Tuesday, December 27. 2022
UFO Personality Travis Taylor Admits To Working For Pentagon
'The star of the TV show The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch Travis Taylor has accused “debunkers” of having a bias in their research. In the interview that appeared last week on 8 News Now, journalist George Knapp reveals the double life of this star. He was secretly working as the chief scientist for the Pentagon’s UAP Task Force.
'The article describes how Travis Taylor was an integral part of investigating UFO sightings and other phenomena related to UFOs and extraterrestrial.
'During his interview with KLAS-TV, the chief scientist of the Pentagon’s UFO Task Force, Travis Taylor, took aim at skeptics who are biased in their research.
'Taylor explained to journalist George Knapp in an interview that skeptics and debunkers obtain their results by “knowing what answer they’re going to get” and “changing” the analysis to take them in that direction.
'It seems that independent fact-checkers like Mick West are being belittled. Not just by Travis Taylor, but also by biased journalist George Knapp, who is also good friends with UFO hoaxer Jeremy Corbell.
'Jeremy Corbell, an American contemporary artist, documentary filmmaker, and ufologist, has repeatedly been caught lying about his claims. In one example, he posted a UFO from the miniseries Taken (2002) as “real” on his Instagram account which he later removed when we exposed him.
'In the 8 News Now article dedicated to Travis Taylor, George Knapp called fact-checkers “civilian debunkers”, saying: “Civilian debunkers have tried to explain away the Tic Tac or Gimbal UFOs as birds or reflected light or far off jet engines as if military investigators are oblivious to such possibilities. When The UPA Task Force determined these objects to be genuine unknowns, it wasn’t merely relying on brief video clips.”
'George Knapp, a supporter of the hoaxer Jeremy Corbell, featured a video in his news reporting that originate from the hoaxer Jeremy Corbell. This video contains a “UFO video” involving the USS Russell in 2019. The video footage depicts multiple pyramid-shaped flying objects.
'The UAP Task Force, George Knapp, and intrepid UFO investigator Dr. Travis Taylor all failed but not the “civilian” debunker Mick West. This just turns out to be an effect as a result of a triangular camera lens called the Bokeh effect. This is confirmed by the congressional committee. ' (LionsGround article).
Monday, December 26. 2022
UFOs - Why Now?
'A discovered US Department of Defense document provides unprecedented insight into why the US government is disclosing information concerning UFOs.
'The US Department of Defense is very certainly utilising or plans to deploy sophisticated anti-gravity planes to gain an advantage over its terrestrial opponents. If the document obtained by UFO researcher Richard Dolan from the DNI report is to be believed, the US was in the midst of an informational campaign to gain a significant advantage, which may have been thwarted. The document obtained by Mr. Dolan makes a bold claim that anti-gravity aircraft is already being tested at Area 51 and related sites (based out of Nevada).
'The actual objective of the Viper teams, who seemingly work closely in association with with George Knapp and Jeremy Corbell (both stationed in Nevada), might be for Information Operation (IO). Information Operations (IO) are critical to the successful execution of military operations, according to a recently discovered US Department of Defense study document.
'“Information is facts, data, or instructions in any media or form,” according to Joint Publication 1–02 (Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, April 2006). Information is also defined as “the meaning that a person imparts to facts via the application of recognised protocols in their representation.”
'For those wanting to answer additional existential mysteries, Richard Dolan’s report also cites “Advanced utilisation of exotic elements for energy research (ET related stuff).” With former US intelligence member Christopher Mellon and AATIP Director Luis Elizondo alluding to wrecked ET spacecraft on many occasions, it is reasonable to conclude that the anti-gravity craft now being tested were successfully reverse engineered.
'According to the uncovered document, DoD is using media as a key perception management tool. The document also claims that the media is a force multiplier and a weapon of war. When using media for perception management, the intent is to achieve key objectives such as targeting the mass minds on the inner front of a hostile nation. This aims at defeating adversary psychologically by subverting their public and defense forces and, also, disarming them morally.' (The Pulse article).
