ola

Masterworks To Feature Nicola Muirhead’s Work

Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art will be showcasing the work of award-winning Bermudian documentary photographer and visual storyteller, Nicola Muirhead, in the next Rick Faries Gallery exhibition entitled ‘Descendants of Summer: A Preview,’ which will be opening on Friday, October 4. A spokesperson said, “This exhibition showcases a sample of Muirhead’s ongoing documentary series Descendants […]




ola

Nicholas Christopher Set For Hit Musical

Bermudian actor Nicholas Christopher is set to star in the Off-Broadway revival of Little Shop of Horrors at the Westside Theatre in New York. Mr Christopher and Sherie Rene Scott will step into the roles of the unlikely lovers, Seymour and Audrey, respectively, beginning on October 22. Alan Menken and Howard Ashman’s hit musical will […]




ola

Piráti po zvolení Hřiba přichází o známé členy. Skončil Kolaja i Michailidu

Piráty opustil bývalý místopředseda strany a někdejší europoslanec Marcel Kolaja. Na síti X dnes uvedl, že nesouhlasí s dalším směřováním strany. Předsedou Pirátů se v sobotu stal bývalý pražský primátor a nynější primátorův náměstek Zdeněk Hřib, který zároveň prosadil reformu fungování strany. Členství v reakci na to už v sobotu zrušila k 17. listopadu bývalá místopředsedkyně strany Jana Michailidu, která neuspěla ve snaze o znovuzvolení. Členství pozastavil také vedoucí rušeného zahraničního odboru Pirátů Michal Gill, který byl odpůrcem změny stanov.




ola

Řízení investičního rizika v podmínkách tržní volatility

Investování je umění kombinovat znalosti, strategii a intuici, abychom dosáhli zisku. Každé investiční rozhodnutí však nese riziko a jeho řízení je klíčovým prvkem pro dlouhodobý úspěch na trhu. Zejména v době zvýšené volatility, kdy jsou finanční trhy náchylné k náhlým výkyvům, je schopnost řídit riziko prioritou. Dokonce i zkušení investoři mohou čelit výzvám, které mohou negativně ovlivnit jejich portfolia, pokud nevyužijí správné techniky ochrany kapitálu.




ola

Co dostane Musk od Trumpa za volební výpomoc? Zakázky a volnou ruku celkem v řádu bilionů dolarů

Z návratu Donalda Trumpa do Bílého domu bude profitovat jeden z jeho nejviditelnějších příznivců: Elon Musk. Přiznaně transakční vztah obou idiosynkratických sólistů je v moderní historii bezprecedentní.




ola

Thoughts Of Love and Chocolate Brownies for St Valentines Day

With Valentines Day just around the corner … ones mind begins filling with thoughts of love, chocolate and chocolate lovers. If your someone special loves chocolate, think about making a batch of Ghirardelli Triple Chocolate Brownies to share with them on St. Valentines Day. Ghirardelli Brownies are delicious when served with a scoop of ice …




ola

Poland National Day 2024

Date: November 11, 2024

Today’s Doodle celebrates Poland’s National Day, known as Narodowe Święto Niepodległości. On this day in 1918, World War I ended, marking the rebirth of an independent Poland, free after a century of partition. 

Today, red and white, Poland’s national colors since the 13th century, are displayed everywhere. Faces are painted, flags wave from buildings, and a sea of red and white shirts fill the streets, all showcasing the nation’s vibrant spirit. Towns come alive with the sights and sounds of parades. In Warsaw, “The March of Independence,” proceeds through Constitution Square, complete with red flares, while smaller parades echo with marching bands and cheers of onlookers.

Independence Day is also a time to toast the nation’s rich culture and history with family and friends. Happy Independence Day, Poland!

Location: Poland

Tags:




ola

Solar maximum = maximum awe

With the Sun at the peak of its activity cycle, we Earthlings get treated to some awesome sights. Plus, some truly awe-inspiring launches happened this week.




ola

Joe Marshall: Lisp vs. golang

It's no secret that I'm an aficionado of Lisp. It's my go to language, especially when I don't know what I'm doing. I call it research and prototyping, but it's really just playing around until something works.

