At some point in the mid-late 1980s (I think), I read a novel written in the 60s or 70s (I think) about submarine warfare. This was pre-Tom Clancy stuff, not technoporn. More the gritty, sweaty industrial stuff. Anyway, in the book in question (Event-1000?) a submarine is damaged (I forget if due to hostile action,... Continue Reading →
Staring into Buridan’s ass hole
Yesterday I met someone formally for the first time (we’d crossed paths a couple of weeks earlier). And he told me some background about the person in charge of a current campaign that helped me see recent events in a new light. Without getting into libelous details, suffice to say that sometimes people are using... Continue Reading →
Architect or Bee? The warnings were there. Oh well…
I have been deep into the archives of the State Library of South Australia, mostly looking at papers (magazines, newsletters etc) from the second half of the 1960s through the 1970s. No, I am not a strange strange man. Why do you ask? Anyway, this was the period, as the 'Great Acceleration' slowed slightly, where... Continue Reading →
Pilate-Lite –Frank Hardy, “The Dead are Many” and drowning in AI slop
John 18: 38 Pilate saith unto him, What is truth? And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, I find in him no fault at all. I did not buy a copy of Frank Hardy’s Power Without Glory (that’s a lie). I did not spend a... Continue Reading →
What am I even doing here?
I met up with an old friend recently. Right at the end she asked if I wanted feedback on blog posts I had sent her. I knew roughly what was coming, because I have heard it once or thrice before. The main problems (before you get to the content) are around even understanding what the... Continue Reading →
Policy entrepreneurs and giving the ideal speech community a nudge (a fictional example)
Thanks to a rather brilliant writer (Beejay Silcox, since you ask), I read an 'Outback Noir' novel, by Garry Disher. It involves a cop (bent? Seems not, but who can tell and what is bent anyway) exiled from the bright lights of the (checks notes) big "city," Adelaide to - as the Americans say -... Continue Reading →