Matthew Aldridge

@mpaldridge.bsky.social

395 Followers 412 Following

But blue. https://mpaldridge.github.io

A 1991 paper of Bourgain, annotated by my much younger self. Annotations include: * Next to “one may see”: “I hate Jean Bourgain.” * Next to “the usual way”: “???” * Next to “We skip the details”: “AARGH!”
If the Working Hypothesis holds, then without suitable policy and cultural changes, significant “impedance mismatches” (or “proof indigestion”) will emerge all throughout this process: * AI-generated proofs will accumulate waiting to be verified. * Many verified AI-generated proofs will await a readable writeup. * AI-generated proofs, even when required to be correct and well-written, will overwhelm our traditional peer-review system. * And even the published proofs will be too numerous for the community to work into a definitive form. In short, we will transition from an era of proof scarcity to an era of proof abundance. Some signs of this indigestion are already occurring; in fact, strains were emerging even before the advent of modern AI.
from Stefan Collini, “On Not Getting On With It: The Criticism of Cyril Connolly” When Cyril Connolly's Enemies of Promise was published in 1938, W. H. Auden sent its author an admiring letter: “As both Eliot and Edmund Wilson are Americans, I think Enemies of Promise is the best English book of criticism since the war, and more than Eliot or Wilson you really write about writing in the only way which is interesting to anyone except academics, as a real occupation like banking or fucking, with all its attendant boredom, excitement, and terror.” The word that catches the eye here is, of course, “banking”. It is typical of Auden's off-hand daringness to suggest that the experience of writing might in some way measure up to the “excitement and terror” of banking.
Skeet: Microsoft is planning to build three massive AI data centres in Leeds. It’ll drain thousands of litres of water from the River Aire and become the city's biggest carbon emitter. We can still stop the council's sign-off, but we need more voices. Add your name: you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/pr... Link card: Stop the Microsoft AI megasite in Leeds! Microsoft wants to build three huge AI data centres at Skelton Grange. It would drain the River Aire and become the city's biggest carbon emitter. We can stil
Screenshot from Pitchfork: ELECTRONIC ʅ͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡(̸̢̛̼̞̭͋ͅ)̸͚̰͛̔̾̀̿͒͂:̴͓̞̑̌̂̆̊͋̀:̸͎̟̯̂̓̌ ҉ ͡ ͞ ͞ ͞ ҉● ࿀ ● ࿀ ● ҉⃝ ⃝͢ ͞ ͘ ͞⃝̕ ͢ ̛ ⃝ ̸ ̡ ͢⃝̧ ͡ ͡ ̀ ̧ ̢⃝͜ ҉ ͞ ͞ ⃝͞ ͘ ͞ ͡⃝ ⃝҉҈҉҈҉҈҉҈҉҈҉ :̶̢͙͙͕̠̩͆(̷̮͍͚̫͚͂̍)̵̳̗̊( ̟̞̝̜̙̘̗̖҉̵̴̨̧̢̡̼̻̺̹̳̲̱̰̯̮̭̬̫̪̩̦̥̤̣̠҈͈͇͉͍͎͓͔͕͖͙͚͜͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢͢ͅ l̡̡̡ ̡͌ Ɵʅ͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡͡(̸ Four Tet The tempos are brisk and the energy is high on a new compilation from Four Tet’s unpronounceable glyph project that includes some of Kieran Hebden’s most fully realized productions under any name. By Philip Sherburne
The final line of The Power Broker: “Why weren’t they grateful?”
Less dramatic than the injury toll—but wearing on the tens of thousands of subway riders who were never involved in a major disaster—was the daily toll imposed by calculated neglect. The floors of New York's subways were filthy, and the grime was mixed with scattered pages of newspapers, candy and gum wrappers and, for emphasis, an occasional blob of spittle or a smear of vomit that no one had yet wiped up. Subway walls were covered with verbal filth; the scenery amid which the New Yorker traveled around his city was a vast mosaic of FUCK and SUCK and COCK and CUNT.
