Category: anonradio

ASFO 2023–02–11

A Question, of the type I so love to pose. Also more about that cult I’m definitely not starting, and a brief aside regarding so–called generative artificial intelligence (also referred to as “regurgative AI” or “stochastic parrots”), with a plea to read Reflections on Trusting Trust. And I merely tease a dive into the wonderful world of the Oklo Phenomenon.

ASFO 2023–02–04

Power outage? Power outrage! And just like that, I’m back to talking about the Regulated Utility Model for applying private enterprise to furnishing public goods, and trying to examine its potential uses in fields as disparate as pharmaceuticals and housing. With a bonus mention of Jimmy McMillan, the guy who says The Rent Is Too Damn’ High! Also Mail Call.

Supplementary Show

  • 2023–02–07 More from Interstellar Migration and the Human Experience (Finney and Jones, eds) : Introduction to Section II, Demography and Economics : Growth of the Human Tribe ; Comments on Hodges’ “The Division of Labor”, by the editors (with a very different view of “artificial intelligence” from that exhibited by, say, ChatGPT) ; Introduction to Section III, Migrating Societies ; Introduction to Section IV, Speciation ; and a part of the Introduction to Section V, Is Anybody Home? (stopping at the beginning of the section on the “Fermi paradox”).
  • 2023–02–10 Probably the last I’ll read out of Interstellar Migration and the Human Experience (but perhaps you’ll be interested enough to seek out the book for yourself). Fermi’s Question, the Epilogue, and the short biographies of authors.

They do not grow old, as we who are left grow old

I acquired what might have been, by that time, the last new, sealed copy of Challenger Memorial tape in the world at the Montreal Worldcon in 2009, and listened to it obsessively for two weeks when I got home.

“Recorded during a memorial presentation at Bayfilk III in San Jose, California, on March 9, 1986, before an audience of 200. The dream is, and must remain, alive.” (Archive recording)

Continue reading “They do not grow old, as we who are left grow old”

ASFO 2022–01–28

Graphite leads me to consider the problem of false mental world pictures, with a detour to boggle at the neologism elementeome. I interrogate just what it would mean for The Singularity to come in seven years. And, having considered “population control” from the standpoint of genocide last week, I look at it from the standpoint of eugenics ― which involves a closer examination of that concept. Also there may be just the slightest smidgeon of cult–starting.

ASFO 2022–01–21

In which I announce an Exciting New Initiative, although I’m not yet clear on how to pay for it, and consider non–existent remedies for non–existent maladies, and the question of whether you are really entitled to your own opinion, if you can’t be bothered to inform yourself about the topic. Also… yes, Virginia, reducing the human population of Earth to 2 billion by 2100 would in fact constitute genocide, even if you do it purely by limitation of births. Let’s spend more time on the happier business of the what and how of the Lunar Settlement, shall we?

Cover of a booklet entitled (in German) "Homeopathic Prescriptions for a Future with Radioactivity".
Non–existent remedies for non–existent maladies

Supplementary Shows

  • 2023–01–24 Probably the last reading from Man and the Moon. In addition to the notes by Richardson, I read the whole of Where to Land on the Moon by Wilkins, and the first part of Man on the Moon ― The Exploration by Whipple and von Braun (from the famous 1952 Man Will Conquer Space Soon series of illustrated articles in Collier’s). The idea behind this has been to get a feel for the way people were thinking when serious work on space travel began.
  • 2023–01–27 Interstellar Migration and the Human Experience (Finney and Jones, eds) is the proceedings of a conference held at Los Alamos in 1983. And a very interesting volume it is, too! I read the Table of Contents, Prologue, Introduction to Section I Resources : Human, Technological, and Cosmic, and the concluding summary to Solar System Industrialization : Implications for Interstellar Migrations by David Criswell.