Unexpected Polish Akunin in Mexico
Tag: books
Exploring the Rational and Historical Intricacies of Paper Sizes | February 23 2025, 14:57
Somehow I managed to miss this back in the day, but it turned out that the European paper sizes A0, A1, A2, A3, A4, … are not just arbitrary. Let’s start with the fact that A0 has an area of exactly 1 square meter. Well, with a slight error margin to avoid dealing with fractional millimeters. And the aspect ratio — 1:√2 is the only possible one that maintains itself when the paper is divided in half. Thus, there is a rationale behind paper formats in Europe.
But with our paper formats, there seems to be no sense. What we have are letter, legal, tabloid, all with different proportions, and the origin of the format goes back to tradition and is not well known.
I decided to dig into the topic and found a claim that “dimension originates from the days of manual papermaking and that the 11-inch length of the page is about a quarter of ‘the average maximum stretch of an experienced vatman’s arms’. However, the claim does not explain the proportions, but then there is the word vatman, which reminds one of Whatman sheets, remember those? But no, a vatman is a specialist who scooped up the liquid paper pulp from a vat using a mold (sieve) and formed the sheet. And the Whatman sheet comes from James Whatman, an English paper manufacturer of the 18th century, which was simplified to ‘vatman’. Interestingly, the term ‘vatman’ seems to exist only in Russian, derived from Whatman’s surname and his paper, Whatman paper.
And why do we call the formats in the U.S. legal and letter? This is quite interesting as well.
Interestingly, in the U.S., there were two different “standard” sizes initially: 8″ x 10.5″ and 8.5″ x 11″. Different committees independently adopted different standards: 8″ x 10.5″ for the government, and 8.5″ x 11″ for everyone else. When the committees discovered a few years later that they had different standards, they agreed to “disagree until the early 1980s when Reagan finally declared 8.5″ x 11” the officially approved standard size for paper.
The matter began in 1921, when the first Director of the Bureau of the Budget, with the President’s approval, formed an inter-agency advisory group called the “Permanent Conference on Printing,” which approved 8″ x 10½” as the standard format for government agency forms. This continued a practice established earlier by former President Hoover (who was then serving as Secretary of Commerce), defining 8″ x 10½” as the standard format for his department’s forms.
In the same year, the Committee on the Simplification of Paper Sizes, comprising representatives from the printing industry, was appointed to work with the Bureau of Standards as part of Hoover’s program to eliminate waste in industry. This committee defined basic sizes for different types of printed and writing paper. The “writing” size was set as a sheet of 17″ x 22″, while the “legal” size was 17″ x 28″. The now well-known Letter format emerged as a result of dividing these sheets in half (8½” x 11″ and 8½” x 14″).
Even when choosing 8½” x 11″, there wasn’t a special analysis conducted to verify that this size was optimal for commercial forms. The committee that developed these formats aimed solely to “reduce leftovers and waste during the trimming of sheets by reducing the range of paper sizes.”
Moreover, the legal size is still in full use as its name suggests, especially among lawyers, and folders and desk drawers are made to fit its size.
But if you look at a pack of paper in the U.S., you will see “20lb” on the pack. Actually, 20lb is the weight of a small dog, but it is also written that there are 500 pages. “Amazon Basics Multipurpose Copy Printer Paper, 20 Pound, White, 96 Brightness, 8.5 x 11 Inch, 1 Ream, 500 Sheets Total”
In the U.S., the “weight category” of paper indicates the total weight of one ream (500 sheets) of paper in its uncut (original) format. For office paper of the Bond class (often sold in Letter format), the base size is considered to be 17 x 22 inches. For example, a “20-pound” label means that 500 sheets of exactly 17 x 22 weigh 20 pounds. But if we take a pack of Letter format (8.5 x 11), which results from cutting 17 x 22 into four parts, its weight will be about 5 pounds.
In Europe, the weight category essentially refers to the weight of an A0 sheet in grams.
So, if you fold A0 in half, you get A1 with half a square meter area, if you fold A1, you get A2. That’s clear. But how many times can you actually fold a sheet of paper?
