Category: Daily Journal

Today’s edition seems to focus a lot on skepticism and the harsh nature of reality scratching up the smooth surface of idealism and desire. The world is complex and dirty and difficult, and any time someone wants to sell you on it being simple, pay close attention to what they’re eliding over. The trick is in the misdirection, in encouraging you not to notice the action in the other hand, the string hidden behind the back, the difficult, dangerous machinery that lurks in the eaves, cloaked in shadows by the glittering lights.

Inputs

1: Spent some time reading about the current state of quantum computing and the general (reasonable) skepticism about breakthroughs or tangible real-world usage being just over the horizon. A telling tidbit:

Troyer and his colleagues compared a single Nvidia A100 GPU against a fictional future fault-tolerant quantum computer with 10,000 “logical qubits” and gates times much faster than today’s devices. Troyer says they found that a quantum algorithm with a quadratic speed up would have to run for centuries, or even millennia, before it could outperform a classical one on problems big enough to be useful.

https://spectrum.ieee.org/quantum-computing-skeptics

The technology is amazing, the pictures of it elegant and beautiful, but the applications are still a ways off. The chief concern here is that this sort of intensive R&D work has been trimmed from corporate budgets at every turn, and the thought that we could lose out on a future because of the pressure to stare at the end of the fiscal quarter is disheartening.

2: You may or may not have heard about the “AI-generated” George Carlin special that was released recently. I’m not telling you to go watch that (fuck everything about the thought of that), but I am interested in this theory, that it wasn’t actually written by AI and instead some AWESOM-O-esque farce written by a human or humans trying to pose as AI through voice generation software.

3: Hey, train robberies are back! Dutch and the gang have saddled up again and are apparently after your Amazon orders. Also, the issue is large enough that the LAPD has put together a “Train Burglary Task Force,” which, given the nature of police institutions, must have some sort of patch or logo for it, but damned if I can find it. If you do, lemme know!

Today’s been me subtly avoiding preparing for an interview for weird, complicated reasons, and yet knowing that I’ll be cramming for it in the hours before it actually kicks off. The neuro’s real spicy today.

Inputs

1: The two big stories in Wisconsin sports today are the Bucks pulling the rip cord on their first year head coach with the third best record in basketball, and looking to replace him with Doc “And now we cut to the losing coach at the podium” Rivers, and the Packers firing of defensive coordinator and regular fan whipping boy Joe Brady.

Wisconsin, in my experience as a resident here, is a state that loves an incumbent head coach. The level of patience and acceptance of most leaders of teams is rather wide, with a non-affected “aw shucks, he tried his best” attitude allowed to cover for what, in more rabid media markets, would have people outside the building with signs and effigies. So it’s odd seeing this much change in a short period, especially after what one would have considered success in the aggregate. Best of luck to whoever’s here next, and have a good time with it. We’ll be rooting for you in earnest.

2: This interview with Penn Jillette hits on something I think that I and many of a similar mind ran into during their growth from simplistic to complex belief structures, in his journey out of big-L Libertarianism. I’ll quote it here:

For so long, you identified as Libertarian. What changed?

I completely have not used the word Libertarian in describing myself since I got an email during lockdown where a person from a Libertarian organization wrote to me and said, “We’re doing an anti-mask demonstration in Vegas, and obviously we’d like you to head it.” I looked at that email and I went, “The fact they sent me this email is something I need to be very ashamed of, and I need to change.”

https://www.cracked.com/article_40871_penn-jillette-wants-to-talk-it-all-out.html

It brings to mind the bit from the most recent season of Fargo:

Lorraine Lyon: “So you want freedom without responsibility? Son, there’s only one person on Earth who gets that deal.”

Sheriff Roy Tillman: “The President?”

Lorraine Lyon: “A Baby”

3: I’m wary of any story that essentially begins with “A new study says” due to so many things, from misreporting the actual findings of scientific work (sometimes intentionally, usually just through lack of rigorous knowledge about the vagaries of how science reports on itself) to the replication crisis to a general malaise at the faith we put in one study of questionable size and scope compared to the claims.

So when I see “How exercise increases brain volume — and may slow memory decline” I take it with a grain of salt (which also may or may not be bad for me depending on the latest stories about salt intake.)

However, I can say that I, personally and anecdotally, notice the difference on the days I get my 30 minutes of walking in vs the days I don’t, and while I hate that it helps, it definitely helps.

The cold has broken (leaving behind a still chilly but livable low-30s) and dropped a couple inches of thick, wet flakes on its way out. Above freezing highs the next week or so are hinting at an end to a peaky Winter some time on the horizon. We’re all looking your way now, groundhog.

Inputs

1: An interesting digression on the odd history of serendipitous discovery of sweeteners among chemists at LessWrong. One of the first things one learns in Intro to Chemistry is the rhyme about sulfuric acid¹Johnny was a chemist, Johnny is no more, for what he thought was H2O was H2SO4 and not to ingest things in the lab²I mean, I think they usually mean a sandwich or whatever, but certainly don’t eat the experiments!. How so many professional chemists not only end up with their experiments on their bare skin, but go on to lick it, is beyond me.

2: I’ve always wondered about this happening on a delayed penalty, but it couldn’t have happened to a better guy. Best goal of Malkin’s career.

3: Tonight! Katie Nolan goes for the Celebrity Jeopardy crown, which will air after this posts, but which I will most definitely be watching. 8/7c on ABC³Check your local listings, as they say.

Notes:

• 1
  Johnny was a chemist, Johnny is no more, for what he thought was H2O was H2SO4
• 2
  I mean, I think they usually mean a sandwich or whatever, but certainly don’t eat the experiments!
• 3
  Check your local listings, as they say.