Ken's Blog

Many years ago I paid a visit to Apple Research Labs, back when they had a computer graphics research group. One of the people in that group was the late great Lance Williams.

At some point he and I both watched in bemusement as several people in the group got into a heated discussion about some arcane technical point. I could tell that Lance thought the whole topic was a waste of time, but he was too polite to say so.

Finally one of the people, exasperated by all the arguing over little details that probably didn’t really matter, said in frustration “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?”

Finally Lance spoke up. In a calm measured voice he said “It’s been well established that the egg came long before the chicken.”

That seemed to be the one thing everyone could agree about.

Tomorrow I am facing a big deadline. I hate deadlines. In fact, there are a few things I hate more in this world than deadlines.

But I love how much I get done when I am pushed to do so by a deadline. Some of my best work was only accomplished because, you guessed it, deadlines.

I guess you could call it a love-hate relationship.

I recently bought a wonderful little cup from a local craftsman in Seoul Korea. Its texture reminded me of my noise function. I keep it at the lab and use it for my daily espresso. Today I brought an avocado to the lab, and was struck by the similarity of the texture between cup and avocado. I took a photo, which you can see here.

It seems that noise is everywhere. Maybe it’s trying to tell us something.

Every once in a while, somebody says something in public that absolutely nails an important truth — one that actually matters. It doesn’t happen very often, but when it does, it is breathtaking.

This video by Ezra Klein is a beautiful example of that. Many of us had already understood what he is saying to be true, but it required a person of his talents to articulate it so perfectly.

Maybe there is hope for us after all.

I am working with my students on a research proposal to the National Science Foundation. The general idea of what we are up to is a sort of mixed-reality equivalent of Google Docs. Except instead of the shared “document” being just on everyone’s screen, it can also be in your physical space.

All of this would be using technology that doesn’t quite exist yet in the form that we’d like. But that’s why it’s research. 🙂

Google Docs is indeed a powerful tool for collaboration, and I don’t think we could be collaborating as well if we didn’t have it. And yet here we are, proposing to create something which may end up supplanting it in some ways.

I think that’s the way it is with tools. You use the best tools you can get your hands on, and sometimes you use them to make even better tools.

In a way you are building a kind of ladder of tools. You may eventually jump to those new tools, and abandon the old ones. But that is not a sign that those older tools have failed. It’s a sign that they have succeeded.

I wonder how long it took most people in Germany in the 1930s to catch on to what was actually going on with their charismatic leader, Mr. Hitler. I’m sure a lot of people did not want to let go of the idea they had of an effective leader who was not afraid to move fast and break things in order to make Germany great again.

How hot does that pot on the stove need to get before the frog realizes that it’s time to jump? And by the time the frog finally figures that out, is it already too late?

I love the entire idea of modeling with implicit surfaces. Instead of building things in computer graphics piece by piece, you can describe many organic looking shapes just by blending together simpler shapes.

Just for fun, I put together a simple demo of this. Behind the scenes it is actually a blend of three simple ellipsoids, but what you end up seeing is an organic and ever changing shape that feels like some sort of living creature.

Just one of the many reasons that I love computer graphics.

It used to be that when you tried to recall the names of the five Great Lakes, you might resort to a mnemonic. Maybe something like H.O.M.E.S. (for Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior).

Or perhaps you would use a sentence like “Super Man Helps Every One.” Or maybe you would just give up and look it up on a map.

But now, thanks to the wisdom of our Supreme Leader, we don’t need to do any of that. The new naming convention is super easy to remember, as you can see from this official White House map:

And just in case you still need an acronym, here’s a handy-dandy mnemonic that seems to fit the mood: “Arrgh arrgh arrgh arrgh aaaarrrggghhh!”

The tools you use shape what you do. Clearly having access to a screwdriver, or to a programming language, allows you to do things that you couldn’t otherwise do.

But those tools also shape what you want to do. In your mind, having the right powerful tool brings something into the realm of possibility.

And so there is this wonderful cycle: We refine our tools, and then they refine us. And we then use those tools to build the next level of powerful tools.

There might be a break in this pattern with our increasing reliance on A.I. Because A.I. is presented to us as pretty much a black box (unlike a screwdriver or a programming language), it may not be giving us the right kind of working knowledge that we need to make new and better tools.

Still, it is possible that our continual use of A.I. will end up — in the long run — giving us new kinds of skills that are not yet understood. In that case, our species’ wonderful power of toolmaking may end up taking an odd turn or two, but it will probably continue.

When I was a child there was a TV jingle that every kid in America knew by heart:

Hot Dogs, Armour Hot Dogs,
What kind of kids eat Armour Hot Dogs?
Fat kids, skinny kids, kids who climb on rocks,
Tough kids, sissy kids, even kids with chicken pox
Love Hot Dogs, Armour Hot Dogs.
The dogs kids love to bite!

I’ve been struck by the negative tone of the few on-line articles about this jingle, which was written by the prolific Clay Warnick in 1967. All of those articles — as well as many YouTube comments — focus on the claim that you could not air this jingle today.

One such article states “They certainly couldn’t air this commercial nowadays. We are so easily offended.” Another article says “There’s no way this article could pass muster in today’s times.”

And yet, this song is the very definition of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. It’s not making fun of anybody. Rather, it is cheerfully inviting everyone to the party.

As those song lyrics show, the spirit of DEI is, fundamentally, the spirit of freedom. Are people today really so Slept that they can no longer see a genuine invitation to wake up and have some fun?