“The Human Body Is A Machine”

May 26, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech | Permalink

Gerontologist Aubrey de Grey, who aims high and communicates well, always makes for good copy, whether you agree or not with his optimistic view of human life without death. From an interview by Gian Volpicelli at Vice:

“Question:

Do you think that people may be starting to think that ageing is the real enemy?

Aubrey de Grey:

I do think so, yes. The things that I’ve been saying for years are finally beginning to get understood. People are understanding that diseases of old age are not really diseases: They are aspects of ageing, side effects of being alive. If you want to cure them, what you’ll have to cure is to be alive in the first place—but you can’t actually do it. So we’ll have to take a preventative maintenance approach. That means that we’ll have to identify the various types of molecular and cellular damage that the body does to itself as a side effect of its normal metabolic operation. Once you’ve identified them, which has already been done, you have to find a way to repair that damage and prevent it from developing into a pathology of old age. That’s what I’m working on.

Question:

What are you really trying to achieve? Longevity or immortality?

Aubrey de Grey:

Well, first of all, any longevity benefit that I may achieve would be a side effect. I don’t work on longevity, I work on health. And it just happens that, historically, the main thing that kills people is…not being healthy. So healthier people will likely live longer.

Question:

How much longer?

Aubrey de Grey:

It depends on how much longer we can keep people healthy. The best we can say at the moment is that the human body is a machine. Therefore, it ought to be the case that we can have the same kind of impact on the human body that we already have now on simple manmade machines, like cars. So, as I said, we can rely on preventative maintenance: repairing any damage before it makes the doors fall off. It seems to work really well with cars; we’ve got one-hundred-year-old cars around now. So, if you do sufficient maintenance, the sky’s the limit. We should be able to maintain the human body in good health indefinitely, however long we like.

Question:

So…it’s immortality, right?

Aubrey de Grey:

Don’t use the word immortality when you talk about my work. It’s taken; it’s a religious word. Immortality means zero risk of death from any cause, but I don’t work on stopping people from being hit by trucks. I work on keeping them healthy.”•

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“It’s Cheaper To Invest In Technology Than To Hire Even The World’s Lowest-Paid Workers”

May 26, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

We will all be freed from toil, but freed to what? How do you reconcile a free-market economy with a highly automated one? From Angelo Young at IBT Times:

“As the 106,000 contract workers who lost their Nike jobs in the past year can attest, apparel manufacturers have decided that it’s cheaper to invest in technology than to hire even the world’s lowest-paid workers.

The relentless move toward industrial automation is undercutting vulnerable workers around the globe.

For years, China and India offered manufacturers a low-wage workforce. Production recently expanded around Asia to countries like Cambodia, Bangladesh and Vietnam as well.

But now, automation is allowing manufacturing to stop chasing cheap labor altogether. Automated production machines cut costs and immunize manufacturers from the dangers of a labor shortage.

‘I think this is going to accelerate,’ said Erik Brynjolfsson, professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management. ‘What we have is a situation where robots and automation do more and more tasks that are being done by low-wage labor in Asia and elsewhere in the world. People involved in repetitive work are very vulnerable to what’s happening.'”

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Old Print Article: “David Warshauer Will Soon Get Wooden Leg,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1935)

May 26, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

Sometimes surviving calamity is just the beginning of a rough voyage, as evidenced by an article in the December 8, 1935 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. The story:

“David Warshauer expects to get his wooden leg by the first week of the year, and then he hopes to work again.

‘I can still drive a truck, I guess,’ he says, stolidly, at his home, 1925 47th St.

Slightly more than four years ago Warshauer was given up for dead. He and his brother-in-law had been rescued after nine days in a disabled floating motorboat at sea; nine days without shelter, food or drink, nine days toward the end of which they ate bugs from the side of their tiny craft, and drank a poisonous liquid from a fire extinguisher and swore solemnly that the last to die would naturally have to eat the other’s body, and in return for the gift of life would try to take care of the other’s family.

Unconscious When Rescued

The cannibalistic pact was never carried out, because both became unconscious at about the same time, and were lying side by side in several inches of water when the boat was picked up by the cutter Cuyahoga.

Both were suffering so from the moist gangrene, exposure and other injuries that the doctors shook their heads at Staten Island Hospital when they were brought in. There was no hope, they said.

Irving Tuchyner, 28, a pocketbook manufacturer, did die the next day, but Warshauer, a Wallabout Market truckman with an unusually strong physique, lingered on. Even then the doctors shook their heads. Whole areas of his body were affected.

Of the four years since then, of the transfer from hospital to hospital and the endless skin-grafting, Warshauer today does not like to talk.

‘Those four years were worse than the nine days at sea,’ he says. ‘I can’t understand myself how I came through.”