We had a need for some auditing of some of our databases at work. They ought to agree with each other and with what GitHub and CircleCI think. It took a couple of weeks part time to prototype a solution in Common Lisp. It showed that the databases were in 99% agreement and found the few points of disagreement and anomalies that we ought to fix or look out for.

I want to integrate this information into a dashboard on one of our tools. I prototyped this by spinning up a Common Lisp microservice that returns the information in JSON format.

But management prefers that new services are written in golang. It would be easier for me to rewrite the service in golang than to try to persuade others to use Common Lisp. It also gives me the opportunity to compare the two languages head to head on a real world problem.

No, this is not a fair comparison. When I wrote the Lisp code I was exploring the problem space and prototyping. I'm much more experienced with Lisp than with golang. The golang version has the advantage that I know what I want to do and how to do it. In theory, I can just translate the Common Lisp code into golang. But then again, this is a “second system” which is not a prototype and has slightly larger scope and fuller requirements. So this cannot be a true head to head comparison.

The first point of comparison is macros (or lack thereof). I generally don't use a lot of macros in Common Lisp, but they come in handy when I do use them. One macro I wrote is called audit-step, which you can wrap around any expresion and it prints out a message before and after the expression is evaluated. The steps are numbered in sequence, and nested steps get nested numbers (like step 2.3.1). If you wrap the major function bodies with this macro, you get a nice trace of the call sequence in the log.

Golang doesn't have macros, but it has first class functions. It's easy enough to write a function that takes a function as an argument and wraps it to output the trace messages. In fact, the macro version in Common Lisp just rewrites the form into such a function call. But the macro version hides a level of indentation and a lambda. In golang, my major functions all start with

func MajorFunction (args) int {
        return AuditStep("MajorFunction", "aux message", func() int {
                // body of MajorFunction
                // Actual code goes here.
        })    
}

The bodies of all my major functions are indented by 16 spaces, which is a little much.

I like higher order functions. I can write one higher order function and parameterize it with functions that handle the specific cases. In my auditing code, one such workhorse function is called collate. It takes a list of objects and creates a table that maps values to all objects in the list that contain that value. To give an example, imaging you have a list of objects that all have a field called foo. The foo field is a string. The collate function can return a table that maps strings to all objects that have that string in the foo field.

collate is very general. It takes a list of objects and four keyword arguments. The :key argument is a function that extracts the value to collate on. The :test argument is a function that compares two keys (it defaults to eql if not specified). The :merger argument is a function to add the mapped object to its appropriate collection in the table (it defaults to adjoin). The :default argument specifies the initial value of a collection in the table (it defaults to nil).

The :merger function is the most interesting. It takes the key and the object and the current value of the table at that key. It returns the new value of the table at that key. The default merger function is adjoin, which adds the object to the collection at the key if it is not already there. But you can specify a different merger function. For example, if you want to count the number of objects at each key, you can specify a merger function that increments a counter.

The functional arguments to the collate function are often the results of other higher order functions. For example, the :key argument is often the result of composing selector functions. The :merger argument is often the result of composing a binary merge function with a unary transformer function. The transformer function is often the result of composing a number of primitive selectors and transformers.

In Common Lisp, it is quite easy to write these higher order functions. We can compose two unary functions with the compose2 function:

(defun compose2 (f g)
  (lambda (x) (funcall f (funcall g x)))

and then compose as many functions as we like by fold-left of compose2 starting with the identity function:

(defun compose (&rest fs)
  (fold-left #'compose2 #'identity fs))

We can compose a binary function with a unary function in three ways: we can pipe the output of the binary function into the unary function, or we can pipe the output of the unary function into one or the other of the inputs of the binary function.

