Week of July 16, 2023

I don’t need to remind you how remarkable a thing the internet is. These are just some remarkable things I’ve come across in the last week, either on purpose or through algorithm-wizardry, while procrastinating.

A thorough explanation of lab-grown meat from The Counter (from 2021)

If you’re like me and see lab-grown meat as something game-changing (even salvific), or if you find the idea strange/repulsive, this longer article from Joe Fassler is worth a read. Fassler explains the potentially insurmountable challenges of scaling up cultured meat to something more than a luxury item, and takes aim at the (apparently) premature optimism of the tech investors driving it forward.

Is it a strong enough case to dissuade investment in something that might be a dead end? I’m not entirely convinced, but that’s largely because I so badly want there to be a way for this to work.

Joe Fassler, “Lab-grown meat is supposed to be inevitable. The science tells a different story.” The Counter, September 2, 2021.

BobbyBroccoli’s YouTube Channel

I’m a humanities guy through-and-through, and I get most of my STEM knowledge third- or fourth-hand through the work of science popularizers and video essayists like BobbyBroccoli.

I found BobbyBroccoli’s channel a summer ago, and caught up with it again recently. His multi-hour exposés on frauds, failures, and missed opportunities in the sciences are enthralling, in part because they hit the sweet spots that draw “humanities people” to science stories: the mystique of “genius,” the concept of “progress,” etc. I recommend starting with the story of Jan Hendrik Schön, “The man who almost faked his way to a Nobel Prize.”

Austin City Limits (and Pavement, and Spoon, and The War on Drugs, and…)

Two years back I realized that if I never put in the effort to actually listen to the albums I always said I would “get to,” then, simply, I would never actually hear them. This self-intervention was a small miracle: I’ve heard more music, and more new-to-me music, in the last 800 or so days than I have since the magical taste-making days of high school.

While reading/writing/lounging with my dogs this week, I had PBS’s “Austin City Limits” running in the background. I’d meant it as background music (a “necessary evil” method of listening), but was distracted over and over by the performers’ energy. These were artists I’d only slightly known, and granted, I’m not a concert-goer to begin with— but seeing and hearing them with fresh ears revived my confidence in the vitality, durability, and reach of the sort of punk-adjacent, lyric-forward rock music I was drawn to back in my embarrassing days as a high school lyricist. I picked up my guitar this week for the first time in a long time.

Local Interest: A Revolutionary War-Era home (temporarily) saved from demolition

This might merit a longer post (I’m a little too caught up in the drama involved). But, in brief: an Eastchester, New York home dating to the 1700s, known locally as “The Ward House,” passed a major hurdle in efforts to preserve it from demolition. It’s the first of (hopefully) many victories to come for one of Westchester County’s oldest existing structures, and the site of wartime bloodshed. More on this soon!

Some links for out-of-towners or history geeks:
Jonathan Gordon, “Tuckahoe historic preservation board rules against Ward House developer.” News 12 Westchester, July 20, 2023.
“Stephen Ward: A Local Revolutionary Leader who guided the town’s transition from colonial times to the early republic”, The National Park Service.
“Ward House Timeline,” Friends of the Ward House.