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Month: November 2023

Listening to the ancient past

Listening to the ancient past

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Equator AI created a video series that answers the question of what ancient languages sounded like. They even tackle some purely reconstructed proto-languages like Indo-European that was re-built from later derived (but documented) Indo-European languages.

The first video demonstrates Old Norse, Latin, Old English, Proto-Celtic, Phoenician, Hittite, and Akkadian. I can affirm the Latin is understandable but has an interesting accent. We do actually have some idea of how things were pronounced in Latin, because ancient documents exist that gave pronunciation guides or even (in a mirror of modern grammar Nazi’s) complained about common pronunciation errors.

This second video shows off Proto-Indo-European, Sabaic, Sanskrit, Aramaic (bonus points for the video character looking like Jesus), Sumerian, Old Chinese, Ge’ez, and Gothic.

Since it is all AI generated, it seems like it would be an interesting way of adding authentic language pronunciation to games about the past. Imagine playing Civilization and having each of the ancient leaders speaking their actual languages.

If you like this, maybe give learning Latin a try.

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Classic ghost stories in VR

Classic ghost stories in VR

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One area in which VR seems to land well is scary experiences. Everything from walking on a tiny plank hundreds of feet in the air, to madness, to the isolation of space.

As a lover of classic ghost stories from the Edwardian and Victorian eras, I applaud this attempt by Abi Salvesen to retell H.G. Wells’ The Red Room as a VR experience.

Give it a watch. Or curl up with a cup of warm drink, start a fire, and give an audio version a listen.

The Low Res car

The Low Res car

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“It’s like a child’s backyard project”. The cool looking unibody design shakes and rattles, only goes about 12mph, has no heater/AC, isn’t practical, but there it is and it turns heads since it’s basically an art car.

It’s part of the Peterson automotive museum which is worth checking out.

Jean Restout’s Pentecost

Jean Restout’s Pentecost

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1 When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all assembled together in one place. 2 Suddenly, there came from heaven a sound similar to that of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were sitting. 3 Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which separated and came to rest on each one of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different languages,[c] as the Spirit enabled them to do so.

5 Now staying in Jerusalem there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven. 6 At this sound, a large crowd of them gathered, and they were bewildered because each one heard them speaking in his own language.

7 They were astounded and asked in amazement, “Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? 8 How is it then that each of us hears them in his own native language? 

So many things happen around the octave of Easter that it’s easy to be overwhelmed and miss the important and deeply rich events.

Pentecost (Hebrew Shavuot, Greek pentekoste fiftieth) was an annual Jewish festival marking the end of the barley harvest and the beginning of the wheat. It is also called “the day of the first ripe fruits” (Numbers 28:26), and in the Greek Scriptures is the name used for the Feast of Harvest (Exodus 11:16) or Feast of Weeks (Exodus 34:22). Shavuot unfolded ‘seven full weeks after Passover from 16 Nisan, the day when they offered a sheaf of barley (Leviticus 11:15).

According to Jewish tradition, the day of Pentecost correspond to when the law was given to Moses at Sinai and Israel became a people apart. The apostle Paul draws a comparison of this event by saying that the Christians are a ‘holy nation’ (1 Peter 2: 9) a kind of first fruits to God (John 1:18), met on a heavenly Mount Zion as part of a new covenant (Hebrews 12: 18-24; Luke 22:20).

Jean Restout II’s Pentecost is currently housed in the Louvre (room 924, Sully Wing, Level 2), but was originally painted for the Abbey of Saint-Denis which is outside of Paris and is definitely a painting you should see if you get a chance. Click below for a bigger image.

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The Thing infection order

The Thing infection order

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The 1982 movie The Thing is one of my favorite sci-fi/horror movies – right up there with Aliens. It a paranoia fueled mystery of a alien organism that can assimilate and imitate both human or animal hosts. 

Based on the 1938 story Who Goes There by John W. Campbell Jr, The Thing takes us along into the fear and paranoia of an isolated Antarctic research station with the characters trying to ascertain whether everyone is who they say they are.

What makes it so re-watchable is that the timeline when certain characters are assimilated is unclear. Filmmaker James Cameron even used stand-ins so that the shadows were not easily identifiable. This has lead to years of speculation and fan theories (Clothing continuity theory, Molotov whiskey theory, No breath theory, Who sabotaged the blood bank) about what happened when.

Of all of them, I think the Den of Geek does the best breakdown of the most likely order that each of the characters succumbs to the thing.

Halloween Organ Concert

Halloween Organ Concert

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The Old Church downtown is a concert hall and has a number of cool things. One of the fun things is their free lunchtime concerts. They have started live casting them on YouTube, which is even more convenient.

The October concert for the last 2 years has usually an organ concert by Michael Barnes in which he plays classic spooky organ music like the ones below. Plus a guest performer with some more folk classics.

  • Funeral March of a Marionette (Charles Gounod)
  • Toccata and Fuge in D Minor (Bach)
  • Scherzo from Grand Sonata in E Flat (Dudley Buck)
  • March of the Dwarves
  • Have you seen the Ghost of John?
  • Addams Family Theme
  • Rondo Alla Turca (Mozart)