And so five years of Monday Links draws to a close, and has the entire web been listed yet? No; no it hasn't. There's a way to go yet, starting with these:
Happy invoicing!
- Railroad Handcar - From Mason Clark, an American High School student and ”…the foremost expert in the United States for the design and construction of hand powered railroad devices”, i.e. those things you see in Westerns were two people pump a handle up and down on a trolley running on the railway. Be sure to check out the Death by Hand Car page, and if you’re making a movie, you can rent a handcar and other equipment of the period: "Basically I have most of the tools needed to build a railroad."
- Rational and Irrational Thought: The Thinking that IQ Tests Miss - "No doubt you know several folks with perfectly respectable IQs who repeatedly make poor decisions… I coined the term “dysrationalia” (analogous to “dyslexia”), meaning the inability to think and behave rationally despite having adequate intelligence, to draw attention to a large domain of cognitive life that intelligence tests fail to assess.” Luckily, none of the denizens of CUK are subject to any of the listed cognitive errors when forming their arguments
- What Does It Mean To Be ‘Star Stuff’? - "At one time or another, all science enthusiasts have heard the late Carl Sagan’s infamous words: “We are made of star stuff.” But what does that mean exactly?" Vanessa Janek explains the processes by which all the stuff of which we and our world are made is formed in stars.
- Captain Zilog - Comics featuring the eponymous superhero, in adventures such as Menace of the Motor Control Maggots: ”Once my Z8 Encore Microprocessor is embedded in your motor-dependent systems, you’ll be fish bait!” (Requires Flash, sadly.)
- Things You Might Not Know - Tom Scott, who you’ve probably met if you go to certain tech conferences and unconferences in London and other places, has made a brilliant series of short videos about, well, things you might not know, which I’ve been meaning to put in here for ages. The link is to the page on his site about the project; use the “Playlist” menu at the top right of the video to see them all, or find the playlist on YouTube, where all the videos are hosted. Here he is on The Three Types of Twilight, and The Days Without Night:
- Why Procrastination Is Good - Don Norman on the benefits of putting off deciding things: ”Making decisions early means it is possible to check their accuracy, etc. Making early decisions improves efficiency at the time of execution… These reasons might be OK if the goal in life is to improve the efficiency of our machines, but when it comes to accommodating the complexities of human behavior, these are all poor reasons.”
- The Scientology Christmas Catalog Is Totally Insane - Drew Magary goes gift shopping: ”For $5,000, this piece of tulip oughta make you a decent cappuccino, operate your home thermostat remotely, and finely dice vegetables. But instead, all you get is a lie detector that doesn't work. It doesn't even have WiFi… Please note that the Mark Ultra VIII comes with free electrodes! "Our gift to you," the copy says. Why, you'd practically be losing money if you didn't buy the thing now.”
- My name is Vitaly, and I am homeless. - "There is nothing more liberating and sentimental than the sound of a closing door that you will never open again. As memories are flowing by, you turn your back from that door, you hold your breath for just a second and you walk away. At that point you almost sense the change in the wind flowing by. You let go; and knowing and feeling this change is an incredibly empowering, intoxicating experience." Vitaly Friedman on choosing to live with no place to call “home”.
- The 15 worst Internet hoaxes of 2014 — and where the pranksters are now - "If 2013 was “the year of the viral hoax,” what then should we call 2014 — a year slightly older, slightly wiser, and even more full of moronic shenanigans?" Indeed
- cliff richard dying inside - John Oxton has noticed something about Sir Cliff:
”What’s wrong, Cliff? You’re clenching your fist, fresh from a great race, but your smile belies the inner turmoil you’re suffering. It’s all in those eyes, Cliff. You look so horribly worried. What dark burden are you carrying?”
Happy invoicing!
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