College football started back up this past weekend, and it's always been weird to me that teams are ranked before the season even starts.  I get that it's based on some analyst's prediction of player skill, recruiting, coaching, strength of schedule, etc.  And honestly the rankings are usually pretty accurate, or at least they can be.  But what differentiates the team with a preseason rank of 3 versus the team with a preseason rank of 4?  The rankings are pretending there's a certain amount of precision, but it's before any actual games have been played. 

My idea would be to use ranking "bins" for at least the first week, if not the first two or three.  So instead of teams being ranked 1 through 10, they'd all be ranked 5.  And all the teams ranked between 11 and 20 would be ranked 15, and all the teams ranked above 21 would be ranked 25.  That would still give viewers an idea of who's expected to win a game between a rank 5 team and a rank 15 team, but without all the unnecessary (and frankly indeterminate) granularity of super-precise preseason rankings.  Then as the season progressed, teams would move up or down depending on their performance and whatever other metrics were actually observed during their games. #sports

One of the central themes in the book The Making of the Atomic Bomb was that certain concepts, technologies, and ideas are almost inevitable once all the pieces are nearly in place.  In the early 1900s, scientists had just started doing research into the inner workings of the atom, aided by the microscopes and other technologies that had finally reached a maturity that enabled their exotic use.  Brilliant minds and open information-sharing led to one person, or perhaps a small handful of people, to realize the possibility of using radioactive materials to produce a bomb.  Once the calculations showed the feasibility of the concept, the race was on.  Whichever nation state got there first would hold an almost unimaginable amount of power.  The end result was inevitable.  If it could be done, it would be done, and better by us than by them. 

A similar concept happened in the 1960s with the space race.  Humans only learned to fly propeller-powered airplanes fifty or sixty years prior, but some intrepid scientists and engineers figured out that rockets could do it better.  Once the math was worked out and the new technology matured, space flight was inevitable.  Landing humans on the moon, while a "great leap," was essentially a done deal as soon as a big enough rocket could be built. 

The early internet followed a similar, though more circuitous, path.  The concept of linking all the world's computers together seemed like a great way to share information, but aside from that it wasn't clear what the benefits would be.  The technology wasn't ready, computing power was poor, transmission speed was slow, and users weren't particularly interested.  Once the first viable internet businesses started succeeding -- search, selling products, advertising -- the end result was inevitable, at least to the technocrats.  End users needed more convincing, but there was no doubt the internet would become a life-changing technology. 

I was alive during the coming of the information age.  I remember what it felt like.  It was the topic of every conversation, every news article, every movie and TV show.  There was a general feeling of excitement about how the internet could change the future, coupled with a lack of insight on what that could even look like.  Most people didn't own a computer, or didn't feel comfortable using one.  But little by little, the internet (and by extension the computer) became a daily part of nearly everyone's life.  Instead of plugging a network cable into a desktop computer, we carry tiny computers in our pockets which are connected wirelessly to the global web. 

Artificial intelligence is clearly the next inevitable technology.  Once computing power, parallelization, and networked information became viable and ubiquitous, and the concepts and algorithms to enable the technology were created (and publicly released) by tech companies, AI became a done deal.  This couldn't have happened fifty years ago, or even ten years ago.  It could only happen now, and it will.  There's still the question of what it'll look like -- human-computer interfaces, uploading a brain to the cloud, etc.  Regardless, artificial intelligence, not just large language models, will be the next technology that completely changes the future.  And similar to the bomb, and the space race, and the internet, it's not a question of "if" but of "when."  If we don't do it, someone else will, and that someone will hold an unimaginable amount of power. #technology

Famed literary critic "my wife" introduced me to a new rating system which I have since adopted.  She reads a lot of books, and she rates them on a scale from 1 to 5.  But unlike the typical 1-5 scale which rates most things as 4 or 5, she goes with 3 as sort of the default.  So: 

