Interesting Links for 23-11-2025

[andrewducker]

1. The Uncertain Origins of Aspirin (a fascinating piece of history, neatly dividing myths from evidence)

(tags:drugs history myths )

2. 'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit' takes on Neil Gaiman and Amanda Palmer. Kinda

(tags:neilgaiman AmandaPalmer tv rape )

Comments

[calimac]

1) Stan Freberg on one of his comedy albums read 18th-century long s as an f, as a joke. To transcribe it that way in a serious article is just ignorant.

[fanf]

It’s weird that Asimov’s magazine is now science fact instead of science fiction …

(It seems to be a subsidiary of a biotech startup.)

[andrewducker]

It is unexpected.

But then again he wrote a lot of pop science books.

[pseudomonas]

I'm glad it wasn't just me that this grated on! It's not like unicode doesn't have a long s ſ character. I'd even put up with an esh ʃ at a pinch.

[pseudomonas]

And an annotated edition of the complete works of Gilbert and Sullivan.

[calimac]

If you're transcribing such a text today, use a short s. That's what's usually done. The long s is an old typographical custom, not an inherent quality of the text.

[pseudomonas]

Oh, of course that should be the default. I meant if one wishes for some reason to indicate that a long s is being used (either stylistically, or for discussing the typography or paleography or whatever)