Capitalogix

A Change of Pace: Picasso by Theme

I often share examples of functional data science - using data to give insight into our economy, into our impact on the planet, and more. 

Sometimes, it's nice to appreciate a beautifully made infographic purely for its creation and function. 

This won't change your life (or help you make investment decisions) ... nevertheless, hopefully, you will appreciate it. 

Pablo Picasso was a prolific and vastly misunderstood artist during his time. He created tens of thousands of works that span countless topics.   

National Geographic published a painting/infographic depicting the different phases and influences in Picasso's career. It leverages the techniques, colors, and shapes Picasso predominantly used to help immerse you in his art. The size of each category reflects the number of artworks in the category. 

Click the image to see it in full size, with descriptions of each section. 

Alberto Lucas Lopez via National Geographic

Is Mars Going to be an Escape Hatch For Rich People?

Elon Musk recently said that there's a 70% chance he goes to Mars. Their follow-up questions was this... 

Is Mars going to be an escape hatch for rich people?

I thought his response brought some interesting points to light. Check it out (his answer starts @ 22 seconds in).

 

via Axios

"Really the ad to go to Mars would be like Shackleton's ad to go to the Antarctic. It's going to be hard. There's a good chance of death ... going in a little can through deep space."

 

Elon is a controversial character; he may be the closest we have to a real life Bruce Wayne, but  he's also been forced to stepdown as Chairman of Tesla, has many controversial tweets, and is widely considered an eccentric. 

That being said ... I have to respect what he's accomplished, and his approach to his businesses. 

Elon comes from the mindset of "what's possible?" not "how can I make the most money consistently over time?"

When asked why you climb the mountain, the answer doesn't have to be profound ... because it's there, or to see if I can are valid answers. 

If you need rationale, Dr. Zubrin, President of the Mars Society puts it eloquently. 

 

NASA's Ames Research Center via YouTube
 

Human expansion has been furthered greatly by selfish endeavors - and that's okay. 

What's your metaphorical flight to Mars? What's the idea that you want to make a reality? You can accomplish a lot when you're aligned with your goals. 

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - December 9th, 2018

 

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

Lighter Links

• Bill Gates Picks His 5 Favorite Books for 2018. (GeekWire)
• Why the Dalai Lama's Reincarnation is up for Debate. (BigThink)
• The Neuroscience that Shows Us What It's like to Be a Dog. (Quartz)
• Physicists Just Confirmed Evidence of a Possible Fifth Fundamental Force.(Futurism)
• George H.W. Bush Left a Note to Bill Clinton. It's an Artifact of Political Humility. (WashPost)

 

Trading Links

• 'More Trading Will Be Taken over by Machines,' Quant Chief Says.(Bloomberg)
• Investing Legend Jack Bogle Says There's a Big Problem with Index Funds.(Time)
• Lab-grown Meat of the Future is Here and May Even Sustainably Fill Demand. (TheGuardian)
• Look out Prince Harry, the IRS Wants Its Share of Your Royal Fortune.(CNW)
• 19 Indicators that Suggest the US Economy's Record Expansion is about to Come to an End. (BizInsider)

 

A Look Back At The Future, Part 2

As the holiday season begins, I was thinking about my father.

I love him and miss him ... but, truth be told, I teased him mercilessly about being technologically challenged (especially around the holidays, when I'd buy him a new gadget –  only to roll on the floor laughing while watching him try to figure it out).

Karma is a bitch!  My Dad used to say "whatever you make fun of me for ... will happen to you." 

I didn't yet realize how fast the world was changing ... or how quickly I'd find it hard to keep up. 

In 2015 I wrote an article about this titled "A Look Back at The Future". 

It's only four years later ... and somehow my realizations seem out-dated.

It's not just me, it's everyone! 

Realize that human perception is linear, but technological growth isn't.

As technology progression evolves and quickens, it is going to get harder to keep up.

Check out this video from 1974 ... It shows Arthur C. Clarke making some impressive guesses about the future of technology.

 

 

Now that we're here, it may not seem like an impressive prediction ... but how cool was it that Arthur C. Clarke believed a computer would fit on a desk in 1974?   

Do you think that you can predict what a computer will look like in 2034? 

Artificial Intelligence, quantum computing, augmented reality, neuro-interfaces, etc. are all going to change the face and nature of computing and perhaps life itself. 

We live in exciting times!

Onwards.

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - December 2nd, 2018

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

Lighter Links 

• The 10 Best Books of 2018, According to Amazon.(BusinessInsider)
• Great Apes and Ravens Plan without Thinking. (Phys)
• Elon Musk: Ticket to Mars Will Cost about $200,000.(BigThink)
• Game of Thrones' Creator George R.R. Martin Assures Fans: Writing is Coming. (Wall Street Journal)
• Would a Universal Genetic Database Be a Crime-Solving Wonder, or an Orwellian Nightmare? (SingularityHub)

 

Trading Links

• Microsoft Passes Apple to Become Most Valuable U.S. Company. (MacRumors)
• 50 Companies to Watch in 2019. (Bloomberg)
• What Bear Markets Look Like. (AVC)
• International Stocks Will Beat US Stocks over next Decade: Vanguard Group. (CNBC)
• The World's 37 Richest, Healthiest, Happiest, and Most Prosperous Nations. (BusinessInsider)

 

 

A Little Hanukkah Fun

Tonight marks the first night of Chanukah - the Jewish festival of lights. 

