Michael Will 🍁
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scidata.ca
Michael Will 🍁
@scidata.ca
computation from first principles 0101

FORTH PROLOG GOFAI RISC-V HPC Spaceflight Astronomy
Zebrafish SciFi CitSci Archaeology Anthropology Psychohistory

Website: www.scidata.ca
Discussion: worthdefending.blogspot.com
GOFAI Forum: gofai.discourse.group
The answer, then as now, is #Forth.
(16-bit cells, but 8-bit storage)
December 4, 2025 at 2:52 PM
I tried something similar with my Mustang. The machinery was ok, but the cellular connection was crap. Plus it used up all the space in the back seat. Inconvenient.
December 3, 2025 at 2:31 PM
Best exchange from "Joe vs the Volcano"

Joe: I quit
Mr. Waturi: Don't come looking for a recommendation
Joe: Ok, I won't
December 3, 2025 at 1:42 PM
Putting a positive spin on it, maybe that watch saved you from a broken wrist.
December 2, 2025 at 3:33 PM
35 years ago, I designed a parallel-in to serial-out device for the industrial monitoring market. It used a shift register and software. High hopes, zero sales. Well, one, but that's almost worse because it forced me to do a lot of documentation and support gratis.

I can offer appreciation only.
December 2, 2025 at 1:14 PM
Every 50 years, car manufacturers switch from button start to turn-key start or vice versa. The ads proudly exclaim what an innovation the new method is. And music media, and cameras, and clothing. Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, but that's hard to sell profitably.

#Fashion #Trends
December 1, 2025 at 10:05 PM
You can have all our snow, but you'll have to pay for the shipping. We're still a bit disgruntled about the Blue Jays.
November 30, 2025 at 4:23 PM
Always ask yourself, What would Newton do?
November 30, 2025 at 2:29 PM
C'est magnifique
Takes me right back. I was into French new wave synthpop at one point.
November 29, 2025 at 1:22 PM
This is what happens in an age where first principles have been entirely abandoned. Runaway abstraction, as if the entire population has become String Theorists.

"People understand me so poorly that they don't even understand my complaint about them not understanding me."
- Søren Kierkegaard
November 28, 2025 at 10:49 PM
Cory Doctorow talks of 'enshittification'. I'm starting to use 'ensloppification' - more polite.

#GOFAI #CanadianAI
November 28, 2025 at 3:23 PM
I can almost hear the Elvis Costello. That was my coding mood music.
November 28, 2025 at 2:52 PM
Lovely. Sometimes you have to go far away to find your way home. The spirit of America is alive and well in far flung places.
November 28, 2025 at 11:46 AM
Does anyone really need anything more than a 386SX and Windows 3.0? It all just turned into a vicious feedback loop of more power > more bells & whistles > more power. And 40 years of zombified sifting of eye candy.

#Forth #ComputationalThinking #GOFAI
November 27, 2025 at 10:42 PM
“Do not refer to your toy-books, and say you have seen that before. Answer me rather, if I ask you, have you understood it before?”
- Michael Faraday
November 26, 2025 at 5:23 PM
I hope they're smart homes (ie efficient, sustainable). And no, I'm not in that business.

#GOFAI #ComputationalThinking
November 26, 2025 at 4:04 PM
Compared to my copy of "Starting Forth", that one is almost pristine.

#ComputationalThinking
November 26, 2025 at 1:12 AM
Always remember, the human brain models the universe in real time, with advanced communication and sensors, almost unlimited learning capacity, and true intelligence
- and uses 25W.
November 26, 2025 at 12:55 AM
Do not send to know for whom the bell tolls
November 25, 2025 at 12:47 PM
I ran a #CitizenScience team from 2008-2018 that used GPUs, mainly to sift thru Arecibo data looking for pulsars and other astro & bio searches. We got squeezed out of the game during the insane crypto age. Nobody on our team could afford Maxwell GPUs. Now it's data centers. Greed won't stop GRBs.
November 24, 2025 at 5:32 PM
Data center envy is becoming our creed.

#GOFAI #ComputationalThinking #Rationalism
November 24, 2025 at 4:13 PM
You know, I really wish they'd worked a wee flash of #Forth into the movie CONTACT (1997). It would only have req'd a brief screen glimpse during the Vega primes signal detection scene. Would have been dead brilliant and a great tip-of-the-hat to Chuck Moore. Would have made the movie immortal.
November 24, 2025 at 12:26 PM