The maximum number of times a non-compressible material can be folded has been calculated. With each fold, a part of the paper “loses” for the next potential fold. The function of folding paper in half in one direction is:
L=πt/6(2ⁿ+4)(2ⁿ-1)
where L is the minimum paper length (or other material),
t is the thickness of the material,
n is the number of possible folds.
The length L and thickness t must be expressed in the same units.
The thickness W is calculated as πt2^(3(n-1)/2).
This formula was derived by Britney Gallivan, a high school student from California, in December 2001. In January 2002, she and her helpers spent eight hours folding a roll of toilet paper about 4000 feet long (approximately 1200 meters) twelve times in the same direction, thus debunking the old myth that paper cannot be folded more than eight times.
Sources mention that she started in school with gold foil (I wrote about such foil recently), and, starting with a square sheet the size of a hand, after many hours of perseverance and practice, using rulers, soft brushes, and tweezers, she managed to fold her gold foil twelve times. But apparently, that wasn’t spectacular enough, and she found toilet paper over a kilometer long somewhere in 2002 and made a show for the Guinness record.
Britney didn’t stop there and wrote a book. Though it was only 48 pages. How about that, Britney?
Travel Troubles and Unexpected Stays: A Tale of Two Airports | February 22 2025, 16:46
In the end, I managed a bingo of two airports where planes had recently crashed. One incident occurred just the day before my planned arrival in Toronto, which, of course, led to my flight being canceled. I found out at the airport. No problem, I worked from there, then returned home, luckily only a 20-minute drive away. I flew out the next day.
But the return trip was more interesting. First, the flight was rescheduled countless times, then they loaded us into the plane, then unloaded us again and told us to come back tomorrow for a second attempt. Amusingly, the border guard’s question about the purpose of your visit to Canada sounded quite ironic upon exiting. No one knows where to wait for the luggage, and what’s even supposed to be on the display board from where I flew? From Toronto to Toronto? But they say not to worry, they’ll collect unclaimed baggage overnight, and it will fly with me tomorrow. Midnight approaches, no Uber can be caught for all the money in the world, the hotel shuttle has been promised every ten minutes for the last hour but finally arrives, and the three of us, including a couple celebrating their 26th wedding anniversary, occupy the last two seats. On the bus, I joke that all that’s left is to find out that the hotel is fully booked. No way, my fellow travelers tell me, you reserved it in front of us (the airline gave a voucher). I pull out my phone, and instead of a ‘thank you for your reservation’, there’s a message saying no rooms are available at Comfort Inn. Well, the hotel was “better than any motel. I try to find the next hotel on the airline’s website in the hotel lobby; there are three options, of which two are about 70 km away, and one is listed but has no availability. While I was calling, another option popped up, Marriot Residence Inn, and that worked out. Nice rooms, two-bedroom suites with a full kitchen, but with a terrible breakfast in the morning. Luckily, the airline’s voucher covered a good lunch at a restaurant the next day.
The next day, the flight was at the same time, and here comes another delay message. Well, this time it was minor, and our Mitsubishi made it to Reagan Airport quite comfortably. They didn’t lose the luggage;)
Grant Wood: The Enigmatic Life of an American Icon | February 15 2025, 17:29
American artist Grant Wood (Grant DeVolson Wood, 1891–1942) is best known for his painting American Gothic. Starting with Impressionism, he later focused on realistic depictions of Iowa. He lived modestly, avoiding publicity. His strict Quaker father forbade art, but after his father’s death, Wood dedicated himself to painting.
American Gothic—one of the most recognizable, frequently copied, and parodied paintings—brought him worldwide fame, though Wood had no idea what to do with it. He spent his life trying to be talked about, written about, and known as little as possible. To achieve this, he spent years crafting the image of a “farmer-artist”—a painter in overalls, uneducated, and entirely unremarkable. In an interview, Wood once said: “I’m the plainest kind of fellow you can find. There isn’t a single thing I’ve done or experienced that would be worth talking about.”