(defun binary-compose-output (f g)
  (lambda (x y) (funcall f (funcall g x y))))

(defun binary-compose-left (f g)
  (lambda (x y) (funcall f (funcall g x) y)))

(defun binary-compose-right (f g)
  (lambda (x y) (funcall f x (funcall g y))))

The collate function can now assume that a lot of the work is done by the :key and :merger functions that are passed in. It simply builds a hash table and fills it:

(defun collate (item &key (key #'identity) (test #'eql) (merger (merge-adjoin #'eql)) (default nil))
  (let ((table (make-hash-table :test test)))
    (dolist (item items table)
      (let ((k (funcall key item)))
        (setf (gethash k table) (funcall merger (gethash k table default) item))))))

(defun merge-adjoin (test)
  (lambda (collection item)
    (adjoin item collection :test test)))

So suppose, for example, that we have a list of records. Each record is a three element list. The third element is a struct that contains a string. We want a table mapping strings to the two element lists you get when you strip out the struct. This is easily done with collate:

(collate records
  :key (compose #'get-string #'third)
  :test #'equal      ; or #'string= if you prefer
  :merger (binary-compose-right (merge-adjoin #'equal) #'butlast))

The audit code reads lists of records from the database and from GitHub and from CircleCI and uses collate to build hash tables we can use to quickly walk and validate the data.

Translating this into golang isn't quite so easy. Golang has first class function, true, but golang is a statically typed language. This causes two problems. First, the signature of the higher order functions includes the types of the arguments and the return value. This means you cannot just slap on the lambda symbol, you have to annotate each argument and the return value. This is far more verbose. Second, higher order functions map onto parameterized (generic) types. Generic type systems come with their own little constraint language so that the computer can figure out what concrete types can correctly match the generic types. This makes higher order functions fairly unweildy.

Consider compose2. The functions f and g each have an input and output type, but the output type of g is the input type of f so only three types are involved

func Compose2[T any, U any, V any](f func(U) V, g func(T) U) func(T) V {
	return func(x T) V {
		return f(g(x))
	}
}

If want to compose three functions, we can write this:

func Compose3[T any, U any, V any, W any](f func(V) W, g func(U) V, h func(T) U) func(T) W {
	return func(x T) W {
		return f(g(h(x)))
	}
}
The generic type specifiers take up as much space as the code itself.

I don't see a way to write an n-ary compose function. It would have to be dynamically parameterized by the intermediate types of all the functions it was composing.

For the collate function, we can write this:

func Collate[R any, K comparable, V any](
	list *Cons[R],
	keyfunc func(R) K,
	merger func(V, R) V,
	defaultValue V) map[K]V {
	answer := make(map[K]V)
	for list != nil {
		key := keyfunc(list.Car)
		probe, ok := answer[key]
		if !ok {
			probe = defaultValue
		}
		answer[key] = merger(probe, list.Car)
		list = list.Cdr
	}
	return answer
}

We have three types to parameterize over: the type of the list elements (i.e. the record type) R, the type of the key K, and the type of the value V. The key type is needs to be constrained to be a valid key in a map, so we use the comparable constraint. Now that we have the types, we can annotate the arguments and return value. The list we are collating is a list of R elements. The key function takes an R and returns a K. The merger takes an existing value of type V and the record of type R and returns a new value of type V.

The magic of type inference means that I do not have to annotate all the variables in the body of the function, but the compiler cannot read my mind and infer the types of the arguments and return value. Golang forces you to think about the types of arguments and return values at every step of the way. Yes, one should be aware of what types are being passed around, but it is a burden to have to formally specify them at every step. I could write the Common Lisp code without worrying too much about types. Of couse the types would have to be consistent at runtime, but I could write the code just by considering what was connected to what. In golang, the types are in your face at every function definition. You not only have to think about what is connected to what, you have to think about what sort of thing is passed through the connection.

I'm sure that many would argue that type safety is worth the trouble of annotation. I don't want to argue that it isn't. But the type system is cumbersome, awkward, and unweildy, especially when you are trying to write higher order functions.