 

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“I Don’t Know Johnny Rotten…But I’m Sure He Puts As Much Blood And Sweat Into What He Does As Sigmund Freud Did”

May 25, 2014 in Videos | Permalink

In 1977, Iggy Pop, not at his absolute healthiest, getting mad on a talk show about some jibber jabber.

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Recently Posted On NYC’s Craigslist

May 25, 2014 in Misc., Urban Studies | Permalink

"This would reverse the aging process and restore youth."

“This would reverse the aging process and restore youth.”

Needs $ to complete age reversal med

What we have invented is a system to manufacture engineered viruses that will recognize stem cells. there are two immediate uses for this. The virus can install DNA telomeres into stem cells that have had their stem cells shortened due to aging. This would reverse the aging process and restore youth. The second use for the virus would be to attack stem cells that are cancerous. This would be a treatment for any cancer originating from cancerous stem cells, such as breast cancer. The attack would include any metastasized cells.

What we need now is funding to build the system. We ask you to send a tax deductible contribution.

“Yogic Flying Produces Increased Brain Coherence”

May 25, 2014 in Politics, Videos | Permalink

When a kid, I had a seemingly a priori dislike for two things: religion and magic. Not unrelated, right? Yet, I was still forced to go to church and coerced into a Broadway matinee of The Magic Show starring Doug Henning. Well, it usually starred Henning. The day I attended, the lead was his understudy, some dipstick who donned a Henning-esque wig and facial hair. Even dumber. Anyhow, I thought of it recently because Marc Maron had Ivan Reitman on WTF, and the now-famed Hollywood director discussed his involvement in launching the original version (called Spellbound) in Canada. Howard Shore and Paul Shaffer apparently got their start in show business working for Henning’s north-of-the-border stage shenanigans.

But magic wasn’t enough for Henning. He also founded a political organization, The Natural Law Party, which helped him lose elections very badly in both the UK and Canada. Sometimes democracy works.

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“Rapid Technological Change Stands In Stark Contrast To The Lack Of Political Change”

May 25, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

I wonder if we were to do a historical hack of the American Revolution and supplied both sides, redcoats and turncoats, with the diffuse and interconnected technology of 2014, if it would have made the uprising’s stunning success more possible, less possible or impossible. It would be fun to reverse engineer that upheaval along modern tech standards.

On a related note, David Runciman of the Guardian wonders whether politics or technology will rule our future. I think it will be tougher and tougher for legislation to control too many things as we move forward, especially if the Internet of Things becomes a real thing. The opening of Runciman’s well-considered piece, which has some interesting thoughts about China’s technocratic rule:

“The most significant revolution of the 21st century so far is not political. It is the information technology revolution. Its transformative effects are everywhere. In many places, rapid technological change stands in stark contrast to the lack of political change. Take the United States. Its political system has hardly changed at all in the past 25 years. Even the moments of apparent transformation – such as the election of Obama in 2008 – have only reinforced how entrenched the established order is: once the excitement died away, Obama was left facing the same constrained political choices. American politics is stuck in a rut. But the lives of American citizens have been revolutionised over the same period. The birth of the web and the development of cheap and efficient devices through which to access it have completely altered the way people connect with each other. Networks of people with shared interests, tastes, concerns, fetishes, prejudices and fears have sprung up in limitless varieties. The information technology revolution has changed the way human beings befriend each other, how they meet, date, communicate, medicate, investigate, negotiate and decide who they want to be and what they want to do. Many aspects of our online world would be unrecognisable to someone who was transplanted here from any point in the 20th century. But the infighting and gridlock in Washington would be all too familiar.

This isn’t just an American story.”

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“Hunter Would Go Sleep In The Stall With The Animal To Nurse It And Make It Better”

May 25, 2014 in Excerpts, Film, Videos | Permalink

Don Johnson, who seems to be both an a-hole and an underrated actor, recalling Hunter S. Thompson and a couple other A-list friends in a Grantland interview conducted by Amos Barshad:

“Question:

You also got to spend some time with folks like Hunter S. Thompson and Jim Morrison …

Don Johnson:

Hunter was a close, close friend of mine. We were neighbors in Aspen and he was a dear, dear, dear brother to me. I’ve told this before but if I was out of town and I had a sick animal on my ranch, Hunter would go sleep in the stall with the animal to nurse it and make it better. I was very close to him. I loved him. And he co-conceived the idea of Nash Bridges with me. Jim Morrison I knew a little bit, when he was about 25 or 26. He was a charismatic guy, really amazing guy. And then of course he died a year later.

I met Richard Pryor right around that time. That was a thrill. He used to come over to my dressing room. I was doing a play in L.A. and I had two shows back-to-back on Friday and Saturday nights. And he’d come in my dressing room and he would get me ripped. I would have to go out and do the second show just fucking stupid. [Pause.] Good times.”