In 1935, the loss of his mother and an unsuccessful marriage changed his life. He died in 1942, leaving behind a legacy as one of America’s most significant artists. Just a couple of days ago was the anniversary of his death, and a day later—his birthday.
Similar posts are grouped under the tag #artrauflikes, and all 147 of them can be found in the Art Rauf Likes section on beinginamerica.com (unlike Facebook, which forgets—or ignores—almost half of them).
Exploring Generative Art with Raven Kwok | February 14 2025, 23:52
A fascinating Chinese comrade, Raven Kwok (郭 锐文). He calls himself a visual artist and creative technologist: his work focuses on exploring generative visual aesthetics created through computer algorithms. His works have been exhibited at international media-art and film festivals such as Ars Electronica, FILE, VIS, Punto y Raya, Resonate, FIBER, and others.
His biography also mentions education at the Shanghai Academy of Visual Arts, where he received a bachelor’s degree in photography (2007–2011).
Interestingly, this is not the first time I’ve seen Processing used professionally for such gadgets. I’ve run plotting software on it – a plotter that I’ve seen mounted on two motors at the corners of a large board, with ropes dangling from them supporting a pen. I should take a deeper look at this Processing.
The website has a lot of beautiful content
Training Dogs: Communication and Challenges | February 13 2025, 19:59
If, like us, you train a dog to ask to go outside by tapping the window with its paw, and to ask for food by tapping the refrigerator similarly, you quickly notice an interesting effect. Ignoring these requests becomes unpleasant: not because you urgently need to go walking or feed them, but because the tapping turns into something more — into a voice, and teaching the dog to understand the reason for refusal is much trickier. You might want to reinforce — well done, let’s go, I’ll do what you want, you’ve learned to communicate with us, we’ve learned to understand you, but on the other hand, the dog begins to control you, realizing that tapping with its paw actually produces a tangible effect.
The real problem is that if I don’t react, my dog doesn’t think: “Ah, probably not the time right now.” It decides that it’s just not loud enough or persistent enough. In its world, the absence of a response is not an argument but a reason to increase the pressure.
Well okay, it has learned to understand and accept a verbal refusal, after all. But occasionally it doesn’t work. Apparently, in its world, an insufficiently justified refusal is not seen as a refusal.
When we watch movies, we slice cheese for the wine. Yuka knows that when the projector turns on, the smell of wine will soon be accompanied by cheese, and settles nearby. And interestingly, it very clearly senses when the cheese is finished. It can’t see that it’s finished, but apparently, its sense of smell replaces its vision. And as soon as you eat the last piece with it, it stands up and leaves.
Global Leaders in the Sneaker Market | February 11 2025, 22:05
Today we went shopping for sneakers, and I decided to investigate which countries are currently the world leaders in sneakers.
Overall, no surprises—the US is in the absolute lead. Germany and Japan are notable. The rest are catching up.
American brands—at least 9 of them: Nike (+Converse), New Balance, Brooks, Saucony (+Merrell), Reebok, Skechers, Vans, Hoka. Purely sport-wise, probably 7 from the list.
Japanese—Asics, Mizuno.
German—Adidas, Puma (by the way, both founded by the Dassler brothers, yet they are competitors). Swiss—On. Korean—Fila.
Of course, production is all in China, Vietnam, Indonesia.
Personally, I’ve been buying almost exclusively Asics for a long time. They are very comfortable, although the design is so-so, a mere pass.
By the way, want an interesting fact you probably didn’t know? The thin layer of felt on the sole of Converse sneakers was added (at least as of 10 years ago—it was added) not for functional reasons but for economic ones. Footwear with a fabric sole was subject to lower customs duties when imported compared to footwear with a rubber sole because it was classified as slippers. And the duty was reduced from 37.5% to 3%.
Who else from other countries – are there any brands that are very noticeable and popular in your markets, and have yet to make it to the US?
Surprising Facts About Nature and Science | February 10 2025, 22:11
Live a century, learn a century.
