August 9, 2024

THOUGHT OF THE DAY:

“I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time –when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness…

The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.”

― Carl Sagan

BIRTHDAYS:

1593 Izaak Walton, English biographer and author (The Compleat Angler)

1631 John Dryden, English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England’s first Poet Laureate.

1648 Johann Michael Bach, German composer of the Baroque period. Halt was du hast, and Kommt her zu mir spricht Gottes Sohn, and Ach bleib bei uns, Herr Jesu Christ

1690 Lorenzo Zavateri, Italian violinist and composer, born in Bologna, Papal States. Concerto No.10 in d major

1776 Amedeo Avogadro, Italian scientist, most noted for his contribution to molecular theory now known as Avogadro’s law, which states that equal volumes of gases under the same conditions of temperature and pressure will contain equal numbers of molecules.

1834 Elias Álvares Lobo, Brazilian composer. A Despedida de São Paulo

1897 Ralph Wyckoff, American scientist and pioneer of X-ray crystallography.

1927 Marvin Minsky, American cognitive and computer scientist concerned largely with research of artificial intelligence (AI).

1927 Daniel Keyes, American author (Flowers for Algernon).

1950 Chris Haney, Canadian journalist and co-creator of the Trivial Pursuit board game with Scott Abbott.

MISCELLANY:

SAME OL’, SAME OL’… OR SOMETHING ELSE? Ukraine Invasion in Russia in the Kursk Region

OPENING UP A WORLD OF POSSIBILITIES. BREAKTHRUGH Nanonuclear CEO Reveals Safe Nuclear Reactor on Wheels

ATTENTION STAR GAZERS. This Week’s Sky at a Glance, August 9 – 18

RECOMMENDED READING BEFORE THE NEXT LOCKDOWN IS DECLARED:

IN 2006. Disease Mitigation Measures in the Control of Pandemic Influenza

FOCUSED PROTECTION: The Great Barrington Declaration