[CAT] Shakespeare, from above

[PHOTO] Three photos taken around Rosedale TTC station, Wednesday at twilight

Wednesday at twilight, I disembarked at Rosedale station. At the moment of twilight, the sky was a lovely deep blue covering the buildings, all in shadow and aglow.

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

• Charlie Stross at Antipope looks at the catastrophe that a United Kingdom bent on Brexit despite itself is heading for.


• Crooked Timber takes a look at the collapse in Bitcoin prices and sees what this might mean for financial markets and speculation more generally.


• D-Brief looks at the discovery of tools made by ancient humans in China.


• L.M. Sacasas at The Frailest Thing considers the consequences--the prices to be paid--as technology transforms the way we see the world, into a collection of manipulable entities.


• JSTOR Daily considers how the mutilated veterans of the First World War, and their masks, changed the culture of the post-war world.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money suggests trying to cater to white racism in the United States based on a misunderstanding of class structure is mistaken, in multiple ways.


• The Map Room Blog links to a site tracking in detail the many different wildfires of California.


• Marginal Revolution, looking at the remarkable power of artificial intelligence to discover unknown relationships, considers it as an alien intelligence. What might it do?


• The NYR Daily, inspired by the horrors in Xinjiang being inflicted on the Uighurs, looks at the relationship in China more generally between that country and Islam.


• Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains why quantum mechanics are necessary to explain the sun's fusion.


• Arnold Zwicky, noting a recent news report mistakenly claiming the death of Spike Lee, examines the mechanics of misremembering names.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: Yonge, 650 Parliament, renters, El Mocambo, Scarborough

• Urban Toronto shares a photo of Yonge Street in North York, taken more than a decade ago.


• The inhabitants of 650 Parliament Street will be displaced from their homes at least until April of 2019. The Toronto Star reports.


• Tess Kalinowski at the Toronto Star looks at efforts to change the culture and laws of Toronto and Canada to better support long-term renters, here.


• NOW Toronto reports on the latest plans on refurnishing venerable music hub El Mocambo, here.


• Aparita Bhandavi reports on how, after Nuit Blanche, outsiders to Scarborough are only now starting to recognize the vibrancy of culture there. (I am among this number, in truth.)

[URBAN NOTE] Five cities links: Hamilton, Québec City, New York City, Edinburgh, Tokyo

• In Hamilton, ACORN is leading protests against housing laws that threaten to drive people onto the streets. CBC reports.


• Québec City is dealing with its labour shortages by recruiting skilled workers from France, for starters. CTV News reports.


• Atlas Obscura notes that there is a barge off of New York City covered in greenery, free for citizens to harvest.


• The Guardian shares news of the renovation of the Calton Hill observatory into a cultural centre.


• Quartz reports that the Japanese government is offering subsidies to people who move away from Tokyo, to try to promote secondary centres.