Strawberries and wild strawberries are not berries, but nuts. More precisely, not the fruits themselves but the seeds, and the pulp is the receptacle. Potatoes are bi-locular berries. A pear is an apple. Cherries, plums, apricots, peaches are all drupes. They are divided into one-seeded (e.g., cherry, plum, peach, coconut) and many-seeded (e.g., raspberry, blackberry, cloudberry). Bananas are berries. Pineapple is a grass. Watermelon is a berry (a type of pumpkin). Almonds are not nuts, but a dry fruit. Apple seeds, and the pits of cherries, apricots, peaches, or plums contain cyanides (amygdalin converts in them). Just like in almonds. Chocolate contains theobromine – a couple of bars might be lethal for a dog or close to it, half a bar will definitely knock it down. Vanilla is made from a Mexican orchid vine, while vanillin, an artificial vanilla substitute, is a byproduct of the pulp and paper industry.
There is no such animal as a panther. In popular usage, “panthers” are black jaguars or leopards. Black panthers also have spots, they’re just less visible. Polar bears have black skin and transparent fur. And they are white for the same reason clouds are white. Woodpeckers have tongues four times the length of their beaks, wrapped around their skulls that can stretch out. The tongue of the European green woodpecker goes down into the throat, stretches across the back of the neck, around the back of the skull under the skin, across the crown between the eyes, and usually ends right under the eye socket. In some woodpeckers, the tongue exits the skull between the eyes and enters the beak through one of the nostrils.
Anteaters have their tongues attached to their sternums, between the clavicles. Elephants are the only animals with four fully-developed knee joints. Koalas have fingerprints that are almost indistinguishable from human ones. Sharks have no bones and their closest relatives are rays. Crocodiles can go without eating for a whole year (but they feel blue). Zebras are black with white stripes, not the other way round (white appears on black skin). 1% of people have cervical ribs. Squids, cuttlefish, and octopuses can edit their RNA “on the fly”.
As it turns out, René Descartes invented the Cartesian coordinate system for Russia and for the rest of the world. Since Descartes’s name is Descartes, i.e., Des Cartes, it corresponds to Cartesian.
Luck Over Talent: Decoding the True Drivers of Success | February 08 2025, 00:51
A lengthy post on how to achieve success! For free! No registration or SMS required! I just stumbled upon a scientific study proving that the role of chance in success is greater than that of talent. And this resonated with my belief that successful people are successful because they are lucky, not because they are extraordinarily talented, smart, or unusual. Rather on the contrary, they are so because they’ve been lucky. Note, not because they are “lucky ducks,” but because they’ve been lucky. These are different things.
Let me argue this. There’s a study “Talent vs Luck: the role of randomness in success and failure,” authors Alessandro Pluchino, Alessio Emanuele Biondo, and Andrea Rapisarda. Yes, the funny part is that Alessandro received the Ig Nobel Prize for this work (“a symbolic award for scientific discoveries that ‘first make people laugh, and then make them think'”). They used agent-based modeling to analyze the contributions of talent and luck to success.
As initial data, they took supposedly objective things: talent and intelligence are distributed among the population according to the normal (Gaussian) distribution, where most people have an average level of these qualities, and extreme values are rare, while wealth, often considered an indicator of success, follows the Pareto distribution (power law), where a small number of people own a significant portion of the resources, and the majority owns only a small share.
Further, the authors developed a simple model in which agents (1000) with varying levels of talent are exposed to random events over the hypothetical 40 years, which could be either favorable (luck) or unfavorable (misfortune). Each such event affects the “capital” of an agent, serving as a measure of his success.
Result: Though a certain level of talent is necessary to achieve success, it is often not the most talented individuals who become the most successful, but those with an average level of talent who experience more fortunate events. There is a strong correlation between the number of fortunate events and the level of success: the most successful agents are also the luckiest.
My observation of how the world works completely agrees with these conclusions. You just need to do things so that you’re more fortunate. That’s it. Don’t try to be the smartest—it doesn’t help as much as the following things do:
1) Being in environments where important events occur. Silicon Valley for startuppers. New York for financiers. Hollywood for actors. If an environment increases the chance of meeting “key” people, it makes sense to place oneself in that environment.
