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October 24, 2021 Archives
Sunday, October 24, 2021
TRACKING WITH CLOSEUPS: Blue Field Entoptic Phenomenon—Seeing Blood Cells in the Retina
The really remarkable thing about the blue field entoptic phenomenon isn't that you can see the red blood cells moving, but that you don't see the blood vessels and blood in front of the retina all the time. This is the brain up to its old trick of “editing out” distracting information.
Posted at
14:38
CONTINUITY: ARM1 from 1985 vs. Apple M1 Max
Here are the two dies at the same scale. The M1 Max is much larger physically; I estimate it is 20 mm wide. Its transistors are much smaller (5 nm vs 3000 nm) giving it 57 billion transistors instead of 25,000. If built with modern transistors, the ARM1 would be a tiny dot. pic.twitter.com/OdLhG7TXX2
— Ken Shirriff (@kenshirriff) October 18, 2021
Here is more about the evolution of the ARM processor architecture over the years.
Posted at
12:38
CONTEXT: Earth and Moon from the Lunar South Pole
This computer-generated animation shows the Earth and Moon as viewed from the rim of Shackleton crater near the Moon's south pole, with the camera aimed at the mean position of the Earth. The Sun circles the horizon once a month, never more than 1.5 degrees above or below the horizon. The Earth bobs around its mean position with the lunar librations due to the eccentricity and inclination of the Moon's orbit. Shackleton crater is deep, 4.2 km, and in perpetual shadow. It is believed that water and other volatiles may have collected there.
Posted at
11:58
THE HAPPENING WORLD: Weekly Space Report: Starship Static Fires, Catcher Arms Installed on Tower, NASA SLS Stacking Complete
Posted at
11:10