Okay, so we all have thought about the age old question: “Are we alone in the universe?” For centuries people have wondered what life , be it intelligent or not, exists in the universe. Well we don’t have to look up to the stars for ALL of those answers, but rather down and around.
Recently, I have been interested in Neanderthals and other human species that have been proven to exist on this earth. What’s really mind-blowingly badass to me is that for a good long time, I’m talking at least 30,000 years, there were up to NINE other humans species alive when the homo-sapiens (you and me) were walking around eating berries and sticks or whatever we ate back then.
Let that sink in for a minute. They were intelligent ,similar to us and shared up to 98.7% of their DNA with us (chimps share about 96%). There is plenty of evidence to support that us homo-sapiens even mated with the other humans species and thus many people alive today have trace amounts of neanderthal or other DNA in them
I wonder what killed them off. It hasn’t been confirmed by the science community but the leading idea is that they were mainly killed off due to the encroaching modern humans. This then makes me wonder: are we the most aggressive humans species (probably). Did an archaic version of racism make us identify other humans species s targets for elimination? Could they communicate with us?
I really wish we could bring them all back and see what life would be like. Just to think that there were humans other than us is hard to wrap my head around. I wonder if they would be as close to their families as we are or if they were aggressive like us. Having other humans species alive with us is some badass history indeed.
So this week I decided to take a break from a badass moment in history to talk about something man made that I truly think is just badass in the nerdiest way possible. I am talking about Dwarf Fortress. Its a video game that’s been developed since 2002 by Tarn and Zach Adams in which you create a city of dwarves and must create a thriving kingdom in a procedurally generated fantasy world. Tarn does the programming but Zach helps him design it. Dwarf Fortress has gone on to inspire the creation of many games that have become classics such as Minecraft and Rimworld to name only two. We will get to why DF is truly an amazing piece of software in a second. First, lets talk about our friend Tarn.
Tarn in the flesh
Tarn Adams born April 17, 1978 is a mathematician and computer game designer from the good ol’ USA. Tarn received his doctorate in Mathematics from Stanford but eventually opted to pursue a career in game development with his brother, Zach. They made a few games before DF but nothing REALLY changed the industry quite like Dwarf fortress, which came later.
Now, I am writing this for one reason. I recently started playing Dwarf Fortress as I have heard a lot about it over the years. I figured “Hey, I have nothing better to do anyway with the virus and whatnot.” So I browsed the internet for a download link and swiftly installed the game. What happened in the next few hours really just made my jaw drop.
This is the one of the infinite worlds of Dwarf Fortress.
As you can see by the picture above, The UI is just nonexistent. The controls are user-hostile rather than user-friendly and its probably the least intuitive design I think I have ever seen. Period.
The game UI is all ASCI and it is tough to look at. What you see here is one of the maps of the world which shows different mountain ranges, plains. rivers, oceans, deserts, everything but what made me look past the terrible graphics is what is under the hood.
You see, this game doesn’t just create the same world for everyone that plays. It creates a brand new map every time with accurate simulations of how mountain ranges are formed. It creates rivers in the world that actually follow the same paths a real river would. It correctly simulates how gems and metals are formed underneath the earths crust and also creates weather fronts that are dynamic and act as they would in the real world as well.
What is amazing about this is that it does this every time you create a new world. It is never the same. The program creates a real world with real environments. Not only this, but it creates entire civilizations on this map as well that has heroes and peasants that all have unique feelings, wants, desires, distastes, and families with dynamic relations that change if one of them decides to wrong one of the others.
These civilizations also have relations with other cities and races and can have wars and rulers can be dethroned by other everyday individuals given the right circumstances. In fact, the whole world that was generated just for you creates its own history over hundreds of years that are also simulated before you even start the game. Entire empires can rise and fall before you even begin, Heroes and leaders live and die and have kids, and every single one these individual residents of this simulated worlds are affected by what happens around them.
Lets say an elf king was planning on starting a war with a human town. The elf king goes in, kills everyone, and ends any chance for those people to affect the world in any way because they are now dead and their town was conquered.Okay, now lets say he did not start the war and wanted to just go on living peacefully. Incidentally, this means that the humans in that little town will go on to live another day. So it is possible that now one of those human kids that were born in that town grow up to become a mercenary or farmer, or you name it, and has a whole entire life and ends up as a king himself. This is all possible due to how each of the characters (we are talking tens of thousands of simulated people here) create and choose their own destiny in this world.
I would love to write more about this as I have not touched many of the major things this game does but I hope you see what I am saying here. This is a simulation of an entire world. In real time it lives its life out as we do. I am dumbfounded by what this game really is every day I play it. (P.S. if you need to try a nice game out with all the free time you have this is the one)
Spongebob , although an animated character, has done more in his show’s existence than you or I have done in our whole lives. This sponge has been a fascination for people from all walks of life and continues to be a beloved TV star to this day.