2) Creating more points of contact with the world and maintaining them. Running a blog, writing articles, giving interviews. Attending conferences, participating in communities. Calling and writing to acquaintances and semi-acquaintances, especially when such calls and letters are potentially important to them. Expanding the number of contacts—even if 99% are useless, 1% can change your life.
3) Increasing the number of attempts. The more projects, the higher the chance that one of them will “hit.” The best example – venture funds: they invest in dozens of startups, knowing that success will come from only one. Artists, writers, musicians create hundreds of works, knowing that only one will become a hit.
Unfortunately, for this point, you need to love your work. So choose a task where attempts are enjoyable.
Organizational psychologist Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic in his book “Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?” asserts that luck accounts for about 55% of success, including such factors as the place of birth and family wealth. This is true, but since you are sitting on Facebook on an iPhone with a cup of coffee and not herding cows in a loincloth in Africa, you already have pretty good initial conditions.
From here, an interesting conclusion — is it necessary to study at a university to achieve success in life? Look at the points above. Being in the right environment, creating more points of contact, increasing the number of attempts. Out of these three points, two work better in the case of face-to-face learning, while the third does not work well because the university consumes 4-5 years of life (and the university is one attempt). But the other two criteria are very important—during the period of study, the average student interacts with hundreds of peers, who can make a significant contribution to the likelihood of this student’s success.
But sitting at home with books for five years does not meet any criteria. Online education lies somewhere in between, see for yourself, it varies, but it’s closer to the option of “sitting with textbooks.”
The authors of the study confirmed the concept of “The Matthew Effect.” This is from the Bible: “For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.” (Matthew 25:29). They explain why success accumulates even if it is initially random:
People who are fortunate in the early stages receive more resources, opportunities, and attention. This, in turn, increases their chances for new fortunate events. As a result, those who were initially in a better position continue to build on their success, while the rest lag behind.
This explains why wealthy people often receive profitable investments, popular artists become even more popular, and less known ones remain in the shadows, and companies that “hit the stream” attract more customers and resources than their less fortunate competitors.
That’s why success also requires following the principle of “Fake it till you make it.” Successful people often exaggerate their skills or achievements, and then catch up to the proclaimed level. Society easily forgives and quickly forgets such things, but when they work (and they often do), the person no longer really needs them. There’s also a self-fulfilling prophecy—the idea that if a person states something as a fact (even if it’s an exaggeration), they and those around them start behaving as if it’s true, and eventually, it becomes reality.
There’s also the principle of “there’s no harm in asking” (It doesn’t hurt to ask). The principle is that if the likelihood of success is increased by asking someone a question (“can you raise my salary starting in March or put me in charge of that project”), then it’s worth asking. You never know unless you ask.
And one more thing. Act now, apologize later. Actions speak louder than words. As you know, being at the right time in the right place not only involves the right place (this is the first point from my list), but also the right time. Therefore, just do it. People who don’t dream but act never end up homeless on the street because they rushed.
And finally. Time is a finite resource. There was a good idea about the sheet with squares—google “90 years of life in weeks.” You can color the lived weeks and look at the remaining ones.
So, in summary.
Success is determined by luck, not talent. Talent helps, but is often formed under the influence of success. Knowledge is useful, but experience is more valuable. Time is a finite resource. Planning doesn’t work, three things do:
1) being in an environment where important events occur,
2) creating more points of contact with the world and maintaining them,
3) increasing the number of attempts where luck might work.
Three principles:
1) Fake it till you make it
2) It doesn’t hurt to ask
3) Actions speak louder than words
Posthumous Publications of Twain and Kafka | February 05 2025, 05:00
Today I read that it turns out Mark Twain had willed that his autobiography (a manuscript of 5,000 pages, by the way) not be published until 100 years after his death, and then you can do whatever you want. Generally, those 100 years expired in 2010 and three volumes of the autobiography were published.
I also discovered that Kafka had intended for “The Trial” to be destroyed, but it was published anyway. That’s the one where the guy goes to court, and suddenly they start trying him there.
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 