______________________________

Hell’s Angel harrasses Hunter, 1967:

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“Stores Of The Future Will Be More About Services, Like Day Care, Veterinary Services And Beauty Services”

May 25, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

The Apple Store sells ambience, sure, but at the heart of the experience is an array of amazing products. Most shops in the future will probably try to similarly offer an “experience” and diversify their offerings, but will it work if their selling just things and not the thing? From “What Will Shopping Look Like in the Future,” Mae Anderson’s AP report:

“Forrester analyst Sucharita Mulpuru says stores of the future will be more about services, like day care, veterinary services and beauty services. Services that connect online and offline shopping could increase as well, with more drive-thru pickup and order-online, pick-up-in-store services. Checkout also will be self-service or with cashiers using computer tablets.

Some stores are taking self-service further: A store in Seattle called Hointer displays clothing not in piles or on racks but as one piece hanging at a time, like a gallery.

Shoppers just touch their smartphones to a coded tag on the item and then select a color and size on their phone. Technology in the store keeps track of the items, and by the time a shopper is ready to try them on, they’re already at the dressing room.

If the shopper doesn’t like an item, he tosses it down a chute, which automatically removes the item from the shopper’s online shopping cart. The shopper keeps the items that he or she wants, which are purchased automatically when leaving the store, no checkout involved.

Nadia Shouraboura, Hointer’s CEO, says once shoppers get used to the process, they’re hooked.

‘They end up buying a lot more, they’re laughing and playing with it,’ she says.”

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A Brief Note From 1913 About A Mail Carrier

May 25, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the February 7, 1913 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“Ulmers, S.C.–A novel adventure incident to parcel post service, involving two babies and a wooden leg, all three sent by mail, was reported by Edgar T. Phillips, a rural mail carrier connected with the local office. While covering his route, with two infants and a wooden leg among his parcels, Phillips was attacked by a wildcat. For a moment, says the carrier, his live mail was in danger of being carried away. Selecting the wooden leg as the most available weapon, however, Phillips wielded it so well that he put the wildcat to route. All three parcels were delivered, none worse for the encounter.”

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10 Recent Huffington Post Headlines

May 24, 2014 in Humor, Misc. | Permalink

  • No, Urine Is Not Sterile
  • If You Have A Penis, You Should Watch This
  • Taco ‘Bout A Coincidence!
  • WATCH: UFO Crash In China?
  • ‘A Perfect Butt Doesn’t Make An Amazing Person’
  • Woman Allegedly Forces 3-Year-Old To Eat Own Poop
  • Barbra Streisand Finds Gay Sex ‘Distasteful’?
  • This Baby Snow Goat Got A Tiny Wheelchair, Stole Our Hearts
  • WATCH: In Defense Of Pubic Hair…
  • Did Gay Marriage Cause Godzilla?

 

This Week’s Afflictor Keyphrase Searches

May 24, 2014 in Misc. | Permalink


10 search-engine keyphrases bringing traffic to Afflictor this week:

  1. legal basis for donald trump suing bill maher
  2. removing living snakes from stomach
  3. milton berle richard pryor confrontation
  4. automatic hat james boyle
  5. race of giants that inhabited the earth
  6. peter singer practical ethics thought experiment immigration
  7. chico marx final tv appearance
  8. should mlb get rid of errors?
  9. masdar city driverless electric pod cars
  10. gourmand who ate zoo animals

Highlights From Yet Another Week Of Afflictor

May 24, 2014 in Misc. | Permalink

This week, the Internet turned on hero cat when she failed to prevent another tragedy.

This week, the Internet turned on Hero Cat when she failed to prevent a second gruesome tragedy.

“I now pronounce you man and wife.”

“You suck, cat.”

“Mission unaccomplished, kitty”

"Unpatriotic racist."

“Unpatriotic, racist cat.”

  • David Carr delves into the Jill Abramson firing fiasco.
  • Extreme Memory Tournament competitors help explain total recall.
  • EVs have a real opportunity to gain on gas-fueled cars.
  • 4D printing is being worked out even before 3D printing is popularized.
  • Tom Robbins talks Hunter S. Thompson and Philip Roth.
  • We’re very attracted to dystopic art. Why?
  • Amazon is transforming downtown Seattle into a company town.
  • Happiness shouldn’t necessarily be your main goal.

