Golem, Paradox, Time, Blackout, Soviet
The Golem And The Jewish Superhero
Jacob Geller | YouTube | 29th March 2021
Fascinating profile of the Golem (a proto-Frankenstein figure in ancient Jewish mythology, formed from clay to protect the Jews from blood libel) and his effects on modern culture. For example, "in 1938, two Jewish kids from Cleveland created a nigh-invincible protector, quite literally put words in his mouth, and sent him out into the world. They called him Kal-El, or 'Superman'" (38m 05s)
Solution To The Windmill Paradox
MinutePhysics | YouTube | 1st April 2021
How much wind should a windmill mill (given that extracting energy from the wind slows it down)? Brief but complex mathematical explanation arrives at the conclusion that "the most efficient windmill possible slows the wind to about a third of its speed," thus "milling" about two-thirds of the wind that passes through it (3m 02s)
Time, Tarkovsky, And The Pandemic
Nerdwriter | YouTube | 30th March 2021
Ruminations on time, and how Tarkovsky stretches it with one breathtaking shot: "his camera glides back and forth like a hypnotic pendulum; the man's footsteps register like the pulses of a pacemaker." Tarkovsky is "dilating a segment of our personal timeline to such a degree that we catch a glimpse of the infinity beneath the normal rhythms of life" (8m 50s)
Blackout At The Super Bowl
Yuvaroo | Vimeo | 1st April 2021
The 2013 Super Bowl blackout, narrated by the players themselves. "I seen people looking like the X Files, coming up out of the woodwork, all suited up, booted up, and then BOOM...the lights go out." The stadium is enveloped in total darkness. Immediately tensions start to rise, with theories floating around that the outage was planned by the 49ers (5m 29s)
Ghostly Video Of The Week
Exploring an abandoned Soviet military base full of tattered murals and old propaganda leaflets
Browser Video Of The Week: Martin Rees On Climate Change
Lord Martin Rees, cosmologist and scholar of existential risk, on solutions to climate change. "We scientists ourselves don't have traction with the public," so depend on the likes of Greta Thunberg, "the Pope, and our secular pope David Attenborough," to alert and energise the public to existential risks. "The politicans will do the right thing if they think they won't lose votes by so doing" (2m 40s)
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