Results of stage 2 of the Tour de France: 1st – Isaac del Toro (Mexico); 10th – Tom Pidcock (Great Britain)
Page 1000
The conclusive piece of evidence, to an impartial observer, may have been the fact that Singstad did not want the plaza located in the area in which his brother-in-law's tenements were located; his recommendation, for which he fought for two years, would have left them uncondemned—and his brother-in-law with no profit at all. The tenements were condemned only because the Authority overruled Singstad and decided to locate the plaza where its chief engineer, Othmar H. Ammann, wanted it. Two intensive investigations—one by the Port Authority, one by the Tunnel Authority—turned up not a single piece of evidence to prove that the peppery little Norwegian's satements were anything less than completely true. The single damaging fact was his failure to tell the Port Authority when he learned his brother-in-law owned the property, and, says Windels, his attorney, the engineer had a reason for not telling: "He was afraid that someone like Moses would find out and smear him with it."
A production error meant Albert Camus’s The Outsider was omitted from our top 100 novels list; its intended placing was 71. Also, My Ántonia should have been 78, not 100 […] The rankings remain as first published but with the errata acknowledged here.
=== TOP 5 MOST TYPICAL VOTERS === 1. Eimear McBride (168713) 2. Siri Hustvedt (168361) 3. John Mullan (162089) 4. Lily King (154551) 5. Merve Emre (154079) === BOTTOM 5 LEAST TYPICAL VOTERS === 1. Nikesh Shukla (13005) 2. M. John Harrison (10526) 3. Natalie Haynes (9776) 4. Joshua Cohen (8868) 5. Nussaibah Younis (7179)
Three toy elephants rotate around a circle, while two models of the Empire State building swap places.
The investment company that owns the former WH Smith high street stores is charging the retailer millions of pounds in licence fees for the right to use its widely derided TG Jones name, the Guardian can reveal. Modella Capital, which bought the chain from WH Smith’s parent company last year, on Wednesday blamed weak consumer spending as it laid out a restructuring plan that could shut 150 of its 450 shops. It also said “the forced name change from WH Smith has also negatively impacted consumer awareness”. However, documents seen by the Guardian showed Modella, which bought the paperclips to books chain for £76m last year, was so far owed £2.9m in royalty fees for use of the fictitious “family” name now used on the former WH Smith stores.
Roaming his domain in person like Haroun-al-Raschid, he suddenly appeared on lines in front of municipal lodging houses, checking on the treatment of the luckless, or in police precinct houses, employing the mayoralty's hitherto-unused magisterial powers to mete out swift punishment to arrested gamblers, or at the Bronx Terminal Market before daylight one freezing December morning, assembling an audience of shivering market concessionaires by having two police buglers blow a fanfare and then, clambering up on the tailboard of a truck, announcing an assault on racketeers in the artichoke business by reading a formal proclamation banning the inoffensive vegetable from the premises.
Self-service display cabinets are being replaced at a selection of the sausage roll and sandwich retailer’s outlets, with staff now handing over products to customers from behind a theft-proof counter.
French TikToker repeatedly trying to pronounce "burger" https://www.tiktok.com/@tatamayou/video/7425317971876138273
The Guardian: “A scientist, an inventor, a futurist, a voracious reader with a photographic memory and, according to local rumour, shapeshifting powers, Viola wishes to fly like poet-pilot Gabriele d’Annunzio, but her parents require her to marry money and reproduce. And the ‘repulsive little creature’ who falls into her bedroom while undertaking repairs on the Orsini roof is a long way from their idea of marriage material. “In secret, though, the pair cling to each other. Cosmic twins, contrarians desirous of a new world…”
38 Londres Street: On Impunity, Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia by Philippe Sands Occupational Hazards: My Time Governing in Iraq by Rory Stewart Who Dares Wins: Britain, 1979–1982 by Dominic Sandbrook The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert A. Caro
Bookmark placed 118 pages through the 1240 pages of “The Power Broker”.
Copy of “The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York” by Robert A. Caro.