“I Don’t Think Hunter Ever Had A Genuine LSD Trip In His Life”

May 23, 2014 in Books, Excerpts | Permalink

Tom Robbins and I do not agree. It would seem his work is made for me, but I tried and failed in my teens to read his novels, and I walked out on Gus Van Sant’s god-awful adaptation of Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. Robbins talked to Rob Liguori of the New York Times Magazine in connection with the release of the novelist’s first memoir. Here are two exchanges about other writers:

“Question:

You’re often identified as a literary representative of the counterculture of the ’60s and ’70s, along the lines of Hunter S. Thompson.

Tom Robbins:

Once I’m gone, I don’t think I’ll care, but I don’t see Hunter that way at all. For one thing, I don’t think Hunter ever had a genuine LSD trip in his life. He took other drugs at the same time and washed it down with various libations, so he was never a guest in the spiritual dimension that LSD seems to open up for people who take it — well, I don’t want to say responsibly — but who take it under what I consider the right conditions.

Question:

Philip Roth retired a few years ago, and he keeps a Post-it note on his computer that says, ‘The struggle with writing is over.’ Can you relate to that?

Tom Robbins:

Not at all. Even though it can sometimes take me an hour to write a sentence that I’m happy with, I’ve never considered it a struggle.”

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“News Fitted Ideally Into The Expanding Market For Cheap Print, And It Swiftly Became An Important Commodity”

May 23, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

Via the always fun Delancey Place, an excerpt about the centuries-old birth of the newspaper from Andrew Pettegree’s The Invention of News:

“The real transformation of the news market [which prior to the printing press had been oral or laboriously hand-written] would come from the development of a news market in print. This would occur only haltingly after the first invention of printing in the mid-fifteenth century. For half a century or more thereafter printers would follow a very conservative strategy, concentrating on publishing editions of the books most familiar from the medieval manuscript tradition. But in the sixteenth century they would also begin to open up new markets — and one of these was a market for news. News fitted ideally into the expanding market for cheap print, and it swiftly became an important commodity. This burgeoning wave of news reporting was of an entirely different order. It took its tone from the new genre of pamphlets that had preceded it: the passionate advocacy that had accompanied the Reformation. … News also became, for the first time, part of the entertainment industry. What could be more entertaining than the tale of some catastrophe in a far-off place, or a grisly murder?

Naturally the elites sought to control this new commercial market, to ensure that the messages delivered by these news books would show them in a good light. Printers who wanted their shops to remain open were careful to report only the local prince’s victories and triumphs, not the battlefield reverses that undermined his reputation and authority. Those printers who co-operated willingly could rely on help in securing access to the right texts. … From remarkably early in the age of the first printed books Europe’s rulers invested considerable effort in putting their point of view, and explaining their policies, to their citizens. …

The divisions within Europe brought about by the Reformation were a further complicating factor: the news vendors of Protestant and Catholic nations would increasingly reproduce only news that came from their side of the confessional divide. News therefore took on an increasingly sectarian character. All this led to distortions tending to obscure the true course of events. … The purveyors of the news pamphlets had a clear incentive to make these accounts as lively as possible. This raised real questions as to their reliability. How could a news report possibly be trusted if the author exaggerated to increase its commercial appeal?”

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“The Prince Once Described Himself As ‘A Combination Of Bank Manager, Psychiatrist And Nanny'”

May 23, 2014 in Excerpts, Videos | Permalink

Prince Rupert zu Loewenstein, the money manager who made those three-chord wonders, the Rolling Stones, into multi-millionaires, just passed away. Unsurprisingly, his life was colorful. From his New York Times obituary by Douglas Martin:

“On the most prosaic level, Prince Loewenstein got the group to stop accepting paper bags full of cash as payment. On the grand scale, he led in planning a tour — its biggest at the time — to coincide with the release of the Steel Wheels album in 1989. The tour grossed $260 million worldwide and represented a patching up of the strained relationship between Mick Jagger and Mr. Richards.

The prince once described himself as ‘a combination of bank manager, psychiatrist and nanny.’ He helped Mr. Jagger negotiate his divorce from Bianca Jagger in 1978 and his estrangement from Jerry Hall in 1999.

When Mr. Richards was arrested on heroin-trafficking charges in Toronto in 1977, Prince Loewenstein showed the extent of Mr. Richards’s casual spending — $350,000 in the previous year — as evidence that Mr. Richards was wealthy enough not to have to commit crimes to feed a heroin habit. The charge was reduced to ‘simple possession of heroin.’

Rupert Louis Ferdinand Frederick Constantine Lofredo Leopold Herbert Maximilian Hubert John Henry du Loewenstein was born on Aug. 24, 1933, into Bavarian royalty on the Spanish island of Majorca. An ancestor helped repel the Huns in 907.”

