4 ms·

Great to see stuff like this on HN. Curious: there is an unbelievably huge wealth of this type of "content" that lives almost exclusively in history books, or

by fab1an 6y ago

Great to see stuff like this on HN. Curious: there is an unbelievably huge wealth of this type of "content" that lives almost exclusively in history books, or at least seems profoundly difficult to find on the internet. Then there's the insane illusion that virtually all knowledge is accessible within the first Google search result page, so I'm always pleased whenever articles like this one find their way to the surface... Incidentally, if anyone is interested in the general topic of making cloths / tailoring, I just recorded a podcast episode on this - the show is about deep, obsessive hobbies and the first episode is about a neuroscientist who transforms into a tailor at night: https://www.whentheworkisdone.com/ https://www.whentheworkisdone.com/

philipkglass 6y ago
There are a lot of books covering historical subjects on the web. Their contents usually won't show up in a general web search though. I have learned a lot about the past from old books. Google Books, the HathiTrust, and archive.org are useful here. Newer books are often available on Library Genesis. As an example: have you ever wondered about the state of toxicology in the late Victorian era? What poisons were known, what poisons were detectable (and how), and other nuts-and-bolts details of a certain kind of murder mystery? This information is hard to find in modern web pages -- particularly if you don't know enough to tell who is a trustworthy guide to the past. But a HathiTrust search does the job easily. Use the "advanced full text search" form. Search for the word poisons. Restrict results to English language documents in the years 1880-1900. You'll get a wealth of books back, like this illustrated 1885 text: "Micro-chemistry of poisons : including their physiological, pathological, and legal relations; with an appendix on the detection and microscopic determination of blood: adapted to the use of the medical jurist, physician, and general chemist" https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc2.ark:/13960/t9d51ct7s&view=1up&seq=7 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc2.ark:/13960/t9d51... Or from 1883: "Indian snake poisons, their nature and effects." https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo.31924003195769&view=1up&seq=5 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo.31924003195769&vi... 1899: "Practical materia medica for nurses, with an appendix containing poisons and their antidotes" https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark:/13960/t0pr8z47c&view=1up&seq=5 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark:/13960/t0pr8z...
MaysonL 6y ago
Ah, deep obsessive hobbies. My mother once made a couple of suits for herself and my sister-in-law, starting from an almost raw fleece (she refused to do the cleaning of the fleece to get rid of the twigs and other crap). Also, for clothes construction and fabric arts, see my sister-in-laws blog, which made the front page of HN a few months ago. [0][1] She makes clothes, and teaches the art and craft of it. 0: https://weaversew.com/wordblog/2020/11/07/thats-not-why-i-did-it/ https://weaversew.com/wordblog/2020/11/07/thats-not-why-i-di... 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25195659 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25195659
- astrange 6y ago
  > My mother once made a couple of suits for herself and my sister-in-law, starting from an almost raw fleece (she refused to do the cleaning of the fleece to get rid of the twigs and other crap). So she made you a ghillie suit, or did you end up getting rid of them later?
BlueTemplar 6y ago
Speaking of books, and Google: https://www.wired.com/2017/04/how-google-book-search-got-lost/ https://www.wired.com/2017/04/how-google-book-search-got-los... (Also, funny how these days I am getting better results searching HN directly...)
- dredmorbius 6y ago
  I think that GBS has resumed, or at least that the Ngram Viewer is now sourcing data from sources updated since ~2000 -- 2008, the previous cutoff year. (I cannot readily find a source confirming the first point. The second is confirmed through a Tweet: http://nitter.cc/searchliaison/status/1282797986863386624 http://nitter.cc/searchliaison/status/1282797986863386624)
wolverine876 6y ago
> Curious: there is an unbelievably huge wealth of this type of "content" that lives almost exclusively in history books, or at least seems profoundly difficult to find on the internet. > Then there's the insane illusion that virtually all knowledge is accessible within the first Google search result page, so I'm always pleased whenever articles like this one find their way to the surface... The accurate and valuable knowledge humanity has produced is mostly behind paywalls: Books and scholarly journals (and also the best journalism). The masses get the dregs - rumors, speculation, ignorance, disinformation, misinformation - 99% crap is not an exaggeration, IMHO. It also is a massive barrier against anyone, including kids, who try to actually learn. Then the experts wring their hands about all the ignorance and false beliefs held by the public, and how uneducated everyone is. Reading actual scholarly work - from people who have personally examined the primary evidence, and who have the expertise to put it in context with prior evidence and have the skills to evaluate it - is transformative (as is the best journalism - people who also examine the evidence, etc.). The difference between that and usual Internet information is mind-altering - they are different worlds, and often say completely different things. What seemed reasonable on the Internet immediately becomes ignorant and deceptive, sometimes intentionally, and useless. (An important trick is to remember next time that what seems reasonable and useful is really, no matter how convincing it feels, is really ignorant and useless.) Also, IME the scholarly work usually is easy to read - easier than the BS on the Internet, because people who know what they're talking about and have evidence tend to write clearly and get directly to the point. I sprung for a personal subscription to the Oxford English Dictionary - I think ~$90 as a special. Just that is transformative: a quick history, at my fingertips, of every concept ever expressed in English - with the primary evidence right there! ... If we could make all the valuable, accurate information available to the public, it could be transformative for everyone. I wish the Gates Foundation would spare a few billion to buy the IP to the scholarly journals and books and make them open. That may do more than any investment.
- op03 6y ago
  If this was true why do people send kids to school? They can drop them off at the library and let them transform themselves by themselves. Any half baked library has enough info to keep you occupied on any subject you want for your entire life. But rarely does it lead to transformation which is why we end up with schools. People confuse information access with learning. Effective learning, esp for the 6 inch chimp brain wondering around in a dark jungle, always requires a teacher. Someone who is constantly providing feedback to keep the chimp on track, pointing out how to correct blundering, which paths are dead ends, which paths are worth exploring etc etc etc. Where things start breaking down is the availability of high quality teachers, guides, mentors, coaches etc
sevensor 6y ago
Fortunately, this blog seems to get a fair amount of love from HN. That's how I discovered it and became a regular reader. It makes lots of points that seem like they would be common sense, except that they are directly opposite the way the past is shown in popular culture. For instance: It's safe to assume that people in the past believed in their religions. Also, people like to look nice. This is reflected in how they dress, and nomadic peoples are no exception.

