Observations from a Hill

Niklas Luhmann maintained that his Zettelkasten was his second brain. When it came to researching themes and topics for his numerous books and academic papers, its meta-system of links to discrete ideas and references, too numerous for him to hold in entirety in his own brain, formed a kind of physical, paper-based rather than neural network map of his generalised learning process, from which he could inform and enhance his current thinking. Melvil Dewey , in inventing his Decimal Classification system for cataloguing publications - the heart of most of the world's library catalogues, hinted at a method of cross-connection between discrete sources of knowledge to aid further knowledge generation and research. Otlet and La Fontaine extended this idea further and established the notion of data connectivity and correlation with the Universal Decimal Classification system , which took Dewey's concept from the simple cataloguing and indexing of documents - taxonomies of books, p...

The Peter Mandelson affair grinds on; the dark angel's fall from grace accelerating exponentially as he approaches terminal velocity toward the Ground Zero of his own making. The problem is that some of us could see he was a car crash waiting to happen back in the New Labour days. He must have a hefty dose of personal charisma in the flesh, so to speak, as he never came over as anything but an ineffectual political operator, either on screen or by deed itself to us here in reality-land. He struck me back then, a quarter of a century ago, as a bit of a no-mark, and that view hasn't changed since. The biggest sin in all of this affair, though,  is that he managed to schmooze his way back to a position of handsomely-paid influence under a newly-minted Labour government dedicated on paper to avoiding the mis-steps and sleaze of the outgoing Tory mess that preceded them. Starmer's decision to drag out this [old] New Labour fossil was obviously a disaster in the making from day o...

With the Nuclear Doomsday Clock currently standing at 85 seconds to midnight, the current New START treaty on limiting nuclear weapons proliferation runs out tomorrow, the 4th of February. Given the state of the world just at the moment and with two of the most out-of-touch-with-reality men in charge of half of it, gives cause for a modicum of concern, especially when both of these despots would rather not have had the treaty in place at all: Trump's take on the expiry? '..."a bad treaty...If it expires, it expires. We just negotiate a better treaty."...' As for the Russians, they wer never happy being restricted to 'just' the 1,550 warheads allowed under the treaty for each side [both hold far more than that, anyway], and effectively ducked out of the treaty under the cloak of the pandemic in 2020. What of the other nations still holding such weapons? Well, the US and Russia hold ninety-percent of the world's nuclear arsenal. Having said that, the oth...

What did the Romans of the turn of the common era know better than twentieth century structural engineers? Concrete of course. A couple of broadcasts on BBC Radio Four, and a Scientific American article of a couple of years ago prompted me to compare and contrast Roman concrete with the now infamous RAAC [Reinforced Aerated Autoclaved Concrete]. The latter of course is now falling apart without notice in 1960s and '70s built structures all over the UK and beyond, just fifty years into their lifespan. By contrast, Roman concrete dating back 2000 years is still standing and faring very well, thank you: think the Pantheon in Rome: still featuring the largest unreinforced concrete dome in the world. Most people would think, 'well concrete is just concrete, right?', and yes the basic principles are the same, but the mix of materials and how they are prepared are various, and variously effective under various conditions, so to speak. Concrete is essentially a mix of aggregate and...

Another month rolls over on the calendar [Rabbits, White Rabbits] as the first of February slots into place, putting Christmas, New Year and the [psychologically] longest month of the year behind us once again. Can't say I'm particularly sorry to see January go: it's always financially punishing, having less income and much higher fuel bills than in the warmer months; but it's survivable with a bit of ducking and diving, robbing Peter to pay Paul, and other such clichéd aphorisms. Suffice it to say, that with luck and a following wind [there I go again], we can look forward to an upturn in fortunes as spring gets closer and the weather hopefully warms. A quick glance at the bookshelf above me yet again makes me think on: The Origin of Capitalism by Ellen Meiksins Wood stands out, and reminds me of a piece in today's Observer newspaper, which essentially argues that governments simply do not understand the hospitality industry, preferring to outsource what should oth...

Sitting here staring at a blank page - as I've mentioned before, trying to dredge up an idea even for the shortest of posts - sometimes seems an intractable, self-imposed and almost certainly unnecessary task: however, I've not broken the one-scribble-a-day-minimum rule in the nearly five years I've been penning this daily missive, no matter the circumstances. Anyhow, 2,244 posts - and days - later, tonight's blank mind was woken up when I glanced at the small bookshelf on my desk here in the study/dining room/office [delete as functionally and descriptively necessary], and noticed my very old and battered copy of Jerome K. Jerome's 'The Idle Thoughts of An Idle Fellow: A book for an Idle Holiday', which vectored my empty mind back to a discussion on BBC Radio Four's 'Saturday Live' this morning, with Dr. Joseph Jebelli. He was expounding on "the power of doing nothing". He argues, and I concur avidly with his thinking - as would the Je...