Scree

noun : an accumulation of loose stones or rocky debris lying on a slope or at the base of a hill or cliff.

Salience

January 20, 2023 · All posts on Jan 20

I get the impression, reading about his method, that what he’s doing with all the “awareness” and “fine focus” activities is pre-loading information into his unconscious mind so that, at the critical moment, he can respond automatically.

It is not possible to “decide” what to do about a ball coming at you at 90mph. What you can do is make sure your mind is pump-primed with all the available context cues, with the highest signal to noise possible, and then act.

~ Matt Webb, from Don’t keep your eye on the ball but prime your intuition

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I’ll admit that I wound up following Webb’s links about Cricket (the game, not Jiminy.) It’s worth the click just for that. All the while as I was reading Webb’s article, I was thinking this feels like an intentional application of our brain’s power of salience detection; “hacking our salience power” I would say. Our brains only work by ignoring everything—except for a small rounding error’s worth—that our senses detect. Sometimes, a thing or two appear to be salient, and they rise to level of our conscious awareness. Noticing when that happens, and sharing what you’ve noticed, is one way to ask great questions.

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Calm technology

January 18, 2023 · All posts on Jan 18

The most potentially interesting, challenging, and profound change implied by the ubiquitous computing (UC) era is a focus on calm. If computers are everywhere they better stay out of the way, and that means designing them so that the people being shared by the computers remain serene and in control. Calmness is a new challenge that UC brings to computing. When computers are used behind closed doors by experts, calmness is relevant to only a few. Computers for personal use have focused on the excitement of interaction. But when computers are all around, so that we want to compute while doing something else and have more time to be more fully human, we must radically rethink the goals, context and technology of the computer and all the other technology crowding into our lives. Calmness is a fundamental challenge for all technological design of the next fifty years. The rest of this paper opens a dialogue about the design of calm technology.

Designs that encalm and inform meet two human needs not usually met together. Information technology is more often the enemy of calm. Pagers, cellphones, news-services, the World Wide Web, email, TV, and radio bombard us frenetically. Can we really look to technology itself for a solution?

But some technology does lead to true calm and comfort. There is no less technology involved in a comfortable pair of shoes, in a fine writing pen, or in delivering the New York Times on a Sunday morning, than in a home PC. Why is one often enraging, the others frequently encalming? We believe the difference is in how they engage our attention. Calm technology engages both the center and the periphery of our attention, and in fact moves back and forth between the two.

~ Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown, from The Coming Age of Calm Technology

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Calm technology is designed to be unobtrusive and blend in with daily life. The opposite is technology that is distracting and disruptive, creating agitation and stress.

Calm technology

Never before have I seen, nor imagined, the adjective calm associated with technology. It never occurred to me to question where technology falls on a spectrum of calming to agitating. Mark my words: Calm technology is going to get mentioned by me going forward.

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Forget glowing noses

January 16, 2023 · All posts on Jan 16

During the summer, when the sun spends months above the horizon, the inner parts of the animals’ eyes, a structure called the tapetum lucidum, gleam a shimmering gold. But as the landscape dips into the perpetual darkness of winter, their eyes turn a rich blue.

~ Katherine J. Wu, from Twice a Year, Reindeer Eyes Pull Off a Wonderful Magic Trick

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Forget glowing noses; reindeer eyes are magic. This is a short, punchy, pop-sci article— and is exactly the sort of random, interesting thing I delight in trawling through RSS feeds to locate.

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The great conversation

January 15, 2023 · All posts on Jan 15

As Marcus stood upon the Stoa Poikile, he would have gazed across the Agora where Socrates once discussed philosophy, and where he was later put on trial, imprisoned, and executed. Beyond the Agora, Marcus would have seen the Temple of Athena known as the Parthenon. At that time a colossal statue of the goddess of wisdom looked down on Athens, from atop the Acropolis. Most of the drama of Socrates’ life had unfolded within the bounds of the Agora, under the gaze of Athena.

