Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Kid Berwyn
Kid Berwyn's Journal
Kid Berwyn's Journal
February 24, 2021
As We May Think
“Consider a future device … in which an individual stores all his books, records, and communications, and which is mechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility. It is an enlarged intimate supplement to his memory.”
Vannevar Bush
The Atlantic, July 1945
As Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Dr. Vannevar Bush has coordinated the activities of some six thousand leading American scientists in the application of science to warfare. In this significant article he holds up an incentive for scientists when the fighting has ceased. He urges that men of science should then turn to the massive task of making more accessible our bewildering store of knowledge. For years inventions have extended man's physical powers rather than the powers of his mind. Trip hammers that multiply the fists, microscopes that sharpen the eye, and engines of destruction and detection are new results, but not the end results, of modern science. Now, says Dr. Bush, instruments are at hand which, if properly developed, will give man access to and command over the inherited knowledge of the ages. The perfection of these pacific instruments should be the first objective of our scientists as they emerge from their war work. Like Emerson's famous address of 1837 on "The American Scholar," this paper by Dr. Bush calls for a new relationship between thinking man and the sum of our knowledge. — THE EDITOR
This has not been a scientist's war; it has been a war in which all have had a part. The scientists, burying their old professional competition in the demand of a common cause, have shared greatly and learned much. It has been exhilarating to work in effective partnership. Now, for many, this appears to be approaching an end. What are the scientists to do next?
For the biologists, and particularly for the medical scientists, there can be little indecision, for their war has hardly required them to leave the old paths. Many indeed have been able to carry on their war research in their familiar peacetime laboratories. Their objectives remain much the same.
It is the physicists who have been thrown most violently off stride, who have left academic pursuits for the making of strange destructive gadgets, who have had to devise new methods for their unanticipated assignments. They have done their part on the devices that made it possible to turn back the enemy, have worked in combined effort with the physicists of our allies. They have felt within themselves the stir of achievement. They have been part of a great team. Now, as peace approaches, one asks where they will find objectives worthy of their best.
Snip...
2
A record if it is to be useful to science, must be continuously extended, it must be stored, and above all it must be consulted. Today we make the record conventionally by writing and photography, followed by printing; but we also record on film, on wax disks, and on magnetic wires. Even if utterly new recording procedures do not appear, these present ones are certainly in the process of modification and extension.
Certainly progress in photography is not going to stop. Faster material and lenses, more automatic cameras, finer-grained sensitive compounds to allow an extension of the minicamera idea, are all imminent. Let us project this trend ahead to a logical, if not inevitable, outcome. The camera hound of the future wears on his forehead a lump a little larger than a walnut. It takes pictures 3 millimeters square, later to be projected or enlarged, which after all involves only a factor of 10 beyond present practice. The lens is of universal focus, down to any distance accommodated by the unaided eye, simply because it is of short focal length. There is a built-in photocell on the walnut such as we now have on at least one camera, which automatically adjusts exposure for a wide range of illumination. There is film in the walnut for a hundred exposures, and the spring for operating its shutter and shifting its film is wound once for all when the film clip is inserted. It produces its result in full color. It may well be stereoscopic, and record with two spaced glass eyes, for striking improvements in stereoscopic technique are just around the corner.
The cord which trips its shutter may reach down a man's sleeve within easy reach of his fingers. A quick squeeze, and the picture is taken. On a pair of ordinary glasses is a square of fine lines near the top of one lens, where it is out of the way of ordinary vision. When an object appears in that square, it is lined up for its picture. As the scientist of the future moves about the laboratory or the field, every time he looks at something worthy of the record, he trips the shutter and in it goes, without even an audible click. Is this all fantastic? The only fantastic thing about it is the idea of making as many pictures as would result from its use.
Continues...
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1945/07/as-we-may-think/303881/
“Destructive Gadgets.” Hah! Thankfully, we have “Them” beat, stillcool! We still dream.
Thus, the Memex.
As We May Think
“Consider a future device … in which an individual stores all his books, records, and communications, and which is mechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility. It is an enlarged intimate supplement to his memory.”
