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Matthew McDowell-Sweet

@msms

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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: The Alchemy of Air. Learned about the early German dyeing firms—BASF, Bayer etc.; proto chemical engineering orgs—and initial attempts to prise apart bonded nitrogen elements, as well as Haber's research, his collaboration with Bosch, and the subsequent commercialisation by BASF. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/73464/the-alchemy-of-air-by-thomas-hager-author-of-the-demon-under-the-microscope/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Has anyone come across anything at the intersection of personal logging / journaling practices and new(ish?) trends in observability engineering? Currently eyeing up Day One and Drafts apps for some new log-journal-note-taking behaviour and thinking that obs-eng practices could eliminate much of the personal-infra setup headaches that inevitably arise. https://isburmistrov.substack.com/p/all-you-need-is-wide-events-not-metrics
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Training log, no-gi: drilled some Uchi Mata throws into quarter guard, then incorporated a back step into the saddle position and some leg attacks from there (achilles lock, Aoki lock). We also looked at a rolling back take from a saddle position escape, as well as a rolling saddle entry from the Uchi Mata position. Sparring was 10 x 5 minute rounds, as usual. A few fast-paced, scramble-filled rolls mixed with some more balanced, steady rounds, plus a round being on the receiving end of some real sneaky foot attacks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evmsOeYxxzc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-9-KpVAH1k
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's read: Lying for Money. Worked through the chapters on counterfeiting and book-cooking, going from Alves dos Reis and the Portuguese bank note scandal of 1925 to Enron's dodgy accounting in the 90s/00s. https://profilebooks.com/work/lying-for-money/
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: on the escapades of James Cook and Joseph Banks in David Hunt's Girt; about the nitrate industry, the War of the Pacific and the Iquique massacre in Hager's The Alchemy of Air. https://davidhuntwriter.com/book/girt-the-unauthorised-history-of-australia/ https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/73464/the-alchemy-of-air-by-thomas-hager-author-of-the-demon-under-the-microscope/
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
This guy can move. https://youtu.be/duJendMuh9w
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Training log, gi: worked on a few passes from HQ / mission control—knee cuts, switch and staple etc.—and capped it off with a rolling entry to a loop choke. Sparring: nine x five minute rounds. Took a few rounds to mentally lock in, at which point I managed to bruise my wrist. This meant a fun constraint for the remainder: no posting or framing with my left hand and minimal gripping. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCGLrC6q2yM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNASDxyjcAA
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: kicked off two new texts. First, I read about the different types of fraud—long firming, counterfeiting, control frauds, and market frauds—in Lying for Money. Second, I read about the many discoveries of Australia by Spain, Holland, Britain and China. https://profilebooks.com/work/lying-for-money/ https://davidhuntwriter.com/book/girt-the-unauthorised-history-of-australia/
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
This lodged in my brain and wouldn't leave. Realised why. Standards vs. no standards is a more important distinction than high vs. low standards. A passage from Vaillant's The Tiger: "The most terrifying and important test for a human being is to be in absolute isolation,” he explained. “A human being is a very social creature, and ninety percent of what he does is done only because other people are watching. Alone, with no witnesses, he starts to learn about himself—who is he really? Sometimes, this brings staggering discoveries. Because nobody’s watching, you can easily become an animal: it is not necessary to shave, or to wash, or to keep your winter quarters clean—you can live in shit and no one will see. You can shoot tigers, or choose not to shoot. You can run in fear and nobody will know. You have to have something—some force, which allows and helps you to survive without witnesses." That force: standards. https://warpcast.com/na/0x0ce453bd
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: finished up Braudel's Civilisation and Capitalism. The final chapter? Towns and cities. Perhaps my favourite section of all from vol. one. https://www.ucpress.edu/books/civilization-and-capitalism-15th-18th-century-vol-i/paper
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Assume this happens and defence tech amasses disproportionate amounts of attention and capital on the back of its continued advances. Does this spillover into non-defence tech and day-to-day civilisational operations like the early Silicon Valley defence tech did? Prev: missiles and rockets ... PCs Next: drone armies ... ???
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Looking like I won't be able to lean on Zach Lowe podcasts to track /nba happenings this season. And no more JJ Redick pods either. So, what's the new mix? The Dunker Spot; Bill Simmons / The Ringer NBA show?
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: still on Braudel's Civilisation and Capitalism Vol. 1. Worked through the penultimate chapter on money—its primitive forms, its scattershot spread and adoption, its material characteristics, its liquidity and motion, and its abstract (e.g credit) and literal forms (e.g. coin). https://www.ucpress.edu/books/civilization-and-capitalism-15th-18th-century-vol-i/paper
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Fabian strategy 🤝 trolley problem https://x.com/redsun405/status/1845819691874283572 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Finding the rhythm for training logs once more... Training log, no-gi: technical session was focused on a bunch of passes, all starting from mission control / headquarters. Included a knee slide, a leg staple into a step over / glide, a post to the shoulders followed by a kickback and into mount, and a hybrid glide-leg split thing which I can't easily describe. Sparring was, as usual, 10 x five minute rounds. 2/3 I worked from top position (mostly moving through side control, turtle and open guard via scrambles). The rest I played from bottom, mostly in the range of half / quarter guard and mount / side control. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quM3u9Jxthg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hcjo1LI4LKw
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: more of Braudel's Civilisation and Capitalism. Read about the intro of paper and the printing press, the development of ocean navigation, and the varying states of land and water transport. https://www.ucpress.edu/books/civilization-and-capitalism-15th-18th-century-vol-i/paper
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Thesis: devs/engineers streaming their sessions will do way more than any “new gens should learn to code” rhetoric or policy.
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Today's reading: more Braudel—trying to get through this text in the next week or two. Today's segment was on buildings and interiors. Materials, differentiation for richer vs poorer, cultural divergence WRT aesthetics, and function and so on. https://www.ucpress.edu/books/civilization-and-capitalism-15th-18th-century-vol-i/paper
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
Braudel cited some European diarist who lamented how alcohol and tobacco had degraded first brain capacities like memory and wit. It made me think of TikTok, which increasingly feels like a first brain killer. https://warpcast.com/msms/0x8fcb20d8
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Matthew McDowell-Sweet pfp
Matthew McDowell-Sweet
@msms
A "quake book" is a text that radically perturbs how one thinks about and acts within the world. The shift is experienced, individually and ideally societally, as positive (as opposed to the negative shifts associated with ideological or epistemological info hazards. A quake book may make an existing belief, value or stance especially legible to oneself, or provide irrefutable evidence for something felt at a deep level. It may catalyse a novel perspective or insight, or provoke new questions because it's wrong in a particularly interesting or sacrilegious way. No matter how it happens, a quake book terraforms one's existence upon engagement. I first heard of them via Ryan Holiday sometime in the mid-2010s. He heard of them via Tyler Cowen. What are your quake books? https://www.lesswrong.com/tag/information-hazards https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2007/11/view-quake-read.html
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