Monday, December 5. 2022
Headfuck: The Traitors
'The Traitors (BBC One) is the Highlands Hunger Games. It is terrible - a pandering to our basest, most voyeuristic, atavistic instincts, an exercise in exquisite cruelty lasting 12 weeks. You’re going to love it.
'Like all the best tortures, the set-up is simple. Twenty-two people are taken to an isolated spot - a huge castle in the wilds of Scotland - to complete a series of tasks together that will increase the prize money (up to a possible £120,000), which will be split among the winners. Fine! Dandy, you might even think! Except that three of the contestants are secretly designated - by host Claudia Winkleman - “traitors”. They get to “murder” one person a night to reduce the competition. The group can eliminate one person a day. They must try to identify the traitors and get them out because if a traitor survives to become one of the prizewinners, he or she will walk away with the whole sum. Thus are the seeds of discord sown with a lavish hand.
'Somehow, I’ve made it sound complicated. It really isn’t. Not least because the rules are, in a sense, immaterial - all you really need to know is that the game has been ruthlessly designed to set individual against individual, exploit every inch of humanity’s capacity for suspicion, dissembling, paranoia, guilt, sociopathy and every other unpleasantness you can think of. The knowledge that there are three traitors in their midst is like a poison creeping through the group. But as it works on them, they must come together to do the tasks as a unified whole to maximise their profit. If the makers had had the balls, they would have called it Headfuck.' (Guardian article).
Saturday, November 26. 2022
The Real Anthony Fauci
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s book, The Real Anthony Fauci, became an immediate best-seller upon its release in 2021, and that despite Big Tech’s censoring of its advertising. Kennedy’s book has now been made into a movie.
The book and the film reveal how Fauci turned the National Institutes of Health into an incubator for pharmaceutical products and essentially sold the entire country to the drug industry.
The film explores “the carefully planned militarization and monetization of medicine that has left American health ailing and our democracy shattered,” and chronicles the troubling role of the dangerously concentrated mainstream media, which during COVID have seemingly morphed into full-blown propaganda centers.
While the NIH and the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases are supposed to serve the public, the reality is that they’re partnered with private drug companies and act for their benefit. Both agencies own pharmaceutical patents that are then licensed to drug companies while the agencies themselves collect royalties on the sales. Fauci has personally filed patents on hundreds of new drugs his agency funded.
Were it not for this symbiotic relationship with drug companies, the NIH/NIAID would not be working against public health and deceiving the public about drugs and vaccines. (Pirate Bay magnet link).
Thursday, November 24. 2022
Graham Hancock's Ancient Apocalypse
What if everything we know about prehistoric humans is wrong? Journalist Graham Hancock visits archeological sites around the world to uncover whether a civilization far more advanced than we ever believed possible existed thousands of years ago. (Pirate Bay magnet link).
Tuesday, November 22. 2022
Was The Betty And Barney Hill Incident A Top Secret Mind-Control Test? MK-Ultra?
'Ready to see one of the most famous alleged alien abduction incidents questioned? It’s coming, anyway. It’s that of Betty and Barney Hill. They were a husband and wife who, on the night of September 19, 1961, and while driving home from Canada to New Hampshire after completing a fun vacation, had a significant number of hours erased from their minds. It all happened near Indian Head, New Hampshire. It was there they saw a strange light in the sky that appeared to be carefully shadowing them from above. Concern and anxiety set in, which is no surprise. Finally, they made it home. Something very strange and disturbing happened to the Hills, but such was the state of their minds, they weren’t sure what it was. But, they certainly wanted to know. In the days and weeks that followed, the Hills began to experience terrifying, never-jangling nightmares: there were memories of having been taken on-board a UFO, and of having been subjected to intrusive and stressful medical-based experiments. Betty recalled that the aliens inserted a needle into her navel. Sperm was removed from Barney, via what was termed as “a suction device.” The “alien abduction” phenomenon was up and running, and the issue of “missing time” was well and truly born. The fascination that the Hill’s experience generated - partly due to Betty and Barney’s decision to speak openly at UFO events - ultimately led to the publication in 1966 of The Interrupted Journey: Two Lost Hours “Aboard a Flying Saucer.” It was written by a respected journalist and author, John Fuller.