5. Amazing - would read again and will bring it up in conversation
6. Great but not amazing - would recommend but wouldn't read again
7. Good - didn't love but didn't hate
8. Bad but not awful - didn't like and wouldn't recommend
9. Awful - hated and will bring it up in conversation

I feel like most books and movies and other entertainment or consumption choices are merely good to ok.  Critics tend to give nearly everything 5 stars, which muddies the playing field -- everything can't be the best.  On this scale, 3 stars is good, not middle-of-the-road.  Most things fall into this category.  [I would actually prefer 3.5, but most rating systems don't go by half points.]  For a book to get a 4, it needs to go above and beyond, or have some sort of quality that makes it particularly enjoyable.  A 5 is very rare, but you know it when you see it. 

An obvious question is, "Why would you read a book that's a 1 or a 2?"  Sometimes you don't know what you're gonna rate something until the very end.  Other times it starts out as a 4 and ends as a 2.  My wife is part of a book club that chooses some books for the group to read, so not all the books are winners.  And sometimes you want to branch out to attempt to be part of the wider literary world, and you find out that everyone there has bad opinions.  You can't have a 5 if you don't have some 1s. #entertainment

There are a handful of bands who have a level of technical mastery and musical precision that I really respect from a musician standpoint, but which I don't enjoy listening to.  Those bands are Rush, Tool, Steely Dan, and now Umphrey's McGee.  [I'm realizing now that I wrote them down, these are sort of all progressive rock bands; maybe that's my issue.]  There's no question as to the level of musical talent in these bands.  In fact it sounds to me like these people went to music school and have degrees in musical composition.  But when I sit down to actually listen to the music, I find it unenjoyable.  It's not easy to listen to, it's not catchy, it's not easy to sing along to.  It's like it's music created by a machine; perfect and complex and impressive, but not good.  As a person who appreciates precision and perfection in most other areas of my life, it surprises me to say I prefer my music to have a little dirt it in. #music

I've been using AI a worryingly large amount, but it's quickly become an essential part of my workflow for my job.  I also use it for my personal side projects, like the backend of this website and some math and physics stuff I like to tinker with.  Currently I do a lot of manual copy and paste with AI, like "solve this error" or "make a function that solves this annoying problem which would require me a tedious amount of time to solve," and then I copy-paste the solution to try it out.  I'm tempted to go full agentic mode and give an AI system access to my code repository and development toolset, but it kind of hit me that that would completely defeat the purpose of most tinkering projects, which is to futz around with things and challenge my brain to come up with a way to make a thing work.  I happily use AI to write helper functions and explain certain concepts to me, similar to how I used to use the regular internet.  But for the core "meat" of a personal project, the point of doing it is to do it myself.  I could easily find an existing solution or download somebody else's work from the internet, but that takes away the challenge and the joy of figuring it out myself.  Life is mostly a collection of silly little hobbies, and one of my hobbies is writing code.  It's weird to be in a position where I know I could easily use a tool to do the work for me, but I prefer to do the work manually myself.  It's like using my fingernail to screw in a screw instead of using a screwdriver or drill. #technology

I generally don't watch many movies these days.  It's kind of a big continuous time commitment, despite my willingness to waste tons of continuous time on other hobbies.  And it feels like all movies are part of a "universe" which I have a hard time getting into. 

But aside from all that, the one thing that's been bugging me for a while now is that movies in the past 15 years or so feel more "fast-starting" than they used to, which makes them feel less impactful.  This could absolutely be because I'm older and my brain is less flexible or whatever.  But it feels like modern movies don't spend enough time developing the plot and characters early on.  We just jump right in, here's the main guy, he's got one characteristic, and he's currently involved in the main plot of the movie which is currently operating at full pace.  Like, where's the build-up, and the character arc, and the tension and resolution?  It feels like every one-dimensional character encounters the story's main obstacle and instantly overcomes it.  It leaves me feeling disconnected from the character and uninvested in the outcome of the movie. 