by fab1an 6y ago

philipkglass 6y ago

There are a lot of books covering historical subjects on the web. Their contents usually won't show up in a general web search though. I have learned a lot about the past from old books. Google Books, the HathiTrust, and archive.org are useful here. Newer books are often available on Library Genesis. As an example: have you ever wondered about the state of toxicology in the late Victorian era? What poisons were known, what poisons were detectable (and how), and other nuts-and-bolts details of a certain kind of murder mystery? This information is hard to find in modern web pages -- particularly if you don't know enough to tell who is a trustworthy guide to the past. But a HathiTrust search does the job easily. Use the "advanced full text search" form. Search for the word poisons. Restrict results to English language documents in the years 1880-1900. You'll get a wealth of books back, like this illustrated 1885 text: "Micro-chemistry of poisons : including their physiological, pathological, and legal relations; with an appendix on the detection and microscopic determination of blood: adapted to the use of the medical jurist, physician, and general chemist" https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc2.ark:/13960/t9d51ct7s&view=1up&seq=7 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc2.ark:/13960/t9d51... Or from 1883: "Indian snake poisons, their nature and effects." https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo.31924003195769&view=1up&seq=5 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo.31924003195769&vi... 1899: "Practical materia medica for nurses, with an appendix containing poisons and their antidotes" https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark:/13960/t0pr8z47c&view=1up&seq=5 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark:/13960/t0pr8z...

