Nathan Wrigley

  • Seasons

    I live in a part of the world where the seasons matter. In the winter, it’s cold and the plants die back. In the spring, the plants, and many other things, come back to life. I don’t think that I suffer from any kind of seasonal disorder, but I have to say that it’s so nice to see the length of the day extending, and the buds on the plants / trees beginning to emerge. Living through the seasons is a wonderful / tortuous thing.

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  • Music that I like

    I’ve always liked folk music, and this is (a taste of) something that I think sums up why I like it.

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  • Humans are remarkable

    Humans are really rather remarkable. We can do so many things. I find humans are at their very best when they create music. We won’t agree on what style of music is ‘perfect’, but this comes pretty close to me. It brings up so many emotions for me. I find it incredible and beyond extraordinary.

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  • The universe is pretty big

    The James Webb telescope sent back the first image today and it really does make you think. The image shows galaxies as they were 13 billion years ago. This alone is remarkable when you think about it, but the fact that it covers a portion of the sky the size of a grain of sand when held out at arms length is also remarkable. Imagine how many such images are still to be taken. Also pause to think that each of the galaxies are home to billions of stars, many of which will have multiple planets orbiting them. It’s enough…

  • Can we all agree that house prices are just silly?

    So it’s the 26th May 2022, and energy prices are through the roof. Basic commodity prices are through the roof. All-the-things prices are through the roof… And the cost of buying a house (in the UK) is not just through the roof, it went through the roof a decade ago and now it’s approaching low Earth orbit. Would it be silly to suggest that houses ought to be cheaper? I know that this is contentious. Estate agents will not be happy. People who’ve recently bought a house will not be happy. Property developers will not be happy. BUT… The vast…

  • Platform fatigue

    Okay, so this is not something that most people will have to deal with, but I do. Everybody that I speak to has a platform (read… WhatsApp, Messenger, Slack, Signal et al.) which they prefer to use. This means that I have to communicate on dozens of different platforms. I can’t keep up! I have a tiny mind, and I’ve no idea how we solve the splintering of communications. When I was a kid, you had a postal address and a phone number. If you wanted to organise something, you had to arrange it in the real world; you had…

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  • Humans are not good custodians of almost anything

    My hope is that humans go on to do great things, like explore space and make the Earth a greater place than it is now… but it seems like we don’t really have a right to that. It’s not clear that we can cope with the basic scenario of existing on Earth. War, the environment, and many other things don’t seem to point to a bright future. I wish that we were better, but perhaps, on aggregate, we’re not.

  • Algorithms are not good at ‘human’

    Good grief. You cannot make this up. Nobody was hurt, thank goodness, but if you ask AI an open-ended question, you’re likely to get some silly / harmful answers… https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-59810383 Do some ‘honest-to-goodness’ research, then browse the internet. DO NOT ask some form of AI the answer!

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  • 2021

    This appears to be the year in which… Nature 10 – 0 Humans I wonder how many years can pass in which we think that nature will allow us a free pass in all that we do?

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  • Sometimes, (always?) time is the answer

    I know that this will come as no surprise to anyone, but I’m amazed at how often I forget the simple fact that time will always add some perspective to situations / thoughts / ideas which I’m not happy about. Time will add a level of calm and understanding to almost everything decision you have to make, and thought that you have. What seems impossible to take in, will be possible to take in once enough time has passed. That disappointment that you’re sure you will never get over, will be easy to cope with once enough time has passed.…

  • Why does everything have to grow?

    I know that this is not a particularly ground-breaking idea, but… why do companies, ideas, projects have to grow to be considered successful? Why is not okay for anything to just be the size it is now, the size it was two days after it started to be a success? I really don’t have an answer to this, but it appears that the urge to grow things is perhaps at the root of many of problems that we face. Let’s say that I start a company that builds widgets. These widgets are really great and they solve a whole load…

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  • No value

    I think that I need a place on the internet to write down some of the thoughts that I have. I suspect that I’ll post to this site quite infrequently, mostly when the mood takes me, and time allows.