Pinboard (robertogreco) https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/public/ recent bookmarks from robertogreco Jerry's Map 2026-06-24T07:41:46+00:00 https://www.jerrysmap.com/ robertogreco maps mapping fiction jerrygretzinger obliquestrategies art brianeno henrydarger making imagination creativity rules systems systemsthinking games play gaming worldbuilding arts accretion persistence peoplemakegames lore change random randomness uncertainty unrest future disorder order cards carddecks productivity surpise mortality death collage diaries howwewrite writing memory generativeart generative https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:9099a592d543/ He Won’t Stop Building a Map to an Imaginary Place - YouTube 2026-06-24T07:40:50+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Is8N7B9b0GQ robertogreco jerrygretzinger maps mapping fiction obliquestrategies 2026 art brianeno henrydarger making imagination creativity rules systems systemsthinking games play gaming worldbuilding arts accretion persistence peoplemakegames lore change random randomness uncertainty unrest future disorder order cards carddecks productivity generativeart generative https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:6ac8c23a8f07/ 3 Apple Maps Alternatives That Can't Sell You Out - YouTube 2026-06-23T08:15:22+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1DNDGDYhgI robertogreco maps mapping apps ios android applemaps googlemaps osm openstreetmap magicearth osmand organicmaps https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:fd8468f5a07b/ Tolstoy and the Illusion of Inevitability | THR Web Features | Web Features | The Hedgehog Review 2026-06-17T10:22:04+00:00 https://hedgehogreview.com/web-features/thr/posts/tolstoy-and-the-illusion-of-inevitability robertogreco“Traveler, there is no road. The road is made by walking.” —Antonio Machado Machado’s famous line suggests that the future does not exist in advance, waiting to be discovered, but comes into being through a choice among possible actions. Many possibilities exist at any given moment. The one that becomes actual depends on coincidences and chances as well as choices, all producing events whose significance emerges only as they unfold. That, as it happens, is also Leo Tolstoy’s argument in War and Peace. In the book’s battle scenes, plans dissolve into confusion, causes multiply beyond reckoning, and outcomes hinge on fleeting, unrepeatable moments. On the eve of the Battle of Borodino, the novel’s hero, Prince Andrei, reflects that what lies ahead is not a determinate sequence but “a hundred million chances…decided on the instant.” What matters is less the perfection of a plan and more the ability to respond to what no plan could anticipate, by means of what Tolstoy calls “alertness.” For Tolstoy, this is a feature not of war alone but of reality in general. History, far from representing the execution of a grand design, is rather the result of countless interacting elements, each shaping and reshaping what can happen next. New possibilities are always emerging as earlier ones are left unrealized. Life more closely resembles an evolving system than a solved equation. Events are contingent in Aristotle’s sense of the term: They “can either be or not be.” After all, if things could only happen one way, human action would collapse into the mechanical execution of what was already implicit in the present. “If human life could be [entirely] governed by reason,” Tolstoy writes in the book’s epilogue, “the possibility of life is destroyed.” And yet again and again, in our aspiration to a hard science allowing for prediction, we are drawn to deny this. That is one reason War and Peace has never lost its relevance. The Recurring Dream of Certainty Since the scientific revolution, Western thought has repeatedly returned to the hope that contingency might be an illusion. As Newton explained the baffling complexities of planetary motion by four simple laws, perhaps, many imagined, the same could be done for human affairs. Thinkers as diverse as Marx, Skinner, and Malinowski have shared this dream, with each promising, in his own way, to reveal necessity beneath apparent disorder. Complexity, for such men, is conceived of as a surface phenomenon, concealing an underlying simplicity that, once uncovered, will render the future knowable. Pierre-Simon Laplace insisted that events are certain, not probable: In speaking of their probability, we are really speaking of the chances our guesses may be accurate, but the events themselves are certain. Time and again, the apparent contingency of events is presented as evidence of our own ignorance. If we knew enough, we would see that events could not have happened otherwise. But there is another