#EAS #WEA for Carroll, #IL; #Jo Daviess, #IL; #Stephenson, #IL: National Weather Service: #TORNADO WARNING in this area until 4:15 PM CDT. Take shelter now in a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building. If you are outdoors, in a mobile home, or in a vehicle, move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris. Check media. Source: NWS Quad Cities IA IL

** DO NOT RELY ON THIS FEED FOR LIFE SAFETY, SEEK OUT OFFICIAL SOURCES ***

#EAS #WEA for Jo Daviess, #IL; #Stephenson, #IL; #Jackson, #IA: National Weather Service: #TORNADO WARNING in this area until 3:30 PM CDT. Take shelter now in a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building. If you are outdoors, in a mobile home, or in a vehicle, move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris. Check media. Source: NWS Quad Cities IA IL

** DO NOT RELY ON THIS FEED FOR LIFE SAFETY, SEEK OUT OFFICIAL SOURCES ***

#EAS #WEA for Jo Daviess, #IL; #Stephenson, #IL: National Weather Service: #TORNADO WARNING in this area until 6:45 PM CDT. Take shelter now in a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building. If you are outdoors, in a mobile home, or in a vehicle, move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris. Check media. Source: NWS Quad Cities IA IL

** DO NOT RELY ON THIS FEED FOR LIFE SAFETY, SEEK OUT OFFICIAL SOURCES ***

Can't stop thinking about the world building exercise/setup in Stephenson's Anathem where the "avout" (aka intelligentsia) were forced to live in gated monastic communities isolated to varying degrees (and by rank[1]) from secular society. This setup was decided on for a number of self-serving reasons (by the avout), but also largely imposed on them due to a long history where technology & academic pursuits led to several catastrophic events, incl. periodic civilizational collapses triggered by knowledge/research either being weaponized, irresponsibly commercialized and/or unleashed at a rate which society simply couldn't culturally/ethically/politically handle...

He (Stephenson) termed these events "Praxic crises" to emphasize that these kinds of disaster happen when purely theoretical insight is employed as real-world technology (praxis) without any restraint. In reality, there obviously isn't such a clear-cut separation between "purely theoretical knowledge" and its applications (POSIWID etc.) and that also forms part of the basis of this book's premise... I think we also very well know all the causes for such crises: From extreme short-term incentives (profit, war, perceived control/power), lack of ethical/philosophical grounding among decision makers (amplified by political power hierarchies), first-to-market pressures vs. deep understanding & balancing of impacts, but also severe lack of institutional regulation & memory (partially due to cyclic collapse and social amnesia)...

Food for thought...

[1] Monastic rank influenced degree of isolation: Unarians were allowed a few days outside each year, Decenarians every 10 years, Centenarians every 100 years, Millenarians only opened every 1000 years...

#Anathem #Stephenson #Technology #Science #Praxis #Collapse

Revisiting Classics: Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

Over the last year or so, I've been revisiting books that were influential both to tabletop RPGs I'm playing and to genres I really enjoy. Snow Crash belongs a little bit to both lists. I originally came through it as an influence to a game I enjoy, but the cyberpunk genre has come to be one I really enjoy. Its publication in 1992 puts it a little later in the cyberpunk canon than books like Neuromancer. It tells the story of hacker turned pizza delivery boy for the mafia Hiro Protagonist […]

https://alexanderkeane.com/2026/01/24/revisiting-classics-snow-crash-by-neal-stephenson/

Les événements du 27 septembre.
En 1825, ouverture de la première ligne ferroviaire de transports de passagers. Pour la première fois, des passagers prennent place dans un train emmené par la Locomotion No 1 de Georges #Stephenson, sur la ligne « Stockton and Darlington Railway » en Angleterre.
https://www.histoiredesinventions.com/27-septembre/
Neal Stephenson (@nealstephenson) on X

Today in “you can’t make this stuff up,” Meta has suspended my Facebook account because they suspect me of impersonating someone noteworthy

X (formerly Twitter)
#EAS #WEA for Jo Daviess, #IL; #Stephenson, #IL; #Dubuque, #IA; #Jackson, #IA; #Jones, #IA: National Weather Service: SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING in effect for this area until 5:15 PM CDT for DESTRUCTIVE 90 mph winds. Take shelter in a sturdy building, away from windows. Flying debris may be deadly to those caught without shelter. Source: NWS Quad Cities IA IL ** DO NOT RELY ON THIS FEED FOR LIFE SAFETY, SEEK OUT OFFICIAL SOURCES ***
Les événements du 9 juin.
En 1781, naissance de l’anglais George #Stephenson, principal #inventeur de la #locomotive
https://www.histoiredesinventions.com/9-juin/