I know, it may be weird to have a kids TV character as a “badass person” but hear me out. What this show has done for comedy and TV is unmatched. Every episode had a new and original theme. The show had original characters that had inter winding backgrounds and flamboyant personalities. The jokes made in this show were also first class. This character and his home laid the groundwork for the children shows to come.
Not only is he a household name, right up there with mickey mouse, he was the purest form of imbecile and dutiful friend. He lead a great example for us kids in the early 2000’s. He taught us what it really meant to be a friend and how to be compassionate for others. Sure, he was annoying and his laugh is enough to make your ears bleed but you can’t deny he was trying his best to be a good sponge.
Spongebob will always and I mean ALWAYS hold a special place in my heart. The animation, comedy, and just general vibe was never disappointing. Man, even the movies were a masterpiece. They got David Hasslehoff to surf across the ocean on his stomach like a boat and then shoot Spongebob and Patrick miles away using just his pecs. I cant remember the last time I was happy but I’m pretty sure it was that day. Spongebob is a badass no doubt.
Born in Lyon, France around 1772, Tarrare had a normal childhood. Tarrare had a very long grin that stretched across his face ear-to-ear. He was also very stocky and reportedly only weighed 100 pounds as a full grown adult. He had terribly stained teeth that appeared to be rotted and as he grew, so did his appetite. In fact, Tarrare didn’t have an appetite but rather an insatiable urge to keep eating. It’s reported that in his early years he could eat an entire horse the same weight as himself within 24 hours. He also had so much extra skin on his stomach that when he hasn’t eaten after a few hours he could stretch his loose stomach around his whole waist. However, after he finished eating the skin would balloon up into a massive gut
This monstrous hunger eventually lead him to being forced onto the streets by his parents who could no longer support his eating habits. This lead Tarrare to search for new ways to find food. He became a well-known street performer by challenging people on the street to satiate his hunger. Peasants would bring him barrels of apples and chunks of cows just to see this man eat it and not stop eating. The people were amazed and honestly it’s very surprising they didn’t think he was a demon or whatever but fascinating nonetheless.
After collapsing on stage while performing as an opener for a snake-oil salesman due to “intestinal blockage”, Tarrare found himself in the capable hands of a Dr. Pierre-François Percy, who ended up enlisting the strange Tarrare in the French Revolutionary Army.
Tarrare would do jobs for other soldiers in exchange for their rations. He even had double rations at this point and it still wasn’t enough as he decided to eat what trash he could find in the “dung-hill”.
The army eventually found a purpose for our man Tarrare. They tested him to see what limitations there were to what he could eat. They fed him snakes, cats, dogs, rabbits, owls, and an eel. All of those animals were alive when he ate them and drank their blood. They decided to feed him a wooden box that held a secret message inside of it. The idea was he would eat the box and go to an enemy prison in Germany were he would poop out the box and deliver the message to someone on the inside.
This may have been a good plan if perhaps Tarrare looked normal, wasn’t constantly eating, and if he spoke German. Unfortunately for him, he was discovered, beaten, tortured, and had a mock execution before being sent back to France. Tarrare returned to Dr. Percy’s care in the hospital where they fed him eggs and other supplements while he recovered. His story become less sympathetic when in a neighboring wing of the hospital a baby goes missing. Yes,you guessed it. Tarrare ate a LIVE baby. He ran from the law and disappeared into the city when they found out. Tarrare eventually died from late-stage Tuberculosis.
In these times of uncertainty and anxiety the world is falling apart. Hundreds of thousands of people are sick with COVID-19 and even more are affected by the economical stipulations of it. Nurses and doctors are working day in and out to help the people that are afflicted. We all know by now that there isn’t enough toilet paper or paper towels left and, unfortunately, we have to buy the really expensive vegan brands of food to substitute for what we cannot normally get at the store. But most of all, there are nurses and doctors are working day in and out to help the people that are afflicted, that do not have enough masks for their own safety against the virus.
There is hope however. We have people making masks for the doctors by the thousands in their own free time and using their own resources. It has really been amazing to see so many people come together in these last few weeks. We have all seen the videos of people playing music for each other while being quarantined in their homes. (and if you haven’t: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBByYjjvNzs )
The times seem dark right now. Everyone is feeling the stress of not only what is happening, but also what is to come. It is important to remember that worse things have happened to our society and we will make it through this. Let’s all just hope people stop gathering in public for dumb reasons and go back inside.
This week is not about a specific person being badass. This week’s blog is for all the people who, even though they are worried about what will happen to them and their families, are doing their part for the better of strangers. THAT is badass.
