I've been reading the wonderful book "Cell Biology by the Numbers" (https://t.co/rLzAiv32Dq ). Here's a thread of striking things I learned from the book (or related reading)

1. In terms of raw genomic information, human beings are
unimpressive. Many plants & amphibians, for instance, have larger genomes. We're not so much the genomic crown of creation as a cul-de-sac of creation.

I haven't checked, but this graph suggests it may be possible to have a pet snail more genetically complex than you. Or keep (be kept by?) a houseplant that's more genetically complex

2. In fact, the herb Paris japonica has the largest known genome, ~150 billion base pairs, about 50x the human genome. The lungfish has more than 100 billion.

3. What are Paris japonica and the lungfish doing with all that genomic information? No idea! But what a great question!

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BLOODLINES OF THE NEPHILIM – A BIBLICAL STUDY

Music news thread. 👇🍿

1) Here goes my thread about how I landed my first OWA. Open Writing Assignment. Btw, I had no idea what term meant a year ago so don't feel bad if you don't. The easy way to explain: A studio/producer has a property/IP/an idea but no writer. #screenwriting #pipelinewriters

2) So they solicit writers to come in and give their take. It's basically a bake off. I had low hopes because I'm a new writer and they almost always go with more established writers, but hey, sometimes the best idea wins! I landed it, yay.I'll get to that, but first my long road

3) Grew up on Long Island, middle class, zero connections to Hollywood. I mean ZERO. Chose law school. I wanted to be in entertainment but didn't know that was a viable career path. Did well, worked at biggest law firm in the world. But deep down I knew this wasnt the life for me

4) So quit/got fired (depends who you ask ;), and hopped on a plane to LA w no plan.Begged a guy I knew to let me sleep on floor in his back room. So went from making lots of money to zero money with no gameplan.I don't recommend having NO PLAN. Knew I loved writing and standup

4) Sidenote - this thread isn't about my standup career, but objectively I've done pretty well. Started the first and only lawyer/comedy troupe, headlined the country. Album #1 on iTunes. But was making basically NO money. Got a comedy manager, pitched an idea for a reality show

Story time: When I turned 16 my dad took me on a hunting trip. It was a kind of right-of-passage into adulthood and some father-and-son bonding. We travelled to Plumas National Forest (beautiful place) for mule deer.

We drove there. My dad seemed really into the trip. I hadn't seen him so happy but there was something off. Occasionally when discussing "my task" he would trail off and whisper. It was a little strange that he wouldn't say "the task" out loud: kill an animal.

And every time I asked if I couldn't complete "my task" he he would go quiet for a few seconds and say "it won't come to that." I wasn't really sure what that meant but I was 16 and figured I'd "man up" and make my dad proud anyway. But I was a little hurt. I don't perform

traditional masculinity very well and I was very sensitive to that as a teen. Those moments aside, the drive was a blast. Blasting The Clash in the car and talking about Civil War history (my dad is a CW buff) and enjoying the scenery.

It took half a day but we made it to a beautiful campsite in the forest. We set up our tents, made a fire, cooked dinner and settled in for the night. It was so beautiful and peaceful at night but I admit I was starting to dread the next day.

THREAD: Prince's socially conscious songs

Lyrics taken from Genius

"Uptown" from Dirty Mind

"Partyup" from Dirty Mind

"Sexuality" from Controversy

"1999" from 1999

1/36 A thread on Alana Newhouse's Tablet essay. I'm sorry to criticize an essay framed around a writer's ill child.

But my dream for the 2020s is to read big, serious essays whose premises aren't "everything is broken," & that don't say "how to fix

2/36 The writer rightly laments the "flattening" of thought to appeal to algorithms.

But the essay itself commits that sin. We can't observe *something*--problems in medicine--without expanding it to *everything*; & we can't observe *anything* without saying we can "fix it."

3/36 Two weeks ago, I saw a magazine at a cash register: THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING, its cover said, quoting Naomi Klein.

I looked inside.

The cover was an ad, and the "thing" that changed everything turned out to be a Dolce & Gabbana-branded Smeg toaster.

4/36: Obviously, we--businesspeople, writers, editors, academics--feel we can't claims unless it's about "everything"--to be big enough, bold enough, attention-grabbing enough.

This is a really bad problem, though, not just the minor price of admission to public life.

5/36: Trump talked up this philosophy--hyperbole. "The key to the way I promote is bravado," he said in the '80s. "I play to fantasies"--even dark fantasies. "A little hyperbole never hurts."

I say "philosophy, not "tactic," b/c if we use it enough, it becomes a mindset.

reading the self-important and vaguely-cultish textbooks by bayesians makes me want to go out and kill a sufficiently large number of bayesians that i can estimate the mean pitch of their screams

"when we have multiple models, we should choose one using Bayesian statistics"

no

you should do both and publish an appendix showing robustness tests, you cultist

"but my bayesian model takes 4 weeks to process i can't run 1,397 robustness tests"

yes

exactly

"it's #Actually impossible to use predictive accuracy to test model validity because we can't observe future values!!!"

omg

this is a real critically acclaimed textbook im barely even paraphrasing here

i don't trust quantitative methods where people say, "this method has been in use for centuries!"

that is a solid argument for perhaps a theological proposition

it is not highly compelling for code

FYRE FESTIVAL FOR KIDS

Strap in folks for I have story about a festival I ALMOST worked at many years ago that essentially turned out to be a massive scam akin to Fyre Fest only it was aimed at families.

And believe me when I say this tale has a killer twist ending.

