Links Links Links!
October 23, 2024
3-Item Status
Current location: Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
Reading: The Language of the Night by Ursula Le Guin
Listening: Hiding by Ben Böhmer (featuring Lykke Li)
Quick Notes
Links: I’m doing a list of links today, instead of this newsletter’s usual “essay plus updates” template; my brain is fried from a bunch of other writing I’m doing, so it seemed prudent to shift to curation to allow the scrivening side of my grey matter a little break :)
(If you have a moment, reply with your own 3-Item Status and/or Quick Notes about what’s happening in your life.)
Links Links Links!
Post-Apocalyptic Education
Last summer, I wrote about the Homework Apocalypse, the coming reality where AI could complete most traditional homework assignments, rendering them ineffective as learning tools and assessment measures. My prophecy has come true, and AI can now ace most tests. Yet remarkably little has changed as a result, even as AI use became nearly universal among students.
Why Does Ozempic Cure All Diseases?
There’s a pattern in fake scammy alternative medicine. People get excited about some new herb. They invent a laundry list of effects: it improves heart health, softens menopause, increases energy, deepens sleep, clears up your skin. This is how you know it’s a fraud. Real medicine works by mimicking natural biochemical signals. Why would you have a signal for “have low energy, bad sleep, nasty menopause, poor heart health, and ugly skin”? Why would all the herb’s side effects be other good things? Real medications usually shift a system along a tradeoff curve; if they hit more than one system, the extras usually just produce side effects. If you’re lucky, you can pick out a subset of patients for whom the intended effect is more beneficial than the side effects are bad. That’s how real medicine works.
But GLP-1 drugs are starting to feel more like the magic herb. Why?
Radio Shack Catalogs Archive
Astronomy Photography of the Year
The Skill of Naming What’s Happening in the Room
Here are some examples of straightforwardly naming what’s happening in the room, without judgment or leaping to assumptions:
“Hey, let’s just take a second to check in: it feels like maybe we are going in circles on this.”
“Hey Cameron, I noticed your shoulders just slumped. I want to check in—how’s it going over there?”
“I just want to hit pause and say, I sense that we are both not feeling heard right now.”
“It feels like the energy in the room just changed.”
If you’re familiar with nonviolent communication, these statements will probably resonate! By incorporating phrases like “I sense that,” “I get that,” or, “it sounds like”, you can signal to those around you that you want to take a moment to understand their point of view.
Mapping Time: The Surprising Overlaps of History’s Most Influential Minds
The Rise of the Midlife Coming-of-Age Party
On the day of her big coming-of-age bash, Audrey Calzada wore a tiara. Mariachi played. Friends performed a synchronized dance to Rema’s “Calm Down,” and she had a mid-party outfit change from a sequined midnight-blue gown to a gold one—just like so many other girls might do at their quinceañeras, the ritual for 15-year-olds that’s celebrated across Latin American cultures and their diaspora. But Calzada, who works in the oil industry in Texas, had passed the quinceañera milestone decades ago. She was about to hit her 50th birthday, and she was determined to celebrate with pizzazz. “The joke in my community,” she told me, “is that I’m extra.”
BBC Sound Effects
The BBC Sound Effects Archive is available for personal, educational or research purposes. There are over 33,000 clips from across the world from the past 100 years. These include clips made by the BBC Radiophonic workshop, recordings from the Blitz in London, special effects made for BBC TV and Radio productions, as well as 15,000 recordings from the Natural History Unit archive. You can explore sounds from every continent - from the college bells ringing in Oxford to a Patagonian waterfall - or listen to a submarine klaxon or the sound of a 1969 Ford Cortina door slamming shut.
Space Exploration Logo Archive
Outro
If you like this sort of list (a bunch of links to fascinating things, curated for you by someone who’s interested in everything and who spends a lot of time reading and perusing), you’ll probably like Aspiring Generalist, where I basically just share links all the time—that’s the whole project.
Click on anything particularly compelling/interesting/mind-boggling/bizarre/creative recently? Drop me a message and share the link! You can also post it in the comments if you’re keen to share the wealth with everyone :)