the flag for constructed languages

since we are on the topic of the tower of babel, i should point out that because of its association with language, the tower features prominently on the (æsthetically pleasing) flag of constructed languages. apparently, a right of passage of a fabricated language is having genesis 11:1-9 (the tower of babel section) translated into it.

while the ziggurat/devo hat icon is totally badass and the colour fills a conspicuous void of purple among flags of the world, i find it kind of ridiculous that a concept this abstract merits its own flag. where is the flag for binomial nomenclature? what colour is the flag of trigonometric functions? who gets to fly the trochaic pentameter flag?

for wunderkammer: an “in god we rust” quarter—a die error on some of the kansas state quarters lead to this amusing happenstance.

if you’re havin’ algorithm problems, i feel bad for you son

think your latest algorithm problem has got the best of you? consider the formulae and tables needed to determine the exact sunday on which to observe easter. this calculation is so convoluted that the very act of forecasting the date was given its own name—computus—and was considered by many to be the most significant calculation of the middle ages.

for you to engage in computus requires that you perform a series of complex calculations that factor in the (idealized (ie. integerized)) cycles of three heavenly bodies—the earth, moon and sun—through duodecimal and sexagesimal numbering systems and various other (religious and time) constraints initiated by the likes of hindus, jews, christians, sumerians, babylonians, greeks, and romans over the course of several millennia. even the great carl friedrich gauss° had a hard time nailing down the formula in the 1800’s when computers were only able to run windows 3.1.

for much more, including what the above image is all about, there is wikipedia.

this thing just got a whole lot more meta

the first time i heard about the concept of dvd commentaries¹ i thought it was the worst idea that i could think of. i joked that when the next generation of optical discs came out, the studios would release a commentary track for the previous commentary track. needless to say, this was an hilarious joke that everyone commended me for making.

this segues nicely into one of my favourite aspects of islamic scholarship—the sharh and the hashiya. a sharh is a commentary on an ancient text (usually by an ancient scholar). the hashiya is a (more modern) commentary on the sharh. it is at this point that i would make a joke about how someone should write a commentary on the commentary’s commentary, but honestly, i think this joke is a little played out².

krampus

back in the day (and in many modern alpine traditions) there were two spirits that visited children during this time of year. just as i have an evil alter ego, so too did santa claus.

while santy rewarded the good kids with treats and sundries, krampus punished the naughty through scare tactics and relentless spanking (especially the young girls). also, krampus looked like a badass motherfucker.

wiki

bible study

i don’t want to point fingers or anything but it looks as if mark is a big fat plagiarizer.