pdm55

I want to change the speed. [Edit: Now I see that I can vary the speed in my initial drag.]

Have securtiy concerns putting this on my website. Can nasties be hidden in the code?

Thanks for the hint. I found this:

Twitch VOD Track – Exclude Music from your Twitch VODs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwnD3tjhPO4

Would there be a reason that Twitch doesn't use such software?

I needed the reminder to be patient.

I was lucky during the financial crisis to have cash that I could put in a term deposit for 5 years at 7%, my first-ever term deposit, To my detriment, I took out half after a couple of years to create an online game that failed.

However, when the rest matured, I was lucky to triple that money by investing in a couple of speculative ventures. Having used up my allotted measure of luck, I now look for solid investments.

I have recently liquidated about half my shares. I am waiting for the bubble to burst. I have my eye on a couple of solid companies whose share price may fall dramatically as people need the cash. I am approaching seventy and I need a solid portfolio that I can slowly sell down to meet living expenses.

My rules:

1) Avoid bitcoin, it seems so much like the "Souk Market": https://www.livewiremarkets.com/wires/the-greatest-bubble-yo...

2) Avoid meme and NFT stocks; they seem like the new tulip craze.

3) Avoid unethical stocks; they remind me of the South Sea Company: https://www.britannica.com/event/South-Sea-Bubble

4) Avoid hugely inflated P/E ratios; remember pets.com.

In short, look for ethical* companies with strong fundamentals.

*However, I am not sure that ethical and profitable can co-exist. So my rule is to choose a company that has a product or service that I use and like, or a CEO/founder whom I admire. I try to research companies. But I find that other people's advice is rather limited, as they tend to know less about the companies than I do. In the end, you have to trust your own judgement.

We have a certification system for every skill in Australia. Are you a Probation and Parole officer? A preschool worker? An ambulance worker? Working in the food industry selling cheese? You will need a certificate for these skills. Have you been doing the job for 20 years? Sorry.

From about 2002, Australian Quality Training Framework (now reorganised as the Australian Quality Framework) deemed you unable to continue working in your area of expertise and demanded you get certification. Outward Bound instructors with 20 years experience would suddenly find that a neophyte with a certificate was deemed able to direct dangerous rock climbing experiences, while they could only look on in dread.

Certification was a turf fight between different bureaucracies: State versus Federal. Of course, the Federal Government won the battle, as they controlled the purse strings. University qualifications and technical college qualifications, all provided by state institutions, were ignored. A plumber had no need to sit a technical college exam. A federally-approved privately-run Registered Training Organisation (RTO) could provide you with the appropriate certification. It was all too easy. Hand over the money and take the certification test. The hack for a fork lift driver's certificate was to turn over the test paper: the answers were written on the back!

It should have been a national scandal. But, of course, we Aussies are too compliant. And in the end, the federal bureaucrats expanded their empires. I seem angry. And yes I am. Worthless paper certification is hiding the risks being taken with Australia’s future.

Thanks for the insights. I followed one of your links, namely your link to DEV (0). And found this guy's work (1) where he publicly details working through "Eloquent Javascript". Useful. (0)https://dev.to/ (1)https://dev.to/prerana1821

"5D optical data storage (sometimes known as Superman memory crystal) is a nanostructured glass for permanently recording digital data using a femtosecond laser writing process. ... GitHub, a subsidiary of Microsoft, plans to use this technology to archive all public Git repositories. Microsoft refers to this technology as Project Silica with a claimed lifetime of over 10,000 years." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5D_optical_data_storage

I hold conflicted views on this issue. I don't want to inhibit authors from publishing, as I love books. But often they are too expensive. So, about 50% of the time I pay for them, and 50% of the time I get them from sci-hub.

And certainly paying for scientific articles is a big rip off. It effectively means that once you are no longer enrolled or working at a university, your access to this paywalled information is gone.

The centrifuge has also come to play an essential role biochemistry. It is used to both separate proteins and determine their properties. A key challenge was to make something spinning above 10 000 revolutions per minute safe.

