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caesar novus

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Everything posted by caesar novus

  1. Old Norse and old English may have been mutually intelligible, and more words probably have Viking origin than previously thought:
  2. I was worried some of my picks were idiosyncratic, but this topic is what am "I" listening to. And the view and comment counts of the following are stratospheric, so why aren't "you" listening too? Following is a mashup(?) of Brubeck's Take 5, the most popular jazz recording ever made. The sound has been warped into more contemporary song vs the old one being legendary but too familiar to some. This has almost 8M views and 8k comments! That derived from the 26M views and 13k comment video https://youtu.be/tT9Eh8wNMkw which has a long pleasant meandering take at https://youtu.be/G27qErb6R-k . Brubeck did not fall into typical jazz player addictions, but was a WW2 vet with 6 kids brought up in a 70 year marriage. Died not too long ago in his 90s.
  3. Isn't the above scene where an assassin shoots darts at Sellers and keeps hitting innocents? Sounds morbid but done in funny way. The above costars Marisa Allasio, the most beguiling actress in history methinks. I am waiting for her marriage into royalty to dissolve and to start dating that 87yr old countess. Fred Astaire became my favorite actor in history after attending film festivals devoted to him in Europe. His singing voice is feeble, thus the hard rock overdub above.
  4. Holy cow, seeing Trajan's column on that livecam (when panning was working) led me to stumble on the news that they recently opened the interior of the base for visits. You can't climb the spiral staircase, but can look up and just wonder about the audacity of constructing it's 19 drums of marble hollowed with functional stairs:
  5. I will make a few comments on what is on view. The Rome camera has frozen panning and just now switched to infrared. Anyway, when you get the view of big white king monument on upper left, look at the brick ruins under the trees (currently lit with single spotlight). This is a friggen 5 story ancient Roman apartment building! Well, the top story is gone and bottom is underground, but I will post a photo of insula dell'Ara Coeli: To the right under the bell tower is Capitoline museum (world's first) with full Roman sculptural content: And more hidden stuff back when panning worked. BTW I tweaked my webcam playlist so it doesn't get jammed by African camera downtime so easily.
  6. Webcams have a special appeal to me, but the ones from Italy labeled live seem overwhelmingly old and canned. You can tell because youtube posts total runtime. Below is a rare live one that picks up only scraps of ruins, and it is has certain restrictions due to being labeled child-oriented. Maybe others can post genuine ruin live cams where you can see the rhythms of seasons, etc. P.S. I am starting a playlist of sort of chill livecams which show slices of life, mostly in nice places I have visited. About a quarter of the time they have something interesting or quirky going on. You can advance thru the list, but without any ruins so far:
  7. I'm looking for one on Roman north Africa, in case you see a quality history. Want to post corrections to some travelogue stereotyping of Romans. But my insomnia remedy is less educational, consisting of cooking a decadent meal then sinking into lullaby land. Bad for the waistband, wallet, and health but hard to resist.
  8. Smoother than long exposed via Appia, and maybe less wheel traffic
  9. The premium version of my Cuban post above appears to be at https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=onwoLbL2OZY&feature=share but I suspect it often gets downshifted into regular version. When the stars align right it can sound like each player is swinging on a separate pendulum overhead. The Indian one in particular rises from tame to sparkling on a high end laptop (or maybe headphones?). On my nearly high end laptop it sounds tame and flat. I wish we could sort out a common youtube strategy for using their music mode or radio mode. I get these for no (extra) cost but others maybe cannot. I can't even figure out music.youtube terminology, which seems changeable anyway, so someone more knowledgeable is welcome to advise.
  10. This video illuminates so many issues of regional dialect, beyond the banal one of pronouncing tomato. Like how the Canadian oo sound and backwater regions of UK are actually retaining what used to be mainstream pronunciation. How some weird spellings are actually phonetic according to older english. And how Shakespeare was on the cusp of writing in a distinctly different language. It seemed so cruel to be graded on comprehending such mysteries in school, probably now replaced with something readable but bad. It used to be that in at least coastal US the A sound was ridiculously nasal and was kind of considered dialect 30 years ago. But I observed this was primarily from females, often young, and thus a faddish affectation. Kind of like how young Japanese females adopt a baby talk affectation. Thank goodness that annoyance lessened. By the way, more evidence seems to pile up that english is stealth viking. English is said to borrow heavily from French, but often not Parisian French. More like Norman French. Nor-man. North men. Danish vikings that raided then settled in Normandy. They only superficially adapted to local language, giving what has been depicted as a bizarre dialect in one of the highest-grossing French films of all time (really funny). PPS. The eyeshadow of this man reminds me of a factoid in a lecture I have buried in long audio form. While localized darkening varies with ethnicity, it tends to signal a B vitamin deficiency. I forget which one, and even a B complex pill leaves out some, but is a worthwhile precaution. I used to have the flippant attitude that no pills were needed with a varied diet, then suffered critically from low b12. Be pragmatic; you need what you need, and the whole framework of what is a vitamin is garbled due to historical mistakes of which ones are or are not true vitamins. Not a fan of mindless consumption of multivitamins tho. PPPS. for extra credit see related Italian super popular funny films https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JtQfHPPGS8 and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocSf8m2xWiI
  11. I had ignored the history channel new Colosseum series as not likely worthy, but some channel surfing indicates it may be pretty good. It even looks like you can stream episodes after a while for free at https://www.history.com/shows/colosseum . Where is that old forum spirit of critiquing popular media representations of Rome? I can understand avoiding TV due to spewage of woke commercials, but use that fast forward button. They even revive having real expert commentators instead of the trend towards slangy pierced woke figureheads mouthing scripts they don't understand. I'm a little embarrassed about Romans love of such games and would prefer to follow their more popular horseracing, but this series apparently redeems itself with wider context.