______________________________

“Please allow me to introduce myself, I’m a man of wealth and taste”:

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“He’s Hoping 4D Printing Will Be The Thing Of The Not-So-Far Future”

May 23, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech | Permalink

The opening of Randy Rieland’s a Smithsonian post about MIT’s Skylar Tibbits, who aims to one-up 3D printing before it even becomes popularized:

“These days, 3D printing seems to be at the core of most new new research ventures, whether it’s developing ways to print entire meals or recreating facial features to repair a patient’s face.

But Skylar Tibbits wants to up the ante: He’s hoping 4D printing will be the thing of the not-so-far future.

The name for his concept, Tibbits admits, was a bit lighthearted at first. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tibbits and researchers from the firms Stratasys and Autodesk Inc were trying to come up with a way of describing the objects they were creating on 3D printers—objects that not only could be printed, but thanks to geometric code, could also later change shape and transform on their own.

The name stuck, and now the process they developed—which turns code into ‘smart objects’ that can self-assemble or change shape when confronted with a change in its environment—could very well pop up in a number of industries, from construction to athletic wear.”

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“There Are A Lot Of Interesting Reasons That Brought Down The Civilizations”

May 23, 2014 in Books, Excerpts, Science/Tech | Permalink

Eric H. Cline, archaeologist and historian, has written a new book, 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed, about the end of the Bronze Age. He just did an Ask Me Anything at Reddit. A few exchanges follow.

________________________

Question:

In what you’ve studied, what’s the most interesting reason/way that a civilization collapsed? Is there anything in the story of that collapse that you think that we could take a lesson from today?

Eric H. Cline:

I’ve only studied the Late Bronze Age collapse, but in my view all of the civilizations were interlinked and so I argue that there a lot of interesting reasons/ways that brought down the civilizations, ranging from climate change, drought, famine, earthquakes, internal rebellions, etc. There may or may not be lessons that we can learn; some people reading my book are intrigued by the fact that there is evidence for climate change back then, just before/as the civilizations were collapsing.

______________________

Question:

What’s your most controversial opinion?

Eric H. Cline:

That we’re never going to find Noah’s Ark. That pisses off more people than you might imagine…

________________________

Question:

What are your thoughts on Jesus?

Eric H. Cline:

He was a nice Jewish boy.

________________________

Question:

The title of your book is very intriguing. Can you explain the significance of this year and how you pinpointed 1177 B.C. as the year that Bronze Age Civilization collapsed?

Eric H. Cline:

Thanks for a great question. Let me simply quote from my book by way of answering:

“The end of the Late Bronze Age in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean regions, an area that extended from Italy and Greece to Egypt and Mesopotamia, was a fluid event, taking place over the course of several decades and perhaps even up to a century, not an occurrence tied to a specific year. But the eighth year of the reign of the Egyptian pharaoh Ramses III—1177 BC, to be specific, according to the chronology currently used by most modern Egyptologists—stands out and is the most representative of the entire collapse. For it was in that year, according to the Egyptian records, that the Sea Peoples came sweeping through the region, wreaking havoc for a second time. It was a year when great land and sea battles were fought in the Nile delta; a year when Egypt struggled for its very survival; a year by which time some of the high-flying civilizations of the Bronze Age had already come to a crashing halt. In fact, one might argue that 1177 BC is to the end of the Late Bronze Age as AD 476 is to the end of Rome and the western Roman Empire. That is to say, both are dates to which modern scholars can conveniently point as the end of a major era. Italy was invaded and Rome was sacked several times during the fifth century AD, including in AD 410 by Alaric and the Visigoths and in AD 455 by Geiseric and the Vandals. There were also many other reasons why Rome fell, in addition to these attacks, and the story is much more complex, as any Roman historian will readily attest. However, it is convenient, and considered acceptable academic shorthand, to link the invasion by Odoacer and the Ostragoths in AD 476 with the end of Rome’s glory days. The end of the Late Bronze Age and the transition to the Iron Age is a similar case, insofar as the collapse and transition was a rolling event, taking place between approximately 1225 and 1175 BC or, in some places, as late as 1130 BC. However, the second invasion by the Sea Peoples, ending in their cataclysmic fight against the Egyptians under Ramses III during the eighth year of his reign, in 1177 BC, is a reasonable benchmark and allows us to put a finite date on a rather elusive pivotal moment and the end of an age. We can say with certainty that the far-reaching civilizations that were still flourishing in the Aegean and the ancient Near East in 1225 BC had begun to vanish by 1177 BC and were almost completely gone by 1130 BC. The mighty Bronze Age kingdoms and empires were gradually replaced by smaller city-states during the following Early Iron Age. Consequently, our picture of the Mediterranean and Near Eastern world of 1200 BC is quite different from that of 1100 BC and completely different from that of 1000 BC.”•

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Old Print Article: “Miser Wanted A Wife With Plenty Of Money,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1903)

May 22, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

"The fact that Van Steinberg starved himself into a condition of chronic blood poisoning did not surprise his neighbors very much."

