Links for 2009-12-13

“[H]ow did we wind up with a more negative view of the world than our parents? Or grandparents? Back then, people didn’t live as long and babies died more often. Diseases were more common. In those days, if your buddy moved away the only way to communicate was with pen and paper and a stamp. We have Iraq, but our parents had Vietnam (which killed 50 times more people) and their parents had World War 2 (which killed 1,000 times as many). Some of your grandparents grew up at a time when nobody had air conditioning. All of their parents grew up without it.

We are physically better off today in every possible way in which such things can be measured … but you sure as hell wouldn’t know that if you’re getting your news online. Why? “

“As I scan the list of popular DSLRs that have been purchased it’s clear that Canon and Nikon lenses have dominated the list once again. However instead of listing them in a mixed list in order of popularity I thought it’d be more useful to list them by manufacturer. Afterall – if you’ve got a Canon DSLR you’re not going to be interested in a Nikon or Pentax lens.”

“[S]o anyway did you know [Meet the Beatles]? Were you aware of it? Came out in the beginning of 1964. The one with the four guys in black and white, half their faces white, half in shadow? Just four faces against a black backdrop? He says he’s familiar with the album but he thought we were getting on the phone to talk about incentivizing heavy users in order to optimize the network resources blah blah and I’m like, Dude, if you ever use the word incentivize around me again I swear I will get in my Gulfstream and fly to wherever you are and I will smash you in the face with a rock.”

“It is my pleasure to write this letter,/
He is not just good, he is simply better,/
A promising researcher, young yet mature,/
He will be an asset, of that I am sure.”

“For a while now the fraction of condensed matter physicists that think about electronic transport measurements have been interested in noise as a means of learning more about the underlying physics in systems. I thought it would be useful to give a sense of why noise is important. “