Recommended Links N°697: Z-Library Closure, Fearless Woman, and More

Leopard Men, background music, people who never admit they're wrong, the fearless woman, and the closure of Z-Library and the gap in book access are just some of the things you'll find in this week's Recommended Links. I wrote them to pique your interest and keep you reading. So do that and... enjoy!

Recommended Links of the Week (N°697) — Lana Turner

Music, that background sound: "Focusing on what's playing without doing anything else seems like a privilege. It implies pausing, caring, and, ultimately, something we don't have in surplus: time. Spotify has noticed this and, in a corporate editorial titled A New Golden Age of Audio, points out that it is “much more likely” that the user is “exercising, making dinner, hosting friends at home, playing video games, cleaning your apartment, driving somewhere, studying or working” when listening to music."

How the closure of Z-Library highlights the gap in access to books: "Some compared the site's closure to the mythical burning of Alexandria. Although this type of page stands as a champion of free culture, even though it always tends to profit from piracy, whether through advertising, subscriptions, or premium services, the closure of Z-Library has revealed the enormous gap that exists worldwide in accessing books, and especially certain types of books."

When Neil Armstrong escaped death by seconds with the lunar landing simulator: "When NASA embarked on the mission to go to the Moon, it made many mistakes. The most serious one caused the deaths of Apollo 1, the men who were supposed to be the first to land. But it was very close to not being the only astronaut death in the program. Beyond the Apollo 13 accident, Neil Armstrong had a very serious accident before even taking off."

Ace Ventura in The Witcher 3

Why do some people never admit they are wrong?: "We all make mistakes. We are not infallible. And we make them more often than we would like to admit. Some mistakes are small and irrelevant, like not buying milk because we are “sure” we still have some at home. Others are more significant, like confusing the schedule of a job interview and missing that opportunity. And other mistakes mark turning points in our lives, like losing a partner due to fear of commitment."

More than 30 times when people found something in their home that they didn't know was there: "Every year, hundreds of people find something that has been hidden in their home, something that didn't originally belong to them. Removing old wallpaper or a rug, they come across a treasure whose contents look like nothing they've ever seen. These photos remind us that you never know what might be a few meters away, even in your own home. It could be an artifact, an old photo, or even something worth a fortune!"

Why do we drink alcohol?: "Humans and alcohol have maintained a long and complex relationship since the dawn of history, and like many enduring marriages, it has evolved into a union of love and hate. Alcohol relaxes us and gives us more confidence in social situations, but its misuse can take a toll on our health and relationships and cause deadly accidents. However, humanity shows no signs of wanting to divorce the drink, and its consumption is increasing worldwide."

Perito Moreno glacier collapse

Almost half of the world's population still believes in witchcraft, according to a study: "More than 40 percent of the world's population believes in the power of witchcraft, understood as the ability of certain people to intentionally cause harm through supernatural means, according to research that surveyed 140,000 people in 95 countries, whose results are published in PLOS ONE. The data come from personal and telephone surveys conducted by the Pew Research Center, as well as professional surveys conducted between 2008 and 2017."

The strange case of SM-046, the woman who knows no fear: "The fact that SM's amygdala doesn't work causes her to react little or poorly to negative stimuli, which doesn't allow her to recognize people or potentially dangerous situations that would put the rest of humanity on alert. This leads her to get into trouble because she doesn't recognize the typical facial expressions of fear or anger, which, on the other hand, prevents her from prejudging negatively (everything bad that happens to her is just circumstances of life)."

‘Come and See’, the resurrection of the best Soviet war film: "Come and See surpasses the codes of war cinema and becomes a sensory experience. Intimate, almost dreamlike scenes with shots that make you doubt reality and fiction, distorted voices, laughter, dances, psychedelic sounds, images wrapped in halos, grotesque characters playing music while dozens of people are murdered, and a deranged lysergic atmosphere that culminates in an insane scene that we won't spoil."

Dance macabre by FLUTERSCOOTER

Kyujo Incident, the frustrated coup by Japanese military to prevent surrender at the end of World War II: "Kyujo was the word used for the Palace Castle, the palace in Tokyo where emperors lived since 1888 and which kept that name until 1948, when it was changed to Kokyo (Imperial Residence), after a reconstruction of the western part due to the destruction it suffered from bombings (the eastern part became a public garden two decades later)."

The ancient skin-covered boats: "The small flat-bottomed river boats used to navigate some rivers in Ireland, the Aran Islands, and Galicia were called curraghs. They were made of wooden planks on which animal skins or hides were placed. Their origin seems to be in the Neolithic, in those used by the Celts to reach the British Isles. Although the first boats of this type were small and designed to navigate inland waters, there is unequivocal evidence of their use in the Atlantic in later times."

Leopard Men, the feared African secret societies: "Between the end of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th, from Guinea to the Belgian Congo, there was a group of cannibal sects of ancestral worship that caused global impact due to their crimes and ritual practices. Their existence was a real headache for colonial powers. Closely followed by the international press, the stories of these societies were cultivated in literature and fiction. Between 1850 and 1950, about 1,000 people died mysteriously who could have been murdered by the so-called Leopard Men."

Turning things into sand

Videos

The infinite LEGO machine
Cheap tires vs expensive tires
If American Psycho were an anime
Neural radiance fields
Stung by 200 yellow jackets
How to fake an orchestra
The oldest living cat
Walk of Life on FLOPPOTRON 3.0
"Hologram" for presentations
Programming Pac-Man ASMR-style
A total electrical collapse
How to make a Béchamel sauce like a Michelin chef
Kirigami robots
The Callisto Protocol
Cocaine Bear
Mauna Loa volcano eruptions (Hawaii)
The making of Dr. Strangelove
How automatic replays work at the World Cup
The turntable paradox
The shorts 'Klimax' (about pleasure), 'Black Hole' (science fiction), and My Cat Lucy (animated, very cute)