possibility: that contingency is real—that the world is not merely complicated but fundamentally generative, that new possibilities are not simply revealed over time but produced within it, through the interaction of elements that cannot be fully anticipated in advance. This is the world Tolstoy describes, one where knowledge cannot precede action, only emerge through it. Time and the Limits of Foresight Tolstoy’s deepest insight concerns time itself. In a deterministic view, time is a neutral space where events unfold according to fixed laws and the future lies already implicit in the present, waiting to be revealed. But in Tolstoy’s world, time is generative. Each moment reshapes what can happen next. Possibilities interact, combine, and disappear, their significance becoming visible only as events unfold. One might say that the system is constantly generating variation—new configurations, new alignments, new opportunities—but without any overarching mechanism that selects among them in advance. Selection happens locally, in real time, through action. The closer one looks, the more things fail to simplify, as in the Newtonian model, and ramify instead. What happens to be taken up is what persists. This is why most Austrian and Russian generals in War and Peace are consistently wrong. They believe they possess a science of warfare—a system capable of anticipating outcomes. Before Austerlitz, they insist that “every contingency has been foreseen.” The result is Napoleon’s greatest victory—yet their confidence remains intact, attributing failure to imperfect execution, never to the limits of prediction itself. As so often happens, the conviction that events must conform to a science makes the supposed science unfalsifiable. The wisest general, Kutuzov, appreciates that people conceive only of a few possibilities while there are thousands. Famously, in the Council of War before Austerlitz, he advises not more planning but “a good night’s sleep.” What matters most is the alertness to seize opportunities that cannot be anticipated in advance. This distinction—between a world that can be mapped and one that must be navigated—extends beyond warfare. Wherever outcomes depend on unfolding interactions, local knowledge, and irreversible time, no complete science is possible. One can orient oneself, but one cannot blaze the path in advance. The Illusion of Inevitability If the future is open, why does the past so often appear inevitable? Tolstoy offers several answers, including what he calls “the law of retrospection.” Once events have occurred, we can reconstruct the paths that led to them. We identify signs that seem to foreshadow the outcome we now know. Alternatives fade from view—not because they were not real, but because they left no trace. The result is a powerful illusion: What happened begins to seem as if it had to happen. Tolstoy asks us to imagine a group of men hauling a log, all pulling in different directions. Wherever they happen to wind up, someone will say they planned to do so. This retrospective projection—which one of us has called backshadowing—reshapes our understanding of history. We look at earlier moments and conclude that the outcome was implicit all along. The more coherent the explanation, the easier it is to forget that things might have turned out otherwise. To avoid backshadowing, we must practice sideshadowing—recognizing that other outcomes, some of which we can imagine, were genuinely possible. That is just the insight that those who believe they have discovered a hard science allowing for prediction in the social world forget or deny. And yet they cannot foresee their own future. Tolstoy’s narrative resists this illusion by preserving the density of lived experience—the sense that at each moment multiple futures were genuinely possible. History, in this view, is not a line but a branching structure, most of whose branches vanish without record. AI and Narrative Certainty In the age of AI, this dream of certainty has taken a new and more persuasive form. Artificial intelligence can process vast datasets, identify patterns invisible to human perception, and generate explanations with remarkable coherence. Faced with such capabilities, it is tempting to believe that uncertainty can finally be overcome—that the future can be rendered legible in advance. But the deeper effect of AI lies in its ability to reorganize the past. Given sufficient data, AI systems can produce narratives that make outcomes appear coherent, even inevitable. They can identify correlations, reconstruct causal chains, and highlight what they regard as signs foreshadowing what followed. The result is not necessarily false, but it is selective. In this way, AI functions less as a predictor than as a powerful