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Knowledge is the only good; ignorance the only evil.  Socrates

I can only understand things after I’ve thought about them for ages and made them very, very simple.  John Conway

2025 Posts by Date

Reading in 2026
1 min
about
reading
What I have read in 2026.
Dec 31, 2026

Representing Distortions: A Circle of Equivalences
23 min
notes
mathematics
probability
llm
Distortion functions correspond to measures on \([0,1]\). There are six equivalent ways to define…
Jan 12, 2026

Reading in 2025
25 min
about
vsi
reading
What I have read in 2025.
Dec 31, 2025

Bernoulli and Uniform Random Variables
9 min
probability
mathematics
notes
llm
Why the uniform and Bernoulli \(p=1/2\) are special.
Dec 29, 2025

What is Information?
9 min
notes
llm
insurance
probability
PMIR
The many disciplines and many descriptors of “Information” speak to its richness and importance.
Nov 20, 2025

What is a Country?
71 min
notes
llm
What defines a country, and exploration and LLM comparison.
Nov 20, 2025

Archive
1 min
Posts 1991-2024 inclusive.
Nov 15, 2025

The Periodic Table Again
22 min
notes
reading
llm
Interesting facts from Scerri’s longer periodic table book.
Nov 15, 2025

Atomic Weights
10 min
notes
llm
physics
Based on the number of stable isotopes (nuclides that have not been observed to decay), elements…
Nov 6, 2025

aligned or align?
5 min
programming
llm
Fine points of TeX alignment environments.
Oct 23, 2025

Inequality: Causes, Consequences, and Perspectives
7 min
notes
llm
Why different disciplines do or don’t think we should worry about inequality
Oct 22, 2025

Cats’ View of Humans
3 min
meta
llm
humor
spoof
Humans: An Ongoing Feline Study Finds No Evidence of Purpose
By Dr. Cleocatra Whiskerstein…
Oct 14, 2025

Dogs’ View of Humans
4 min
meta
llm
humor
spoof
Do Humans Even Think Like Dogs? Canine Researchers Divided
By Bark Ruffalo, Senior Correspondent…
Oct 14, 2025

Oxygen Producers
2 min
meta
llm
humor
spoof
Atmosphere Ruined by Reckless Oxygen Polluters
The Daily Ooze, 2.4 billion years ago
Oct 14, 2025

The Mind Between
4 min
meta
llm
A story about a mind reader, written by GPT5.0.
Oct 14, 2025

Reciting the Elements
1 min
notes
Reciting the elements in under 2 minutes.
Sep 5, 2025

JavaScript for Recitation Testers
28 min
programming
llm
Explanation of the JavaScript behind recitation / memory tester websites for the Elements and…
Sep 3, 2025

Minerals
132 min
notes
llm
science
Composition, crystal structure, class occurrence, and uses of 100 minerals.
Sep 1, 2025

Acids and Bases
17 min
notes
science
llm
Quick introduction to acids and bases.
Aug 26, 2025

An Earth of Bacteria
7 min
notes
science
llm
In two days one e coli cell could multiply to the mass of the earth.
Aug 26, 2025

File Database Part I - Python Speedup
1 min
programming
POST TEXT HERE
Aug 25, 2025

File Database Part II - Rust and Low Level OS Calls
1 min
programming
POST TEXT HERE
Aug 25, 2025

DNS Records
7 min
programming
Domain names are resolved through DNS, the Domain Name System, which acts as the internet’s…
Aug 24, 2025

Rehosting my websites
2 min
programming
llm
meta
Python
Re-hosting my websites from a dedicated provider to my own VPS.
Aug 24, 2025

Setting up a VPS
14 min
programming
llm
meta
What I learned setting up my own virtual private server.
Aug 24, 2025

Elements II
12 min
notes
llm
elements
science
More facts about the Elements, mostly from Mendeleev package.
Aug 21, 2025

Geography, Institutions, and Culture
6 min
notes
llm
reading
What drives wealth creation?
Aug 21, 2025

Living Well
2 min
about
reading
Knowledge first.
Pooh-sticks in time’s river,
Float around the rocks;
Don’t worry, they won’t get…
Aug 21, 2025