\lim_{n \to \infty} ( (1 + \frac{x}{\sqrt{n}})^n e^{-x \sqrt{n}} )
Screenshot of blog header: Shtetl-Optimized The Blog of Scott Aaronson If you take nothing else from this blog: quantum computers won't solve hard problems instantly by just trying all solutions in parallel.
MARTIN HAIRER: One thing I noticed, in general, was that the model tended to give a lot of details on the things that were easy, where you would be like: “Yeah, sure, go a bit faster. I’m bored with what you’re saying.” And then it would give very little detail with the crux of the argument. Sometimes it would be like reading a paper by a bad undergraduate student, where they sort of know where they’re starting from, they know where they want to go, but they don’t really know how get there. So they wander around here and there, and then at some point they just stick in “and therefore” and pray.
Dear All, I'm writing to share some excellent news: Becca Rothfeld will be joining The New Yorker as a staff writer, and Jordan Salama will join us as a contributing writer. Becca comes to us from the Washington Post, where she served as the nonfiction book critic for nearly three years. In 2023, she won the Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing, and in 2021, she was the recipient of an inaugural Robert B. Silvers Prize for Literary Criticism. Her first book, "All Things Are Too Small: Essays in Praise of Excess," was published in 2024. She has also helped edit the small literary and philosophical magazine The Point. Becca currently lives in D.C. with her husband and her dogs, Kafka and Theo, but says she hopes to move to New York soon.
"After Seattle’s Marshawn Lynch gained four yards to set up second-and-goal from New England’s one-yard line, most assumed the Seahawks would hand the ball again to Lynch – the Skittles-scarfing bruiser whose impact was once measured on the Richter scale."
"The idea that anyone did not know about Epstein’s conviction as a sex abuser is absurd. Some people spurned his social approaches. Having been invited in 2010 to an Epstein dinner with Woody Allen and then Prince Andrew in New York, the magazine editor, Tina Brown, replied: 'What the fuck is this . . .? The paedophile’s ball?' Brown’s reaction should have been everyone’s."
A take-away carton with some slightly squashed lunch food in it.
The New Year’s Eve scene from Phantom Thread.
Room full of boxes, like the end of Indiana Jones
There have been attempts to change this. In 1993 parliament passed the Leeds Supertram Act, paving the way for a new tram system. In 2005 it was cancelled. Alistair Darling, then transport secretary, said a trolleybus scheme would deliver 90 per cent of the benefits at 50 per cent of the cost. It turned out that it would deliver 0 per cent of the benefits, because it was cancelled in 2016. Leeds was going to get a branch of HS2. It got cancelled. And HS3/Northern Powerhouse Rail, across the Pennines. It got cancelled. As a consolation prize, Leeds got more funding for trams. Spades were going to go into the ground in 2028. But after another government review, it has been pushed back by five years, or maybe ten — because the business case and route planning will now be undertaken sequentially rather than in tandem. And it’s by no means guaranteed that it will happen at all.
A Spotify playlist called “Edited (but still quite long) highlights from the Sufjan Stevens Christmas albums”
Mince pie with some weird crumbly stuff on top
✔️ Definitely ≥3 Z’s Zsa Zsa Gabor — Zsa (2 Z’s) + Zsa (2 Z’s) + Gabor (0) → 4 Z’s Zbigniew Brzezinski — U.S. National Security Advisor → 3 Z’s Zbigniew Preisner — Polish film composer → 3 Z’s Zbigniew Herbert — Polish poet → 3 Z’s Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (sometimes spelled Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, but variants with “Zulfiqar/Zulfizar/Zulfiqaar” can reach 3 Z’s, and “Benazir Bhutto” contains 2 of them) Zézé di Camargo — Brazilian singer → 3 Z’s Zezé Motta — Brazilian actress/singer → 3 Z’s
Poster for Force Majeure
Plays of tracks from each album
 *divided by the number of tracks on that album* 19.2 Lorde – Virgin 18.4 FKA twigs – Eusexua 17.4 Music of Tori and the Muses 15.2 Banks – Off With Her Head 14.1 Haim – I Quit 13.0 Ringdown – Lady on the Bike 11.2 Dj Koze – Music Can Hear Us 10.8 Mark Pritchard & Thom Yorke – Tall Tales 9.6 Oklou – Choke Enough 6.3 Clément Ducol & Camille – Emilia Pérez soundtrack
Michael Baum @MichaelBaum11 This morning I published a letter in the Times to illustrate paradigm shifts in science. After editing to fit the page it reads like I was the first to introduce adjuvant systemic chemotherapy. That honour goes to B.Fisher in Pittsburgh and G.Bonadonna in Milan
Top 10 Songs of 2025: 1. Blood Orange / Caroline Polachek / Lorde / Mustafa – Mind Loaded 2. Kangding Ray – Les Marches 3. Lorde – David 4. Raye – Where Is My Husband! 5. Haim – Everybody’s Trying to Figure Me Out 6. Jamie xx – Dream Night 7. Bon Iver – Everything Is Peaceful Love 8. Oklou – blade bird 9. Tame Impala – My Old Ways 10. Kanye West – Preacher Man
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_England_and_Wales_police_and_crime_commissioner_elections#Humberside_Police
The art-deco clock at the Hyde Park Picture House says it’s about five to nine.
