I’m looking at a banner ad that says
Q. Which is not like the others? 63 57 98 01
I saw quickly that none are prime (1 is usually not counted as prime, so that each integer’s prime factorization is unique) and then that two of the four are divisible by 3, and then a long pause before I saw that only one is even. Does that say something about me?
Over in Volokhia, Jim Lindgren (cited by Tom W Bell) points out a presumably unintended consequence of the atrocious Kelo decision: if commercial activity is “public use”, then it’s not taxable. Hee hee.
“I think the world has been run long enough by well-meaning professionals. We might give the amateurs a chance now.”
—Carol Fisher in Hitchcock’s Foreign Correspondent (1940)
Planarity, a Flash puzzle: rearrange the vertices so that no edges cross. (Cited by Joshua Burton.)
When a solution is near, the program gets very slow, which seems backward. (Thursday: It has been changed to test only on the player’s request.)
How is the graph generated? Perhaps it starts with a Delaunay triangulation of a random set of vertices, and deletes edges until each vertex has degree 4, 3 or 2.
You are elegant, withdrawn, and brilliant. Your mind is a weapon, able to solve any puzzle. You are also great at poking holes in arguments and common beliefs. For you, comfort and calm are very important. You tend to thrive on your own and shrug off most affection. You prefer to protect your emotions and stay strong. |
Dean Ing’s first novel Soft Targets (1979) suggested that against terrorists the most effective weapon is mockery. Since the London bombs I’ve seen hints of such an approach.
Arthur Silber (2006: that link is gone bad, here’s another) gets in a dig at another faction that favors indiscriminate violence:
. . . one has the sense that this kind of hawk (which is most of them now) can’t grasp the nature of a convincing argument. It is as if they believe that by shouting, over and over again, “But terrorists are really, really, really, REALLY evil!,” they will finally convince everyone who doubts or criticizes Bush’s foreign adventures that Bush is entirely right about everything. . . .
(This post was previously part of another one, severed for what now seems to me greater convenience.)
Charlie Stross‘s recent novel Iron Sunrise has a surprising number of minor errors. The distance between Moscow Prime and Old Newfie is stated as 1393 light-days, one parsec (1191 d·c, close enough), one light-year (365 d·c). Someone mentioned in conversation is “he” then “she” then “Otto”. A garment is white when bought and black when worn.
Iron Sunrise is a sequel to, but plotwise independent of, Singularity Sky. It’s generally more coherent and less whizbang.
I’ve spotted two personal references in the first half. An empress is named Ayse, presumably after Ayse Sercan who, like Charlie, is or was a regular in alt.peeves. One of the quotations from which another Edinburgh writer takes the title of his blog is, er, quoted.