Random Musings

This week the news media were all agog about how AI had discovered two vulnerabilities that affect websites that use PHP – which is most websites. According to the media, this was a devastating blow that took down 70% of all websites, would end life as we know it, yadda-yadda-yadda. As usual, the media were light on information, heavy on drama.

On February 28th of this year, the US and Israel attacked Iran. One of the goals was to effect a regime change. Another was to decisively eliminate any possibility of producing nuclear weapons. A large number of people in the US have been harshly critical of this effort.

I had previously offered various suggestions to explain what we call the Fermi Paradox. There I mentioned one idea that I want to develop further.

Often something is said to violate the Laws of Physics; or it is impossible, because that would violate the Laws of Physics. It is as though there is some sort of police force that makes physics follow the rules.

One of the common ideas about Quantum Theory is that some things don’t happen until someone observes the experiment. Until the observation, events are said to be in superposition – a particle is in all possible states, until someone observes it; when the observation is made, the particle is found to be in only one state.

Marathons have an interesting history. The story is that Greece and Persia were at war. Greece finally won a decisive battle at a place called Marathon. The runner Pheidippides was sent to give the news to the people of Athens. Pheidippides ran the 25 or so miles, imparted the news, and promptly dropped dead of exhaustion.

Somehow someone thought, “Say, this running sounds like a great idea. We should do it regularly.” Not sure how they skipped the part about dropping dead, but there it is.

So now marathons are held all over the world. And every year, some people wind up dropping dead, and it’s a great mystery. “He was in good health, young, can’t imagine why he dropped dead.” I’ll tell you why: running is bad for you. WTF are these people thinking?