'The story of Betty and Barney - and of their pet dog, Delsey, too, who was also in the car at the time of the incident - still provokes interest and intrigue to this very day. It is to alien abductions what Roswell is to tales of crashed UFOs: a key case in the history of Ufology. What if, however, aliens did not abduct Betty and Barney? What if - just like those who were present in Rendlesham Forest in 1980 - the pair were led to believe they had undergone something that had extraterrestrial origins, when things were actually much different? One of those who came to believe that the Hills had been subjected to an MK-ULTRA-type encounter was the late Philip Coppens. He said: “It is clear that the Hills were being monitored by USAF [U.S. Air Force] Intelligence before the encounter took place, through Major James MacDonald, who had befriended them some time earlier. Betty Hill wrote to [UFO researcher/author] Donald Keyhoe who, despite the fact that he received over a hundred letters a day, homed in on this initially unremarkable case. Within twenty-four hours, Keyhoe had arranged for the Hills to be visited by top-level scientists, including C.D. Jackson, who had previously (definitely not coincidentally) worked on psychological warfare techniques for President Eisenhower. Stretching coincidence far beyond breaking point, Jackson already knew Major MacDonald, with whom he next interviewed the Hills.”' (Mysterious Universe article).
Monday, November 21. 2022
The BBC-To-NATO Pipeline
'The death of Queen Elizabeth II, where the BBC dropped programming to run endless, wall-to-wall coverage, has underlined the fact to many Britons that the network is far from impartial, but the voice of the state.
'The BBC website draped itself in black, printing stories such as “Death of Queen Elizabeth II: The moment history stops,” while BBC News presenter Clive Myrie explicitly dismissed the cost of living and energy crisis wracking the country as “insignificant” compared to the news.
'But even before the monarch’s death, the BBC’s reputation was in crisis. Between 2018 and 2022, the number of Britons saying they trusted its coverage dropped from 75% to just 55%. Yet it still remains a giant in media; more than three-quarters of the U.K. public rely on the network as a news source.
'However, this investigation will reveal that the BBC has always been consciously used as an arm of the state, with the broadcaster openly collaborating with the U.K. military, the intelligence services and with NATO, all in an effort to shape British and world public opinion.' (MintPress News article).
Sunday, June 19. 2022
The Subverse Is Back
Alright you twisted freaks! After a very long hiatus, The Subverse forum is back online.
Why has it come back now?
Well the bottom line is that social media is dead.
Now sure, the normals might not realise this yet, but the death knell of Facebook and Twitter is sounding as society descends into a state of complete paranoia and uncertainty. Operation Mindfuck has been a success, it just didn't quite pan out the way the original architects probably intended it to.
The mere fact that huge online social networking companies were able to replace the likes of the humble user created online forum was, without a doubt, a tragedy. But it was inevitable.
As the masses flocked to share all their data for the chance of centralised peer recognition, the resulting outcome has proven to be precisely what is expected from selling your soul to the devil - a brief period of hopeful yet unfulfilling opportunity, followed by an eternity in hell.
I was never a particular fan of social media, having never bothered jumping on the Facebook death slide, but I did tinker with the Twitter for a while, only to come to the realisation that it was turning out to be exactly what I expected from a centralised social media system; where the advertisers are the customer and the users (i.e. user data) are the product. Inevitably the algorithms that tailor your feeds have lead to an increase in bias and polarisation. The world is now a total clusterfuck and so any sane person has gone back to looking for decentralised alternatives.
So will a return to decentralised forums be a solution? I dunno, but I've now eradicated all centralised social media from my life and, for me, it's a step in the right direction. I'm not, however, particularly interested in reinstating The Subverse for nostalgia - although I am curious to see if any old faces return to the boards - but I've missed the community spirit of a small forum and can no longer deal with the suffocating feedback loops created through profit driven corporate vampirism.
So unplug, tune out and sign up to The Subverse if you find yourself concurring. At the very least we can discuss these issues without troves of personal data being gathered to try sell us ideas and products that none of us really need or require.
The Rites Of Mu
Saturday, April 9. 2022
Gerald Suster - Aleister Crowley Lecture
A rare audio recording of Gerald Suster's lecture on Aleister Crowley - recorded in West Hollywood, California on September 1st, 1989.