The thing is, I would say I typically feel "entertained" by movies, even the dumb ones.  Fast cars, explosions, aliens -- it's entertaining, but it's not meaningful or fulfilling in any way.  I don't ask other forms of entertainment to provide me with fulfillment, but I guess if I'm investing 2 hours  of my life into something that cost a billion dollars to make and will win awards and become part of the cultural lexicon, I expect a little more than "ooh cool explosions." #entertainment

It's funny how one of the internet's most talked-about and valuable products is so poorly named.  ChatGPT is four spoken syllables, is difficult to say quickly, and contains an acronym that is essentially meaningless and unmemorable for its users.  It's like an internal codename that accidentally slipped into production. #technology

A few things to clarify: 

• Frog vs. Toad - Toads are a type of frog.  Frogs have smooth, moist skin and live near water.  Toads have dry, bumpy skin and live on dry land.  You can't get warts from a toad (that's a myth).
• Lizard vs. Salamander - Lizards are reptiles with dry, scaly skin and claws; they can live in dry or wet environments.  Salamanders are amphibians with smooth, moist skin and no claws; they can only live in wet or damp environments.
• Turtle vs. Tortoise - Tortoises are a type of turtle.  Turtles spend most of their time in water, and have streamlined shells to help them swim faster.  Tortoises spend most of their time on land and have more rounded or domed shells.
• Handling Baby Birds - It's a myth that parent birds will abandon young that have been touched by humans.

Ok that's all, carry on. #nature

I realize I'm not the first to say this, but timekeeping in soccer is absolutely ridiculous.  It's mind-boggling to watch a sport where literally no one knows when the game will end, not even the refs.  The argument is that if the refs stopped the clock during the game, teams could take advantage of the stoppage to get into a better position, or they could fake an injury to stop the clock, etc.  I get that, but surely there's a reasonable middle ground between no clock stoppages and some clock stoppages?  I watched a game where a guy BROKE HIS LEG, and the clock kept running.  That seems like a reasonable time to stop the clock.  Maybe there could be a handful of things that are stop-worthy, such as broken limbs, blood, decapitations (hasn't happened that I've seen), fan running on the field, etc. 

Aside from clock stoppages, could we at least get an idea of how much extra time there will be after regulation?  Surely that wouldn't too controversial.  Just a nice big clock on the sideline to let both the players and the fans know whether it'll be 30 seconds of extra time or 10 minutes. 

I played soccer (poorly) in high school, and we had timed halves.  I don't know how they managed the clock during the game, but it was never unclear when the game would end.  The fact that world-class major league soccer is run this nonchalantly is eye-opening to say the least. #sports

I've had a handful of experiences lately that have made me question the intelligence of the average person.  Doctor's offices, insurance companies, helpdesk people.  It's been a bit of a whirlwind. 

But actually intelligence is the wrong word.  Intelligence is essentially just "knowing things," and knowledge doesn't really come in to play as often as it might seem.  People can learn things.  Everyone is lacking intelligence about certain things, and that's fine. 

So then that made me think maybe it's capability, as in certain people are incapable of completing certain tasks.  But that's not really it either.  Human beings are surprisingly capable of many things, and they often become more capable as they become more intelligent. 

What I settled on was competence, which is basically having the intelligence and capability to accomplish something, and then actually successfully doing it.  Completing the task.  Finishing the job.  Whether for money or for free, a competent person will get a thing done. 

I don't know if it's a lack of motivation, or bad pay and long hours, or just a general disinterest in the positive outcome of a situation, but here's what I'm dealing with: 

• A medical receptionist who I called (multiple times) who was unable to successfully fax (yes, fax) a piece of paper to another doctor, only for me to suggest emailing it, which worked instantly.
• An insurance adjuster who couldn't understand the bill they sent me, and couldn't get the math to make sense on her end.
• An IT helpdesk person who couldn't identify a single human being involved in the servicing of a support ticket for software deployed and managed by his IT group.

I'm not the smartest person I know, or the most capable or competent, but I've either been unfairly conditioned by my coworkers and my friends and my family and basically every person I've ever known and interacted with to expect at least an ounce of competence, or people are getting dumber. #psychology