  12. Cuban music = afro beat + euro glide If you can switch into "youtube music premium" mode, this Indian piece rises to ethereal levels. Oops, maybe that triggers a month free trial. P.S. Here is the premium version https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=jmxtgU7--ps&feature=share
  13. Webcam: I still don't recommend this port over other spots in the Med, but others seem to like it...
  14. Here is an interesting English series with a Roman/Latin episode. Medieval scholars sabotaged perfectly phonetic english spellings to reflect Latin root words. So douBt or receiPt picked up silent letters that weren't even in the French roots of the English words. P.S. See his episode on names for military ranks, which has quite comical roots. But no, there is no known reason why Brits put a f in LeFtenent. I more and more often hear UK content by amateurs who furthermore use F instead of TH, like I Fought for I THought. Didn't TH originate from Vikings, but even Scandinavians tend to replace it with T or D.
  15. Maybe craftspeople but probably unlike modern aesthetic or representational artists. The ancient mind seems to have been about 98% concerned about mythology and supernatural religion if my anthropology studies were correct. It was so disappointing when I studied precontact west Africa and meso America and found few insights applicable to real life; I so expected to find useful alternative mindsets. But their world was one of dealing with uncertainty and powerlessness, and I think the few representational depictions they made were aimed at superstitious concerns. I love a cartoon that showed "vegetarian" cavemen drawing big luscious carrots! And I have beat to death the theme of how wonderful realistic Roman sculpture is, often with meditative "warts and all" realism instead of vainglory. Human representational sculpture can be hard to find in very ancient worlds. Semi-representational stuff can be so weird that must have some other function other than "art". The "archaic" phase of Greek sculpture seems even more stereotyped than Egyptian, but I guess the Hellenistic phase gave over the top expressive art.
  16. A film on how the Stones produced "Sympathy for the Devil" has reappeared at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rohaZ8mB1zE . I think it was taken down due to objecting to the traffic generated here from my thumbnail, so I omit thumbnail this time. It seems one of the best re-edits of a famous flawed documentary. Consider how the group there is navigating towards a $1billion net worth, instead of the usual bankruptcy from agents or management. Jagger is from a media savvy family, as can be seen from his young appearance on his father's TV show below. Note on the documentary how he gently but firmly substitutes two group members who can't get their job done on that song. P.S.Here is newly higher resolution Roman songs Miles Gloriosus and Comedy Tonight
  17. I prolong a bit more because my casual research shows Italy having a historic opportunity to get western Europe out of projected energy/food deadlock from the coming winter onward. Italy seems to be the Saudi Arabia of easily tapped shale oil/gas reserves. In western Europe only Estonia has a fraction of what is primarily in economically depressed and outward migrating Sicily. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_shale_reserves#Europe I suppose this geographic feature may be an extension of Libyan fields, and some nearby Italian islands (Lampedusa etc) could be a base for horizontal drilling and fracking, if only for vital chemical and fertilizer production. I read this could be established in a couple months, but of course has little chance under eco-religious regimes for now. But in a coal burning and fertilizer-lacking near future, look for Sicily coming to the rescue for both humanitarian and eco benefits.