engine of narrative compression, reducing the apparent space of possibilities by presenting a single path as the path. What was once understood as a field of possible alternatives becomes retrospectively legible as an inevitable sequence, reducing many “futuribles” to one. The danger here lies in premature coherence, the sense that complexity has been resolved when it has only been reorganized into a persuasive form. A Compass Rather Than a Map Tools do more than extend thought; they reshape the environment in which thought occurs. AI, for instance, introduces a distinctive bias by generating what is statistically coherent, what resembles patterns derived from accumulated data. In an evolutionary system, what persists is not necessarily what is best in any absolute sense but what is most easily selected under prevailing conditions. AI changes those conditions in the intellectual world, lowering the cost of generating variations while subtly guiding selection toward what is already legible within its patterns. Over time, this can narrow the space of perceived possibilities by making them less visible, less accessible, less likely to be pursued. Certain forms of thought—those that resist simplification, that depend on sustained attention, or that emerge from direct engagement with the world—become comparatively fragile. What follows from Tolstoy’s ideas, on the other hand, is not that prediction is useless or that analysis should be abandoned, but rather that we must think in terms of a compass rather than a map. A map assumes a fixed terrain and a determinate path, while a compass provides direction without specifying the route. In a world of genuine contingency, only the latter is available. One can choose a bearing, but the path itself is discovered through movement. Orientation is not foresight. This is the force of Machado’s insight: The road is made by walking not because we lack information but because the path does not exist until it is created. To accept this is to adopt a different understanding of knowledge, not as a complete representation of what will happen, but as a capacity to respond intelligently to what does happen. It is inseparable from time, from attention, from the ability to recognize significance as it emerges. The impulse to eliminate contingency is understandable. Uncertainty is uncomfortable: It resists control and frustrates planning. But it is also what makes agency possible. A world in which everything could be predicted would be a world in which nothing could be otherwise. Action would lose its meaning, since outcomes would already be fixed. The openness of the future is not a defect in our knowledge, but a condition of human life. Artificial intelligence does not change this condition—but it can make us forget it. By rendering the past as if it had been inevitable, it invites us to imagine that the future is already written. Against this, one must insist on what Tolstoy and Machado understood in saying that the future remains unwritten, not because we have failed to compute it but because it does not yet exist."]]> tolstoy garysaulmorson julioottino antoniomachado fleeting alertness certainty uncertainty foresight prediction predictions contingency time variation selection local localism slow small complexity simplicity inevitability retrospection localknowledge knowledge irreverability science 2026 backshadowing sideshadowing coherence cohesion control human humanism planning plans narrativecompression future data ai artificialintelligence conditions possibility possibilities simplification orientation compass direction maps mapping liveexperience experience history action reason technocracy futuribles compasses canon humanness life living warandpeace bfskinner bronisławmalinowski karlmarx https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:9d990d00b4a4/ Apocalypse Early Warning System 2026-06-12T00:35:17+00:00 https://ews.kylemcdonald.net/ robertogreco maps mapping aviation apocalypse flight flights prediction privatejets kylemcdonald eattherich emergencies https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:49ba7ef0dec0/ Crumbling Land documents these shifting landscapes, tracing the transformation of communities displaced by climate migration, envisioning them as a new commons. 