I always feel like a bit of a fraud giving advice about revision and exams: I did my last set of important exams around the time that you were learning to walk, while you did your last set of important exams a few months ago! You’re the expert here, not me!
Tweet from Agnes Callard: 9yo: mama you DIDN'T throw out the halloween candy?!--- [background: we have a halloween tradition where after the kids go to bed, I throw all their candy in the garbage. The next morning, they are filled with rage.] ---thank you SO much!!! [hugs & kisses] Reader, I forgot.
(Jean-Pierre, who served for more than two years in her role, which consisted of defending the Administration to the press and explaining its policies, also blames the Democratic Party because it “couldn’t articulate the achievements of the Biden/Harris administration well enough.”)
* Mr Weebl, Badgers (2003) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIyixC9NsLI * HDCYT, Charlie bit my finger (2007) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OBlgSz8sSM * Paul Weedon, I Can’t Believe You’ve Done This (2007) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKbU8B-QVZk * WhispersRed, Binaural ASMR Ear Massage & Ear Brushing (2014) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-wKbUYNt60 * Integrate UK, #MyClitoris (2016) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fq6v-kIcG_Y * Charity Shop Sue (2019) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4vm6PRqbR9XBj5gfpq8ygw * Dr Nathan Robinson, Life Through A Sea Turtle's Eyes! (2019) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f41ekEDtHGY * Tom Scott, This Video Has X Views (2020) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxV14h0kFs0 * RNLI, The RNLI’s Seaside Safety Song (2021) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmSM_Caw7yw * Limmy, Some Scots can't say "purple burglar alarm" (2021) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AC__o1UxDl8 * Andy Holden, Cat-tharsis (2022) https://x.com/BFI/status/1953442125976055830 * Daily Star, Liz Truss lettuce (2022) * Norwich City Football Club (2023), Check in on those around you https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tX8TgVR33KM * Lucy Edwards, Asking Birmingham what they think I can't do as a blind person (2023) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNUUeBYJN64 * Food with Chetna, Mums Punjabi Kadhi (2023) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCwSepKafGg&t=4s * work by Jenn Nkiru https://x.com/BFI/status/1930593558311883200
As part of an effort to make The New Yorker’s archive more accessible to readers, this story was digitized by an automated process and may contain transcription errors.
Instagram post from @leedsfilmfest: Resurrection is the most popular film in the #LIFF2025 programme so far - screenings are almost entirely sold out!
Waterloo lake, Roundhay park, Leeds
Programme for Leeds International Film Festival 2025.
Me in a lecture pointing at something with my foot
“At 5.30 the next day Jamie arrived at my flat with his editorial colleague Nick Davies. (Mental health warning: there are two Nick Davies in this story. This one worked for Canongate; the second is a well-known reporter for the Guardian.)” From https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v36/n05/andrew-o-hagan/ghosting
"The cheap 12 inch sq. marble tiles behind speaker at UN always bothered me. I will replace with beautiful large marble slabs if they ask me."