Hey friends,
To begin, I would feel wrong not to briefly comment on current events: namely, that violence against civilians is horrendous in any context, both in acute and chronic forms. For me, I feel that this is a time to express empathy and compassion to all facing danger, whether enacted by people or nature. It is only human to priotize the most salient events, and this is justifiable— and I think it’s also important to remember that empathy and compassion are not finite resources! In terms of tangible actions: if you have the means, join me in supporting to relief efforts (ICRC, Doctors without Borders, IRC) , and please share any other means of contribution. In addition, I hope we can all be intentional in our balance of listening & learning to people’s lived experiences and actual experts with the need to express our (perhaps less expert or unrepresented) viewpoints. In the long term, once the current acute conflicts have hopefully receded or at least stabilized, I would also like to start sharing my efforts in educating myself about some of the more chronic injustices in the world that are often easier to overlook. With that, I’m always open to listen, learn, discuss, or otherwise connect about anything relevant to this.
On to our regular programming. I have not had many exciting adventures in the past weeks, but have found of assorted readings, some of which I hope catch your interest. It’s been more of a thinking than doing time for me, what with my previous tangent, the academic quarter starting, iterating on project ideas, and contemplating just what to do with all the stickers I bought in Canada.
A few things that have made me smile recently:
- spotting an SUV custom-painted matte black (this has been my secret dream car since forever)
- strange little flowers blooming from my string-of-hearts plant
- the playful joy of a dog destroying a new toy
- recycling empty tip boxes
- walking directly into yellow sunshine
What are you most grateful for these days?
Cheers,
Maya
Links
- Why our climate change debates are out of date
- I love stalking my friends via location-sharing, too (don’t read this, Mom)
- “No one is talking online anymore” — this pretty much summarizes my social media approach these days
- A clock that plays a song with the time in it, every minute
- We’re living in the invisible age of copper
- Why can’t robots click the “I’m a human” box? (A quick and informative vid on how reCAPTCHA works)
- This is such a fascinating and unexpected use of data… “Martinez (2018) looks at satellite photos of night lighting compared to GDP. He finds that in autocratic countries like China, there’s a much steeper relationship between night lights and GDP; for a given amount of lighting, autocracies report higher GDP numbers than democracies. His measure suggests that China’s GDP is about 12% lower than the official number — not a huge amount, but a sign that there is manipulation going on.” — Noah Smith
- We know how to teach kids to read— Hooked on Phonics had it right all along (the surprising power of standardization in education)
- A long + wild read by Elizabeth Kolbert on efforts to use machine learning to understand (and talk to) whales
- A quick profile of Sudan Archives, a previously-unknown-to-me, Cincinnati-born musician who "pursues technical, rather than emotional, manipulation with her instrument [the violin]. She can coax from it the sounds of an accordion, a drum, or a string orchestra.” At the very least, check out her music!
- Two maps, same scale…
- What cake-cutting can teach us about equity, fairness, and the mathematics of resource allocation
- Play Tradle: like Wordle, but guess what country exports the given distribution of products
- I want to listen to this podcast, Tooth and Claw— as the article puts it, a podcast that fits into the popular genre of “bros talking about stuff”— in this case, “true crime”-style wildlife stories with a touch of conservation
- Sketchplanations (just check them out)
- Very soothing digital stained-glass maker
Books
- How High We Go in the Dark — Sequoia Nagamatsu
- Sorta weird, sci-fi/cli-fi collection of interwoven narratives from a world not so different than our own
- Spare — Prince Harry, ghostwritten by J. R. Moehringer
- Nice New Yorker review
- An inside look at the prince/ghostwriter relationship
- Babel — R. F. Huang
- [The Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution]
- Related: on the intricacies and art of translation, the question of what it really means to capture the spirit of a piece of literature, and Emily Wilson’s new translation of The Iliad