Ching Shih’s, born Shil Xiang Gu, early life in china remains a mystery. We do know that she was born in the Guangdong province of china in 1775. She became a prostitute who worked in a floating brothel in Canton. In 1801 pirate captain Zheng Yi, leader of the Red Flag Fleet, was at her brothel and noticed her beauty and the two went on to get married.
The Red Flag Fleet was a very, very powerful group of ships. Starting at around 200 ships , it eventually grew to a whopping 1800 ships with 50,000-70,000 pirates all together. in 1807, only 8 years of being married, Zheng Yi died and passed the flet on to his wife: Ching Shih.
Ching Shih stepped up to the plate to lead the Red Flag Fleet. She was a great leader for a pirate. She attempted to set up a form of government for her fleet even. Some of the rules that she made were that all the ships in the fleet must pool their money together for the better of the fleet as a whole. If a sip plundered something they were entitled to 20% of the loot and the rest of it was used put in the community fund.
Other rules she enacted were that women prisoners should remain safe and unharmed by their captures. However, If a pirate wished to marry a captive, they were allowed to but were bound to the code that they remain faithful to their spouse. Ching Shih became so powerful that she eventually began to rule over coastal towns and cities. Levying taxes from them among other things.
Ching Shih eventually gave up the life of privateer by striking a deal with the Chinese government for amnesty. She was eventually allowed to keep all her riches so long as she stopped being a pirate and so she did. She lived happily ever after running a brothel in Canton where she started.
Now don’t get me wrong, although Ching Shih was not a good person. Perhaps she was even a bad person. But one thing is for sure, If you can be a prostitute one year and not even a decade later you are running the largest pirate fleet in history you are a damn badass.
The father of modern day computing, the man who cracked the Nazi enigma code,the pioneer of artificial intelligence, and the hero who was rejected by his country. Alan Turing was a genius in every sense of the word. He was a brilliant logician, mathematician and computer scientist.
Born June 23, 1912 to a middle class family in England, Alan Turing always showed promise in the field of mathematics. He reportedly was always working on rudimentary chemistry projects and studying mathematics.
After attending college in the field of science Alan would go on to work for the British government in the 1940’s. Now if you aren’t familiar with this time period in Britain, let’s just say it was less than enjoyable. During WW2 the German military was able to send encrypted messages to each other that the allies would not be able to understand. The “Enigma Code” was, at the time, known as the “unbreakable code”. It was a way where German officers could type a regular message, and then using many algorithms could hide the message in plain sight.
The Enigma Code
Alan created a machine that could crack this “Unbreakable” code and normal decryption began in 1941. Many people believe that Turing was one of the key people responsible for winning WW2 due to this revolutionary machine he created. He was celebrated as a genius in England and by the allies as he may have turned the war in their favor.
Explaining how the Enigma Code works can be a challenge so check out this link if you would like to learn how complicated the encryption was and to understand how awesome it was that our boy Alan cracked it. We use similar methods that Alan used today when cracking the encryption within messages on our computers but he did it in 1941!
Alan Turing was also the first person to theorize about a computer using electrical power rather than mechanical. He dreamed of utilizing the speed of electricity in his machines (This turned out to be a great idea if you are reading this right now.)
He also was the first to really think about artificial intelligence. He reasoned that computers think and learn as people do. He would be very involved in debates on the topic and sometimes he spoke of the future as if he lived in 2020.
“I believe that at the end of the century the use of words and general educated opinion will have altered so much that one will be able to speak of machines thinking without expecting to be contradicted.”
Alan Turing speaking on AI
Looking at you Siri.
The great Alan Turing, no matter how much of his life he gave for humanity and his country, soon was met with a gloomy ending in 1952. You see, Alan Turing was an openly gay man in England in the first half of the 1900’s. Even though he was a hero, he was arrested for “Gross Indecency” when he was found to have a relationship with a 19 year old man. At the trial he never defended nor denied his actions, only saying he did nothing wrong.
The British government decided to strip him of his access to government sites as gay people were not allowed access. This means that all his research he was working on was locked behind the walls of a facility that he would never be able to go to again.
Alan Turing took his own life in 1952 by ingesting cyanide.
Alan is a man that saved his country and then was rejected by them. Who created the concept of digital computers and artificial intelligence. He was a gay icon that lived knowing he could be murdered or imprisoned but decided not to change. Alan Turing was a damn badass.
The Battle of Bastogne was a small part of the larger battle also known as the Battle of the Bulge. General McAuliffe was on the front lines with his troops during a major attack against their headquarters. The Germans were attacking with everything they had and it seemed that General McAuliffe was losing the battle fast.
As the situation got worse a radio communication was sent to the American headquarters. It was from the Germans! They demanded for McAuliffe to surrender as the battle was not favoring the Americans. The issue with surrendering was that McAuliffe and his men had to defend a strategic position where they were so surrender was out of the question. The general was so offended by the demand it is reported that he was screaming after the message was received saying the Germans should perform anatomical impossibilities on themselves.