“The fact that Van Steinberg starved himself into a condition of chronic blood poisoning did not surprise his neighbors very much.”

For a miser, keeping money for himself probably feels a little like cheating death. If you’re gripping something of value tightly in your hands, how can your body become a worthless coil? But the end comes, regardless, and the death of just such a skinflint was the focus of an article in the March 7, 1903 Brooklyn Daily Eagle. An excerpt:

“Mrs. Mettetal, the proprietor of the delicatessen store on Fulton Street, near Chestnut, who rented to John Van Steinberg the little back room where he slept and cooked the scanty meals which were insufficient to keep body and soul together, says that not long ago the old miser advertised in a New York newspaper for a wife. One of the conditions that the old man insisted upon in the advertisement, was that the young woman should be rich and possessed of plenty of means. He received many answers to this advertisement, but whether any of the replies suited him or not Mrs. Mettetal does not know.

The fact that Van Steinberg starved himself into a condition of chronic blood poisoning did not surprise his neighbors very much. Some of them, it is said, remember that before Mrs. Van Steinberg died, about two years ago, she complained that her husband did not give her sufficient food and that he refused to supply her with all the medicines ordered by her doctors. Notwithstanding his meanness as to food, Van Steinberg, when he lived in the house at 92 Pine Street, was known to spend his money freely for valuable flowers, of which he was a great lover. He spent his whole time in the garden cultivating scarce and beautiful plants.

Mr. Mount of 13 Cooper Street, who is a member of the board of directors of the Veteran Firemen’s Association, to which Van Steinberg belonged, throws an interesting light on the manner in which the old miser lived for the past two years. During this time, while he had thousands of dollars in the bank, Van Steinberg was drawing $5 a week distress benefit from the organization. When he died, Mr. Mount, under the impression that he was very poor, told Undertaker Brewster that the Veteran Firemen would be responsible for a funeral costing as much as $200. When Mr. Mount visited Van Steinberg, just before he was removed to the hospital, he was astounded to find on the mantel in his room letters containing checks which he had sent to the old miser still unopened. The old man’s excuse was that he had been too weak to get the checks changed into money to buy food with it. 

Mr. Mount took the checks and gave the old man cash. Then with some of the money he went downstairs and bought a lot of nourishing food. After Mr. Mount left, the sick miser got one of his children living in the house to take the food back to the store where it had been purchased and secure the purchase money for it.

Before Dr. Robinson went to attend the old miser he had ordered two doctors out of the house because they asked him for a fee. He only agreed to listen to Dr. Robinson’s advice when he learned that he was a Holland Dutchman by descent, like himself, and didn’t care whether he got any money or not, providing the sick man was too poor to pay.

When he finally agreed to go to the hospital, Van Steinberg insisted in going in a cab instead of the hospital ambulance, as he would save $2 by that mode of conveyance. To Dr. Robinson, the old miser said that his sole enjoyment in life had been the contemplation of the fact that after his death his relatives would not be able to touch any of his money.”

 

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“The Whole Idea Of Progress Is To Starting Inventing Things That Haven’t Been On Earth Before”

May 22, 2014 in Politics, Videos | Permalink

In 1979, Germaine Greer, part genius and part cuckoo clock, comments on creativity under various political systems.

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“I Couldn’t Quite Shake The Feeling Of Spending Time In A Company Town”

May 22, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

Amazon is building a trio of biospheres–the kind filled with crazy laughter, not crazy ants–in Seattle to serve as new company headquarters. Unlike Google and Nintendo, which live in that city’s suburbs, Bezos’ bunch are heading downtown, bringing excitement to the locals but also fears that they’ll be priced out of the fun. From Colin Marshall at the Guardian:

“Pending the completion of the towers, Amazon’s current South Lake Union operations go on in clusters of lower-rise buildings whose purpose you couldn’t necessarily surmise through a streetcar window. But other, subtler clues identify their function: the sudden preponderance of blue Amazon badges and unflattering Amazon logo-emblazoned hooded sweatshirts on the street; the nearby dentist’s and even masseuse’s offices advertising their acceptance of Amazon health insurance; the recorded voice inside the streetcar itself advertising the upcoming stop as ‘sponsored by Amazon.com.’

Nobody could ever mistake Microsoft and Nintendo’s Redmond campuses, surrounded for miles by little more than grass and parking, for cities. Even the most Amazonian blocks of South Lake Union, by contrast, never feel less than urban in form. Maybe it has to do with the nearness of the Seattle skyline, or with all the construction adding to the bustle, or with the fact that people actually live here, not just sleep on the plush employee-lounge couches. Still, much of it struck me as slightly too new, and slightly too thought-through; I couldn’t quite shake the feeling of spending time in a company town, albeit a company downtown.

