Really. The Blind Watchmaker and The Selfish Gene are great. I waited for The God Delusion with bated breath (honest!), what a disappointment. I suppose if you’re a 13-year-old just encountering atheism you might be dazzled; past that…
As a thinkerer, he makes a good scientist and a bad philosopher.
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KV is my favourite writer and also my dad’s favourite
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Reading this. History of the Balkans and the conflicts there, dressed up as a travel book
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Cool concept
It’s really good book. He is traveling there in 92 so just after fall of communism. Really explains alltbe histories of the ethnic divides and conflicts between the countries in the Balkans, that I really didn’t understand at all before
Tried to read ‘Hillbilly Elegy.’ It had a promising introduction, but by page 50 I was so bored I had to give it up.
Colleen Hoover
“Dominating the Bestseller List”
“efficient delivery mechanisms for the maximum dosage of multiple crowd-pleasers: love stories, unabashed smut, trauma plots, tear-jerking soap opera, and wild narrative twists.”
Anyone heard of her or care to read her books?
Read this in anticipation for the movie (scheduled for 2023):
I haven’t read a new comic in over five years. At that time, there were some indies I was really enjoying (Monstress, Black Science) and one or two interesting Marvel/DC books (The Vision, revamped Superman), but I was bored as hell by most superhero comics and wasn’t sure if it was because they’d gotten worse or because I was growing out of them. X-Men comics in particular, I’d found unreadable for many years. I mean, how many times can you read about the same characters being “hated and feared” before feeling like you’ve read everything that can be done?
Currently reading Peter Zeihan… “Disunited Nations.” Will move on to his new book soon… “The End of the World Is Just the Beginning.” Interesting stuff, especially considering current global geopolitical situations.
His knowledge of the semiconductor industry is kinda screwy.
how so? I’d say he was pretty spot on about how China could never take it over. Before hearing it directly from the chairman of TSMC, I heard Peter Zeihan say it first.
Zeihan didn’t say it first. Someone said it in 2001.
And you hear 夕盾夕盾 all over the Taiwanese media all the time. It’s a common refrain long before Zeihan.
He read off some stat about US creating majority of semiconductor “value,” and that means the US “probably” produces the most advanced chips, like the ones for phones.
That’s a complete misunderstanding. US’s value is in design and equipment.
He also said that TSMC’s production uses American IP, which isn’t true. The designs do mostly come from the United States, but that stuff is easier. The IP for TSMC’s processes are its own.
Does that negate his overall thesis? No. But I wonder if he’s that loosy-goosy about other things he talks about as well, things I know less about.
I went off Marvel for ages–but somebody said House of X/Powers of X was great–and it was. So I got back into them again.
It’s basically Professor X uniting the mutants to achieve dominion in a peaceful way–using mutant gifts to create miracle cures to trade to countries who recognise Krakoa and basically turning Krakoa/mutants in a global superpower.
It’s a fun story so far–I’ve paused at the moment to let the current issues get ahead a bit so I can binge read it. So it may have dropped off in that time.
Plus, some absolute genius decided to make Mr. Sinister extremely camp and catty and it is the most fun he has ever been.
I never said he said it “first first”… in the context of who said it first, between him or the TSMC chairman, I heard Zeihan saying it before he did.
So what’s the significance of saying something everyone knows?
The US makes more semiconductors, and better ones, than China. Global Foundries alone makes more than ALL of China… check these charts out.
As for IP, as far as I can tell, TSMC does a lot of contract manufacturing for Intel, Nvidia and probably TI…But I really don’t know precisely how much of that makes up for the total production.
Not everyone realizes this. And a lot of people think China’s semiconductor industry is better than it really is… in reality, it’s pathetic and what they make could be made elsewhere, even in Malaysia or Thailand.
And while Taiwan does seem to have more companies involved in design, most of the biggest ones are still from the US.
TSMC owns the IP to its manufacturing process. Contract manufacturing a chip is harder than contract manufacturing an iphone, which is just assembly. It requires nanotechnology to put ever more processors on a chip.
Design is not as hard as manufacturing. It’s basic selecting components of the chip.