Date archives "February 2018"

Early Thaw

Pawnee Eagle Corn Revived

Pawnee Eagle Corn reflects social, political, agricultural history. A fascinating tale.

When the Pawnee Nation was forced from its homeland in Nebraska to a reservation in Oklahoma in the 1870s, they lost a lot more than their home and their lives.
A partnership allows the first Cornhuskers to save the ancient Eagle Corn seed. The last 50 kernels of Eagle Corn were kept in a mayonnaise jar, the last seeds of a mother corn that had nurtured the Pawnee people for generations and was taken with them when they were exiled from Nebraska to Oklahoma…
SHELTON:  Seed sisters Ronnie OBrien and Deb Echo-Hawk can barely contain their joy when they talk about progress made by Oklahoma and Nebraska gardeners to restore the Pawnee corn

This, and much more on @AgBioWorld’s thread.

People’s Socialist Atlas: A History of the United American Socialist Republics

A thought-provoking feat of world-building.

By (apparently) Rebecca Stirling and Richard Collins? Someone get them a proofreader and publisher, STAT.

Predecessors: there hasn’t been much discussion (in detail) of a fictional socialist USA. It’s played for amusement in “Back in the USSA” by Eugene Byrne and Kim Newman, where much of USSR history is mapped onto the USA.

http://www.uchronia.net/label/newmbackin.html
https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/back-in-the-ussa.196465/
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Literature/BackInTheUSSA

https://quantumbranching.deviantart.com/art/Back-In-The-USSA-409464583


Terry Bisson’s Fire On The Mountain utilizes precedents of anti-racist activism in the USA to portray a successful slave rebellion in the American south, changing the political landscape forever.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_on_the_Mountain_(Bisson_novel)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/166902.Fire_on_the_Mountain
https://boingboing.net/2010/07/28/bissons-fire-on-the.html
https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/does-anyone-here-think-terry-bissons-fire-on-the-mountain-is-plausible.166825/
https://medium.com/@FAQzine/terry-bissons-fire-on-the-mountain-book-review-b648cbd1392c

So it’s welcome to see a new spin. Check it out, Comrades.  The UASR’s own internal struggle has lasting impact on the globe as well: no ‘manifest destiny’, no Monroe Doctrine.
Online: https://sites.google.com/site/peoplessocialistatlas/
As PDF via Dropbox [link]
Reddit discussion on worldbuilding project: https://www.reddit.com/r/worldbuilding/comments/7xcagp/a_full_200page_althistorical_atlas_i_created/

Alternate History Forum Discussion:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/the-peoples-socialist-atlas.432968/
Thanks, Metafilter!

AI Neural Net Writes Valentine Messages

 

http://aiweirdness.com/post/170685749687/candy-heart-messages-written-by-a-neural-network
(Also, pickup lines…)
http://aiweirdness.com/post/159302925452/the-neural-network-generated-pickup-lines-that-are

Prehistoric Children’s Toys and Proto-Animation

Check out this whole thread from Archaeologist @muckymaiya & friends:

Some unusual finds from thousands of years ago are actually toys and children?s attempts at mimicking adult craftwork.

 

Free Housing Entices Youth To Join Eldercare Facilities

A nursing home in the Netherlands allows university students to live rent-free alongside the elderly residents, as part of a project aimed at warding off the negative effects of aging.

Also: pairing and sharing:

We are the UK network for HomeShare. We believe HomeShare has the potential to change the face of social care in the UK. How? HomeShare enables two unrelated people to share a home for mutual benefit.

This Library of Academic Papers Lives in Kazakhstan

Piracy? Or progress?

“SCIENCE’S PIRATE QUEEN
Alexandra Elbakyan is plundering the academic publishing establishment
[Sci-Hub has been] transforming it into the largest Open Access academic resource in the world. In just six years of existence, Sci-Hub had become a juggernaut: the 64.5 million papers it hosted represented two-thirds of all published research, and it was available to anyone.

But as Sci-Hub grew in popularity, academic publishers grew alarmed.”

https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/8/16985666/alexandra-elbakyan-sci-hub-open-access-science-papers-lawsuit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sci-Hub