2026-06-04T03:42:52+00:00 https://www.crumbling.land/ robertogreco climatechange climate globalwarming migration climatemigration noahgotlib maps mapping property sovereignty northamerica us canada https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:5afcca0414b6/ The Making of the National Geographic: Science, Culture, and Expansionism on JSTOR 2026-06-03T20:01:10+00:00 https://www.jstor.org/stable/40643115 robertogrecoWhile professional geographers “struggled to secure even a small niche in the new American universities,” the Society “managed to grow by leaps and bounds in the early twentieth century.” The Spanish-American War (1898) transformed the magazine. It helped that a second generation of leadership came to the fore in the same period. After Hubbard’s death in 1897, his son-in-law, famous inventor Alexander Graham Bell, took charge. Together with his son-in-law, Gilbert H. Grosvenor, Bell pushed the Society towards a wider, nonspecialized membership and rode the imperialist wave. (Grosvenor was editor, president, and finally chairman during a tenure that lasted until 1966.) In 1905, the magazine started to run lots of pictures. By 1910, when the title of the publication became The National Geographic Magazine, fully half the contents were photographs. While professional geographers “struggled to secure even a small niche in the new American universities,” notes Schulten, the Society “managed to grow by leaps and bounds in the early twentieth century.” Monthly circulation reached 170,000 in 1913 and one million in 1926. Originally a private adjunct to the federal government, forging a direct connection between geographical knowledge and “the health of the nation itself, a precondition for vigorous nationalism,” the Society’s mission after the Spanish-American War was supercharged. The decisive American victory in that war resulted in a far-flung empire, from Cuba and Puerto Rico in the Caribbean to the Philippines and Guam in the Pacific. For the Society, writes Schulten:
The war […] gave the Geographic the exhilarating opportunity to cover international events and defend the nation’s goals abroad, while at the same time bringing the exotic and potentially enriching reaches of the new American orbit home to its readers. By taking advantage of the opportunity, the magazine’s scope was effectively enlarged to include not just geographical research, but also political and commercial issues that related to the nation’s new international posture.
Unmentioned in the magazine before the war, the newly annexed territories were all covered repeatedly afterward. The April 1905 issue on the “culture, politics, and resource wealth of the Philippines,” illustrated with 32 pages of photos, was “so popular it had to be returned to press to meet the demand.” (By then, the Philippine-American War—in which the United States employed torture, scorched earth, and concentration camps—had resulted in the crushing of an independent Philippines, although the Moro Rebellion continued until 1913.) In 1899, only three of the fourteen Society board members worked outside government. Without correspondents abroad, the magazine depended on information from government agencies. Maps either came directly from government sources or were modeled on those drawn by the War Department or Army Corps of Engineers. “In general,” writes Schulten, “the men behind the Geographic were eager to employ their skills in service to the state.” Needless to say, the American Anti-Imperialist League, with Mark Twain as its most prominent member, “found little sympathy” in the Society’s pages. Long before Time Inc.’s Henry Luce coined the term “American Century,” National Geographic Magazine was delivering it to millions of mailboxes. At its peak in the late 1980s, about 13 million subscribers received the magazine every month. With the decline of print in the digital era, the magazine—now majority owned by Disney—is no longer ubiquitous, but “National Geographic” remains a potent media brand. On Instagram, for instance, NatGeo is the third most popular non-celebrity account."]]> nationalgeographic 2000 photography susanschulten philippines imperialism empire us spanish-americanwar alexandergrahambell gilbertgrosvenor 1898 1905 cuba puertorico guam henryluce maps mapping 1899 mororebellion caribbean expansionism gardinergreenehubbard https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:7411a900feb3/ Pastmaps — Historical Maps Overlaid on the Modern World 2026-05-30T18:06:11+00:00 https://pastmaps.com/ robertogreco maps mapping history cartography gis https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:b52d6f76452d/ Of Media, Multiplicities and Monsters - Think Pieces 2026-04-26T07:59:17+00:00 https://thinkpieces-review.co.uk/2025/02/21/of-media-multiplicities-and-monsters/ robertogreco utastaiger 2025 cities maps mapping multiplicities polyphony chaos cartography micheldecerteau erikgustafgeijer urban urbanism visibility legibility hanscristiananderson place luiscernuda josephconrad london literature memory memories felixmendelssohn plasticity anandadevi alexanderherzen geography janejacobs keithhoggard endeltulving edwardcasey malcombradbury chrisitanjacob danieldefoe johnbrianharley peterturchi