~ Donald Robertson, from What the Stoic Emperor Learned from the Athenian Philosopher

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My title is a reference to, The Great Conversation, a book I’ve recently started reading. I’m not particularly interested in learning all of Philosophy, but I am interested in how those threads in which I am interested weave together. I’ve always found interesting the little bits of Socrates and his ideas which I’ve come across. I’m clearly interested in Stoicism (and a few historical figures who were its ancient proponents.) Robertson’s article is a fun exploration of Aurelieus’s interest in Socrates—he just missed Epictetus, and Socrates was already a historical figure. All of history, and so also Philosophy, is a conversation woven together, layered, erased and re-woven, re-relayered, and erased.

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What, really, is the final boss?

January 13, 2023 · All posts on Jan 13

“The problem is…”, is such a great phrase. When I hear it, I begin to smile. Unless I just said it, in which case I twitch and remind myself that the really hard part [of anything you want to discuss] is defining exactly what the problem is. A well-defined problem is such a difficult and rare thing. And here’s a fun article from “Dynomight” that plays with just how hard it is to figure out what the problem actually is, Candidate Final Bosses.

Just to be clear: We’re talking about “final boss”, as in the video game context meaning of the phrase. In the classic, journey-of-adventure towards some goal, video game, things get harder and harder and harder until… you have to face the final boss, in the final battle.

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Images?

January 11, 2023 · All posts on Jan 11

My blog has an enormous amount of photography. There are over 2,000 images posted, and while many are simply me saving typing a thousand words, many of them are gorgeous. I’ve cherry-picked the best of them into a Featured Photography page.

…actually, since I’m me, I set up some code that creates pages of images arranged into gallery-carousels, and I have only to tag the images behind-the-scenes rather than manually edit them into the page. I digress.

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Ruh-roh… that’s me

January 9, 2023 · All posts on Jan 9

The ways in which we are all susceptible to drowning ourselves into drama, and what it takes to float free, is what Iris Murdoch (July 15, 1919–February 8, 1999) explores in her subtle, splendid 1978 novel The Sea, the Sea — the story of a talented but complacent playwright approaching the overlook of life, who is ultimately overcome by his tragic flaw: Despite his obsessive self-reflection (or perhaps precisely because of it), his egotism ultimately eclipses his creative spirit — that brightest and most generous part of us, the part rightly called our gift, the part that extends the outstretched hand of sympathy and wonder we call art and invites, in Iris Murdoch’s lovely phrase, “an occasion for unselfing.”

~ Maria Popova from Iris Murdoch on the Myth of Closure and the Beautiful, Maddening Blind Spots of Our Self-Knowledge

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I’m not a playwright—but the rest of that character seems too like me. “Drowning ourselves in drama…” “…obsessive self-reflection…” “…egotism ultimately eclipses his creative spirit…” Methinks The Sea The Sea would be a good cautionary tale for me to consume forthwith.

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Choose today

January 8, 2023 · All posts on Jan 8

In recent years I’ve been choosing a touch phrase. The phrases are reminders, intended to cue up a larger train of thought.

For 2023 the phrase is “Choose today”. It is inspired by two different quotes, both having withstood the test of time:

Stick to what’s in front of you—idea, action, utterance. This is what you deserve. You could be good today. But instead you choose tomorrow.

~ Marcus Aurelius

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…and one of my daily reflection prompts from Epictetus:

So is it possible to be altogether faultless? No, that is impractical; but it is possible to strive continuously not to commit faults. For we shall have cause to be satisfied if, by never relaxing our attention, we shall escape at least a few faults. But as it is, when you say, “I will begin to pay attention tomorrow,” you should know that what you are really saying is this: “I will be shameless, inopportune, abject today; it will be in the power of others to cause me distress; I will get angry, I will be envious today.” See how many evils you are permitting yourself. But if it is well for you to pay attention tomorrow, how much better would it be today? If it is to your advantage tomorrow, it is much more so today, so that you may be able to do the same again tomorrow, and not put it off once more, to the day after tomorrow.

~ Epictetus, 4.12.19-21

Indeed. If it is to my advantage tomorrow, it is much more so today.

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A space ship

January 6, 2023 · All posts on Jan 6

Congratulations on the new library, because it isn’t just a library. It is a space ship that will take you to the farthest reaches of the Universe, a time machine that will take you to the far past and the far future, a teacher that knows more than any human being, a friend that will amuse you and console you—and most of all, a gateway, to a better and happier and more useful life.

