Monthly Archives: May 2004

devolve Iraq

Posted on Saturday, 2004 May 15 by Anton

When I disagree with Vin Suprynowicz it’s usually over the appropriate treatment of foreigners, but Vin’s Iraq policy is not without appeal. He didn’t need to put it so spitefully, though. Secession is not a punishment. On yet another hand, … Continue reading →

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as we suspected

Posted on Saturday, 2004 May 15 by Anton

Ellipsoids can be packed denser than spheres can. (Cited by Oliver Xymoron.) One of these days I must make a doodle of this result.

Posted in mathematics | Leave a comment

that gun gave up smoking

Posted on Saturday, 2004 May 15 by Anton

Dave Muse thinks the Michigan state lottery has a mechanical bias favoring smaller intervals. (Cited by Jon Handler.) So I wrote a short program that generates all C(50,6) = 1589 0700 possible lottery draws and counts the resulting intervals. The distribution … Continue reading →

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temporal foreshortening

Posted on Thursday, 2004 May 13 by Anton

Watching Hitchcock’s Secret Agent (1936, starring John Gielgud so young that I couldn’t place him), I think I’ve spotted Hitchcock – but my first thought was “there’s Rumpole!”.

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in the Hellenistic age, savage warfare— no, that’s not it

Posted on Sunday, 2004 May 09 by Anton

Bill Poser at Language Log agrees with me: Greek, not Latin, ought to have been spoken in The Passion. (Cited by Prentiss Riddle in a comment at languagehat.)

Posted in history, language | Leave a comment