walterbenjamin frantonkiss jonthanraban javiermarías https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:c2996b9ec425/ Extrapolated Futures Archive 2026-04-22T03:49:17+00:00 https://urubos.github.io/efa-site/ robertogreco scific sciencefiction speculativefiction history books reference databases maps mapping stories https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:22feacc6e430/ Data Center Proposal Tracker 2026-04-17T05:28:14+00:00 https://trackdatacenters.com/ robertogreco datacenters maps mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:21153651afa3/ Organic Maps: Offline Hike, Bike, Trails and Navigation 2026-04-11T22:30:47+00:00 https://organicmaps.app/ robertogreco maps mapping osm openstreetmap offline ios android opensource onlinetoolkit organicmaps https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:97f7a9ae450a/ A Deeper Sense of Place is Like an Anchor in Turbulent Times | David Griesing | Work Life Reward Author | Philadelphia 2026-04-11T06:30:21+00:00 http://davidgriesing.com/2022/06/13/a-deeper-sense-of-place-is-like-an-anchor-in-turbulent-times/ robertogrecodavidgriesing rebeccasolnit 2022 wayfinding place orientation nature senses sensing memory richardpowers multispecies morethanhuman philadelphia animals whales humpbackwhales mro'connor indigeneity indigenous jamesgibson space time humans human navigation arctic aboriginal aboriginies australia technology gps brain cogntion maps mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:b053ffc81b5d/ There’s No Homunculus In Our Brain Who Guides Us - Nautilus 2026-04-11T05:49:34+00:00 https://nautil.us/theres-no-homunculus-in-our-brain-who-guides-us-237709 robertogreco mro'connor 2020 brain maps mapping cognitivemaps harryheft psychology knowledge environment hippocampus anthropology science navigation jamesgibson perception claudiusptolemy ptolemy timingold neuroscience howardeichenbaum ruthdalton memory community imagination language reasoning decisionmaking emotion place https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:cfa0eb18330e/ David Barrie - Supernavigators: The Wonders of How Animals Find their Way - 11:00 AM EST - YouTube 2026-04-10T02:03:13+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPA-PCN9k1U robertogreco 2022 davidbarrie nature animals morethanhuman multispecies wayfinding navigation wildlife biology maps mapping science franzdewaal migration https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:84777272c058/ The Pull of Primitive Navigation - The New Yorker | The New Yorker 2026-04-09T23:40:17+00:00 https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/finding-the-way-back-primitive-navigation robertogreco mro'connor 2015 wayfinding johnhuth weather gps maps mapping navigation senses sensory biology nature multidisciplinary multispecies mroethanhuman culture intelligence tristangooley pacificislanders marshallislands polynesia berbers higgsboson knowledge australia aborigines language stephenlevinson guuguyimithirr véroniquebohbot philosophy aboriginal indigenous indigeneity waysofsensing sensing place land location https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:78673c36978c/ M.R. O'Connor - Wayfinding: The Science and Mystery of How Humans Navigate the World - YouTube 2026-04-09T23:39:07+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brrGT5kIhqY robertogreco mro'connor wayfinding senses sensory multisensory navigation humans indigeneity indigenous 2022 brain neuroscience maps mapping time space memory place inuit nunuvut details memorization memories observation noticing oralhistory storytelling oraltradition imperialism colonialism colonization mobility knowledge culture cartography timingold sami erikliddell kellicarmean hippocampus childhood childhoodamnesia children spatiality sociology anthropology lost gettinglost exploration wandering orientation walking sauntering thoreau plasticity topophilia human presence canon cognition nature morethanhuman multispecies embodiment movement convenience orienteering spatialmemory henrymullison johno'keefe arctic solomonawa oukcholae australia billharney margaretkatherine thomasgridlock cognitivemapping self-determination songlines animals multidisciplinary transdisciplinary waysofsensing sensing land location bodies language https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:3ce2806954d9/ Affective Land: MADEYOULOOK & Kang Seung Lee on Memory and Mapping – KoozArch 2026-04-09T21:11:33+00:00 https://www.koozarch.com/interviews/searching-affective-land-madeyoulook-kang-seung-lee-on-memory-and-mapping robertogreco landscape mapping memory kangseunuglee moelmomoiloa naremokgotho everyday experience place memories narrative land invisibility visibility recognition maps