Vannevar Bush
The Atlantic, July 1945
As Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Dr. Vannevar Bush has coordinated the activities of some six thousand leading American scientists in the application of science to warfare. In this significant article he holds up an incentive for scientists when the fighting has ceased. He urges that men of science should then turn to the massive task of making more accessible our bewildering store of knowledge. For years inventions have extended man's physical powers rather than the powers of his mind. Trip hammers that multiply the fists, microscopes that sharpen the eye, and engines of destruction and detection are new results, but not the end results, of modern science. Now, says Dr. Bush, instruments are at hand which, if properly developed, will give man access to and command over the inherited knowledge of the ages. The perfection of these pacific instruments should be the first objective of our scientists as they emerge from their war work. Like Emerson's famous address of 1837 on "The American Scholar," this paper by Dr. Bush calls for a new relationship between thinking man and the sum of our knowledge. — THE EDITOR
This has not been a scientist's war; it has been a war in which all have had a part. The scientists, burying their old professional competition in the demand of a common cause, have shared greatly and learned much. It has been exhilarating to work in effective partnership. Now, for many, this appears to be approaching an end. What are the scientists to do next?
For the biologists, and particularly for the medical scientists, there can be little indecision, for their war has hardly required them to leave the old paths. Many indeed have been able to carry on their war research in their familiar peacetime laboratories. Their objectives remain much the same.
It is the physicists who have been thrown most violently off stride, who have left academic pursuits for the making of strange destructive gadgets, who have had to devise new methods for their unanticipated assignments. They have done their part on the devices that made it possible to turn back the enemy, have worked in combined effort with the physicists of our allies. They have felt within themselves the stir of achievement. They have been part of a great team. Now, as peace approaches, one asks where they will find objectives worthy of their best.
Snip...
2
A record if it is to be useful to science, must be continuously extended, it must be stored, and above all it must be consulted. Today we make the record conventionally by writing and photography, followed by printing; but we also record on film, on wax disks, and on magnetic wires. Even if utterly new recording procedures do not appear, these present ones are certainly in the process of modification and extension.
Certainly progress in photography is not going to stop. Faster material and lenses, more automatic cameras, finer-grained sensitive compounds to allow an extension of the minicamera idea, are all imminent. Let us project this trend ahead to a logical, if not inevitable, outcome. The camera hound of the future wears on his forehead a lump a little larger than a walnut. It takes pictures 3 millimeters square, later to be projected or enlarged, which after all involves only a factor of 10 beyond present practice. The lens is of universal focus, down to any distance accommodated by the unaided eye, simply because it is of short focal length. There is a built-in photocell on the walnut such as we now have on at least one camera, which automatically adjusts exposure for a wide range of illumination. There is film in the walnut for a hundred exposures, and the spring for operating its shutter and shifting its film is wound once for all when the film clip is inserted. It produces its result in full color. It may well be stereoscopic, and record with two spaced glass eyes, for striking improvements in stereoscopic technique are just around the corner.
The cord which trips its shutter may reach down a man's sleeve within easy reach of his fingers. A quick squeeze, and the picture is taken. On a pair of ordinary glasses is a square of fine lines near the top of one lens, where it is out of the way of ordinary vision. When an object appears in that square, it is lined up for its picture. As the scientist of the future moves about the laboratory or the field, every time he looks at something worthy of the record, he trips the shutter and in it goes, without even an audible click. Is this all fantastic? The only fantastic thing about it is the idea of making as many pictures as would result from its use.
Continues...
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1945/07/as-we-may-think/303881/
“Destructive Gadgets.” Hah! Thankfully, we have “Them” beat, stillcool! We still dream.
February 21, 2021
Cliff Baxter didn't get a chance to testify.
Cliff Baxter, ENRON vice chairman, who had told friends he was going to cooperate with Congressional investigators and was considering hiring a bodyguard when he unexplainedly left his home in his pajamas one evening and was found shot to death inside his car, parked a short distance from his house.
