The Literal Translation of Country Names – Reddit. “Pretty much what it says: A map of the world showing what each country’s name means, translated literally into English. Apparently Benin is the Land of Argument. I love me some quirky maps.” (Alistair for Mitch).
The Dig – Contradictions with Eric Levitz. “When president you-know-who was elected, Mitch, Alistair and I agreed that there would be no links about president-you-know-who, and more generally no links about US electoral politics. This podcast, with New York Magazine writer Eric Levitz touches on you-know-who, but is much more about the ways in which the GOP and the Democratic parties in the US are both getting pulled apart by deep, and perhaps irreconcilable divisions within their ranks.” (Hugh for Alistair).
Uber and the ongoing erasure of public life – The New Yorker. “Another article about the ways in which Uber in particular is reshaping cities in counterintuitive (and negative ways). Recent studies suggest that in large cities, Uber has a toxic effect on transport efficiency/gridlock, with twinned impacts: Uber presence means that public transport ridership is declining rapidly, and in parallel, the streets are getting clogged with Uber cars (often passenger-free cars, driving around waiting for rides). In short, Uber may be creating traffic nightmares.” (Hugh for Mitch).
The Pediatric AI That Outperformed Junior Doctors – SingularityHub. “In a nutshell: ‘New research out of Guangzhou, China, published February 11th in Nature Medicine Letters, has demonstrated a natural-language processing AI that is capable of out-performing rookie pediatricians in diagnosing common childhood ailments.’ The question is this: how long before it gets more sophisticated? With the speed of AI? It may have already happened in between this research being published and this post.” (Mitch for Alistair).
Do we write differently on a scree? – The New Yorker. “This is a very astute observation and a truism from my own writing experience. Writing in pen creates a much different result than writing on a keyboard. So, does this change everything – from how literature works to how it is consumed? It sure can…” (Mitch for Hugh).
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