Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Israel's Iron Prime Minister

- Michael Shermer: Free Speech and Theater Fires. Even Oliver Wendell Homes Jr. later said his quote was wrong.

- Colorado Springs artist appeals rejection of trademark over AI art.

- Why satellites are finding more Mayan ruins than ever before. (HT Borepatch)

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- 20,000 years ago our ancestors had the speed of Olympic sprinters but were barefoot running in sand. 

- Ford sees $3 billion pretax loss on EV business this year. Only Tesla seems to be able to make a profit on EV sales.

- A real man of genius

- Coinbase asked the SEC what rules they may be in violation of but got threats back instead. The people who brought you the latest banking crisis don't want anyone escaping their grasp via crypto.

More Linky Links

More stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Archaeologists discover 1.2 million year old "workshop" in mind blowing find. Discovery pushes use of tools by hominids back by half a million years!

- Louis CK "uncancels" himself.

- Why the Real Thing Matters

- Scientists struggle to understand why Antarctica hasn't warmed in 70-years despite rise in CO2 

More Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Attack of the archaeologists (a defense of Graham Hancock)

- Honest advice for people in their 20's from Zuby. Honestly the advice is great for people of any age. 

- Bari Weiss on how she got to work on the Twitter Files and why

- The supply chain that keeps tech flowing into Russia despite sanctions. Business finds a way.

Linky Links

Haven't done one of these posts in quite a while but I've go too many tabs open and all of them (that aren't work related) are worthy of sharing.

- Steven Pressfield and the Goddess at Our Shoulder.  Writing and philosophical life advice taken from The Odyssey

- Visualizing FTX's balance sheet before bankruptcy. Oh what a tangled web. So tangled its like trying to find the queen in three card monte.

- Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA discovered in ancient South America. We have no clue on how old mankind really is.

- Paul Graham's essay How to Think for Yourself. From the archives but definitely worth the time.

Find Something Beautiful Today

Archaeologists uncover a 2,000-year old Greek floor mosaic in Turkey (photo via). Headline stolen borrowed from Execupundit. 

Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous thoughts and observations.

Tom Brady is exactly 500 yards away from breaking Drew Brees all-time passing yards record of 80,358 yards. That means there's a very good chance he'll break the record in his week 4 game against the Patriots in Foxboro. I expect him to get a standing ovation from the crowd when that happens... Did archaeology just solve the riddle of the destruction of Sodom in the Old Testament? Pretty good evidence that they did... Product idea - come out with a really hot, hot sauce. Call it Anus Napalm... Amused myself thinking about how changing the phrase "All sales are final" to "All sales are terminal" would work. Think it would be particularly amusing for a store that sold coffins... The surprising origin of high heels... Just learned that the sheriff in those Dr Pepper commercials is Brian Bosworth. Not sure if that makes me dislike those commercials even more or not... 

The History of the Earth

 

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- You have to love the Rock.

- Is confirmation bias guiding COVID vaccine recommendations?  The answer is absolutely YES which is bothersome when you remember that the pharmas have no liability for bad outcomes or side-effects.

- Interesting profile of Navy Seal David Goggins. I still have his book Can't Hurt Me on my wishlist. Has anyone read it?

- Archaeology and genetics keep updating the history of human lineage. As an aside - how great a name for a Substack is "Unsupervised Learning?" Bravo. 

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Cool - the day Private Willie Mays threw out my dad. (HT Daddy Pundit)

- Interesting partnership between Apple and Target.

- Very true

- The 10 biggest archaeology finds of 2020 

- Cool cover of Roxy Music's Avalon. Peter Frampton doesn't get enough credit as a world class guitarist. (HT Meanderthal)

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

-  The Day the Dinosaurs Died (Long but interesting read)

- Matt Taibbi on former Havard President Larry Summers' comments on the proposed $2,000 stimulus checks. 

- 22 quotes from a recent Charlie Munger interview

- Kevin Simler - Ads Don't Work That Way (another long but interesting read)

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Africa's ghost Roman city buried in the sand for centuries.

- Analysis - True!

