How To Tell The Difference

The Evolution of the Alphabet by Matt Baker

This amazing visualization from Matt Baker of UsefulCharts demonstrates how our modern Latin script used in English evolved from Greek, and other, much older alphabets.

Matt Baker says, "I originally titled the chart 'Evolution of the English alphabet' and many people commented that there is no such thing as an English alphabet and that the chart should be titled 'Evolution of the Latin alphabet'. Actually, both titles are correct. Obviously, many European languages use the same Latin script. But some use a slightly different number of letters. When one is referring to the set of Latin letters used for a particular language, it's ok to refer to that set as the '[language name] alphabet'. However, in the end, in order to be more inclusive, I decided to change the title to simply 'Evolution of the Alphabet' and use the row titles to make it clear that it is the evolution of the standard Latin script that is being shown (as opposed to say, the Cyrillic or Hebrew scripts)."

You can see how the chart begins with something called the Proto-Sinaitic script which was derived in Canaan, around the biblical Land of Israel. It was repurposed from Egyptian hieroglyphs that were commonly seen in the area (its name comes from Mount Sinai). This Proto-Sinaitic script influenced other Semitic languages: it was the precursor to the Phoenician alphabet, which was used in the area of modern-day Lebanon and spread across the Mediterranean, becoming the basis for Arabic, Cyrillic, Hebrew, and of course, Greek. The first forms of the Archaic Greek script are dated circa 750 BCE, which then grew into Latin, with Archaic Latin script appearing circa 500 BCE. The evolution into Roman script, with the same recognizable letters used in our modern English, occurred 500 years later in 1 CE. Fascinating.

https://usefulcharts.com/blogs/charts/evolution-of-the-english-alphabet

Climate Catastrophe Change In A Chart

UK climate data scientist has charted the monthly/yearly change in global temperature from 1851 to 2020. We have always known it is not good news and here is the chart...

https://twitter.com/neilrkaye

The Cyanometer

Who knew there is an invention to measure the blue of the sky?

Well, there is and it was invented by Horace-Bénédict de Saussure, a Genevan geologist, meteorologist, physicist, mountaineer and Alpine explorer, often called the founder of alpinism and modern meteorology (and considered to be the first person to build a successful solar oven!) who was fascinated with the phenomenon of the sky appearing to be a darker blue the higher one ascended in elevation. So after climbing Mont Blanc to experience the phenomenon for himself, he invented in 1789 a device to measure the exact blue of the sky. He called this invention, a ring of paper with 52 different hues of blue arranged from light to dark on a gradated circular scale, a Cyanometer.

de Saussure’s original Cyanometer now at the Bibliothèque de Genève, Switzerland

A reproduction in a book of de Saussure’s original Cyanometer

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyanometer

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horace_Bénédict_de_Saussure

Know Your Donuts

Are You In A Film Noir?

Here is a handy flow chart to help you determine if you are in a Film Noir. Good luck. And wise up Charlie, don't take any wooden nickels.

Do you favor a side?

To be clear, we all use BOTH sides of our brain. It is necessary. But sometimes we are more comfortable on one side or the other...
Do I have more left- or more right-brained followers?

A Color Thesaurus

At a loss as to how to describe a color?

Parent hue is in the top left corner of each chart, created by Ingrid Sundberg.

Since I am an interior designer, I have seen many couples face the "color conundrum" in which women seem to see more tints, tones, and shades than men, illustrated below. I am not sure if it is an actual physiological difference in the eye itself (I know color blindness exists almost exclusively in men) or just a stubbornly-adopted, false gender affectation in men. Think I am exaggerating? Just try to get an average heterosexual man to wear a pink shirt...he will act like it is kryptonite that will sap him of all his energy and end his life.

Let's Talk About Size 2

Reminiscent of a previous post about the relative size of the planets and stars, here is another reminder about how incedibly big our star is...

If 7 Billion Were 100...

http://jackhagley.com/The-World-as-100-People
Sources here.

86 Billion Neurons, 0 Pain Receptors

By Dwayne Godwin and Jorge Cham