He knew that the rainy weather that they were fighting in was going to clear eventually to allow American air support to help out and they reportedly had a lot of reinforcements coming if they could hold out just a little longer. He just did not know how to respond back to the Germans in a way that was professional (as he was a professional soldier after all.)
He asked the men he was with at the time how he should respond to them. The overall consensus is that “Your original reaction is the best reaction.” He then returned a message that was one word only. The one word that makes me laugh a little bit every time i think about this event.
“Nuts”.
He replied back with “nuts”. Now this might seem lame to us today. However, in the 1940’s that is a straight up swear. He just straight up swore at the German army through an official message from the U.S. Army. The kicker here is that when the Germans received the message they didn’t understand it. They had to ask a translator what the word meant and the German translator said the closest thing it means in German is “Up yours”.
In honor of Coronavirus, lets review the world’s most lethal plague.
With the death toll ranging from 75 to 200 million people, the Black Death is known to the world as the deadliest pandemic in human history. Not only did it kill a large portion of Europe in 1347 – 1351 (30 – 60%), many religions and economic upheavals stemmed from it. It also changed European history forever.
The disease was mostly carried by flees. Flees tend to latch on to other animals and drink their blood so obviously that caused the disease to eventually spread to humans. The disease started in mainland Asia. Due to the climate at the time being extremely dry for wildlife in Asia many animals decided to migrate west for better food and water sources, taking the disease with them.
The disease traveled via the Silk Road to Europe along with the animals and many Mongolian soldiers. It swept through countries along the way. It was reported at the time that India was empty due to the illness. Syria, Armenia, and Mesopotamia were all covered in bodies (Yikes). It eventually reached Europe and went on to wipe out a 3rd of all Europeans at the time.
Common signs that you were infected include: Buboes, which were essentially tumors that grew to about the size of an apple or orange and then started to ooze pus. following symptoms tend to be extreme fever, gangrene which causes the skin to turn black and fall off, vomiting of blood and other fun things you would expect from a Middle Age plague. It was common for the infected to die within a week of infection.
The Black Plague was unfortunately the worst disease humanity has ever faced. So let’s just be glad we aren’t Europeans in the Middle Ages.
Born around 1869 to a Siberian peasant family in mother Russia, Rasputin had a interesting life ahead of him. Not much is known about this tall creepy looking guy, but the little information we have only helps to illustrate the mystery of his life further.
Most likely not knowing how to read or write, given that this is Siberia in the 1860’s, many people of his home village claimed he possessed supernatural powers, while some claimed he was extremely cruel.
in 1903 Rapsutin was a wanderer. He eventually wandered into St. Petersburg, Russia with the reputation as a shaman or faith healer. A couple of years later, He crossed path with Czar Nicholas II of Russia and his wife. (In case you don’t know what a Czar is, it’s a Russian Emperor). Rasputin proved his “capabilities” to the Czar by curing his sick son of hemophilia. This act solidified his powers as a healer to the czar and his wife immediately.
This relationship with the Czar was poorly timed however as the politics at the time in Russia were approaching A civil war.Rasputin was always frustration to the Russian politicians and they would request the royalty to get rid of him. They believed he was toxic to the government and had no place being there anyway. However, the Czar and his wife refused.
Now this is why I’m writing this article. Rasputin may be a creepy dude from the arctic but how he was murdered is what is most badass. You see, he really must have had some supernatural power because he just. wouldn’t. die.
Its reported that a high ranking Russian at the time, Yusupov, invited Rasputin to his house for pastries and wine and to meet his “beautiful wife”. Little did our boy Rasputin know however, the food and drink was laced with enough cyanide to kill several men. It became apparent that Rasputin would need more than a ton of poison to do him. After eating multiple pastries, he was still laughing and talking with his hosts. Annoyed that the poison did not work, Yusupov whipped out a pistol and shot Rasputin in the back causing him to fall to the floor presumed dead. After seeing his dead body, Yusupov and his friends celebrated and went upstairs. Later in the evening, Yusupov checked on the body again. Still, no pulse and no sign of life and even shook Rasputin’s body.
Then, all of a sudden, Rasputins eyes shot open. Yusupov recollected the colors of his eyes when they opened and referred to them as “green eyes of a viper”. Rasputin attempted to escape. Yusopov and his co-conspirators chased Rasputin out into the yard, shooting him two more times and beating him with a rubber club. To ensure he didn’t rouse again, the men tied Rasputin in a blanket and dumped his body into the Neva River.
Now, Although Rasputin had a very interesting life and to only dwell on his unfortunate death does not due his story justice, we must not forget how damn badass he must’ve been to take so much and still live. It seemed to me as if he really was not supposed to die.