Even in its incomplete state – and even more than America’s older city centres, now coming back to life largely through infusions of high-end shopping – South Lake Union caters to those prepared to spend. You may do it with relative modesty, at the food truck parked at the end of the streetcar line offering kale salads and burgers with bacon jam and jalapeño aioli; you may drop a few dollars more at the speciality hot-chocolate shop or the combined dog bakery and boutique; or you may go all the way and get your teeth capped, purchase a Bang & Olufsen stereo system, and put in an order for an $80,000 electric sports car at the neighbourhood Tesla showroom.”

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Recently Posted On NYC’s Craigslist

May 22, 2014 in Misc., Urban Studies | Permalink

""Whilst I don't have the money to pay...""

“Whilst I don’t have the money to pay…”

Muse Sought

Screenwriter from London, newly transplanted to New York. I’ve recently been pondering embarking on a novel. About what I do not know just as yet, but I do know that it demands that I engage with completely different energies and thinking from which I succor at for my screenplay writing at this time. This urge has been sparked by some recent short story writing I have been indulging in and it’s made me crave something to inspire me to write something in long form.

I am looking for a woman who can challenge me creatively, mentally, sexually and emotionally. In essence I guess, I am seeking a muse. I am seeking someone from outside the realm of individuals I would typically gravitate to. I need someone who is going to both inspire and scare me to strive for some truths in my writing.

Whilst I don’t have the money to pay, I am specifically looking for someone who seeks the same sort of inspiration as well and perhaps the compensation can be me doing the same for you in relation to what you are working on.

“It Also Hints At A Future Where Local And State Governments Will Have To Operate Without A Substantial Source Of Revenue”

May 22, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

One unintended consequence to driverless cars and their growing ability to avoid traffic infractions is that the money from tickets often goes to fund law enforcement. Of course, fewer road accidents and, say, the decriminalization of drugs, would lead to less of a need for a large police budget. From Colin Neagle at Network World:

“Shortly after the state of Washington voted to legalize recreational marijuana late last year, opponents made a very interesting, if somewhat counterintuitive, argument against legalized pot – law enforcement would miss out on the huge revenue stream of seized assets, property, and cash from pot dealers in the state.

Justice Department data shows that seizures in marijuana-related cases nationwide totaled $1 billion from 2002 to 2012, out of the $6.5 billion total seized in all drug busts over that period. This money often goes directly into the budgets of the law enforcement agencies that seized it. One drug task force in Snohomish County, Washington, reduced its budget forecast by 15% after the state voted to legalize marijuana, the Wall Street Journal reported in January. In its most fruitful years, that lone task force had seen more than $1 million in additional funding through seizures from marijuana cases alone, according to the report.

Naturally, this dynamic is something law enforcement either is or should already be preparing for as driverless cars make their way onto the roads. Just as drug cops will lose the income they had seized from pot dealers, state and local governments will need to account for a drastic reduction in fines from traffic violations as autonomous cars stick to the speed limit.

Google’s driverless cars have now combined to drive more than 700,000 miles on public roads without receiving one citation, The Atlantic reported this week. While this raises a lot of questions about who is responsible to pay for a ticket issued to a speeding autonomous car – current California law would have the person in the driver’s seat responsible, while Google has said the company that designed the car should pay the fine – it also hints at a future where local and state governments will have to operate without a substantial source of revenue.”

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“Offensive Assistant: Tarzan”

May 22, 2014 in Excerpts, Sports | Permalink

Mike Leach wasn’t only a radically innovative offensive mind while coach at Texas Tech but also an eccentric who made for great copy. Unfortunately, his obsessions with history and his myriad oddities were so alluring to journalists (Michael Lewis among them) in search of a salable narrative that most of them never dug deep enough. Leach was ultimately fired from his post for serious misconduct in his treatment of his players. He’s now the head coach for Washington State University. His fixation on certain historical periods and his new book about Geronimo and leadership, which seems ready-made for the corporate-lecture circuit, were central to an Ask Me Anything he just did at Reddit. A few exchanges follow.

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Question:

I know you are big history buff, if you had to fill your coaching staff with historical figures who would you choose? For the sake of discussion you can’t pick a sports figure.

Mike Leach:

Head Coach: George Washington. Offensive Coordinator: Geronimo. Offensive Assistant: Tarzan. Defensive Coordinator: Winston Churchill. Defensive Assistant: Daniel Boone.

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Question:

The team is down by 15 with four minutes left when it punches in the ball on the outside zone read that hasn’t worked all day but finally beats the WILL who’s starting to dog it late in the game. Geronimo is the head coach. Does he go for 2 now, or kick the PAT and wait for the second opportunity?

