“Once a thriving international trade hub, the archeological site of Hegra (also known as Mada’in Saleh) has been left practically undisturbed for almost 2,000 years. … Hegra was the second city of the Nabataean kingdom, but Hegra does much more than simply play second fiddle to Petra: it could hold the key to unlocking the secrets of an almost-forgotten ancient civilization.” – Smithsonian Magazine
Tag: 11.23.20
On The Verge Of Thinking Far Beyond Our Own
Why couldn’t one of these marvelous learning machines, let loose on an enormous astronomical catalog or the petabytes of data compiled by the Large Hadron Collider, discern a set of new fundamental particles or discover a wormhole to another galaxy in the outer solar system, like the one in the movie “Interstellar”? – The New York Times
Ask A Teen: Ballet’s A Visually Perfect Sport Art Form
Fair enough. The teen, and other dancers, keep their routines going during the pandemic, as well as they can. The high school senior: “I want to inspire people. I wish for people to be moved and left with a sense of pride and joy when they watch me. … That’s all I’ve ever dreamed of really, on the stage or in the street. I want people to look at me and feel inspired.” – Greenville (South Carolina) News
A Breakthrough In Artificial Intelligence Is Surprising Its Creators
It generates tweets, pens poetry, summarizes emails, answers trivia questions, translates languages and even writes its own computer programs, all with very little prompting. Some of these skills caught even the experts off guard. – The New York Times
Why Do So Many Books With Trump In Them Not Name Trump?
Why are novelists not naming this man? The reasons will naturally vary author to author, but it is not fear or superstition, as far as I can tell. – The Guardian
Judge Rules Seller Of Fake Hals Must Pay Sotheby’s
As one of the judges said of this costly procedure, the law has “to fall on someone“, as “obviously it did not fall on the forger“. – The Art Newspaper
Does Nudging Someone Really Change Behavior?
“Nudge theory has taken the world by storm (with organizations and governments using these techniques), and so you might be forgiven for thinking that these behavioural interventions get it right most of the time. Well, as is often the case, things do in fact go wrong in the world of nudging.” – 3QuarksDaily
‘The Inheritance’ Playwright To Pen Major Biopic Of Tennessee Williams
Matthew López has been engaged by Searchlight Pictures to write a screen adaptation of Leading Men, the Christopher Castellani novel about Williams and his longtime lover Frank Merlo. López’s The Inheritance won four Olivier Awards in London in 2019 and garnered eleven Tony nominations this year. – Variety
Josh Kosman: My Encounters With Classical Music
“If you think of Classical Music as a vast and imposing monolith, with both words capitalized, it isn’t an easy thing to take on within a single encounter. Individual pieces, on the other hand, are like people — each one quirky and distinctive, and each one carrying the promise of a lifelong acquaintance.” – San Francisco Chronicle
Metal Monolith Discovered In The Utah Desert
Wildlife officials spotted the “unusual” object while counting sheep during a flyover in a remote south-eastern area of the US state. They said the structure had been planted in the ground between red rock. There was no indication who installed the monolith, which was about 10 to 12ft (3.6m) tall. – BBC