more human-like reasoning skills. This could allow us to build more powerful AI tools that could be used to help mathematicians solve equations and perhaps come up with better tutoring tools.”
🤔 This is a good question: if things are better than ever before, why do they seem worse? A look at the Seven Laws of Pessimism. “In the world of Douglas Adams’ 1978 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, ‘Nothing travels faster than the speed of light, with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.’”
👨💻 This made me laugh: commenting on social media. “Do not read the whole original post or what it links to, which will dilute the purity of your response and reduce your chances of rebuking the poster for not mentioning anything they might’ve mentioned/written a book on/devoted their life to. Listening/reading delays your reaction time, and as with other sports, speed is of the essence.”
🐐 One of my least favorite terms is “GOAT,” or “Greatest of All Time.” Is it Jordan or Lebron, CT Tamburello or Johnny Bananas, Tom Brady or… well in football it might actually be just Tom Brady. But more often than not, it’s too subjective, and while someone could easily be one of the greatest of all time, too often “The GOAT” is used for so many people that it becomes a bit silly. I looked into who the term was (at least widely) used for, and not to my surprise, it was he who floated like a butterfly and stung like a bee.
💬 A brief history of accents and dialects in the United States. “The United States may lack an official language, but a road trip across the country reveals dozens of different accents and dialects of English that serve as living links to Americans’ ancestors..”
🃏 A brief video on the history of poker.
🏡 A new book contains dozens of photographs of Salvador Dalí’s Seaside “small home on Spain’s Costa Brava that Dalí and his wife Gala bought in 1930 and transformed into a characteristically dreamlike space.”
🙀 One of my oldest friends (a patron of this newsletter), scored a horror film that’s now streaming, available to rent on Amazon and Apple and Youtube, etc . As mentioned in The New York Times: “That notion of heartbreak and survival as the ends of supernatural means comes alive here, thanks to a disorienting story, a slow-burn visual style and a score, by Roberto Garza, that knocked me off balance.”
✌️That’s all for this week, but lots of blogging and other writing on the horizon. I’ll keep ya updated. In the meantime, remember to keep the Hoping Machine running.
Love,
Luke