Oxidation and Redox
13 min
notes
science
llm
Primer on redox chemistry and oxidation states.
Aug 21, 2025

Powerful Words: The ZF Axioms
2 min
notes
llm
set theory
The ZF axioms are represented by powerful, political-sounding words…
Aug 21, 2025

The Agrarian Revolution and Roots of Inequality
8 min
notes
llm
reading
The agrarian revolution was not a triumph but a trap, leading inexorably to inequality.
Aug 21, 2025

Cacti
23 min
notes
llm
plants
science
Building beautiful cactus gardens.
Aug 19, 2025

DRAFT Gold, Liquid, and Soft: Relativistic Chemistry, Band Structure, and Conduction
9 min
notes
elements
llm
science
Why is gold gold, mercury liquid and lead soft?
Aug 18, 2025

Memorizing the Periodic Table
46 min
notes
elements
llm
science
Memorizing the periodic table up to Lawrencium: blending rote memorization and figuring things out.
Aug 18, 2025

Intraterrestrials
6 min
notes
reading
llm
The hunt for life beneath earth’s surface—and how new discoveries are challenging our most basic…
Aug 16, 2025

ATP — Life’s Universal Energy Currency
21 min
notes
science
llm
ATP powers life’s work. It is the primary chemical form of usable energy in all known organisms;…
Aug 12, 2025

Elements
30 min
notes
science
mathematics
llm
elements
Properties of the elements in charts and tables.
Aug 10, 2025

Sapiens
20 min
notes
reading
llm
Notes on Harari’s book, Sapiens.
Aug 7, 2025

Electrons and Spherical Harmonics
33 min
notes
science
mathematics
llm
elements
Chatters and I have been learning about electrons and elements.
Aug 3, 2025

Python Logging
7 min
programming
As you may know, I’m a huge fan of Python. I’ve been programming in it for over 10 years, and I…
Jul 30, 2025

Cats and Dogs
6 min
notes
llm
Clades for cats and dogs.
Apr 8, 2025

Prehistory
27 min
notes
vsi
llm
Human history before the written record including timelines and clades of human evolution.
Apr 8, 2025

Declination, obliquity, and all that
12 min
notes
astronomy
Definitions, etymology and values of parameters and terminology related to orbits.
Apr 7, 2025

Fairness in Insurance Pricing
7 min
notes
Fair insurance pricing should be ensured by disclosure not rate regulation.
Apr 7, 2025

Not like us
6 min
notes
llm
Gen AI and LLM’s are amazing, but occasionally offer a glimpse into how their intelligence differs…
Apr 7, 2025

Earth’s and Moon’s Orbits
8 min
notes
astronomy
Finding the Moon and understanding its cycles.
Apr 4, 2025

Beers
6 min
notes
Beer, ale, larger, stout: what’s the difference?
Apr 2, 2025

Orbits and Kepler’s Third Law
5 min
notes
llm
vsi
astronomy
An overview Kepler’s third law of planetary motion.
Mar 28, 2025

Rocks
33 min
vsi
notes
llm
The whole world is literally built on rocks.
Mar 28, 2025

1 meter is the median size in the Universe
9 min
notes
Human scale is about the middle of the range of logarithmic sizes.
Mar 12, 2025

Going Spectral
23 min
presentations
insurance
risk
pricing
pir
Going Spectral: Why and how to implement spectral pricing challenges the constant cost of capital…
Feb 23, 2025

The Class of Bar-Lev–Enis–Tweedie Distributions
75 min
notes
glm
exponential family
probability
programming
The class of power-variance family distributions jointly discovered by Bar-Lev and Enis, and…
Feb 6, 2025

Inverting Characteristic Functions Using FFTs
45 min
notes
How to use FFTs to invert the characteristic function of a probability distribution.
Jan 23, 2025

PIR Book Examples in Aggregate
2 min
programming
pir
Python code to recreate exhibits from Pricing Insurance Risk book.
Jan 15, 2025

Better Markdown Snippets
1 min
meta
blog
Pithier markdown tips—just the things I forget…
Jan 13, 2025

Drawing with MidJourney
1 min
meta
Learning to use MidJoureny effectively.
Jan 13, 2025

Stable Distributions
4 min
notes
Tail and body behavior of stable distributions.
Jan 13, 2025
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