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This week, two technological advances caught our bleary, head-cold ridden eyes. First, is a huge advance by Google in translation capability. The company used its A.I. technology to radically improve its translation services. Try it out and you’ll see the translation is remarkably better. In fact, the New York Times reports, “The A.I. system had […]
As the end of this year of trials and tribulations draws near, we were called to jury duty this week. It was our first time as a potential juror and our experience suggests that jury duty is a prime target for a cocky start-up to make more efficient. We sat in a room with pretty good Wi-Fi for […]
Somehow in our many years on this planet, we have never read John Steinbeck. We recently rectified this situation by reading The Grapes of Wrath. Steinbeck is very different than what we expected: far more gritty, earthy and melancholy. We enjoyed the book and are edified by it. And yet, we are struck both by its short-sightedness […]
We have pondered in this space of how large a role fear plays in what is happening in our world, in our revolt against post-world war institutions, in how we vote and in many other ways. The documentary, Amanda Knox, now playing on Netflix, can be seen as a metaphor for our times. One theme of […]
In light of recent events perhaps we should not have been surprised to learn that chimpanzees score higher than humans in “working memory, information processing and strategic play.” No, really, you can see the videos here. The Australian PhD in economics and evolutionary biology blogger (now there’s a description) Jason Collins informs us, “If you […]
I tell those who are afraid of flying that it is not the flight you should be scared of, it’s the taxi ride at the end of it. I have been nearly killed in at least half a dozen cab rides in different locations around the world. Last week in a small town in Eastern Washington, my cab driver […]
(Caution: Parts of the following was written early in the morning after the 2016 World Series [congratulations Cubs! Once every 108 years without fail]. We cannot vouch for veracity, grammar or decency but like the Cubs and Indians, we left it all out on the field. International Need to Know is attending a Homeland Security […]
In a world of short attention spans, segregated news sources and fetishes for frivolity, what people become famous for has changed. Jane Espenson, an accomplished TV screenwriter who created great episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, had some level of fame previous to this week. But her fame grew to much greater magnitudes on Tuesday when she created a […]
The Interurban bike trail is located near the worldwide INTN Headquarters and the other evening while riding on it, we saw a man with a chain saw leap from one roof to another leading us to hope that “chain saw man” replaces the scary clown meme. As we continued our ride, we started to count […]
Last Friday we saw the great Dr. John perform in Tacoma. Tacoma is not far from Seattle as the seagull flies, but with horrible traffic it was a multi-hour drive and it was also a long ways from Seattle culturally. Seattle, like many cities nowadays, prides itself on its sophistication and worldliness. And yet at […]