World Socialist Web Site did some journalism at that time:
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2002/01/enro-j28.html
Columbia Spectator also went where mainstream media fear tread:
https://www.columbiaspectator.com/2002/01/28/former-enron-executive-was-business-school-alum/
February 19, 2021
https://hyperallergic.com/435790/trump-portrait-contest/
“The essence of every picture is the frame.” — G. K. Chesterton
A Better Pig than Putin.
https://hyperallergic.com/435790/trump-portrait-contest/
“The essence of every picture is the frame.” — G. K. Chesterton
February 19, 2021
Flippers. Flipping.
“I have seen it many times,” he continued, leaning in toward Earhardt. “I have had many friends involved in this stuff. It’s called flipping, and it almost ought to be illegal.”
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/08/donald-trump-flipping-ought-to-be-illegal
February 14, 2021
In 2016, I identified four future developments that would justify the Trump-Hitler comparison. Here are the results.
Posted February 12, 2021 by Sebastian Schutte
Excerpt...
Nazi policies concentrated on building a cohesive national majority, to unite ‘ethnic’ Germans against Jews, foreigners, homosexuals, political critics and other minority groups. The contemporary analogy would be Trump actively pitting white Christian America against minorities in the years ahead.
Snip...
The first step is scapegoating
Snip...
A second component of the Nazi power consolidation was media co-optation.
Snip...
A third component of the Nazi reign was paramilitary organizations.
Snip...
Finally, I identified emergency laws as a cornerstone of Nazi rule:
Source: https://blogs.prio.org/2021/02/in-2016-i-identified-four-future-developments-that-would-justify-the-trump-hitler-comparison-here-are-the-results/
Very Important Post, yours, olegramps.
First America
Then the World.
From one of the wise writers in 2016:
In 2016, I identified four future developments that would justify the Trump-Hitler comparison. Here are the results.
Posted February 12, 2021 by Sebastian Schutte
Excerpt...
Nazi policies concentrated on building a cohesive national majority, to unite ‘ethnic’ Germans against Jews, foreigners, homosexuals, political critics and other minority groups. The contemporary analogy would be Trump actively pitting white Christian America against minorities in the years ahead.
Snip...
The first step is scapegoating
Snip...
A second component of the Nazi power consolidation was media co-optation.
Snip...
A third component of the Nazi reign was paramilitary organizations.
Snip...
Finally, I identified emergency laws as a cornerstone of Nazi rule:
Source: https://blogs.prio.org/2021/02/in-2016-i-identified-four-future-developments-that-would-justify-the-trump-hitler-comparison-here-are-the-results/
Very Important Post, yours, olegramps.
February 14, 2021
Trump Acquitted
And so, the NAZIs get away to continue spewing Big Lie after Big Lie.
“We’re going to Disney World!” — Trump lawyer Michael van der Veen
February 13, 2021
Donald Trump's last stand: How his desperate attempt to overturn the election failed
Republicans cowered in terror until he was decisively beaten — then, at last, just enough of them stood up
By LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IV
FEBRUARY 13, 2021
Many things have confounded me about Donald Trump over the last five years, but perhaps most confounding has been the spectacle of so many Republicans cowering and shivering in fear of his almighty tweets. I simply could not understand why they were so afraid of him. Yeah, I read all of the analysis pointing to the likelihood that if Republicans didn't go along with Trump's every little whim, he would insure they were "primaried" the next time they came up for election. They were in fear for their political careers, it was said. I got it. I've watched many men during my lifetime exhibit abject cowardice in the face of nothing more fearsome than an unreasonable asshole of a boss. Some of them had wives and kids and mortgages and didn't want to lose their jobs. Others simply got comfortable where and were willing to put up with crap from their superiors so they could stay put. So it's understandable, if hardly commendable, that so many Republicans lived in dread of the fearsome Tweeter in Chief.
I waited in vain for some Republican, any Republican to stand up to him. In the end, it took losing re-election for Trump to appear wounded enough that Republicans, or at least a few of them, began to show some backbone. After he was beaten and on the ground, a few of them finally decided it was safe to give him a few kicks.
