OK #CellTower 1059
https://www.andrewt.net/puzzles/cell-tower/?p=1059 Did that, now time to make a thing.

OK #CellTower 1059
https://www.andrewt.net/puzzles/cell-tower/?p=1059 Did that, now time to make a thing.
OK, top of the hour! Second load of laundry is in becaues I stuck one in last night. Time to stop dodging and ... accept the reality that I said I would do a presentation I need to organize the 8 powerpoints :P
BUT hey, the proposal says what I said I would do, with the citations.
I did the laundry, the dishes and blocked Elon Musk.
(note, I said particle *theorist*; if he'd been an experimental particle physicist responsible for building accelerators and detectors, he'd definitely care about that!)
Linguistic prescription trigger warning.
I hate that "algorithm" has come to mean something like "AI-powered recommender system". If there's any kind of software which is *not* algorithmic that is machine learning.
The whole point of artificial learning is to not have to write algorithms: explicit recipes for solving a problem. Instead, a "program" is automatically inferred from data/experience, and may be even constantly changed with the arrival of new evidence.
This morning eclipse, as viewed from home, reflected in the ceiling.
#eclipse #solareclipse
L'eclipsi d'aquest matí vist des de casa, reflectit al sostre.
#eclipsi #eclipsisolar
Un buen ejemplo de que saber analizar datos es importante y, de hecho, en ocasiones puede ser crucial.
((a∧a)⇾¬¬¬¬¬¬a)
I've done my nerdy duty this morning, and experienced an example of the clockwork of the universe, first-hand.
Didn't have any proper equipment, so I improvised a pinhole camera making a small hole in a piece of paper with a toothpick and projecting the image of the (partial) eclipse on a second piece of paper.
Rudimentary, but it works.
Asimov's SF and Analog have put the top few stories in each category in their 2024 annual readers’ poll free to read online on their web sites.
My novella “Death and the Gorgon” from Asimov’s and my novelette “Vouch For Me” from Analog are among them.
Links:
https://www.asimovs.com/about-asimovs/readers-award-finalists/
https://www.analogsf.com/about-analog/analytical-laboratory-finalists/
If you like some of these stories, I hope you’ll consider subscribing to the magazines. It’s a tough time for all SF magazines, and they’re the place where new writers get their start.
Theorem of the Day (March 29, 2025) : The Existence Theorem for Orthogonal Diagonal Latin Squares
Source : Theorem of the Day / Robin Whitty
pdf : https://www.theoremoftheday.org/CombinatorialTheory/DDOLS/TotDDDOLS.pdf
notes : https://www.theoremoftheday.org/Resources/TheoremNotes.htm#131
I will say one more thing. I have a lot of respect for what GNU and the FSF have done, and even for Stallman's historical contributions, but I think a big problem with their approach has been describing things in terms of "user freedom".
It is not about user freedom at all. It is about social ownership of computing, bound to the public good so that the benefits cannot be expropriated by anti-social interests including corporations.
Talking about all this in terms of "user freedom" requires redefining so many words in technical ways that are internally consistent but not at all consistent with the way that people think or talk about things in everyday life. I have found that "loading" everyday words like this is usually a bad way to convince the public of things. I think any veteran of the culture wars, and its redefinition of "literal violence" and other things, would probably concur.