~ Isaac Asimov, from Isaac Asimov On How Libraries Can Change Your Life

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This tiny little post, which is written around Asimov’s short note quoted above, launched me in off in multiple directions. A library. Asimov. A type–written note. Even Asimov still made typing mistakes—how fast must he have been able to type after all those years of writing? What type writer did he use? Every now and then I feel like getting a type writer—but I spin off into looking at typefaces, and what the heck would I actually do with a type writer? OMG no I’m not going to start type writing the slips in the slipbox. (Because that’d be insane, and because hand writing the slips is part of the point since it reinforces learning. I don’t think typing would do that.) And I keep thinking I never got around to building the library/reading space that as a kid I’d always dreamed of. So many ideas. So little time.

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Gone

January 4, 2023 · All posts on Jan 4

This practice is one form of what Shinzen Young would call “Noting Gone.” (He uses gone as a noun here, a certain kind of sensation, rather than an adjective.) What you’re noting is the moment where a thing goes from being here in your awareness to being gone from it, and the feeling of that moment. It doesn’t matter what the thing is –- a fish, an LED light, a musical note, a shape formed by drooping power lines. It also doesn’t matter how it vanishes — by slipping beneath the surface, by turning off, by going silent, by exiting your field of vision. In all cases the this gone quality has the same feel. It is the unmistakable, mildly surreal sensation of a thing having vanished.

~ David Cain, from The Vanishing Point

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This piece is a real splinter in my mind. I feel certain I’ve seen the “noting gone” concept before… but I can’t definitely find it. Perhaps I’m recalling that I read this very article, 6 months ago, AND marked it for reading later. So now I’m actually reading it a second time . . . It is definitely an unmistakable, mildly surreal sensation of a thing having vanished.

Also, in my quest to dig out the splinter, I searched for “gone” and got an interesting in itself set of posts.

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Murderous feather dusters

January 2, 2023 · All posts on Jan 2

Three birds of prey hunker down in the light drizzle falling on Bouchaine Vineyards in California’s Napa Valley. Rocky, a beefy Harris hawk with long white-tipped tail feathers gently preens his marbled wings while E.B., a hybrid barbary and saker falcon with a dappled white-and-brown chest, keeps his gaze trained on a row of neatly plaited grapevines. Hootbert’s eyelids flutter sleepily over his big yellow spectacled owl eyes.

~ Shoshi Parks from, The Birds of Prey That Stand Guard Over California’s Vineyards

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That’s worth the click just for a few close–up shots of some raptors. But also, “Hootbert”.

I once had the distinct pleasure of a too-brief visit to a Falconry school where I was repeatedly astounded. The Harris Hawk I handled was a rescue; It had a damaged toe making it unable to survive on its own. Perched on your arm they are impressive—like, “there is a dinosaur standing on my arm” impressive. It weighs nothing. When it flies in your face it’s like being beat with a feather–duster. It’s gaze and movements are so fast and focused, it seems time must run at a different speed for them. In flight it’s nearly silent, but perched, it makes little sounds rather like a chicken, rather than what you might imagine of a murderous bird of prey. They’re supremely efficient at killing, but basically dumb as a stump otherwise. It was not the least bit interested in harming me, with its razor–sharp beak and talons mere inches from my face and my [I assume] tasty eyes. However, it was 105% interested in murdering the *expletive* out of what we offered it as food. We humans come hard-wired to be afraid of snakes and falling. (I’m only afraid of three kinds of snakes: Little snakes, big snakes, and most sticks.) Harris Hawks are fairly low on the shock-and-awe scale of avian predators. Having met one, I now completely understand why other birds flee in terror.

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Tis’ the season to be thankful

January 1, 2023 · All posts on Jan 1

Thank you for reading! I appreciate your time and attention, and I don’t take it for granted.

In years past I’ve posted some links to things which I pay for—if I’m not paying for something, then I’m probably the product being sold. So I prefer to pay for things when I can (when I’m able and when paying directly is possible.) Here are few things I use, which I pay for: Hindenburg, Overcast, Reeder, Feedbin, Tower, Transmit, OmniFocus, OmniOutliner, iaWriter, Discourse, Basecamp, Bluehost, Hover, Zencastr, Zoom, Otter, Mailchimp, Substack, Supercast, and Front.