Edward Pickles took on the challenge: “... (the Model L) has done more than any other single instrument to advance the study of viruses, yet Pickels received almost no attention for these remarkable achievements. Previously, ultracentrifuges had to be run behind three-foot-thick walls of reinforced concrete. The scientists who operated them were considered slightly insane. Centrifuges required constant attention … and explosions were to be expected at fairly regular intervals. The Spinco preparative centrifuge, for contrast, is about the size of a washing machine, and anyone can learn to run it in 10 minutes.” https://www.beckman.com/resources/technologies/analytical-ul...

"Gernot Zippe, an Austrian physicist, .. in the early 1950s figured out (with others) how to fix the problems that Beams had with his centrifuges. Amazingly, he did this while being a prisoner of war in the Soviet Union." http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2012/05/28/zippes-centrifuges...

I have never believed the argument that we can develop a way to live to 200. I am now in my mid 60s and it seems that a number of my parts are starting to "wear out". My skin is certainly thinner; my eyesight is damaged (macula degeneration) in one eye; ... And covid has taught us that our immune systems are not as effective as when we were younger. We older folks all see heart and cancer problems over the horizon. Cancer just seems a matter of time: I mean how can our cells keep replicating the 3 billion(?) base pairs in our genomes - with a mistake rate of about 1 per 100 000 (i.e. 30k mistakes per division) - without those eventually leading to cancer? And if I could only remember how to spell that alzyhmr thing, I would mention it also. And why does our government keep sending me those kits for faeces samples? Sorry to disagree with you, but I don't think aging is a reversible process: we seem to have too many parts, each with an "expiry date".

I can longer fit into my old clothes - the problem of the expanding waistline - which is why I take them to the charity store. We Aussies truly are a consuming society: too much food, too many clothes, too many electronic gadgets, too easy a lifestyle.

The original goal of mRNA vaccine research was to fight cancer. After being so successful in immunizing against COVID-19, the research is refocusing on fighting cancer.

Quote: Ozlem Tureci, who co-founded the German company BioNTech with her husband, was working on a way to harness the body’s immune system to tackle tumors when they learned last year of an unknown virus infecting people in China. ... [T]he couple decided to apply the technology they’d been researching for two decades to the new threat. ...

As BioNTech’s profile has grown during the pandemic, so has its value, providing funds the company can use to pursue its original goal of developing a new tool against cancer.

“We have several different cancer vaccines based on mRNA,” said Tureci, who is BioNTech’s chief medical officer.

Asked when such a therapy might be available, Tureci said “that’s very difficult to predict in innovative development. But we expect that within only a couple of years, we will also have our vaccines [against] cancer at a place where we can offer them to people.”

https://www.timesofisrael.com/scientist-behind-pfizer-vaccin...

Quote: The vaccines that target tumor-associated or tumor-specific antigens (TAAs or TSAs) can specifically attack and destroy malignant cells that overexpress the antigens and achieve chronic therapeutic response because of immunologic memory. Therefore, cancer vaccines offer specific, safe, and tolerable treatment compared to other immunotherapies.

https://molecular-cancer.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/...

Because of our increasing need for copper for electric vehicles, which contain about 4 times as much copper as a regular vehicle, the search is on for untapped copper reserves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IZz26dR9ik&t=3s

I'm jealous of my wife. She uses her synesthesia (inborn association between numbers/letters and color) to remember phone numbers and people's names. I think she can remember all the different phone numbers she has had in different countries over the last 50, or so, years. She can certainly remember all the names of people we meet at different gatherings.

At present, she is cataloging her thousands of photos, including writing captions. Occasionally, she grumbles because she can't remember the name of some out-of-the-way location in France or the name of some obscure scholar in Turkmenistan. Me, I'm happy if I can remember to get out of bed in the morning.