This week, Democratic House managers described Trump's campaign to intimidate Republicans around the country into helping him overturn the election.. They showed how a few of them stood up to him, as if suggesting to the senators in his party that they could risk his wrath and survive, too.
Trump fired his first shot at the courts. His campaign, and outside forces friendly to him, filed no fewer than 61 lawsuits aimed at overturning the presidential election in Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia. When he began to lose the lawsuits one by one, Trump ramped up his tweeting, trying to intimidate the judges, some of whom were Republican appointees, who consistently and repeatedly ruled against him. He turned loose his house hit man, Rudy Giuliani, in appearances such as the notorious Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference, and in hearings held by rogue legislative committees in Michigan and elsewhere, trying to intimidate the local judges who were hearing his cases. When his campaign of intimidation didn't work, he simply ignored adverse rulings and filed new cases in the same states — in different jurisdictions, and based on marginally different claims. When he had lost 60 of the 61 cases, he sent his lawyers directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, which he apparently thought was bought and paid for. When the Supreme Court slapped him down in two or three sentences, he erupted in rage.
Continues...
https://www.salon.com/2021/02/13/donald-trumps-last-stand-how-his-desperate-attempt-to-overturn-the-election-failed/
Historic times, ours, Raine!
Lucian K. Truscott IV: How Trump's conspiracy failed
A great journalist observes...
Donald Trump's last stand: How his desperate attempt to overturn the election failed
Republicans cowered in terror until he was decisively beaten — then, at last, just enough of them stood up
By LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IV
FEBRUARY 13, 2021
Many things have confounded me about Donald Trump over the last five years, but perhaps most confounding has been the spectacle of so many Republicans cowering and shivering in fear of his almighty tweets. I simply could not understand why they were so afraid of him. Yeah, I read all of the analysis pointing to the likelihood that if Republicans didn't go along with Trump's every little whim, he would insure they were "primaried" the next time they came up for election. They were in fear for their political careers, it was said. I got it. I've watched many men during my lifetime exhibit abject cowardice in the face of nothing more fearsome than an unreasonable asshole of a boss. Some of them had wives and kids and mortgages and didn't want to lose their jobs. Others simply got comfortable where and were willing to put up with crap from their superiors so they could stay put. So it's understandable, if hardly commendable, that so many Republicans lived in dread of the fearsome Tweeter in Chief.
I waited in vain for some Republican, any Republican to stand up to him. In the end, it took losing re-election for Trump to appear wounded enough that Republicans, or at least a few of them, began to show some backbone. After he was beaten and on the ground, a few of them finally decided it was safe to give him a few kicks.
This week, Democratic House managers described Trump's campaign to intimidate Republicans around the country into helping him overturn the election.. They showed how a few of them stood up to him, as if suggesting to the senators in his party that they could risk his wrath and survive, too.
Trump fired his first shot at the courts. His campaign, and outside forces friendly to him, filed no fewer than 61 lawsuits aimed at overturning the presidential election in Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia. When he began to lose the lawsuits one by one, Trump ramped up his tweeting, trying to intimidate the judges, some of whom were Republican appointees, who consistently and repeatedly ruled against him. He turned loose his house hit man, Rudy Giuliani, in appearances such as the notorious Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference, and in hearings held by rogue legislative committees in Michigan and elsewhere, trying to intimidate the local judges who were hearing his cases. When his campaign of intimidation didn't work, he simply ignored adverse rulings and filed new cases in the same states — in different jurisdictions, and based on marginally different claims. When he had lost 60 of the 61 cases, he sent his lawyers directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, which he apparently thought was bought and paid for. When the Supreme Court slapped him down in two or three sentences, he erupted in rage.
Continues...
https://www.salon.com/2021/02/13/donald-trumps-last-stand-how-his-desperate-attempt-to-overturn-the-election-failed/
Historic times, ours, Raine!
Profile Information
Member since: Mon May 6, 2019, 08:01 PMNumber of posts: 14,904
