Sunday, September 23, 2018

Me on deathbed regret

“The idea of dying young when you're 25 is kind of cool — a bit romantic, like James Dean. But then you realize that life is too much fun to do that.”
- Helen Mirren #rethink and have even more fun

The human brain has 100 billion neurons, each neuron connected to 10 thousand other neurons. Sitting on your shoulders is the most complicated object in the known universe. 
~ Michio Kaku

Why It’s So Hard To Make A Movie About Lizzie Borden (And Why People Keep Doing It Anyway) 


"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why the Borden murders still grip us. They're unsolved, they're grisly, ... and they involve a very strange woman. ... The problem with 'reimagining' the story of Ms. Lizzie Andrew Borden is that, by 2018, there is nothing new under the Fall River sun." …


Personally, I find the following people intriguing: Jesus Christ, Martin Luther King, Sir Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei, Marie Curie, Diego Maradona, Michael Jordan, Socrates/Aristotle/Plato, Samori Toure, Nelson Mandela, Michel de Nostredame. It’s a long list. There are even some historical figures that I do not admire, but would like to know more about – people such as Joseph Stalin, Napoleon Bonaparte, Judas Isacriot, among so many others.

Who has led the most interesting life




Ten Reasons Why We (And  Literature) Love Lists


Actually, not a list of lists, but some questions and thoughts: “Is there such a thing as a happy list in literature? The blithe verbal sum of possessions, achievements or experiences? Isn’t the very act of setting such things down evidence of some vexation, a clue that something is missing? The collector’s catalogue, the merchant’s tally, the seducer’s black book: they are all examples of compensating control. Compensation for what? For a scouring anxiety, or cumbrous melancholy?”


Pronounced dead for over three minutes following a horrific car crash, Sam Cawthorn survived despite all the odds stacked against him. The accident resulted in his right arm being amputated, and caused permanent damage to his right leg. He was told he would never walk again; a setback that would surely defeat many. Proving the doctors and critics wrong, through sheer determination Sam regained his ability to walk just over a year later.
STORYSHOWING - How to stand out from the storytellers





Alfred Hitchcock is interviewed by Mike Scott on an episode of Cinema, originally telecast by ITV Granada on May 20, 1966: (This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that ... rea


Me on deathbed regret, with a hat tip to an earlier conversation with Robin Hanson



EU Passes Controversial Copyright Law With ‘Link Tax’ And ‘Upload Filter’


"The reform is called the Copyright Directive and it was first proposed in 2016. On Wednesday, members of European Parliament voted 438-226 in favor of adopting the directive. The law is meant to be an overhaul of copyright rules, aimed at making sure publishers and artists are compensated by platforms like Google or Facebook. ... The controversial directive contains two articles" — known as the "link tax" and the "upload filter" — "that open internet and free speech advocates believe could fundamentally alter the way the internet works. Here's what they mean." …[Read More]


On The Misuse Of Civility


Lewis Lapham: "The operatic protest blowing through the country’s internet portals raises the question as to whether the sound and fury signifies something or nothing, the telling of “mischief-making,” fairy-tale lies that is the life of our good and great consumer economy, or the voicing of competitive truth that is the vitality of a democratic republic. It’s hard to know which is which because over the past forty years we’ve become accustomed to pretending that democracy is a peaceful idea, something civil, orderly, quiet, and safe. It isn’t." … Read More