The Tank Museum
Published on 18 Aug 2017Originally known as the Ferdinand, then later renamed Elefant, 90 of this heavily armed and armoured vehicle were built, seeing service in the Soviet Union, Italy and Germany.
Although deployed as a tank destroyer, the Elefant had its origins in Ferdinand Porsche’s attempt to build what became the Tiger tank.
This particular Elefant is part of The Tiger Collection at The Tank Museum, Bovington, on loan from the US Army Ordnance Training and Heritage Center, VA.
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February 17, 2019
Tank Chats #42 Elefant | The Tank Museum
QotD: Nanotechnology and quantum computing
When I say Quantum Computing is a bullshit field, I don’t mean everything in the field is bullshit, though to first order, this appears to be approximately true. I don’t have a mathematical proof that Quantum Computing isn’t at least theoretically possible. I also do not have a mathematical proof that we can make the artificial bacteria of K. Eric Drexler’s nanotech fantasies. Yet, I know both fields are bullshit. Both fields involve forming new kinds of matter that we haven’t the slightest idea how to construct. Neither field has a sane ‘first step’ to make their large claims true.
Drexler and the “nanotechnologists” who followed him, they assume because we know about the Schroedinger equation we can make artificial forms of life out of arbitrary forms of matter. This is nonsense; nobody understands enough about matter in detail or life in particular to do this. There are also reasonable thermodynamic, chemical and physical arguments against this sort of thing. I have opined on this at length, and at this point, I am so obviously correct on the nanotech front, there is nobody left to argue with me. A generation of people who probably would have made first rate chemists or materials scientists wasted their early, creative careers following this over hyped and completely worthless woo. Billions of dollars squandered down a rat hole of rubbish and wishful thinking. Legal wankers wrote legal reviews of regulatory regimes to protect us from this nonexistent technology. We even had congressional hearings on this nonsense topic back in 2003 and again in 2005 (and probably some other times I forgot about). Russians built a nanotech park to cash in on the nanopocalyptic trillion dollar nanotech economy which was supposed to happen by now.
Similarly, “quantum computing” enthusiasts expect you to overlook the fact that they haven’t a clue as to how to build and manipulate quantum coherent forms of matter necessary to achieve quantum computation. A quantum computer capable of truly factoring the number 21 is missing in action. In fact, the factoring of the number 15 into 3 and 5 is a bit of a parlour trick, as they design the experiment while knowing the answer, thus leaving out the gates required if we didn’t know how to factor 15. The actual number of gates needed to factor a n-bit number is 72 * n^3; so for 15, it’s 4 bits, 4608 gates; not happening any time soon.
It’s been almost 25 years since Peter Shor had his big idea, and we are no closer to factoring large numbers than we were … 15 years ago when we were also able to kinda sorta vaguely factor the number 15 using NMR ‘quantum computers.’
I had this conversation talking with a pal at … a nice restaurant near one of America’s great centers of learning. Our waiter was amazed and shared with us the fact that he had done a Ph.D. thesis on the subject of quantum computing. My pal was convinced by this that my skepticism is justified; in fact he accused me of arranging this. I didn’t, but am motivated to write to prevent future Ivy League Ph.D. level talent having to make a living by bringing a couple of finance nerds their steaks.
Scott Locklin, “Quantum computing as a field is obvious bullshit”, Locklin on Science, 2019-01-15.
February 16, 2019
The state of play in the SNC-Lavalin affair
If you happen to have misplaced your Libranos scorecard, Daniel Bordman has a quick summary to bring you up to date:
So here is how the accusation stands: The PMO put pressure on the AG to the benefit of SNC-Lavalin, she refused and was shuffled out of the AG position.
This led to a massive public outcry from the Conservatives, NDP and the 10 or so Journalists left in the mainstream media. The original plan was for the new AG, David Lametti, to explain to the public why this story is overblown and there was no need to look any further into the allegations.
His plan: he went on TV and explained to the public that he had spoken to Justin Trudeau and he had denied the allegations, so no investigation was needed. Brilliant! If only Bruce MacArthur and Alexander Bissonnette had known of this expert legal strategy of denying what you were caught doing, they could have escaped justice.
It is also important to note that the Prime Minister admits to having “rigorous conversations” with Jody Wilson Raybould over the SNC-Lavalian case.
After the Shaggy “it wasn’t me” defence failed to convince anyone outside of the CBC editorial board of Justin Trudeau’s innocence, a new plan was formed.
