“The Country of Marriage” (7”x12”) titled after Wendell Berry’s 1973 book of poems. (The birds are modeled on sandhill cranes, so I should maybe have found a title from Aldo Leopold?) N.B. the frame is meant to evoke sunset and autumn leaves, not to go with your décor. Thanks for supporting etc.
More fun for the whole family: The North Carolina Liver Mush Festival in Shelby, October 17. I don’t believe I’ll be in attendance, I just want to make sure y’all are apprised of your options.
Added to my platform: Tax breaks for bands with brass sections.
Far be it from me to criticize what I don’t understand, but I have to think that emails reminding me that my CVS points expired today would be more convincing if I only received one, instead of four… or at least if they all listed the same number of points. I feel like we’re just not even trying.
If I weren’t going to be at Centerfest in Durham this weekend, I’d be going to Asheville for the 46th Annual World Gee Haw Whimmy Diddle Competition.
A Severe Misalignment of AI in Mathematics, signed by 25 Fields medalists:
In recent months, the success of AI in solving major mathematical problems has made headlines even outside mathematical circles. But solving problems is only a tool and proxy for achieving the primary goal of conceptual understanding and insight. Forgetting this in the world of AI may turn the tool against the primary goal. Indeed, the mass production at faster and faster pace of “true/false” statements could destroy fertile ground instead of breathing life into new ideas.
Maybe I shouldn’t admit this but the no-splash urinal paper was exactly the sort of thing that fascinated me when I was in physics.
The city laid a sidewalk between a broad clear street and a park where once there was a grassy shoulder: of all the places to lay a sidewalk, the least disturbing of existing patterns and the least improving to the lives of pedestrians. On the park side the ground slips quickly down the brushy bank of a stream and is protected by a railing that makes one feel not safer but more exposed to traffic, should there ever be any.
Perennial grains in the news! If you are one of those people who like to mutter about how the agricultural revolution of 10K BC was bad idea, this is one way forward. If you want to try them at home you can buy Kernza flour here, among other places. It makes good muffins.
When I rise up
let me rise up joyful
like a bird.When I fall
let me fall without regret
like a leaf.
(Wendell Berry, c. 1969)