#history
Is mainstream media promoting UFO conspiracy theories for clicks, without adequate skepticism or fact-checking?
An interesting, long, and diverse conversation with Stephen Wolfram. Most interesting to me is the idea that technologies are usually invented for practical purposes, and science later catches up.
In 1988, English art dealer James Birch exhibited Francis Bacon in the USSR. In this book, Birch tells this story.
This article pitches 2012 as a “tipping-point” in various culture, economics, and public health.
Putin’s rise to power was backed by a nexus of KGB, oligarchs, and criminals, not with a goal to return to communism, but to restore security services’ prominence.
Geruso and Spears argue that the declining birth rate could lead to a global population of around 560M in 300-600 years, making humanity more vulnerable to extinction.
Large datasets of individual biographies were analysed to quantify scientific production between 1300–1850, revealing significant differences among countries; England and the United Provinces were notably more creative.
Four new studies investigating the effects of Facebook and Instagram’s algorithms on political beliefs found that removing some key functions of these algorithms had “no measurable effects” on people’s political beliefs. In fact, the ability of users to share political news declined when their ability to reshare posts was removed, according to one study.
Historically, people in Europe consumed a large amount of beer and wine, with the average person consuming about a liter of beer a day, four times more than in modern beer-drinking countries.
Brain drain, or the emigration of highly-skilled and highly-educated individuals from Europe to the United States during World War II, driven by the fear and destruction of the Nazis and their anti-Semitic agenda, had an impact on the outcomes of the war.
H.G. Wells foresaw the potential atomic bombs in his novel The World Set Free (1913), which depicted a devastating war that led to the creation of a unified world government to prevent future conflicts.
In the 1920s, Berlin nightclubs, such as the Resi and the Femina, used a unique system of table phones and pneumatic tubes for anonymous late-night flirting between strangers.
Alberto Grandi challenges the traditional notions of Italian cuisine, claiming that many Italian classics are relatively recent inventions.
This is an incredibly fascinating article, and the related video is fantastic.
This is an interesting story about a British family living in China during the Cultural Revolution.
Anyone who’s spent as little as a day in Mexico City has heard fierro viejo, the incredibly charming and annoying marketing siren of scrap metal haulers. This is the story of fierro viejo and the people who use it.
US elites (cultural, government, and security) conspired to make American modernism a successful counterpoint to the socialist realism of the Soviet Union.
An interesting conversation from 1989 from a mailing list, discussing the fall of the Berlin Wall.
This is the best book about Steve Jobs, because it’s built with direct quotes from Steve (interviews, emails, notes-to-self). While most meander around the details of his personal life or glorify him as a tech prophet, this book homes in on some practical takeaways from his success and worldview. It demystifies him.
In the Soviet Union, even vacation was regulated by the Party.
Important quote from George Box. I came across it in the context of AI, but it applies to all science. We’re just building models for understanding nature, which is probably too complex to truly understand, but some of our models are useful nonetheless.
Today is the fifty-third anniversary of the most thrilling jazz album I’ve ever heard. Bitches Brew by Miles Davis.
Monica Macias was just seven when her African despot father left her under the guardianship of Kim Il-sung. A fascinating story about growing up in North Korea.
Not your average wordcel, it sounds like Twain was somewhat of a techno-optimist, friend of Tesla, and even tech investor.