scott b. weingart

😂 While I've written a bunch for popular audiences, this is very much Not That. It's a first-pass dry chronology of my great great grandpa, a Litvish rabbi with some truly strange accomplishments (like helping establish law among Jewish couples in India) about whom absolutely zero has been written.

the thing about quitting academia is apparently I did not quit academia

oops I just wrote a 4,000-word biography of a rabbi that died a hundred years ago that nobody will ever read

(I'll admit he did struggle with the fact that neither mom is always and exclusively Other Mom. But he also struggles with the fact that heart-shaped honey nut cheerios and circular ones are actually the same food, so don't read too much into it.)

Hello non-fiction writers of the internet!

If you or someone you know is feeling stuck, overwhelmed, or could use an outside reader, I still have some availability this spring for writing coaching and editing. ✨

You can learn more about working with me here:
halperta.com/categories/e...

I taught my toddler about Gay when we went to his friend's parents house and he asked which of the two women were his friend's mom and I said "both of them" and he said "okay."

Now that's some operator algebra!

So I'm gonna guess that's a 'no'?

Hey math friends: is the name of Richard Kadison (prominent operator algebra theorist beginning in the 1950s), or any of the things named after him, still well-known?

Some of you may be wondering: Scott, were you replaced by a 106-year-old Jewish man from Hester Street?

And the answer is no, I have always been this way, going to my local delicatessen to order a tongue sandwich with Cel-Ray soda.

Not a sandwich, but grape jelly omelettes are only for me.

There are good reasons for the redundancies and complexities of airplane cockpits, which focus attention where attention is needed. Not all model interfaces need that (there's a risk assessment), but the one-interface-fits-all approach prevents that thoughtful approach when it's needed.

They're successful for similar reasons to why casinos are successful, and damaging for the same reasons. New (more frictional) interfaces will make them worse, but would ideally help preserve strengths while minimizing harms.

Conversation is self-evidently one of the best interfaces we've ever invented, and that's precisely why to avoid it. It's successful because it taps into something we've trained a lifetime for, but what's underneath it is deceptively different. The design ought to clarify those differences.

Okay here's my recipes: docs.google.com/document/d/e...

If you want to keep it, download and print rather than bookmark it, as I'll probably take it offline at some point.

Yeah you don't want the schmaltz in the soup, you want it in the matzoh balls.

For a while health professionals did think schmaltz was very unhealthy, but that's been reevaluated (by my understanding on account the saturated fat balance). I think now folks say it's about as unhealthy as many other fats, and like those, fine in moderation (once in a while for matzoh ball soup).

Hey math friends: is the name of Richard Kadison (prominent operator algebra theorist beginning in the 1950s), or any of the things named after him, still well-known?

Hah, like so:

You can always order it online. But if you have trouble finding it, it's honestly pretty easy to just cook chicken skins down into schmaltz (if your butcher processes chickens they can get you some), or you can skim it off the top of homemade chicken stock left in the fridge overnight.

You'll find lots of great recipes. Almost none on them will include the key ingredient: schmaltz. Rendered chicken fat (rather than the suggested oil) will improve any recipe.

Also, lots of recipes cut corners, but you want to cook the matzoh balls in a separate pot of good chicken stock.

See

utppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.3...

and

www.jstor.org/stable/43955...

Even small platform/infrastructure changes can have unexpected effects on "the scholarly landscape."

Ice cream scoop with a label that says: "THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS: AI."

my new ice cream scoop and I are about to vibe code some cookies 'n cream

yeah the note about chemicals sadly gave it away =/

If there’s one thing I learned from Juicero, it’s that you could absolutely get millions in funding for an AI ice cream scoop startup.

Ice cream scoop with a label that says: "THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS: AI."

Open the ice cream pint, HAL.
...
I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.

Ice cream scoop with a label that says: "THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS: AI."

my new ice cream scoop and I are about to vibe code some cookies 'n cream

This passage has been stuck clearly in my memory since the first time I read it. Any time a modern remake doesn't make Holmes insufferable, I think about it (but most do a good job of making him insufferable).

Come work with me at the Library of Virginia in Richmond!

We're an awesome state library/archive with 100m+ items going back 400+ years.

Grant writer / donor comms ($50k-$55k): lvafoundation.org/grants-and-e...

Director of org excellence & assessment ($90k+): www.jobs.virginia.gov/jobs/directo...

End of an era. I've enjoyed so many First Monday publications over the years.

"First Monday is one of the first openly accessible peer review journals solely on the Internet, about the Internet. Indeed, First Monday was openly accessible well before formal definitions of open access appeared."