She said that when she was child she thought that everyone just saw numbers and letters in color. She didn't realize till about 20 years ago that she had the gift of synesthesia. I think her father and her uncle probably also had synesthesia. Both had great recall. Her uncle was famous for knowing the names and relationships of thousands of people in his district.

Lynne Kelly's book, "Memory Craft", explores memory palace techniques used from ancient times by different cultures. She is the current Australian Senior Memory Champion. The most intriguing thing for me is how she has turned her walks around her neighbourhood into her memory palace. I think though she now prefers to call them her songlines, mimicking how the aboriginal people of Australia created memory songlines based on their landscape. This has given her a deep attachment to her surrounds. She spoke on Australian radio in 2019: https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/conversations/lynne-ke....

I moved my cursor pointer around the screen and hoped it would follow.

If only I had read advice like this earlier, life would have been so much easier.

As of 2019, oil, gas and coal were still king. They provided 84% of the world's energy needs. There were some exceptions: France: used nuclear for 38% of its needs; Canada: hydro for 24%; and Denmark: wind for 18%.

See graphs from

https://bourne2learn.com/math/energy/consumption-totals.php

https://bourne2learn.com/math/energy/consumption-fuels.php

using data from

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-consumption-by-sou...

The effort, in terms of time and money, required to move to greener power generation will continue to be substantial as evidenced by this extract from the Berkshire Hathaway 2020 Annual Report:

"[O]ur country’s electric utilities need a massive makeover in which the ultimate costs will be staggering. The effort will absorb all of [Berkshire Hathaway Energy's] earnings for decades to come. We welcome the challenge and believe the added investment will be appropriately rewarded. Let me tell you about one of BHE’s endeavors – its $18 billion commitment to rework and expand a substantial portion of the outdated grid that now transmits electricity throughout the West. BHE began this project in 2006 and expects it to be completed by 2030 – yes, 2030. The advent of renewable energy made our project a societal necessity.

Historically, the coal-based generation of electricity that long prevailed was located close to huge centers of population. The best sites for the new world of wind and solar generation, however, are often in remote areas. When BHE assessed the situation in 2006, it was no secret that a huge investment in western transmission lines had to be made. Very few companies or governmental entities, however, were in a financial position to raise their hand after they tallied the project’s cost.

BHE’s decision to proceed, it should be noted, was based upon its trust in America’s political, economic and judicial systems. Billions of dollars needed to be invested before meaningful revenue would flow. Transmission lines had to cross the borders of states and other jurisdictions, each with its own rules and constituencies. BHE would also need to deal with hundreds of landowners and execute complicated contracts with both the suppliers that generated renewable power and the far-away utilities that would distribute the electricity to their customers. Competing interests and defenders of the old order, along with unrealistic visionaries desiring an instantly-new world, had to be brought on board.

Both surprises and delays were certain."

https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/

I'm not sure where this line of thought is headed. I once had to work with the Hela cell line, coating it in alginate polysaccharide. I thought to myself,"How can I test if the functioning of the cells have been altered by the coating?" A little book research convinced me that any tests would be useless, as a cancer cell has basically shut down all functions except those required for growth. So I just worked on trying to improve the coating, and continued staring through the micrscope at the somewhat terrifying malignant growth.

As regards, climate studies. Where have we heard the term "peak" something-or-other before. Ah yes, "peak oil". Well that didn't happen: we found more oil, we substituted gas, ... "Peak CO2": I nearly choked on my morning biscuit. Please tell China and India and Africa to stop developing and remain underdeveloped. Come on man, are you on drugs? Maybe, when a few billion have been displaced from their homes and invaded our comfortable lifestyles, we all might decide to stop driving and generating power with coal, oil and gas.

I remember the time at uni 20 years when the power failed. The cafeteria went dark, the fridges didn't work, the heated food display cabinets didn't function, the cash registers were useless and the cashiers had to write down amounts with pen and paper. When our grandchildren have to make the hard decision to drastically reduce power consumption in a last ditch effort to reduce CO2, they will be turning off the switches in fully-automated societies. Will societies cope with that scenario?