Plan B seemed to be, have everyone smear Jody Wilson-Raybould and act like it was her scandal not the PMO’s.
While she was remaining silent due to attorney-client privilege (which is a debatable position), Trudeau continued to speak for her. Again, it should be pointed out that Trudeau could have waived this at anytime to let her tell her side of the story, he didn’t.
This all came to a head when Trudeau claimed that “her presence in the cabinet speaks for itself”. The next day she resigned.
Off to Plan C, which seems to have been concocted by new Liberal strategist, Kim Jong Un.
A committee will be constructed to investigate these accusations, which of course will have a majority of Liberals and be headed by Liberal MP, Anthony Housefather, who has already added his flare to the investigation suggesting the reason that Jody Wilson Raybould was shuffled out of the AG position was because she didn’t speak French.
Remember, he is the impartial leader of Liberals investigating an allegation of Liberal corruption. It is also important to point out that both of the ministers in charge of immigration matters, Ahmed Hussain and Bill Blair, can’t speak a word of French between them.
Project Lightening Episode 01: Introduction
Forgotten Weapons
Published on 14 Feb 2019Don’t wait like a chump! Get the whole 8-part series right now at:
https://candrsenal.com/product/lighte…
I am excited to introduce Project Lightening! This is a collaborative series with Othais and Mae of C&Rsenal in which we test all seven light machine guns and automatic rifles of World War One and put them through a series of tests and evaluations. Each week we will be posting one video on Forgotten Weapons and one on C&Rsenal. Today we have the introduction here, and the 100 yard accuracy testing over on C&Rsenal (https://youtu.be/-hSZbo8Hvn4).
http://www.patreon.com/ForgottenWeapons
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
PO Box 87647
Tucson, AZ 85754
Indian government considers hiking the national minimum wage
Tim Worstall explains why this is a bad idea that won’t do much — if anything — to improve the lot of workers already earning the current minimum wage, and might well make things worse:
It’s not surprising that this is happening, India mooting a rise in the national minimum wage. There is, after all, an election in the offing. Just when we would expect crowd pleasing but bad ideas to surface. The problem here is that the Indian minimum wage is already too high. Increasing something that’s too high is not sensible policy. […]
Sure, we can declare a floor price and that will be valid wherever the government’s writ runs. Which, in the Indian economy, isn’t all that far.
The national minimum wage could be set at Rs 9,750 per month, almost double the current level, along with an additional Rs 55 per day of average HRA for urban workers, an expert committee has submitted. The January report, which went public for suggestions on Thursday, has also suggested an alternate plan, with a range of Rs 8,892-11,622 per month of national minimum wage for five different regions as they have diverse socio-economic and labour market situations, The Indian Express reported.
The specific details don’t matter all that much because the Indian government isn’t that powerful in economic matters.
The point being that any formal minimum wage will only apply to people in the formal economy. Depending upon who you want to believe between 80 and 90% of the Indian economy is over in the informal sector. That’s the part of the economy that doesn’t have health and safety standards, proper contracts and minimum wages. And our proof that the current minimum wage is too high is exactly that, that most of the economy isn’t in the formal sector where it applies.
In one manner raising that Indian minimum wage is an irrelevance because it affects so few people. In another it’s actively bad, as it makes it more expensive to join that formal economy, thus making it less likely. Thus it’s a bad idea either way. But you know, elections, politics.
What woodworkers need to know about plywood
Stumpy Nubs
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QotD: The attraction of Islam to would-be converts
… humans are hierarchical apes who crave rules. The astonishing number of western converts to Islam (astonishing considering what Islam is as a way of life) particularly the women shows the craving for rules, spoken and unspoken is far stronger than rationality. And the fact that young men aren’t converting en masse to Islam (which gives them a much greater power than any western culture) means some traces of Noblesse Oblige remain. The idea of keeping your women imprisoned and veiled for their protection; the idea that those other men will of course rape them and hurt them; the idea that strange women are fair game, are still revolting and repulsive to men who were told “never hit a girl. Never, ever, ever” as little boys.
Sarah Hoyt, “Noblesse Oblige and Mare’s Nests”, According to Hoyt, 2015-05-05.
February 15, 2019
“Blood of Bannockburn” – Sabaton History 002
Sabaton History
Published on 14 Feb 2019Sabaton’s song “Blood of Bannockburn” is about the First War of Scottish Independence and one of its key figures, Robert the Bruce. He fought the English King Edward who invaded Scotland when Bruce’s revolutionary force forced all Scottish nobles to join his cause or lose their lands. Edward moved on Bruce’s army while they were besieging Stirling Castle, but his plans to overwhelm the Scottish was opposed by Bruce.
