Interesting Links for 02-10-2023

[andrewducker]

1. cripes does anybody remember Google People (a short story)

(tags:short_story Google technology AI scifi horror )

2. The world's oldest trigonometry table (1,500 years before the Greeks)

(tags:archaeology mathematics )

3. Extreme Misogyny in Incels Probably Not Caused by Sexual Frustration (instead caused by trying to show how much inceller they are than any of their terrible friends)

(tags:misogyny psychology )

4. How Insect Brains Melt and Rewire During Metamorphosis

(tags:insects brain )

5. U2 at the Sphere in Vegas looks mind-blowing

(tags:u2 video concert technology )

6. The 'Center of Edinburgh' Bollard

(tags:Edinburgh postoffices )

7. You cannot design a productive city around car transport

(tags:cars transport cities viaDanielDWilliam )

8. Animation vs. Math

(tags:mathematics animation video )

9. Oxford University Mathematician reacts to "Animation vs. Math"

(tags:mathematics video animation )

10. The Untold Story of NotPetya, the Most Devastating Cyberattack in History

(tags:security Technology epicfail hacking )

Comments

[nancylebov]

This

[nancylebov]

This time around I noticed how expressive the stick figure and the e were.

[andrewducker]

The animator has done a great job.

U2 at the Sphere in Vegas looks mind-blowing

[anef]

And considering that that was recorded on a phone the sound quality isn't too bad at all.

Re: U2 at the Sphere in Vegas looks mind-blowing

[andrewducker]

Yeah, the quality of phone sound really does seem to be improving. Impressive considering how tiny the microphone must be.

[bens_dad]

2 .Lamb's rebutal to Mansfield and Wildberger: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/dont-fall-for-babylonian-trigonometry-hype/

Wikipedia also seems to object to M&W.

[channelpenguin]

Ooh, thanks for that! I hadn't even read the link Andrew posted ... and now I feel I don't need to!

I feel old though + I DID in fact, use trig tables at school, although we just about had affordable scientific calculators available when I was in my teens (and I had one), we were taught to trig do without. I missed slide rules by a few years though. I always thought that a bit of a shame.

[bens_dad]

I still think M+W was worth reading.

The objections are that a) it isn't new, b) that it isn't trignometry and c) that it isn't history.

M+W admit c) as this tablet doesn't show how the Babylonians used the table.
Since the Babylonians don't use angles, but describe the associated right angle triangle, this is not trig. but working this way you don't put the approximations into the table but get a division out which you can make as accurate as you need.
As far as I can see this exactness *is* new.
Wikipedia mentions a French paper by Proust (not that one) and suggest that it is what we ought to be reading.

I too had tables and calculators at school. I did have a slide rule but using them wasn't part of the syllabus (there existence was). But I also have a desk top hand-crank calculating machine.

[andrewducker]

Thank you, that's useful to know.