  18. A bit new-agey upbeat, but hard to resist once they get in the groove:
  19. Since this "Guantanamera" has as much visual as audio appeal, may I point out that mobile youtube allows passing videos to TV's on the same wifi network. Instead of a phone I use a tiny $50 tablet that nicely bypasses the menu clutter on wifi enabled TV. Maybe I am the last to find that out... P.S. It offers subtitles with lyric translation
  20. I only beat this topic to death due to the possibility of bringing it full circle back to Romans, and a possible revival of their imperial type of economy. This is my own extrapolation of the Zeihan explanatory framework, like my digression into progressive poo politics, so blame me rather than denigrate his framework. Caveat is I haven't viewed several videos by toldinstone about the Roman economy, so will have to defer to others for that knowledge. So given how the world gained much wealth in the cold war period where trade flourished as if geography offered few limitations, this created 2 ticking time bomb effects. Firstly wealthier folks have few babies, and many economies are on the cliff of massive retirements and few taxpaying young worker/consumers. We indulge in denial now because current older workers are more skilled and productive than young until the switch is flipped and they become expensive drags in retirement. Secondly, the expanding economy soothed the rough edges of capitalism, euro/canadian socialism, and even corporation fascism (= China now and even S. Korea in past). Now a shrinking pie will really stress out losers which will be most folks in these regimes. Internal conflict and external war may return as geography issues becomes more important. Zeihan sees old ideas revived to address this, like communism and especially imperialism. I've spared the "why" details but offer a new "what". Maybe the Roman Imperial type of economy will be a least-bad fit and be revived at least as an inspiration! P.S. here is a substitute agricultural video for the one withdrawn above:
  21. Case study of organic farming in Sri Lanka leading to starvation, from foreignpolicy.com: Rajapaksa's palace has just been stormed and his resignation announced:
  22. I have never agreed with the modernized portraits; they don't capture the demeanor at all especially around the mouth. Mouth areas tend to be super expressive of a persons life history and life focus, unless they live a soft life unlike an emperor who knows he won't die peacefully. These pictures tend to show vapid banal modern expressions vs the glorious sculptures. Have you ever seen a person you know well freshly dead, with no cosmetics done? In my experience the entire personality was gone like turning into a generic person, something you don't see from just sleep. Have you seen a military officer with that distant look of a fighter pilot - they have to have insane foresight even apart from combat and have a signature 20 mile stare. You can look at another variation and say, oh that is probably a high performance helicopter pilot with a very alert 2 mile stare. It's people shaped by highly unforgiving environments, not any joe six pack who flies piston airplanes or helicopters. It used to be very noticable before globalization that you could see a different demeanor even in parts of Europe that was just plain impossible in a same-ethnic American. Even now, you might see that from mountain villages say in Albania. The Roman demeanor in realistic sculpture is just wow to me, and I hate to see it dumbed down.
  23. I just heard spokesman from the Anuvia company speak about their new product turning manure etc including that from humans into fertilizer. Remember typically "Around the globe, natural gas is used as a raw material as well as fuel for nitrogen fertilizer production. In some countries such as China, coal is gasified into ammonia and used for manufacturing fertilizers." I mention human because there may be a lot less animal manure available. If food scarcity trends continue and given that meat production is 9 times less efficient to produce than vegetarian fare, then our poo might ameliorate dire situations in the warm colored countries seen below:
  24. Whoops, that audiobook posting was unauthorized and got flushed, although the fascinating map/graphic link endures. The timing was unfortunate because the book starts out slow and digressive, then as it passes 2 hours it transcends into an engrossing explanatory system for our last 100 turbulent years and obvious future prospects. If instead the beginning had the sparkle, he would have hooked more folks like me to buy and finish it. Well I have it, but will refer to his more digestible video shorts for reflection. I've been thinking how under his scheme the direction of progressive politics should change to reduce rather than worsen the dire consequences of de-globalization. Globalization emerged 50 years ago due to freak and temporary circumstances that led to massive betterment of world standards of living and a resulting crash in birth rates. Only a handful of countries now have enough young to sustain population and economic growth, altho many are burdened supporting legacy of many old folks. So will progressives promote childbirth? It is almost too late unless done very aggressively. Large areas of the earth have poor soils that only recently were made productive by petrochemical fertilizer and GMO breeding (sometimes disguised by being naturally bred copycats of GMO). With fertilizer trade and petro availability breaking down, will progressives decouple from this "buy local organic foods" mantra, maybe in the face of famine? The only way to sustain that seems to be reverting to using human waste for fertilizer. I visited China in 1980 when even in a city of multimillions, you would encounter women with 2 huge nightsoil pots at either end of a bamboo pole on her shoulders. It had a vile smell that you also encountered walking by a garden or field... OR IN YOUR BOWL OF VEGGIES at the dinnertable. Well, progressives could do it better now. Related to this I love how these root causes explain a lot. For instance in our beginnings of food transport involved phasing out New England as the breadbasket for Boston, NYC, etc. It was a good thing because new england has mediocre soils compared to the emerging midwest. Vermont for instance was razed flat like a moonscape for resources - I've seen the pictures. Then more remote trade allowed it to reforest and take up more value add trades and mfg. BTW I hate the gushy admiration of NE forests where I grew up. It's mostly trashy stunted second growth not yet recovered from being razed for newspaper pulp, dairies, etc. Another big reversal area for progressives is their religious zeal for unsustainable green energy. Like the below video describes, just the carbon footprint of building green generators is bigger than any possible savings in much of the cloudy non windy world. It also depends on exotic minerals that are becoming un sourceable. None of this means anything to a greenie, which is why it is a religion that needs to transform to rationality and maybe acceptance of modern safe forms of nuclear. So those are some examples on how progressives can and maybe eventually will be more pragmatic if this plays out. Alternatively a conservative wait-and-see approach with flexible free market response will be workable. The worst approach is delusional gov't intervention like what turned Zimbabwe and Venezuela into catastrophes. From https://www.youtube.com/c/ZeihanonGeopolitics/videos :
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