meanderingexile

Chernobyl Control Systems

Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

//I never want to end up piloting a nuclear reactor.//

At some point in the past, I’d picked up the bit of trivia that the Chernobyl nuclear reactor had to be much more actively controlled than I realized leading up to the accident, with the human operators actively in the loop.

I recently became curious, and tracked down the source of that claim to an article, “How it was: an operator’s perspective”, from Nuclear Engineering International.

Rogue Traders

Sat, 03 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

//Shipping and swashbucklers//The Good Old Days//Opportunity in complexity//

I recently read The World For Sale, an investigation into commodities trading in the 20th century. While the whole book is a good read, the early chapters in particular are a ton of fun, following the swashbuckling post-WWII days where traders made fortunes with chutzpah and instinct.

I found it interesting to reflect a little on what factors made this first big boom of commodities trading possible: transport, communication, and opportunity. The most obvious one, and Farchy and Blas explicitly highlight, is networks of global transport. Shipping of bulk commodities goes back to antiquity, but only because truly possible at scale in the modern era.

The Golden Age of Mercenaries

Fri, 02 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

//Military enterprisers//the feudal and the federal//Putting pikemen on your credit card//

If there was a ever a time to be a mercenary, it was Renaissance Italy. The condottieri, or “contractors” were masters of the art: skilled at fighting, certainly, but also the art of waging war for profit, and living long enough to enjoy your rewards.

While the Italians embraced the system most fully - for a time, practically all of the Italian city states outsourced their military operations to privatized contrators - contractors were common throughout Europe in this period. These ranged from the famed Swiss pikemen, whose descendants still guard Leo XIV as we speak, to a range of French, German, and English mercenary outfits, what Fritz Redlich calls “military entrepreneurs”.

Apollo and Automation

Thu, 01 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

//the beginning of digital flight control//vibe astronautics//the human wants to be in the loop//

Mindell’s Digital Apollo is a great book, and not just for the space-obsessed. Spaceflight was intertwined with the development of cybernetics, modern control systems, and the digital computer. Re-reading it recently while recovering from an illness, I found certain themes especially resonant: specifically, the role of human beings in semi-automated systems, and the nature of human control.

Amateur Volcanology

Tue, 26 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

//two volcanoes, both alike in dignity (but not in violence)//lava-passata theory//the pacific rim//the big rip at Þingvellir//making sense of the world//

In the last year, I’ve passed close to a couple of volcanoes, one of which is known for exploding violently and killing people, and one of which is not. I decided to try to understand a little bit about why. Epistemic status: iffy. Trying to be correct, but not my area of expertise.

Reframing Anxiety

Tue, 26 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

I never thought of myself as an anxious person, but for a few years fear and anxiety became a pretty big part of my life. An increasing number of things became stressful, and I made an increasing number of decisions, big and small, to avoid those stressors. It wasn’t a great time.

There was a lot of stuff involved in digging out of that hole, but one thing that helped a ton was a bit of fortune-cookie wisdom off of Twitter: “sometimes fear is excitement in disguise”.