Mike Leach:

Geronimo’s speed and tenacity in adverse conditions is going to allow him and his band of Chiricahua Apaches to score swiftly with that much time left. Illustrated in my book, “Geronimo: Leadership Strategies of an American Warrior,” they prepared for situations like this and were raised to respond to them starting as children. They would never flinch in a situation like this. Going for 1 or 2 would be based on their evaluation of the opponent, the terrain, and the resources they had to work with.

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Question:

What characteristic of Geronimo’s do you most look up to and how has he influenced your coaching?

Mike Leach:

I have read about and studied Geronimo for a long time since I was a child. In writing the book with Buddy Levy, and articulating a lot of these things, I discovered that I have been sharing a lot of these philosophies and stories with my teams for years. Among many others, Geronimo’s life story illustrates that a lot of impossible things are possible, everybody can work harder than they think they can, everybody is tougher than they think they are, but it is starts with the proper preparation, attitude, and philosophy. One of the most exciting parts of writing the book was the opportunity to discover a lot of interesting specifics on what made the Apaches what they were.

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Question:

Who is your favorite pirate?

Mike Leach:

The most exciting pirate is Edward Teach (Blackbeard). Probably the most productive one, and someone I would be fascinated to study more closely, would be Bartholomew Roberts.•

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“They Flock To Movies Depicting A Relentlessly Depressing View Of The Future”

May 21, 2014 in Books, Excerpts, Film | Permalink

Are we attracted to dystopic novels and films because they caution us or because they titillate us? Deep inside humans, along with an impulse to create, is one to destroy. Some get more joy from the seconds it takes to topple an elaborate sand castle than the hours it takes to build one. Perhaps these stories of decline and doom are psychological outlets for destructive tendencies, the way sports can be a safer outlet for aggression than war. Of course, sports has not ended war nor gave apocalyptic books and movies stopped us from trying to extinct ourselves.

Excerpts follow from two new pieces about dystopian art.

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From “Let’s Go to Dystopia,” by Diane Johnson at the New York Review of Books:

“Maybe there are people who read dystopian tales for self-improvement the way people used to read sermons, or for amusement—people who can edit out the very details that have most preoccupied the person who made them up, and read for the story alone. The stories, boiled down, are usually at bottom just the good old stories. Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, set in London, is basically the same story as Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, set in the dystopian world of a mental institution; both Alex and McMurphy are forced into conformity and docility by institutional powers.

There are quest stories or love stories—a quest runs through Margaret Atwood’s trilogy about Crake and Oryx. Chang-rae Lee’s On Such a Full Sea is both a quest and a love story—a girl searches for her lover and for her brother, and so on. There’s no missing the appeal, especially for adolescents, of another common structure of these tales: a protagonist, often a teen, somehow preserved from the brainwashed docility of most people in his or her society—a rebel—solves some personal or social problem afflicting everyone (Hunger Games), and escapes from the future into what we recognize as a more normal world.

Utopias of course are just variations of dystopia, the reverse side of the same coin, in which a traveler from somewhere better tells about a distant society whose humanity and wisdom throw into relief the practices of our own, as in Sir Thomas More’s Utopia, or William Dean Howells’s A Traveler from Altruria, when the disingenuously leading questions that the suavely persuasive traveler asks his American host expose American laws, tastes, and manners as a kind of dystopia next to the traveler’s ideal Altruria. Through three hundred pages, America is indirectly portrayed as a dystopia of hypocrisy and self-delusion, the way Brobdingnagians, Yahoos, Lilliputians, and Houyhnhnms threw light on Swift’s and Gulliver’s England.”

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From “Why Hollywood Loves Dystopian Science Fiction,” by Alex Mayyasi at Priceonomics:

“Neal Stephenson knows a thing or two about science fiction. The author of thick, best-selling novels that cross genres but slant toward sci-fi, Stephenson also writes about technology and has worked part time on a private space company.

He is also tired of dystopian science fiction movies and video games. ‘A few weeks ago I think I actually groaned out loud when I was watching Oblivion and saw the wrecked Statue of Liberty sticking out of the ground,” he tells Morgan Warstler in an interview. 

A proponent of the thesis that we have ‘lost our faith in technology to bring progress’ and ‘lost our ability to get important things done’ on an Apollo mission scale, Stephenson sees the ubiquity of dystopian visions as a cultural expression. Whereas it was once ‘refreshing, and extremely hip, to see depictions of futures that were not as clean and simple as Star Trek,’ we now experience ‘a strange state of affairs in which people are eager to vote with their dollars, pounds and Euros for the latest tech [like iPhones], but they flock to movies depicting a relentlessly depressing view of the future, and resist any tech deployed on a large scale, in a centralized way.’“

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