Monday, July 31. 2017
Is Net Neutrality An Essential Right?
Despite the distractions caused by recent scandals and the ongoing drama of U.S. politics at the moment, net neutrality is still at the center of much debate. Some efforts to remove it have even moved forward in Congress, much to the chagrin of supporters and to the benefit of internet service providers (ISPs). The FCC has recently considered killing net neutrality, bringing the issue to the forefront of interested parties’ radars.
If you’re wondering what net neutrality is, to summarize, it is a series of laws and guidelines that have been adopted by most Western governments to ensure all content and data are treated the same by ISPs and government organizations. It is intended to prevent discrimination of the user or host based on political views or for potential financial gains. Some of the things it prohibits, for example, are:
• An ISP “fast lane” allowing ISPs to charge websites and online services for improved bandwidth or priority over other services.
• A government or ISP ability to throttle (make loading times impossibly slow) political content of one view or another.
• Discrimination against a particular IP address or user to leverage higher rates or prohibit access to certain content.
Net neutrality, for most people, equates to keeping the internet an egalitarian arena where websites can easily and freely rise through the ranks. Proponents argue it keeps internet standards high and fosters free speech for people around the world. Without it, they worry governments and corporations will control the flow of information more strictly to keep people in the dark.
Continue reading "Is Net Neutrality An Essential Right?"
Wednesday, April 5. 2017
The Bushcraft Bothier - Wild Hammock Camp
An overnight wild hammock camp in the woods, followed by an afternoon in search of a future bug out location...
Sunday, March 19. 2017
The Bushcraft Bothier - Unfamiliar Territory
Here's my latest video upload: an overnight recce at a new location. Topics up for discussion include Death, Scottish Independence, Misanthropy, the 'Alone' series, and the imagined joy of seeing Piers Morgan and Katie Hopkins being hit by a double-decker bus.
Tuesday, February 28. 2017
Introducing The Bushcraft Bothier
I've decided to start video documenting my off-grid trips. Still much to learn with the filming and editing process - plus there's a few schoolboy errors in this episode - but the quality should improve with time and experience.
Here's a recent trip I took into the Scottish wilderness to spend a night at one of my favourite bothies...
Saturday, January 28. 2017
The Mysterious Origins Of Civilization: John Anthony West & Graham Hancock
'John Anthony West (born July 9, 1932 in New York City) is an American author, lecturer, guide and a proponent of Sphinx water erosion hypothesis in geology. John Anthony West is today the leading authority and proponent of the 'Symbolist' school of Egyptology, an alternative interpretation of ancient Egyptian culture advanced by the French scholar and philosopher, R. A. Schwaller de Lubicz. In the Symbolist view, Egyptian architecture and art disclose a richer and more universal wisdom than conventional Egyptology has assumed.
'Filmed in New York, December 2016, a month before John was diagnosed with cancer. Please show your support for this great man and for his work by making a donation to his crowdfunding campaign.' (The John Anthony West Project website).
Friday, January 13. 2017
Douglas Rushkoff Discusses 'Aleister & Adolf'
'Media theorist and documentarian Douglas Rushkoff weaves a mind-bending tale of iconography and mysticism against the backdrop of a battle-torn Europe.
'In a story spanning generations and featuring some of the most notable and notorious idealists of the 20th century, legendary occultist Aleister Crowley develops a powerful and dangerous new weapon to defend the world against Adolf Hitler's own war machine spawning an unconventional new form of warfare that is fought not with steel, but with symbols and ideas.
Unfortunately, these intangible arsenals are much more insidious and perhaps much more dangerous than their creators could have ever conceived.'
Wednesday, January 11. 2017
Omega Tau Podcast: Arctic & Antarctic Sea Ice
'The sea ice in the Arctic and Antarctic regions of the earth is an especially sensitive indicator of the earth’s climate, and in particular, the current overall atmospheric temperature of the planet. It was recently reported to have reached a new low. Our guest, NASA’s Walt Meier explains why this is the case and which processes govern the increase or decrease of the ice. We then discuss how the ice mass is measured based on satellite and how its thickness is estimated based mostly on in-situ measurements. We cover climate modelling and its connection to sea ice and conclude with an outlook on future research.' (Omega Tau podcast).
