A study showing that neural signaling in on-line conversations is significantly lower than when the conversation is in-person may have some implications both for remote work and for education.
Technology
Sputnik + 66
Today marks the 66th anniversary of the Soviet Unions launch of its Sputnik earth satellite.
There’s a great memoir, Rockets and People, by Boris Chertok. The author worked on Soviet & Russian missile and space programs over a span of many years; he has many interesting stories to tell and many interesting characters (quite few of them who were indeed Characters) to portray. I reviewed the book here.
Worthwhile Reading and Viewing
Allocation of IQ to thinking about relationships–different in men and women. So argues this article, which is linked and discussed in a thread by Rob Henderson at Twitter.
The Great Untethering–school choice and remote work.
East of the Mississippi–19th century American landscape photography.
How Allied mass production drove the victory over the Axis powers. A YouTube documentary, which I haven’t seen yet but which looks promising.
What kinds of people are attracted to mass movements? “(Eric) Hoffer emphasizes that creative people–those who experience creative flow–aren’t usually attracted to mass movements.” (Twitter) Makes sense, but is this really true? Seems to me that there were quite a few creative scientists and artists who were strongly attracted to Communism, and I can think of at least one supposedly-creative philosopher who was strongly attracted to Naziism.
The Real Roaring Twenties Was… the 1720s. So argues Anton Howes in this article. His Twitter feed is here.
What Happened in 2012?
From cdrsalamander at Twitter, based on an analysis of Monitoring the Future survey data by Jean Twenge.
Thoughts?
Retrotech: Making a Tunic, 1700 Years Ago
The tunic was found in the Norwegian mountains. Textile historians recreated it using the technologies current when it was made–pulling the wool naturally rather than shearing, spinning it into thread (with no spinning wheel), and weaving it into cloth. The labor required was estimated by having skilled people do a sample amount of each task required and extrapolating to the complete garment.
Total labor requirement was 780 hours. The linked post estimates the cost at almost $38000, apparently assuming Norwegian labor rates.
I don’t think anyone would produce such garments using such expensive labor, though (unless it was for some very affluent niche market) but would use cheaper Asian or South American or even American labor. Maybe a reasonable number including overhead and supervision would be something like $5/hour. Which still gives a cost of $3800.
And if someone made it for their own use, or that of someone in their family, that 780 hours would represent a pretty large piece of their work capacity for the entire year.
As Paul Graham noted, clothing was very expensive right up to the Industrial Revolution.