Museums tell stories that collapse the distance between past and present. Within a single room, centuries can stand side by side. A weathered artifact, a painted face, a fragment of text, or a carefully preserved object can carry visitors into worlds that no longer exist but still speak with remarka…

12 days ago / 31 visits / 3 comments / 3 people like

“The art of war is of vital importance to the State. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin.” –Sun Tzu The most dangerous thing a great power can do is to reveal that it lacks the will, judgment, and seriousness to defend the interests it has declared vital. That is wha…

2 weeks ago / 48 visits / 3 comments / 7 people like

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both… The opening lines of Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” endure because they capture three of the oldest and most powerful realities of human life: uncertainty, choice, and consequence. Long before writing, the printing press, o…

3 weeks ago / 58 visits / 5 comments / 7 people like

Technological innovation occurs at the confluence of knowledge and imagination. Technology then shrinks, merges, and often reappears inside something more powerful. Devices that once dominated homes, offices, and studios fade when their functions are absorbed by smaller, cheaper, more capable system…

4 weeks ago / 69 visits / 8 comments / 3 people like

The Ipernity platform functions much like a great rainforest. Each night, shortly after midnight, the servers clear, the systems refresh, and the site hums with renewed energy. In these early hours, Ipernity runs fast and clean, like dry air beginning to gather moisture. As users upload photos, exch…

12 months ago / 591 visits / 8 comments / 9 people like

Something in the intensity with which Windrip looked at his audience, looked at all of them, his glance slowly taking them in from the highest-perched seat to the nearest, convinced them that he was talking to each individual, directly and solely; that he wanted to take each of them into his heart;…

2 years ago / 562 visits / 4 comments / 2 people like

At work, I will play a significant role in the upcoming strategic planning process. To many, that might sound dull, dry, and perhaps even depressing. To those who feel that way, you have my fullest condolences. Much has changed since the existing strategic plan was adopted and implemented. The COVI…

2 years ago / 464 visits / 4 comments / 2 people like

In an opinion piece written by Washington Post Opinion Graphics Reporter Yan Wu, Wu proclaimed that AI “is opening new pathways for creativity.” “Consider visual arts,” she continued. “Just as photography changed the course of art in the 19th century, AI image generators now stand to revolutionize h…

2 years ago / 327 visits / 3 comments / 1 person likes

Prior to 2019, July 2016 was Anchorage, Alaska's warmest month on record. Summer 2019 as a whole was even warmer than July 2016. The duration of the excessive warmth and extreme temperatures recorded during the summer would have been very unlikely, if not improbable, without human-induced climate ch…

6 years ago / 1 026 visits / 21 comments / 3 people like

The second of the most intense pair of heat waves ever to roll across the European continent is now departing Scandinavia and headed for Iceland and Greenland where it will finally dissipate altogether. On account of these unprecedented bursts of heat, the weather record book has been rewritten acro…

6 years ago / 979 visits / 12 comments / 4 people like

I typically refrain from writing political commentary here. But these are no ordinary times, at least in the United States. The January 29, 2017 edition of The Washington Post reported: Sharef once worked for a U.S. government subcontractor in post-invasion Iraq as a translator and a program manager…

9 years ago / 1 741 visits / 9 comments / 12 people like

In his Chronicles of England, Richard Grafton wrote, “Thirty days hath November…” Yet, thirty days is sufficient time for this transitional month to bring one from one season into another. November is the elegant bridge that leads from autumn to winter. As one walks across that bridge, autumn’s bril…

9 years ago / 1 257 visits / 6 comments / 10 people like

In his A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, Winston Churchill wrote: Every nation or group of nations has its own tale to tell. Knowledge of the trials and struggles is necessary to all who would comprehend the problems, perils, challenges, and opportunities which confront us today... It is i…

10 years ago / 3 026 visits / 74 comments / 13 people like

One moment in early March, the ground was covered by snow. Despite lengthening days, the late-starting winter of 2015-16 struggled to hang on. But seemingly the next moment, all the snow was gone. Where snow and ice had once hugged the earth, the landscape blushed in the growing colors of spring. Ea…

10 years ago / 1 139 visits / 9 comments / 10 people like

In his “Autumn Hymn,” Richard Newell observed: Soon shall all the songless wood Shiver in the deepening snow… Instead, December 2015 unveiled an entirely different scenario. Large parts of North America, Europe, and Asia basked in unseasonable warmth. In North America, as wave after wave of warmth…

10 years ago / 1 345 visits / 15 comments / 9 people like