It is taking me longer to write the golang version of the audit service than it did to write the Common Lisp version. There are several reasons. First, I am more experienced with Common Lisp than golang, so the right Common Lisp idioms just come to mind. I have to look up many of the golang idioms. Second, the golang code is trying to do more than the Common Lisp code. But third, golang itself introduces more friction than Common Lisp. Programs have to do more than express the algorithm, they have to satisfy the type system.

There are more points of comparison between the two languages. When I get frustrated enough, I'll probably write another post.




ola

USC football placed on 1 year of probation, fined for coaching staff violations

Southern California’s football program has been fined $50,000 and placed on probation for one year by the NCAA because of multiple violations of coaching staff rules over two seasons




ola

The U.S. Can’t Beat China at Solar Power. It May Be Time to Join Them




ola

Polarization of American politics

Polarization of American Politics Ah politics… fun fun fun ‘til Daddy takes the T-Bird away, the polarization of America is getting out of hand. Everyone can buy a gun? State religion? No taxes? Unbridled Capitalism? Socialism? Libertarianism? Communism? Extremism! Oh My! Has everyone lost their collective minds? We live in a society, supposedly a free...




ola

N-complex number, N-dimensional polar coordinate and 4D Klein bottle with 4-complex number

« N-complex number, N-dimensional polar coordinate and 4D Klein bottle with 4-complex number» “A concrete representation of a 4D Klein bottle has been desired by many but has never been presented. So, I decided to dive into the Klein bottle. Working with the Klein bottle was my first opportunity to practice with this system. To...




ola

Explore these unique sustainable pergola design Ideas

The pergola is one aspect of ancient architecture that remains relevant today. Pergolas date back to ancient Egypt, but the concept itself might have come much earlier. The evolution of pergolas has witnessed many changes along the way. Today, it is technically impossible to draw a line between a pergola and a gazebo. However, for clarity, we will stick to the traditional idea of a pergola, one that is relatively merged with the house design.[...]




ola

These zero energy ready homes are solar and energy efficient

Lots of people want to have more sustainable homes, not just to help the environment. Because at the end of the day, it's a lot more affordable to get your energy from the sun and the wind than to pay some oil or coal plant to provide it. But for many people, being sustainable means having a home built. Hiring an architect and a contractor and going to all that trouble gets pretty expensive. Thanks to Clayton, sustainable living is about to get much more accessible.[...]




ola

Did you know these surprising solar panel facts?

Solar panels are by far the best applicable technology for converting solar energy to usable electricity today. With the sun available to us around the year, it is only reasonable to consider taping its energy for domestic use. Even so, the currently available photovoltaic solar cell technology is still not as efficient as desired. The cells used in most solar panels have an efficiency of about 15% to 20%. This means that only about 20% of the sun rays that reach the panel are converted to electricity.[...]





ola

Fifteen scholars named Presidential Postdoctoral Research Fellows

The program, now in its fifth year, recognizes and supports outstanding scholars primed to make important contributions in their fields. The 2024 cohort includes disciplines spanning the humanities, engineering, the sciences and the social sciences.




ola

SPIA exhibit and programming are directing attention to nuclear weapons as a scholarly and policy issue

“Close Encounters: Facing the Bomb in a New Nuclear Age” is on display at SPIA’s Bernstein Gallery through Oct. 25. 




ola

Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts welcomes new scholars

A commitment to the liberal arts is at the core of Princeton University's mission. A new cohort of outstanding postdocs has joined the Society of Fellows for three years of teaching and research.




ola

Endowment continues to provide foundation for Princeton’s groundbreaking research, innovative scholarship and national leadership on college affordability

In the Class of 2028, 71.5% of students qualify for financial aid and 21.7% of the class are lower-income students eligible for federal Pell grants.




ola

Mathematician Joseph Kohn, ‘a giant’ in several complex variables and generous mentor to young scholars, dies at 91

“His mathematical legacy is enormous,” said John D’Angelo *76. “Joe was among the most friendly, popular and influential mathematicians of his generation.”




ola

Men's Basketball vs Loyola Chicago

Men's Basketball vs Loyola Chicago




ola

Global Existential Challenges: Designing Mechanisms for Addressing Political Polarization in Voter Behavior