- Peter Thiel's 2019 Manhattan Institute's Wriston Lecture.

- This may be the end of free conference calling services.

- Individual neurons may be "smarter" than previously believed. Though I'm not enamored with the metaphor of the brain as a computer.

- Trudeau's administration has pushed government spending to the highest levels in Canada's history. As much or more than 40% of GDP - higher levels than during World War II. And the economy has nothing to show for it.

- Heh Heh

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Radio legend Don Imus passes away aged 79. Love him or hate him he did good charity work for kids with cancer.

- Another example of why hockey players are the best

- Rewriting human history through DNA

- Dean Martin the coolest cat who ever lived

- Interesting - scientists have discovered a way to manipulate the body's own immune response to boost tissue repair

- A new patent from Tesla may make a million-mile battery a reality.

- Russ Roberts lists his 5 favorite novels. Sadly I haven't even read one of these. Will have to remedy that in 2020.

Flotsam and Jetsam

Miscellaneous thoughts and observations.

The descent into our world of "fake news" really accelerated when The Daily Show with Jon Stewart became the defacto source of news for many young people. Snark became a replacement for facts...  This is beautiful to me (Trinity College library, Dublin)... This may sound strange but I'd really like to hear what Adele could do with a cover of Ted Nugent's Stranglehold... "Opportunity is missed by most because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work" - Thomas Edison... Interesting rundown of some of the discoveries of the past decade in archaeology. We know so little about our past but hats off to those who are piecing together the puzzle of humanity's history... You have to hand it to Trump's media people. I haven't seen anything from the Democrats that's even close to being this good at messaging... If you're looking for a family movie I recommend the vastly underrated Kubo and the Two Strings. Its a couple of years old and came and went with little fanfare but it has a 97% critics rating and an 86% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes...

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Heh Heh

- A rediscovered John Steinbeck short story about a chef and his cat has been published in English for the first time.

- A reminder that people work very hard to put food on your table

- Cool - Machine learning has been used to translate ancient long-lost languages.

- Naval Ravikant: the company size is shrinking

- This is an interesting idea.

- Probably going to try to work one or two of these into my workout routine.

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- MAD Magazine is shutting down. An end of an era.

- Steep decline in nuclear power would threaten energy security and climate change goals. You can't be for fighting carbon emissions and trying to curb "climate change" and yet still be against nuclear power.

- 3,400-year old palace discovered in Iraq

- How Beautiful We Were by Vanderleun

- A Fine Time to Become an American. Congrats to Niall Ferguson,

- This is great

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- How the Green New Deal would exploit poverty-stricken people across the globe.

- No thank you!

- This could be a pretty cool movie.

- Wicked cool

- Is marijuana as safe as we think? Interesting article by Malcolm Gladwell.

- Could push-ups be the key to heart health?

- Cool

Jesus' First Miracle

Supposedly archaeologists have unearthed the site of Jesus' first miracle.

This reminded me of a story from college.

It was a Friday afternoon and my fraternity was having a "social" at one of the sororities. There was a problem with their tap to the keg so me and a buddy agreed to walk back to our house to get one of ours.

We filled a red solo cup for the short walk home. When we arrived there were three young men in white dress shirts and solid ties waiting for us.

"Jesus wouldn't be happy with what you are doing" one of them said nodding at our Solo cups full of beer.

"Oh really?" said I. "What was Jesus' first miracle?" The man who had spoken knew he was beat. "That's right" said I. "Now get the fuck off my lawn."

They left without a word. My friend was impressed but puzzled. "What was Jesus' first miracle?" he asked.

"Turning water into wine for a party." We grabbed one of our taps, went back to the party and had a great time.

Haven't thought of that story in years.

History of the Earth

Love illustrations like this.

Linky Links

Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.

- Tom Brady practiced nude? I did not know that.

- Very cool - archaeologists uncover ancient Mayan "megaopolis"  in Guatemala

- This stat is troubling

- I still get a kick out of this. A muggle IT person working at Hogwarts.

- Heh heh

- A periodic reminder of why I blog

-  Awesome!