We light the Menorah (Chanukah candles), eat latkas (potato pancakes), we exchange gifts, we spin the Dreidel (a gambling toy), and we enjoy a sense of family togetherness for 8 days and nights.

One of my friends sent me this funny video of a Chanukah parody of Bohemian Rhapsody ... it's better than you would expect.

 

 Six13Sings via YouTube

It's not too different from Christmas (though my kids were jealous Santa didn't come down our chimney). 

The cynic in me beleives the gift part of the holiday was invented by merchants.

In our office,  we have an "Elf on the shelf", the magical elf who reports who has been naughty and who has been nice to Santa, perching in a new spot each day. 

 

 

And, we also have "Mensch on a Bench", who watches your Menorah to make sure you don't run out of oil. 

 

 

Happy Chanukah ... or at least an early start to your holiday season!

Tackled on Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

My children came to town, and we continued our tradition of spending time together watching some football. The top photo is from 2008. 

 

After looking at this picture, I recognize the burden I impose on my sons.  Some would call it crushing. 

 

 

That's my oldest son, Ben. He's a good sport.

My youngest son, Zach, was happy to make sure that I got mine too. 

 

 

He still plays Rugby. 

I am thankful for my family, my company and that I continually face a better class of challenges ... forging a path to a bigger future.

What about you?

Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading - November 25th, 2018

 I remember when they told me that eating meat was bad for my health ...

 

Here are some of the posts that caught my eye recently. Hope you find something interesting.

Lighter Links  

• Is It Possible to Replay the Tape' of Evolution? (Futurity)
• Should You Be Eating a High-Fat, Low-Carb Diet like Keto? Scientists Weigh In. (Gizmodo)
• An 1861 Japanese Book of American History. (Neatorama)
• Beijing to Judge Every Resident Based on Behavior by End of 2020.(Bloomberg)
• How Many Fake Accounts are There on Facebook? Here's a Clue: 1.5 Billion Fake Accounts Were Removed in Just the past 6 Months. (Neatorama)

 

Trading Links

• Mark Cuban Explains Why Dallas Wasn't Selected as Amazon's HQ2 Location. (SportsDay)
• Jerry Jones: Wouldn't Sell Cowboys for Less Than $10 Billion.(Profootballtalk)
• Beyond Meat Continues to Sizzle, Announces IPO. (Forbes)
• Masayoshi Son: the Man behind a $90B Empire. (TechInAsia)
• How Juul, Founded on a Life-Saving Mission, Earned a $16B Valuation Despite the Controversy. (FastCompany)

Storage Wars

Have you ever seen the posts showing what happens in a minute on the Internet?  The speed and scope of activity is amazing ...  so is how fast it is increasing.

The same is true for storage.  It is getting bigger and cheaper quickly.

This picture shows an IBM VP holding a 10 MB hard drive from the 1960s.   

via novartistic

When it was invented, I bet they wondered how someone could ever fill it.  Now imagine what it cost back then.

For context, here are some things you can do with 10 MB of space:

• Download approximately 3 songs
• or 5 medium-sized photos
• or store 50-100 HTML e-mails
• or a 3 minute low-quality video (or 48 frames of 4k footage).

Things are changing.

Here's a link to a 256 GB flash drive that you can buy for about $50 dollars ... and here's a link to a working prototype of a 1 TB flash drive.

Here are some things you can do with 1 TB of space:

• Store 17,000 hours of music
• or an 85,899,345 page word document. (source)
• or 250 full-length movies
• or 310,000 photos.

I wonder how someone could ever fill it?

Crazy!

The Gait Keeper - What Makes Human's Gait So Hard for Robots?

For centuries we've struggled to extract what makes humans "human".

In contrast, we understand exactly what makes machines "machine".

Yet, even when you recognize what's missing ... it's often harder than you'd guess to train the machine to do what humans do. 

Here is a video showing how to train robots to do what we do.

 

Jonathan Samir Matthis et al. via CellPress

While little is known about how the visual and locomotor systems work together to support movement, it's cool to watch (and appreciate) what happens and what we can do. 

It's almost mind-boggling how quickly our brain can process complex geometric decisions to ensure we don't slip off the terrain. The speed and precision of the eye movements performed in a task like this are absurd. 

What's even crazier is that, despite performing "calculations" that computers struggle with, these calculations happen far below our conscious awareness. 

For all that complexity - in gaze and gait, in copying humans and innovating past them - robotics has advanced very far.

We now have robots that walk with relatively human gaits, and we have Boston Dynamics creating humanoid and quadrupedal robots that challenge what we thought was possible.

We've even got robots doing parkour. 

 

via Boston Dynamics

Exciting or Scary?