Simon A. Levin, James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University Samuel S. Wang, Professor of Neuroscience, Princeton University Discussant: Keena Lipsitz, Associate Professor of Political Science at Queens College, City University of New York




ola

O holograma em vitrine da Holanda usado para tentar desvendar assassinato de prostituta

A morte por esfaqueamento de uma jovem húngara, assassinada logo após dar à luz, intriga a polícia há 15 anos.




ola

Polar bears face higher risk of disease in a warming Arctic

Climate change and sea ice loss leaves polar bears exposed to more diseases, research suggests.




ola

Gaza’s top Islamic scholar issues fatwa criticising 7 October attack

It is an embarrassing critique for Hamas, which has used religious arguments to justify its actions.




ola

Guardiola: Chasing Perfection

How and why has Pep Guardiola been able to revolutionise football?




ola

This is a crisis for Guardiola - Sutton

Former Premier League striker Chris Sutton discusses Manchester City’s recent form, and asks if this can be considered a crisis for manager Pep Guardiola.




ola

News24 | OPINION | Lisa Otto: Isolationism vs hegemony... and the contradictions of Trump's America

America and Americans must decide what the US' place in the world is and then accept what comes with that, writes Lisa Otto.




ola

News24 | Donald Trump's 'very polarising brand' raises new conflicts of interest following US election win

Donald Trump's impending White House return poses questions once again about conflicts of interest related to his business empire, with new cryptocurrency and other ventures raising fresh concerns.




ola

Tomie dePaola: We will miss him — but what a legacy!

The world lost an incredible talent with the death of Tomie dePaola. 




ola

luxuriantbliss763.yolasite.com

The mobile phone market is teeming with a large number of brands, which have been capable of gaining worldwide recognition. Similar to other, this market is also witnessing fiercely competitive scenario.




ola

News24 Business | South African AI body calls for LinkedIn probe over alleged local user data violations

The South African Artificial Intelligence Association wants LinkedIn to be investigated, as it claims the social networking platforms new data use practice violates local personal information protection law.




ola

News24 | Lottoland wins Google battle, Mogale City sewage disaster: Today's top 7 stories in 7 minutes

News24 brings you the top stories of the day, summarised into neat little packages. Read through quickly or listen to the articles via our customised text-to-speech feature.




ola

News24 | Ronald Lamola denies ANC is protecting 'its friend Frelimo' ahead of more protests in Mozambique

International Relations and Cooperation Minister Ronald Lamola threw diplomacy out the window on Tuesday and responded angrily when he was asked whether South Africa and the ANC were "protecting its friend" Frelimo in troubled Mozambique.




ola

Mutation of an atypical oxirane oxyanion hole improves regioselectivity of the {alpha}/{beta}-fold epoxide hydrolase Alp1U [Enzymology]

Epoxide hydrolases (EHs) have been characterized and engineered as biocatalysts that convert epoxides to valuable chiral vicinal diol precursors of drugs and bioactive compounds. Nonetheless, the regioselectivity control of the epoxide ring opening by EHs remains challenging. Alp1U is an α/β-fold EH that exhibits poor regioselectivity in the epoxide hydrolysis of fluostatin C (compound 1) and produces a pair of stereoisomers. Herein, we established the absolute configuration of the two stereoisomeric products and determined the crystal structure of Alp1U. A Trp-186/Trp-187/Tyr-247 oxirane oxygen hole was identified in Alp1U that replaced the canonical Tyr/Tyr pair in α/β-EHs. Mutation of residues in the atypical oxirane oxygen hole of Alp1U improved the regioselectivity for epoxide hydrolysis on 1. The single site Y247F mutation led to highly regioselective (98%) attack at C-3 of 1, whereas the double mutation W187F/Y247F resulted in regioselective (94%) nucleophilic attack at C-2. Furthermore, single-crystal X-ray structures of the two regioselective Alp1U variants in complex with 1 were determined. These findings allowed insights into the reaction details of Alp1U and provided a new approach for engineering regioselective epoxide hydrolases.




ola

US domestic polarization and implications for the presidential election

US domestic polarization and implications for the presidential election 30 September 2024 — 5:00PM TO 6:00PM Anonymous (not verified) Online

This webinar explores the rise of polarization amongst the US public and implications for the upcoming election.

