Things I Find Beautiful - I

This is a collection of some things I’ve found beautiful recently.

Recursive Game of Life (see the run-through here). Each cell is being simulated by another instance of the Game of Life, and if you zoom out enough you see that the structures you started off looking at are also simulations of cells.

Paintings by Owen Schuh. See especially the work page, and this tweet. There’s a quality to many of these that’s halfway between organic and designed that really draws me in.

Bleuje Animations. Similarly halfway between natural and designed, but with a very different flavor. I could spend hours watching these loop if I had the time.

Quick thoughts on research by Michael Nielsen. One line that stood out to me: “Research involves tremendous amounts of routine janitorial work… it’s sobering to then see a Fields Medallist or Nobelist roll up their sleeves and do page after page of very elementary calculations, just chasing down every single lead.”

I also appreciated the idea that you can’t sit on exciting frontiers forever: eventually it either picks up so much momentum that it runs aheda of you, or you find ways to guess where it’s going and run ahead of it.

A short clip on giving feedback. Underlying this is an awareness that receiving feedback can be a vulnerable place to be, and being clear about your intentions and relationship goes a long way to making it safe to be vulnerable.

Simon Sarris on eating. Not endorsing the specific claims, but the clarity of the writing is really something and (given the general uncertainties in the field of nutrition) much of it is at least plausible. It also paints a picture of food that feels quite appealing: simple ingredients prepared in no-fuss yet tasty ways.