MaysonL 6y ago

Ah, deep obsessive hobbies. My mother once made a couple of suits for herself and my sister-in-law, starting from an almost raw fleece (she refused to do the cleaning of the fleece to get rid of the twigs and other crap). Also, for clothes construction and fabric arts, see my sister-in-laws blog, which made the front page of HN a few months ago. [0][1] She makes clothes, and teaches the art and craft of it. 0: https://weaversew.com/wordblog/2020/11/07/thats-not-why-i-did-it/ https://weaversew.com/wordblog/2020/11/07/thats-not-why-i-di... 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25195659 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25195659

astrange 6y ago
> My mother once made a couple of suits for herself and my sister-in-law, starting from an almost raw fleece (she refused to do the cleaning of the fleece to get rid of the twigs and other crap). So she made you a ghillie suit, or did you end up getting rid of them later?

BlueTemplar 6y ago

Speaking of books, and Google: https://www.wired.com/2017/04/how-google-book-search-got-lost/ https://www.wired.com/2017/04/how-google-book-search-got-los... (Also, funny how these days I am getting better results searching HN directly...)

dredmorbius 6y ago
I think that GBS has resumed, or at least that the Ngram Viewer is now sourcing data from sources updated since ~2000 -- 2008, the previous cutoff year. (I cannot readily find a source confirming the first point. The second is confirmed through a Tweet: http://nitter.cc/searchliaison/status/1282797986863386624 http://nitter.cc/searchliaison/status/1282797986863386624)

wolverine876 6y ago

> Curious: there is an unbelievably huge wealth of this type of "content" that lives almost exclusively in history books, or at least seems profoundly difficult to find on the internet. > Then there's the insane illusion that virtually all knowledge is accessible within the first Google search result page, so I'm always pleased whenever articles like this one find their way to the surface... The accurate and valuable knowledge humanity has produced is mostly behind paywalls: Books and scholarly journals (and also the best journalism). The masses get the dregs - rumors, speculation, ignorance, disinformation, misinformation - 99% crap is not an exaggeration, IMHO. It also is a massive barrier against anyone, including kids, who try to actually learn. Then the experts wring their hands about all the ignorance and false beliefs held by the public, and how uneducated everyone is. Reading actual scholarly work - from people who have personally examined the primary evidence, and who have the expertise to put it in context with prior evidence and have the skills to evaluate it - is transformative (as is the best journalism - people who also examine the evidence, etc.). The difference between that and usual Internet information is mind-altering - they are different worlds, and often say completely different things. What seemed reasonable on the Internet immediately becomes ignorant and deceptive, sometimes intentionally, and useless. (An important trick is to remember next time that what seems reasonable and useful is really, no matter how convincing it feels, is really ignorant and useless.) Also, IME the scholarly work usually is easy to read - easier than the BS on the Internet, because people who know what they're talking about and have evidence tend to write clearly and get directly to the point. I sprung for a personal subscription to the Oxford English Dictionary - I think ~$90 as a special. Just that is transformative: a quick history, at my fingertips, of every concept ever expressed in English - with the primary evidence right there! ... If we could make all the valuable, accurate information available to the public, it could be transformative for everyone. I wish the Gates Foundation would spare a few billion to buy the IP to the scholarly journals and books and make them open. That may do more than any investment.

op03 6y ago
If this was true why do people send kids to school? They can drop them off at the library and let them transform themselves by themselves. Any half baked library has enough info to keep you occupied on any subject you want for your entire life. But rarely does it lead to transformation which is why we end up with schools. People confuse information access with learning. Effective learning, esp for the 6 inch chimp brain wondering around in a dark jungle, always requires a teacher. Someone who is constantly providing feedback to keep the chimp on track, pointing out how to correct blundering, which paths are dead ends, which paths are worth exploring etc etc etc. Where things start breaking down is the availability of high quality teachers, guides, mentors, coaches etc

sevensor 6y ago

Fortunately, this blog seems to get a fair amount of love from HN. That's how I discovered it and became a regular reader. It makes lots of points that seem like they would be common sense, except that they are directly opposite the way the past is shown in popular culture. For instance: It's safe to assume that people in the past believed in their religions. Also, people like to look nice. This is reflected in how they dress, and nomadic peoples are no exception.