july

I’m fascinated by “semantic fossils” that exist in the world

I.e. where we use a phrase / word like “hot off the press”, “floppy disk icon”, “riding shotgun” or “horsepower” but we don’t use a shotgun in cars anymore, or horses for measuring power or floppy disks anymore

One day, we’re going to be on another planet, and some kid who’s never been on earth is gonna wonder why some things are still measured in 365 days

creating and destroying; built flying cars & autonomous vehicles, now building roc.camera, writings: july.rocks

This is one of my favorite linguistic things to think about. I also like thinking about what small differences by region might be caused by.

For example, “turn the lights off” / “shut the lights off” / “cut the lights” / “put the lights out.” Like, maybe some of those are due to the type of lighting technology available in a region at the time the phrase was solidified. “Turning” a gas lamp, vs “cutting” an electric circuit, etc

Mathematics/Design ⟢⟢ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟡⟡ᚖ⟣⟣

Text art: linktr.ee/sinusoidalsnail

Or computers being people

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/history-human-computers-180972202/