Spot the Not #36 - Thomas Piketty

All of the following quotes from him are real except one. Can you Spot the Not?

1. My premise is not to tax to destroy the wealth of the wealthy; it's to increase the wealth of the bottom and the middle class.

2. I draw my inspiration from Sweden, not the Soviet Union. I have never advocated a centrally-planned economy.

3. I am not political. It is not my job. But I would be happy if politicians could read my work and draw some conclusions from it.

4. One way to have broader access to wealth is to reduce the tax on the large group and increase the tax on the very top so concentration of wealth doesn't get to extreme levels.

5. I loved American universities. In many ways, they are better organized - certainly than French universities.

6. To put it bluntly, the discipline of economics has yet to get over its childish passion for mathematics.

Thoughts on the aperiodic monotile and its application to cryptography

It's made up of 8 kite-shaped tiles. I haven't checked, but they seem to be non-cyclic quadrilaterals. Intriguingly, each kite shape is made up of 2 right triangles joined along the hypotenuse.

One could argue that the true monotile is the kite shape. It also would not surprise me if any non-cyclic quadrilateral made up of right triangles would also be a monotile.

Now imagine the tile above (or joined set of them) is laid on a grid. It would be easy enough to send a few sets of coordinates for the vertices to someone so they could verify with their own tile key that you are trustworthy. 

Verifying the coordinates of the vertices is easy, but reconstructing the key from that info is hard. It's the geometric equivalent of the integer factorization problem and thus represents a kind of one-way function. 

Furthermore, any right triangle can be divided into an arbitrary number of similar right triangles. By picking a set of similar right triangles and constructing a monotile pattern, one could make an infinite number of geometric keys, sort of like the way random numbers are used in one-time pad cryptography.

Another way to think of is like a prison steganography template, the kind with a few holes that when placed on a letter reveals the actual message while the rest of the text of the letter is just a distraction. 

 

Spot the Not #35 - Everyday Feminism headlines

All of the following are real except one. Can you Spot the Not?

1. 8 Signs Your Yoga Practice Is Culturally Appropriated- And Why It Matters

2. Yes, You Still Have Thin Privilege If You "Worked For" Your Body- Here's Why

3. Dear White America: You Are All Responsible For Trump

4. Why Owning a Gun is no Different Than Being in the KKK

5. 5 Rules for White People with Black Friends

6. 4 Reasons It's Oppressive to Discuss Gender and Sexuality Without Naming Race

Spot the Not #34 - deus sex machina

All of the following items are true except one. Can you Spot the Not?

1. The black stone inside the Kaaba in Mecca is seated inside a silver vagina sculpture.

2. A Shinto ritual involves attaching notes with pins to a giant wooden penis.

3. The medical condition of a painful, persistent erection is named after a Roman god depicted with an erection.

4. An Egyptian god known as the creator of all has his penis in his left hand and a flail in his right.

5. A Hindu god is depicted in the pose of auto-fellatio while also fisting an elephant.

6. This Aztec goddess of adultery and filth is depicted with a rainbow of "holy shit" around her mouth.

Spot the Not #33 - things that happened to me during basic training at Fort Sill

All of the following items are true except one. Can you Spot the Not?

1) a drill sgt tried to run me over with a bus

2) I was nicknamed "Mailman"

3) When I got my head shaved, I told the barber, "Just a little off the top"

4) I did 580 pushups in an hour

5) I got paid to watch a Kung Fu movie

6) I spent an hour outside in the wind and sleet with no hat or gloves

Spot the Not #32 - jihad song lyrics

All the following except one are real lyrics from jihad songs. Can you Spot the Not?

1. The rattle of spearheads is the melody of men

2. The clashing of swords is the song of the proud and the path of fighting is the path of life

3. And in war there is might and a return of dignity

4. We are men who love death more than you love your life

5. The Islamic State has risen by the blood of the righteous

6. To die for Allah is a beautiful thing and to fight in his cause is the greatest honor

Spot the Not #31 - former jobs of ISIS fighters

All of the following were the former jobs of ISIS fighters except one. Can you Spot the Not?

1. beekeeper

2. elementary school principal

3. perfume salesman

4. airline steward

5. Tunisian soldier

6. Starbucks barista