Thursday, June 2. 2016
Now Available: 'Magick Without Fear - The Gerald Suster Letters'
'Gerald Suster (1951-2001) can be considered one of the most important occultists of the late-20th century. A prolific writer, esteemed historian and advocate of Thelemic Magick, he is best known for his biographies of Aleister Crowley (The Legacy of the Beast) & Israel Regardie (Crowley’s Apprentice). Often described as a somewhat controversial and provocative character, Gerald made best use of these attributes in his published books and writings, employing common sense and wit to demolish all preconceived notions of what Magick is and how it might be utilised to further advance and accelerate human evolution. Note: my sincerest apologies for the somewhat hefty price of £24.99 which is due primarily to the greed of third party retailers like Amazon. For a company that has cornered the market in just about everything, they certainly like a large slice of the pie in return for promotion and quick turnaround delivery. Rest assured, however, that I am currently looking into setting up an individually run online store in an effort to undercut the set price of this book quite considerably, and I hope to also offer signed copies for those who want it. That said, the book comprises of 428 pages in A4 format (20.98 cm x 29.69 cm) and publishers Lulu have done an outstanding job on the quality and production. If you are going to buy it, please consider buying direct from the publisher. Even though they can't offer as quick a turnaround in delivery as Amazon, it is worth doing just to stick the finger up to multinational corporate greed. (Lulu shop).
'This volume comprises of the full collection of personal letters he wrote in correspondence with occult student George T. Mortimer, spanning over eight years from 1992 until near his death at the beginning of 2001. They reveal an exclusive insight into this unique and complex character, and will undoubtedly be of value to anyone engaged in studying the occult arts from a Thelemic & Crowleyan standpoint.'
Note: be sure to keep an eye out for Lulu discounts on their promotions page. (Lulu discount codes).
Tuesday, March 1. 2016
Coming Soon: 'Magick Without Fear - The Gerald Suster Letters'
A sneak peak at a cover concept I have for Magick Without Fear - The Gerald Suster Letters which I hope to release before the summer 2016:
Sunday, February 28. 2016
Decentralisation: An Evolutionary Biologist's Standpoint
One thing that rarely gets expressed by the Corporate Controlled Media is that Scottish Nationalism is in essence Civic Nationalism, meaning that it is inclusive of different cultural backgrounds and that the only nationalistic element of it is the acceptance that Scotland is made up of people from all corners of the globe but needs its independence in order to survive and flourish. In order for a country to function as a successful decentralised organism it is imperative that it is able to generate its own wealth, use its own resources, and trade the excesses of these resources successfully with other decentralised organisms for the resources in which it lacks but requires for a healthy and fruitful society. It’s how biology has evolved over the millennia and decentralisation will happen to humans if we are to evolve. I found this video interview a year or so ago with an evolutionary biologist whilst researching something that was completely unrelated to politics. I was stunned by the common sense expressed regarding the importance of decentralisation within evolutionary biology, and the parallels between how the human body operates and the clear way in which the world as a global society needs to operate if we are to survive as a species...
Friday, February 26. 2016
Rushkoff & Oeming Take On 'Aleister & Adolf'
Media theorist Douglas Rushkoff has teamed up with Michael Avon Oeming, the artist behind Powers And Hammer Of The Gods, to spin a tale about Aleister Crowley being recruited to oppose Adolf Hitler’s magick with his own. Apparently a connection between Nazi magick and 21st Century corporate culture is also part of the premise. (Comics Alliance article).
Saturday, October 24. 2015
'Geriatric X' - A Work In Progress
Here's a sneak preview of a cover concept that I have for my current work in progress:
Friday, October 23. 2015
'Bothy Culture' Now Available On Kindle
My book, Bothy Culture, is now available to buy on Amazon Kindle. (Amazon book listing).