Allow me to explain one reason to have standardised tests. My last teaching job before retiring was in a school where the administration expected 75% of the students to pass Yr 9 Maths. The Middle School Head had come to my class a number of times to help the students, so she certainly knew what their ability was. It would have been no surprise to her that, rather than 75% passing the test, 75% failed badly. Yet, she was not prepared to accept those results. She pointed out that one particularly disruptive student had passed the previous year. Fortunately, I could point to the standardised test that showed that that particular student was in the bottom 10% in the state. My implication was that his pass in the previous year was fabricated. I was instructed not to hand back any of the students' test results, at that time. I left the school shortly after and have no idea how they would get 75% of the students to pass. But I did know that the standardised results would be a truer indication of that class's Maths ability, than the school's results would be.

I believe that Sicily, during the 1100s, was the place where translations from both Arabic and Greek to Latin occurred. In that century, it was ruled by the Normans who had conquered the Arabs. (Yes, the Normans, that same ex-Viking, Normandy-based group who were also busy conquering England, at that time!) There were separate law courts for each of the three language groups and translators who could speak all three languages.

I couldn't find a definitive reference. There is this short scholarly article from 1920, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1834924?seq=13#metadata_info_ta.... And this series of articles about Sicily's history, http://www.bestofsicily.com/history.htm

One key figure seems to have been Adelard of Bath. "He is known both for his original works and for translating many important Arabic and Greek scientific works of astrology, astronomy, philosophy and mathematics into Latin from Arabic versions, which were then introduced to Western Europe." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adelard_of_Bath

>> "DeepMind seems to be calling the protein folding problem solved, which strikes me as simplistic".

I have a couple of questions, which might be related

(1) Why did you call it out as "simplistic"?

(2) Will the DeepMind team have to throw the same amount of computer power at each structure they seek to solve?

Loved this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2Al2UnrtEE Bohemian Rhapsody

Sometimes companies that sell proteins, enzymes, antibodies, etc. have good educational resources. I came across this company blog the other day:

https://blog.cellsignal.com/

They also have diagrams of the internal structure of cells. Maybe, one day, they will add explanations beyond the succinct labels that they presently have:

https://www.cellsignal.com/contents/science/cellular-landsca...

I also like https://www.intmath.com/ for its short, clear explanations of various mathematical topics.

In Australia, there are plans to manufacture batteries [1]. This is a collaboration with Cadenza, who promote their battery cells as being housed in ceramic insulation, preventing fires [2]. Here's hoping.

[1] https://www.pv-magazine-australia.com/2020/10/13/energy-rena...

[2] https://cadenzainnovation.com/technology/

I have recently retired, and whereas previously my "deep efforts" where devoted to scientific research, my present efforts are devoted to learning to play bridge at an advanced level. When I was working, I wrote a post for Quora about deep work/study. Outlined below are the key points from that post [1]. I wonder whether I can resurrect some of those ideas in my new quest to obtain mastery in the game of bridge.

Here are my tricks, in summary form:

(1) Start your key task for the day when you first wake up, and you have peak energy.

(2) Trick your brain into focusing by tackling something that is a bit of a puzzle, something that intrigues you.

(3) Go and live in another city or country where you are separated from your usual distractions.

(4) Allow the subconscious to work its magic by sleeping on a problem. The Eureka moment often comes during the morning shower.

(5) The inability to leave work undone is a personlity trait - the truly driven person cannot rest till it is done. (I, for better or for worse, am not that type.)

(6) Resilience is one of the most highly regarded qualities in an employee, so persist, if you wish to keep your job.

(7) Realise that your particular skills, combined with your work experiences, have given you unique insights: you need to voice those insights, you need to self-promote.

(8) Overcome procratination by tricking your brain: rather than thinking that you have to spend 3 hours on a task, turn that mountain into a small mound by saying, "I will spend 10 mins on the task". Once you are started, you can keep going.

[1] https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-study-hard-I-mean-100-flat-ou...