Deborah Turbeville in FOAM

A few months ago, I bought Deborah Turbeville: Photocollage, which presents Turbeville’s collage work. It is probably the best photobook of 2023.

Huis Marseille has created a great exposition of her work and I had a look at it today.

Deborah Turbeville was an influential American fashion photographer known for her unconventional and avant-garde style. Turbeville’s unconventional career spanned both commercial fashion work and the art world. Her work is often dreamy, mysterious, almost surrealist, and ambiguous.

Deborah Turbeville in FOAM
Deborah Turbeville in FOAM
Deborah Turbeville in FOAM

The cost of AI

I stumbled upon this fascinating article by Stuart Mills looking at the challenges that further development and operations of AI models face.

The costs of model development and operation are increasing. Efficiencies in development and operation are challenging but may be addressed in the future. However, model quality remains a significant challenge that is more difficult to solve.

Data is running out. Solutions such as synthetic data also have their limitations.

There is also a severe challenge around chips. There is a supply shortage in the context of geopolitical tensions between China, the US, and the EU. Also, the environmental costs of running large AI models are significant.

The costs of model development and operation are increasing. Efficiencies in development and operation are challenging but may be addressed in the future. However, model quality remains a significant challenge that is more difficult to solve.

Data is running out. Solutions such as synthetic data also have their limitations.

There is also a severe challenge around chips. There is a supply shortage in the context of geopolitical tensions between China, the US, and the EU. Also, the environmental costs of running large AI models are significant.

Two revenue models may emerge in the AI industry. Each with their own take on the cost aspects highlighted above. The first is the ‘foundation model as a platform’ (OpenAI, Microsoft, Google), which demands increasing generality and functionality of foundation models.

The second is the ‘bespoke model’ (IBM), which focuses on developing specific models for corporate clients.

Government action can support and undermine the AI industry. Investment in semiconductor manufacturing in the US and China may increase the supply of chips, and strategic passivity from governments around regulations such as copyrights is suitable for the industry. Government interventions should regulate the AI industry in areas related to the socially and environmentally damaging effects of data centers, copyright infringement, exploitation of laborers, discriminatory practices, and market competition.

Remarkable mathematical truths

Deductive systems are either incomplete or inconsistent. Meaning

  • Inconsistent: they contain contradictions. Statements can be true and false in the same deductive system.
  • Incomplete: Statements can be found that can not be proven to be true or false.

Gödel proved this for us.

Wittgenstein formulated something similar:

The truth is built of true facts and untrue facts: facts that are not based on a system of observation yet are true anyway. Nevertheless, Wittgenstein seems to disagree with Gödel’s incompleteness theorem. Food for a lasting scientific debate. Anyway, Wittgenstein was looking at language and philosophy, not at mathematics.

Final remarkable mathematical truth for now from Cantor.

Cantor proved that one infinity is not the same as the other infinity. He developed a way to compare infinite sets and describe how infinite sets with different characteristics exist.

As an example, Cantor proved that real numbers are more numerous than the set of natural numbers. While both are infinite. He also invented a way to operate on infinite sets.

Cantor ended up in a mental hospital, which seems to be viewed as as heroic achievement among mathematicians—an opinion I do not share.

I recall reading The Mystery of the Aleph by Amir D. Aczel about Cantor. Unfortunately, I have lost my notes and the book. This book was very accessible, I do recall that.

Norwegian Wood notes

On the plane back from Prague, I finished reading Norwegian Wood—re-reading, actually. I don’t often re-read books, but Murakami is a favorite of mine.

Watanabe is in love with Naoko. She is the girlfriend of their mutual friend, who died at a very young age. Naoko can not cope with life and commits suicide in the end, while Watanabe is torn between emotions he is not able to identify or is not even conscious of. The girl who falls in love with him must tell him he is in love with her. An old friend tells him he has to choose for himself. While perfectly capable of analyzing other people’s situations, he is unable to analyze his own issues. Let alone that he is able to come up with a choice for his own problems he is not even aware of.

Photo movies

I (re)started making picture movies from my photo projects. I publish them on my YouTube channel. It’s a kind of slide show, but I’m trying to make a bit more of it and augment pictures with some video I made during the photo shoots.

I started this before with low success but now decided to take this more systematically. Nobody seems to exhibit his photography products like this, at least not so systematically. The first new set I created during the Scotland trip. Created a separate playlist for this trip.

This weekend, I created a video using pictures I took during a business trip to New York City and upstate New York.

And I have a large backlog of similar trips. Having fun with this.

Subscribe to the channel if you like it with this button here.

Glasgow Central

I almost forgot to look up to get a good look at how this light could fall so beautifully into the hall of Glasgow Central station.

Exploring Ethical Search Engines Beyond Google

There is no good reason why you should still rely on Google search for your search engine. Read this excellent article on Google’s practices, and Big Tech chills run down your spine. There are ample good alternative search engines these days that do have integrity:

DuckDuckGo

Ecosia

Bing (though also Big Tech and historically suspect)

Brave

StartPage

And there are more.

Lately, I’ve been using Ecosia and DuckDuckGo side by side. I don’t feel like I’m missing anything about Google.

Vacation Photos

Kronkeling has the most fun blog about photography.

Kronkeling has a hard time photographing on vacation. I don’t struggle with it. I always photograph. Sometimes for the image, the beautiful picture, sometimes for the subject, so just the snapshot. I decide the goals afterward, but then I am different from Kronkeling.

Tips for your holiday pictures from Kronkeling are here.

Sometimes, there are miniseries, like when our car broke down, and we had to wait until a mechanic came to help us. I photographed all the trash in the parking lot.

Or, during vacations, photographing tourists.

Toeristen fotograferen

Or hotel rooms.

Hotelkamer
Hotelkamer
Hotelkamer
Hotelkamer
Hotelkamer

Or art on the wall.

Or numbers.

47
104

Nina Katchadourian is a super creative source of inspiration.