Words and Pictures - October

The best reading for the month:

  • Bad Blood: The Life and Death of Alexander Litvinenko - Will Storr (Medium). Interesting background on Alexander Litvinenko, explaining why he was considered a target for assassination, and the pharmacological workings of polonium-210.
  • The Death of the Urdu Script - Ali Eteraz (Medium). New technological considerations in language preservation - what would happen if your pen only wrote words with American English spelling?
  • The White Spider - Heinrich Harrer. A classic mountaineering text about climbing the North Face of the Eiger. The first half was very interesting, but the second half was too slow to keep my attention.
  • Why would I donate my body to science? - Brooke Borel (Aeon Magazine). I’m already an organ donor, but this makes me consider going beyond organ donation.
  • The Slow Winter [PDF] - James Mickens. Brilliant and hilarious commentary on the evolution of CPUs. Best of the month. Seriously… it’s that funny.