Domestic polarization has been on the rise in the US in recent years, with Democrats and Republicans moving further away from the centre on key policy issues. As polarization increases, so too do concerns about the state of US democracy and prospects of political violence surrounding the upcoming presidential election. 

This expert panel discusses key questions including:

  • What are the driving forces of the growing political divide in the US?
  • How far apart are voters on key election issues, from healthcare to immigration to national security?
  • How is partisan polarisation altering the effectiveness of US foreign policy and influencing America’s role in the world?




ola

Relative and Absolute Quantification of Postsynaptic Density Proteome Isolated from Rat Forebrain and Cerebellum

Dongmei Cheng
Jun 1, 2006; 5:1158-1170
Datasets




ola

Reforming the EU: A View From Poland




ola

Rethinking the Governance of Solar Geoengineering




ola

Angola's Business Promise: Evaluating the Progress of Privatization and Other Economic Reforms




ola

Investigating Violations of International Humanitarian Law




ola

Rapid method for the isolation of lipoproteins from human serum by precipitation with polyanions

M. Burstein
Nov 1, 1970; 11:583-595
Articles





ola

Identification of compounds that bind the centriolar protein SAS-6 and inhibit its oligomerization [Computational Biology]

Centrioles are key eukaryotic organelles that are responsible for the formation of cilia and flagella, and for organizing the microtubule network and the mitotic spindle in animals. Centriole assembly requires oligomerization of the essential protein spindle assembly abnormal 6 (SAS-6), which forms a structural scaffold templating the organization of further organelle components. A dimerization interaction between SAS-6 N-terminal “head” domains was previously shown to be essential for protein oligomerization in vitro and for function in centriole assembly. Here, we developed a pharmacophore model allowing us to assemble a library of low-molecular-weight ligands predicted to bind the SAS-6 head domain and inhibit protein oligomerization. We demonstrate using NMR spectroscopy that a ligand from this family binds at the head domain dimerization site of algae, nematode, and human SAS-6 variants, but also that another ligand specifically recognizes human SAS-6. Atomistic molecular dynamics simulations starting from SAS-6 head domain crystallographic structures, including that of the human head domain which we now resolve, suggest that ligand specificity derives from favorable Van der Waals interactions with a hydrophobic cavity at the dimerization site.





ola

Fossil Fuels Expert Roundtable: How Solar is Shaping the Energy Transition

Fossil Fuels Expert Roundtable: How Solar is Shaping the Energy Transition 1 June 2018 — 9:00AM TO 10:30AM Anonymous (not verified) 22 May 2018 Chatham House, London

As global temperatures rise and extreme weather events multiply, doubts over the reality and imminence of climate change have dissipated. Despite this, there is a clear lack of urgency by governments to the approaching crisis. At this event, Prem Shankar Jha will set out what he believes are the three main causes for this inaction.

Furthermore, he will argue that catastrophic climate change is imminent, but even if it weren’t, the risk is too great to ignore. Only a complete shift from fossil fuels by 2070 at the latest would provide reasonable certainty of avoiding irreversible consequences. This transition is not only possible but the technologies to enable it were harnessed four to nine decades ago – and all of them draw their primary energy from the sun. These technologies are already capable of delivering electricity, transport fuels, and petrochemicals at prices that are competitive with the current delivered cost of electricity in the US and Western Europe. So what is holding up the energy shift?

Attendance at this event is by invitation only.




ola

From geodesic extrapolation to a variational BDF2 scheme for Wasserstein gradient flows

Thomas O. Gallouët, Andrea Natale and Gabriele Todeschi
Math. Comp. 93 (), 2769-2810.
Abstract, references and article information




ola

Transmitting Data with Polar Codes