Friday, October 16. 2015
Scopolamine - The World's Scariest Drug
'Ryan Duffy went to Colombia to check out a strange and powerful drug called Scopolamine, also known as "The Devil's Breath." It's a substance so intense that it renders a person incapable of exercising free will. The first few days in the country were a harrowing montage of freaked-out dealers and unimaginable horror stories about Scopolamine. After meeting only a few people with firsthand experience, the story took a far darker turn than we ever could have imagined.'
Thursday, December 4. 2014
Land Reform At Last!
Wow! For Land Reform anoraks such as myself, this last week or so has been truly inspiring. Behind Scottish Independence itself, Scottish Land Reform surely has to be the next biggest ticket on the agenda. I've posted before on the landmark Land Reform Group report, but it now looks like the SNP Government with Nicola 'The Sturge' Sturgeon at the helm is really pushing to make things happen. Hell, it's almost 'cool' to be discussing the future of our land, rather than the likes of me ranting on about it in a bothy to anyone who will listen.
Can you believe that not only do 'sporting estates' (i.e. playgrounds for our establishment fun-killers) get an exemption from business rates, but we actually subsidise them to the tune of £millions per annum? In fact this vile Tory-led Government - the Government of the 'Bedroom Tax' - has almost doubled this despicable subsidy - a subsidy that actually pays for landowners to lay waste to vast acreages of land by slaughtering all manner of wildlife, both 'legally' (e.g. stoats, weasels, foxes, corvids) and illegally (raptors) whom then sell it back to us as 'conservation'. Combine that with heather burning and bulldozing access tracks and you end up with huge upland deserts. If that constitutes 'conservation' then I'm proposing a movement that espouses shagging for virginity.
At last we have a real chance of some ancient wrongs being righted. Bring it on!
'Bring out the violins. The land reform programme announced last week by the Scottish government is the end of civilised life on Earth, if you believe the corporate press. In a country where 432 people own half the private rural land, all change is Stalinism. The Telegraph has published a string of dire warnings - insisting, for example, that deer stalking and grouse shooting could come to an end if business rates are introduced for sporting estates. Moved to tears yet?
'Yes, sporting estates - where the richest people in Britain, or oil sheikhs and oligarchs from elsewhere, shoot grouse and stags - are exempt from business rates, a present from John Major’s government in 1994. David Cameron has been just as generous with our money: as he cuts essential services for the poor, he has almost doubled the public subsidy for English grouse moors, and frozen the price of shotgun licences, at a public cost of £17m a year. (Guardian article, Land Matters article & Raptor Persecution article).
Monday, September 29. 2014
Managing A Nightmare
This is old news in conspiracy circles but things are heating up. There's a new film coming out called Kill The Messenger. Glenn Greewald has just posted about the CIA/Cocaine connection on his blog The Intercept.
'Eighteen years after it was published, Dark Alliance, the San Jose Mercury News’s bombshell investigation into links between the cocaine trade, Nicaragua’s Contra rebels, and African American neighborhoods in California, remains one of the most explosive and controversial exposés in American journalism. The 20,000-word series enraged black communities, prompted Congressional hearings, and became one of the first major national security stories in history to blow up online. It also sparked an aggressive backlash from the nation’s most powerful media outlets, which devoted considerable resources to discredit author Gary Webb’s reporting. Their efforts succeeded, costing Webb his career. On December 10, 2004, the journalist was found dead in his apartment, having ended his eight-year downfall with two .38-caliber bullets to the head.
'These days, Webb is being cast in a more sympathetic light. He’s portrayed heroically in a major motion picture set to premiere nationwide next month. And documents newly released by the CIA provide fresh context to the Dark Alliance saga - information that paints an ugly portrait of the mainstream media at the time.
'On September 18, the agency released a trove of documents spanning three decades of secret government operations. Culled from the agency’s in-house journal, Studies in Intelligence, the materials include a previously unreleased six-page article titled Managing a Nightmare: CIA Public Affairs and the Drug Conspiracy Story. Looking back on the weeks immediately following the publication of Dark Alliance, the document offers a unique window into the CIA’s internal reaction to what it called “a genuine public relations crisis” while revealing just how little the agency ultimately had to do to swiftly extinguish the public outcry. Thanks in part to what author Nicholas Dujmovic, a CIA Directorate of Intelligence staffer at the time of publication, describes as “a ground base of already productive relations with journalists,” the CIA’s Public Affairs officers watched with relief as the largest newspapers in the country rescued the agency from disaster, and, in the process, destroyed the reputation of an aggressive, award-winning reporter.' (The Intercept article).