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Average, or worst?

December 30, 2022 · All posts on Dec 30

Over the last few years, deep-learning-based AI has progressed extremely rapidly in fields like natural language processing and image generation. However, self-driving cars seem stuck in perpetual beta mode, and aggressive predictions there have repeatedly been disappointing. Google’s self-driving project started four years before AlexNet kicked off the deep learning revolution, and it still isn’t deployed at large scale, thirteen years later. Why are these fields getting such different results?

~ Alyssa Vance from, Humans are very reliable agents

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This makes the interesting distinction between average–case performance, and worst–case performance. People are really good by both measures (click through to see what that means via Fermi approximations.) AI (true AI, autonomous driving systems, language models like GPT-3, etc.) is getting really good on average cases. But it’s the worst–case situations where humans perform reasonably well… and current AI fails spectacularly.

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Kino Lorber

December 28, 2022 · All posts on Dec 28

Go to this YouTube channel: Kino Lorber, click Playlists and then view the Free Documentaries (80 feature-length films) or the Free Movies on Demand playlist (145 films.) Kino Lorber is an international film distribution company; I thought it was a person when I first heard mention of this.

Now try this experiment: Pick a documentary (try Filmworker if you know who Stanley Kubrick is, M.C. Escher: Journey to Infinity if you have eyes, or Hieronymus Bosch: Touched by the Devil if painting is more your thing.) Watch the movie. Then reflect on the experience of watching a feature–length documentary, versus say, modern “serial” shows. I’ve relearned just how bad modern entertainment can be, when I reminded myself just how good film can be. (Surprise bonus-round: Watch The Atomic Café and be gobsmacked, horrified, and… some-other-feeling-I-can’t-quite-find-the-right-word-for in repeated cycles.)

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Take some time to reflect

December 26, 2022 · All posts on Dec 26

On your deathbed, you would do anything, pay anything for one more ordinary evening. For one more car ride to school with your children. For one more juicy peach. For one more hour on a park bench. Yet here you are, experiencing any number of those things, and rushing through it. Or brushing it off. Or complaining about it because it’s hot or there is traffic or because of some alert that just popped up on your phone. Or planning some special thing in the future as if that’s what will make you happy. You can’t add more at the end of your life…but you can not waste what’s in front of you right now.

~ Ryan Holiday from, 35 Lessons on the Way to 35 Years Old

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This blog started initially as a place for me to post a eulogy, and then it grew to serve many more purposes. It’s now solidly a way for me to reflect, and to work with the garage door up. Discovery, reflection, and efficacy are pretty frickin’ important to me and keeping up with the ‘ol bloggin’ forces me to keep up with daily discovery and reflection. I’ve a bunch of other processes beyond this blog.

It’s a rare post where I both have a point and state it explicitly: Whether you go off to Holiday’s article and follow that thread, follow my links in this email or this post, or my series teaching daily reflection matters not. It only matters that you take time to reflect.

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Wow! Still, wow.

December 25, 2022 · All posts on Dec 25

Almost fifty years after it was detected, the Wow! Signal continues to tantalize and defy explanation. […] In 2020, interest in this candidate [extra-terrestrial intelligence] signal was revitalized when Cabellaro identified a Sun-like star in the vicinity of the sky where the Wow! Signal was detected. If the analysis is correct, this famous signal may have come from a Sun-like star located 1,800 light-years away.

~ Matt Williams from, There Could Be Four Hostile Civilizations in the Milky Way

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More amazing is that actual progress continues to be made towards understanding the original signal’s origin. Fifty years ago, the area of the sky was known to contain a bunch of stars. Today? We know which of them have planets. …and which of those stars have a planet in the so-called habitable zone. The article is both a good introduction to the famous (among astronomy enthusiasts) signal and a good story about continued research.

And just ignore the article’s click–bait title, which comes from a tangential discussion about whether we should only listen for extraterrestrial intelligence or actually try to contact ET.

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