Support Sabaton History on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sabatonhistory
Watch the official lyric video for Blood of Bannockburn here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xp-Rk…
Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Markus Linke and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Astrid Deinhard and Wieke Kapteijns
Produced by: Pär Sundström, Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Joram Appel
Executive Producers: Pär Sundström, Joakim Broden, Tomas Sunmo, Indy Neidell, Astrid Deinhard, and Spartacus Olsson
Maps by: Eastory
Edited by: Wieke Kapteijns
Sound Editing by: Marek KaminskiEastory YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEly…
Archive by: Reuters/Screenocean https://www.screenocean.com
Music by Sabaton‘Photo young Sabaton’ ©Dalarnas museum, foto: Susanne Nyhlén – The National Portrait Gallery https://www.npg.org.uk
An OnLion Entertainment GmbH and Raging Beaver Publishing AB co-Production.
© Raging Beaver Publishing AB, 2019 – all rights reserved.
From the comments:
Sabaton History
1 day ago (edited)Hey!! We’re leaving the modern times (which instantly that answers a frequently asked question about if we’re just sticking to WW2) and will enter the Medieval Era. The 3d animated maps are made and researched by Eastory (check his channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCElybFZ60Hk1NSjgCf7I2sg). As the battle took place long ago, there is little documentation about it and there are several possible reconstructions of the events of the battle available. We had to prefer one version and proponents of others may criticise it. The most risky decision was to add the effects of land rise and make the Forth river larger as a result. This is absent from most of reconstructions, but Eastory studied some old maps and according to them the sea level in 15th and 16th centuries was far higher in the region.
Enjoy and STAY AWESOME! 🤘🤘
Dune – Origins – Extra Sci Fi – #1
Extra Credits
Published on 12 Feb 2019Frank Herbert’s epic novel Dune began as a photograph of the Oregon coastline — literally, the dunes themselves. From there it grew into a poem, then three books, then a serial in John W. Campbell’s Analog magazine, and then at last… a car repair manual publisher?
If you’re curious, check out our earlier episode on John W. Campbell here, a notable magazine editor in the history of science fiction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ctpvd2VvukQ
European-style passenger railways don’t scale to North American distances
At PJ Media, Charlie Martin does a good job of showing why the fast, efficient passenger railways of Europe are not replicated in the US and Canada:
… the usual story is something like “the United States should have a world-class passenger train system, with high-speed rail like the French and Japanese have.” @AOC’s official-no-fake-no-just-a-draft-Republican-conspiracy-theory-why-are-you-all-being-mean? Green New Deal FAQ wanted one so good that air travel would become “unnecessary.”
Sounds great, and I love the covert “MAGA” aspect of the pitch, but it has one great big, pretty much insurmountable problem: America.
Not the country, the geography. People living on the coasts just don’t realize how big this country is. I was discussing it on Twitter with a Swiss who lives in Zürich who was telling me how great the Europeans trains are — and they really are comfortable, pretty fast, have great scenery to look at — but, well, let’s compare Colorado and Switzerland. Similar climate, mountains, pretty scenery, cranky natives who are suspicious of newcomers. But let’s go to the maps:
Colorado is 6.5 times as big, has 60 percent of the population — and, it happens, about two-thirds of the gross “national” product per capita.
Compare the lower 48 states with all of Western Europe:
The truth is, we’re in flyover country out here. The coastal clerisy don’t realize that on their five-hour flight from LAX to LGA they’re traveling 2,500 miles. Now, back in the days of the Super Chief and the 20th Century Limited, you could make that trip by train in only 76 hours, not counting changing trains in Chicago. (It takes longer on Amtrak.)
So, let’s say we could get high-speed trains for the whole trip that averaged 200 miles per hour, and could travel as the crow flies: that’s 12.5 hours.
Except of course you couldn’t because the crow is flying over some of the highest mountains in the country. You’re going to need rights of way, and you can’t use the rights of way that exist because they’re not suited for that kind of speed and they’re pretty full anyway. Also, it wouldn’t do to interrupt the existing freight lines, which actually are about as good as anywhere in the world.
Introducing the Baroque Theorbo
Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment
Published on Jan 11, 2019“People complain a lot about the space that I take up”.
Lutenist Elizabeth Kenny explains how and why the theorbo was developed in the 17th century, what it was used for, and what it’s like to carry it around on the train.