Brainlike Chip By IBM TrueNorth
'Scientists at IBM Research have created by far the most advanced neuromorphic (brain-like) computer chip to date. The chip, called TrueNorth, consists of 1 million programmable neurons and 256 million programmable synapses across 4096 individual neurosynaptic cores. Built on Samsung’s 28nm process and with a monstrous transistor count of 5.4 billion, this is one of the largest and most advanced computer chips ever made. Perhaps most importantly, though, TrueNorth is incredibly efficient: The chip consumes just 72 milliwatts at max load, which equates to around 400 billion synaptic operations per second per watt - or about 176,000 times more efficient than a modern CPU running the same brain-like workload, or 769 times more efficient than other state-of-the-art neuromorphic approaches. Yes, IBM is now a big step closer to building a brain on a chip.
'The animal brain (which includes the human brain, of course), as you may have heard before, is by far the most efficient computer in the known universe. As you can see in the graph below, the human brain has a “clock speed” (neuron firing speed) measured in tens of hertz, and a total power consumption of around 20 watts. A modern silicon chip, despite having features that are almost on the same tiny scale as biological neurons and synapses, can consume thousands or millions times more energy to perform the same task as a human brain. As we move towards more advanced areas of computing, such as artificial general intelligence and big data analysis - areas that IBM just happens to be deeply involved with - it would really help if we had a silicon chip that was capable of brain-like efficiency.
'Enter TrueNorth, the culmination of the six-year-old SyNAPSE project at IBM Research. The work, which has been partly funded by DARPA since 2008, resulted in a prototype chip with just 256 neurons in 2011, and the Corelet programming language in 2013. This new chip is a second-generation version of the 2011 prototype, based on a new process (Samsung 28nm vs. IBM 45nm) and is orders of magnitude more complex, functional, and efficient. TrueNorth is implemented in standard CMOS transistors, just like the CPU in your PC - but that’s where the similarities end.' (Smart Engineering article).
Saturday, August 16. 2014
What Happens To #Ferguson Affects Ferguson
Algorithmic Filtering is a good enough term but I think someone needs to dumb it down so everyone can understand exactly what's going on here. I may be overstating the obvious but I like to be completely clear. People tend to ignore wild eyed conspiracy nuts screaming on the sidewalk. I also strive for simplicity and readability. Just imagine the next paragraph is written all in caps. Something like...
"With the right kind of hacking Facebook can make a story almost disappear even though everyone assumes it's a tool to give the general public complete freedom to post whatever they want. News stories can be ignored just as easily as they are in mainstream outlets. Just as Google can target ads from what's written inside your email, Facebook has software that can read your posts and bury certain topics or at least control content from becoming viral to a certain extent. This is especially insidious because the very nature of social media gives people the illusion that it's some kind of tool to give a voice to the voiceless. Nothing can be further from the truth."
'For me, last night’s Ferguson "coverage" began when people started retweeting pictures of armored vehicles with heavily armored "robocops" on top of them, aiming their muzzle at the protesters, who seemed to number a few hundred. It was the fourth night after an unarmed black man, Michael Brown, was shot by a - still unnamed - police officer after a "jaywalking" incident. Witnesses say he died hands in the air, saying "don’t shoot".
'The first night Mike Brown was shot, a friend asked on Twitter whether this would ever make the national news. It deserved to be national news as multiple significant, ongoing crises intersect at Ferguson: the loss of jobs which hit these communities worst; the militarization of US police departments; race; chronic multi-generational poverty.
'But those very factors often make it less likely such places make the news, except as trouble spots. Places to be ignored. Avoided. "We" hear it only through official statements, often dismissing local concerns, painting them as looters, thugs, troublemakers.' (Medium article).