THREAD

I say 'almost' worked at because I backed out a few days before. My suspicions were already on alert due to the natural wariness a balding man like myself has towards any full grown adult who uses loads of hair gel, like the Event Organiser (EO) in question. Also he was horrible.

I looked after a STEAM workshop for Science Gallery for a few years and in 2014 we were asked to do a new family friendly festival in Malahide called Wonderfest.

I met with the EO to discuss details & from the off he seemed a bit off. Not my kind of

He promised everything under the sun but wouldn't just give me a fixed budget. The way he talked about the festival sounded great but also far too good to be true. Anyway, we agreed to do the festival, I put a programme together and he approved.

And then it started to get weird.

This was 3 months before the festival & I didn't hear from him again until 3 weeks out. I sent him numerous emails to discuss info we would need for the festival. We did soldering workshops with kids & on a weekend like this you'd get through around 200 workshops, details matter!

So it's Sunday January 17, the day that, according to reports, armed marches are planned on all 50 state capitols and DC. What are we seeing?

So far: very little. The overwhelming consensus in pro-Trump spaces is that the supposed marches today are FBI/CIA/Antifa false flag events or honeypots designed to draw them out.

Before the Jan 6 rally, MAGA spaces online were full of people saying they were going, planning their routes, making banners, wishing they could join. For today, it's the opposite. The message in Trumpworld is "stay home".

At age 24 Amazon let me manage 2500 employees and a $50,000,000 business unit

I learned that leadership at scale is simply about following this one framework

This is going to make you and I hundreds of millions of dollars

Culture is what your people say and do when you are not around

Becoming a master of influencing the behavior of others = becoming a master of culture

There are 3 pillars every leader should use in their language to crush influence

Values
MVP
Heuristics

values are the 5-10 things your company prioritizes as ‘must haves’

They are non negotiables

Individually, they aren’t unique

Together, they create a unique DNA called ‘your

Heuristics are a simple set of rules that drive complex behaviors

In nature, heuristics are what enable ants to build massive ant farms or bees to build huge bee hives

We want to create these in our agency to build something well beyond ourselves

MVP= mission, vision, purpose

The why behind the organization

Everyone, especially now, wants to strive for something more than a paycheck

Not having this in your business will make you obsolete real quick

Right, let’s do this.

Joan Robinson on investment and saving in 10 tweets or less. 1/

By investment is meant an addition to real capital ... This use of the word does not correspond to the everyday sense in which investment means merely acquiring a title to capital. ... Saving is the difference between income and expenditure on consumption. 2/

All incomes are derived either from producing C goods or producing I goods.

All income is spent on C goods or is saved.

The income derived from producing C goods is equal to what is spent on them.

Therefore, what is saved is equal to the income from producing I goods.

S=I 3/

The sum of all the savings, positive and negative, of individuals is the total increase in wealth of the community, and the increase in wealth of the community ... is the investment that has taken place.

But saving is not the same thing as investment. 4/

How does it come about that .. individuals always decide to save just as much as entrepreneurs have decided to invest?

Entrepreneurs decide to expand their plant ... Incomes increase.

With a higher level of income, and the same attitude to saving, the amount saved increases. 5/

Writing tip: let’s talk about the INACTIVE PROTAGONIST. I’ve seen a lot of amazing books lately with incredible plots, intricate worlds, and just really great writing with one recurring issue, which is the inactive protagonist. I think it can get tough when you’re writing (1/10)

a big world, making sure your world building is there, your minor characters don’t fall flat, etc, & we can get an amazing story with one key component missing: an active protagonist. A lot of times, these protagonists will have motivations and they’ll be great characters (2/10)

but instead of moving the plot, they’re reacting to it. I read a great synopsis thread once that talked about your synopsis shouldn’t be a series of “and then’sit should be a series of “because,” and that because needs to come primarily from your protagonist. (3/10)

They react to the inciting incident, and then the plot needs to be reacting to them. They are your protagonist for a reason. This is their story, and in order for it to feel like its theirs, in order for your reader to fall into it headfirst—they have to own it. (4/10)

It’s not enough to want something; the protagonist needs to be actively seeking it. And I see a lot of this in the form of “oh they’re just looking for a sense of belonging” (trust me, I’ve done it too) and that leads to a very internal, borderline stagnant story (5/10)

Tantric ascetic #CompanyPainting

Bandijan or kalavant, a singer or bard from the Bhat caste. #CompanyPainting

Nat caste/tribe person with his troupe of acrobatic animals #CompanyPainting

A bear-keeper with his dancing bear.#CompanyPainting

female conjurer #CompanyPainting

Lizzie Collingham is one of my favorite social historians working today. I finished the latest of her books, Biscuit, on Christmas Day. #FrumReads4

Collingham's "Biscuit" is the history of hard-baked bread from ancient times to the box of cookies in the grocery aisle. As always with her work, "Biscuit" uses the device of a foodstuff to open a wide eye upon the surrounding culture. 2/x #FrumReads4

Biscuits, in the British usage of that word, were among the very first industrial foodstuffs. They enabled the British empire - Royal Navy sailors lived upon them - and were in turn enabled by that empire to discover a global market. 3/x

Collingham self-presents in a self-effacing way. Her short biography notes that she writes "in a garden shed." She includes recipes for the foods she writes about. Do not be deceived. Collingham's theme over her career is a grand one: the interaction of cultures over time. 4/x

Collingham's "Curry," enraged Hindu chauvinists by demonstrating how Indians synthesized their cuisine from their interactions with others. The word "vindaloo" is an amalgam of the Portuguese for wine and garlo, vinho and alho. Tea-drinking was mimicked from the British. Etc. 5/x