Website: http://oae.co.uk
Twitter: https://twitter.com/theoae
QotD: The swordfight from The Princess Bride
I cannot, however, pass by that period without noting one moment of excellence; The Princess Bride (1987). Yes, this is classic stagy Hollywood high-line, consciously referring back to precedents including the Flynn/Rathbone scene from fifty years earlier – but in this context there’s no sense of anachronism because the movie is so cheerfully vague about its time period. The swords are basket-hilted rapiers in an ornate Italo-French style that could date from 1550 to their last gasp in the Napoleonic Wars. The actors use them with joy and vigor – Elwes and Patinkin learned to fence (both left- and right-handed) for the film and other than the somersaults their fight scene was entirely them, not stunt doubles. It’s a bright, lovely contrast with the awfulness of most Hollywood sword choreography of the time and, I think, part of the reason the movie has become a cult classic.
Eric S. Raymond, “A martial artist looks at swordfighting in the movies”, Armed and Dangerous, 2019-01-13.
February 14, 2019
Even train nerds don’t want “people who know absolutely nothing about rail, high-speed or otherwise, jumping on our bandwagon”
John C. Wright shares a communication he received from a train enthusiast:
The comments on your blog post today about the Sickly-Green New Deal were coming thick and fast, so I didn’t really have an opportunity to say anything, but I did want to throw in my two cents.
Along with the other basic reason not to like this whole plan (namely, that it’s lunacy), I am personally frustrated by its emphasis on high-speed rail.
By now you know that I’m a train nerd (and I emphasize “nerd”: by my wife’s estimation, the attendees at a National Model Railroad Association convention are even more undateable than the folks at a typical Comic Con).
It’s precisely for that reason that I am so frustrated by these people: they give rail advocates a bad name.
The last thing we need are people who know absolutely nothing about rail, high-speed or otherwise, jumping on our bandwagon because “trains are neat-o!”
Among other things, this false enthusiasm on the part of the left leads to conservatives opposing trains qua trains, simply because they reason that anything liberals are so fond of must by definition be awful (a reasonable argument, I grant you). It’s a bit like having a crazy stalker woman being obsessed with you. Far from being flattered, you want to get a restraining order.
Now, of course, in MY utopia, railroads would dominate the travel scene, much like they did at the end of World War II, though not to the exclusion of other forms of travel.
(Envision the travel scene as it looked in 1945, but with current technology, and you pretty much have the picture.) People would simply use trains more and other modes less, and we would be able to manage without any more freeways or airports than we had in the late 1940s.
When I imagine this utopia, I run into the same problem anyone who tries to envision a utopia runs into: how does one make people like what you like? Since I would never want to force people to do things against their wishes, I can only overcome this by imagining a utopia where everyone just happens to agree with me about trains (along with anything else I consider important, like belief in God, or that bank tellers should still wear jackets and ties or dresses to work as appropriate).
Because this is obviously impossible, it serves to remind me that utopias can only exist in one’s mind and cannot be brought into reality – and that one should never attempt to do so.
We’re all shocked, shocked to hear allegations of Liberal Party corruption (again)
At Blazing Cat Fur, surprise is expressed that anyone is surprised that corruption in the federal Liberal Party is again in the news. As I commented on Gab last week, “But this has been ‘business as usual’ for the Natural Governing Party for generations. Why is it suddenly not okay now?” It’s no wonder that veteran Liberal politicos are shocked that anyone even cares at this late stage.
Paul Wells of MacLean’s has written Canada, the show in which he professes surprise and disappointment at the back-room dealings exposed in the SNC-Lavalin affair, why he’s almost in shock! Shock I tell you! – “You thought this government was about family benefits and boil-water advisories? The Lavalin affair offers a glimpse of the real scene — maybe the real Canada.”
Seriously? Is anyone over age 8 shocked to learn that Canada is run for the benefit of the Liberal Party and its crony capitalist backers?
I mean besides the media cheerleaders who helped elect the cardboard cutout known as Justin Trudeau.
You shouldn’t be surprised at the antics of a Liberal party whose moral universe dictates no strings attached abortion on demand and the demonization of its opponents. Or whose “leader” experiences sexual assault differently than his victim.
A brokerage party that has weaponized “diversity and multiculturalism” to implement a divisive mass immigration policy that benefits – Surprise! Our corporate welfare class.
The antics of a party that labels citizens who object to their mass-immigration Ponzi-scheme as intolerant, racists, islamophobes & Nazis has surprised you with its shady dealings? Really?