Saturday, May 31. 2014
Revisiting ReBirth
Okay, so I'm almost two decades too late, but I've recently been playing around with Propellerhead's ReBirth RB-338 - a wonderful little acid machine emulator... 'ReBirth emulates two Roland TB-303 synthesizers, a Roland TR-808, and a Roland TR-909 drum machine all at once. Each of the emulated devices has its own pattern selector, a feature the original devices are lacking. This allows fast switches between different musical sequences, and re-programming the TB-303 for playing different notes, for instance, is rendered unnecessary. This feature has been adopted in some of Reason's devices. ReBirth also features mixers, a pattern controlled filter (PCF) and some of the standard effects in software synthesizers like delay, compressor and distortion.
'ReBirth RB-338 is a software synthesizer for Microsoft Windows, Mac OS 8-9 and iOS for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. It was developed by Propellerhead Software, and its first alpha version (for Mac OS) was publicly released in December 1996. Propellerhead Software ceased developing the original program in January 1999. Support for desktop versions was officially discontinued in September 2005. Shortly afterward, the ReBirth Museum Web site was launched and the last desktop version's (2.0.1) disk image was made available as a free download. Propellerhead Software continues to develop other software relating to dance-oriented computer-based music composition, including Reason, its flagship software synthesizer, as well as portable "app" versions of ReBirth.
'The program also supports user modifications, which may replace the samples in the drum machine emulations and modify the GUI. There are four modifications included in the ReBirth installation by default (though the default ReBirth GUI seems to count as a modification as well).
'The virtual knobs and controls can be assigned to physical counterparts via MIDI, so knobs, modulation wheels, faders and other performance controls available on keyboards and modules can be used to shape the software sound.
'ReBirth was an early software synthesizer, pioneering this class of instruments along with Cubase, Cakewalk, Digital Performer, and Reality in the mid-1990s. The sound quality during live playback (as opposed to saving the generated sound to disk), assuming that the CPU could cope with the sampling rate, was imposed by the quality of the sound card.
'The software emulates two monophonic bass synthesizers with filters, two analog drum machines, effects, other filters, and patterns simultaneously, also processing and sending MIDI messages. This suggests highly optimized programming on Propellerhead's account, contrasting with extremely CPU - and soundcard - demanding modern soft synths and plug-ins.
'Some enthusiasts have criticized ReBirth's software emulation of the TB-303 as being an inferior copy of the genuine sound. Such criticism is common to many software synths that emulate analog synthesis (which the TB-303 featured), due to the reputedly inimitable sound of analog synthesis, and quality degraded by low-end sound cards. Despite this, Roland contacted Propellerhead Software to give it an unofficial thumbs up, which Propellerhead considered to be the Roland seal of approval.' (ReBirth Museum website & Pirate Bay torrent download).
Friday, May 23. 2014
Scottish Land Reform: Final Report Published
A comprehensive final report on the future of Scotland's land has just been published, with 62 progressive recommendations, that, if implemented, would change the pattern of Scotland's land immeasurably in terms of use, ownership and funding. It is hard to overstate how important this report is or is likely to be. Of course, will Scotland - either as part of the UK or an independent nation - see these recommendations enacted? Independence will surely help but the jury is definitely out. It will take politicians and principled people with real balls to implement these much needed and long overdue reforms, as the vested interests of the large Scottish landowners and 'slipper farmers' are rich and powerful, not least because they own and control, er, the land...
It is our job (i.e. the people of Scotland) to keep this issue alive and not let this invaluable report become just another paperweight on the desks of the powerful. I live in hope.
'There should be an upper limit on the amount of land held by private owners in Scotland, a government-commissioned study has recommended.
'The Land Reform Review Group also called for a big increase in community land ownership. And the group said the current tax system should be changed.
'Tax "plays an important part in maintaining the concentrated pattern of large scale, private land ownership in Scotland," it stated.
'The Scottish government believes the country needs a fairer distribution of land ownership, and is aiming reduce the dominance of large, traditional sporting estates. The report's authors said the Scottish government should establish a Community Land Agency to facilitate negotiations between landowners and communities, with the goal of achieving a "significant increase in local community land ownership". But they warned that public funding remained "critical" and the Scottish government must ensure there is an "integrated legislative and financial support structure" to help communities in urban and rural Scotland buy and develop land and buildings.' (BBC News article & Land Reform report).