I recently stumbled on 93 Days, which is based on the real story of how Nigeria managed to keep their 2014 outbreak of Ebola minimal despite initial political pressure and through good management. I personally enjoyed it: The human element made it moving, the quiet desperation made it exciting, and the sensible actions helped to find a relatively happy ending for a story about an illness that, as one doctor puts it, “kills 8 out of 10”. I was surprised that multiple Amazon reviews complained of how “vanilla and unrealistic” this “feel-good” movie was. Given this is based on a…
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This is a sort-of review of the book Dragon’s Egg by Richard L. Forward. Imagine a world of tiny creatures who exist with neutrons and live at a pace much faster than humans do. The cheela, once plants, become mobile and live through “turns”, their version of days. With twelve eyes and a rather malleable body, they evolve gradually. Their changes over time both pre- and post-human contact mirror human civilization both amusingly and sadly. Amongst those we meet are Pink-Eyes, who becomes their Jesus and beseeches the god “Bright” to still be kind to the cheela; Swift-Killer, who becomes…
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Abbott, E. A. (1984). Flatland. New York: Penguin Putnam Inc. A. Square, a perfect parellelogram with equal sides, begins by explaining his world where the more vertices one has with regular angles, the higher in status one is. In fact, the highest are polygonal and are indistinguishable from circles. Like Gulliver, A. Square visits other lands that are different from his own. In A. Square’s case, he visits Pointland and Lineland, two worlds rather different from his own two-dimensional existence. He attempts to enlighten the Monarch of Lineland and a self-proclaimed god in Pointland and is himself enlightened by a…