https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:4b156475c97e/ Scrambling for maps – walk · listen · create 2026-03-24T20:48:51+00:00 https://walklistencreate.org/2026/03/24/scrambling-for-maps/ robertogreco maps mapping 2026 andrewstruck davidhaley lucyfurlong janettekerr emilyartinian art poetry photography storytelling sound history place landscape play https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:bd1f3e4d507a/ ‘We need messier maps’ | Chatham House – International Affairs Think Tank 2026-03-23T04:19:59+00:00 https://www.chathamhouse.org/publications/the-world-today/2026-03/we-need-messier-maps robertogreco maps mapping cartography borders williamrankin mikehiggins 2026 geopolitics greenland southchinasea china us https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:a33ddf78a243/ The Longest Line of Sight 2026-02-27T07:19:34+00:00 https://tombh.co.uk/longest-line-of-sight robertogreco visibility linofsight maps mapping india china kyrgyzstan himalayas ryanberger https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:da886608879c/ Automating Banishment: The Surveillance and Policing of Looted Land 2026-02-23T06:43:02+00:00 https://automatingbanishment.org/ robertogreco lapd police policing maps mapping displacement homelessness surveillance land via:javierarbona extraction banishment data losangeles freeradicals lawenforcement gentrification skidrow realestate urbanism urban cities palantir fusioncenters operationlaser predpol https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:bb46f7a6a306/ the OVERHEAR app 2026-02-16T08:19:03+00:00 https://theoverhear.app/ robertogreco ios android applications sound maps mapping audio https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:5ec57ca67407/ Urban Technology at University of Michigan week 288 2026-02-08T08:02:03+00:00 https://urbantechnology.substack.com/p/are-bikes-the-ultimate-urban-sensor robertogreco bikes biking sensors sensing 2026 bryanboyer mapping data brainrogers urban urbanism llms environment safety cities gopro maps https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:e1ec5af9356d/ Bookshelf: Fall 2025 | Book Reviews in Places Journal 2026-01-18T00:51:46+00:00 https://placesjournal.org/article/bookshelf-fall-2025/ robertogreco liskachan garethdoherty fieldwork slow time 2025 via:javierarbona method observation noticing landscape ethnography presentpractice presence katherinejenkins parkersutton michaelgeffel curiousmethods methods process seanburkholder karenlutsky gillianrose visuality donnaharaway situation walking lingering small local surveys maps mapping improvisation situatedknowledge vulnerability reciprocity positionality practice drawing climatecrisis https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:14affdc2e2fd/ Making maps at dusk: reflections on walking the Shrewsbury Skull – Walkspace 2026-01-18T00:36:35+00:00 https://walkspace.uk/2026/01/17/making-maps-at-dusk-reflections-on-walking-the-shrewsbury-skull/ robertogreco paulwakelam maps mapping walking 2026 shrewsburyskull https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:e7255fa5f1d3/ The Geography of Imagination: mapping the maps of Ursula Le Guin – KoozArch 2026-01-11T23:22:40+00:00 https://www.koozarch.com/library/geography-of-imagination-mapping-the-maps-of-ursula-le-guin robertogreco ursulaleguin maps cartography theoleguin worlding worldbuilding 2026 mapping ursulakleguin https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:9a4aa1e45cef/ The RSS Project: Mapping the Largest Far-Right Network in the World 2025-12-25T09:47:49+00:00 https://rssproject.caravanmagazine.in/ robertogreco hinduism rss india racism rashtriyaswayamsevaksangh farright rightwing data maps mapping via:javierarbona felixpal politicalscience https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:323068196fb3/ Palestinian Repairs - e-flux 2025-12-05T20:42:12+00:00 https://www.e-flux.com/architecture/palestinian-repairs robertogreco palestine gaza repair 2025 nickaxel emiliodistretti nikolaushirsch khaldun Bshara ranabarakat muneerelbaz dimasrouji samirharb yarasharif nassergolzari marionroberts cezarybednarski genocide grief endurance reconstruction memory gazacity eteladnan poetry colonialism colonization architecture maps libraries preservation apocalypse violence ruins refugees time archives history mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:d345adde6665/ Amid GPS and Ride-Hailing, the Allure of London’s Black Cab Endures - The New York Times 2025-11-27T05:53:30+00:00 https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/24/world/europe/london-black-cab-taxi-driving-test.html robertogreco maps mapping cities taxis blackcabs london navigation memorization 2025 theknowledge https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:9b0a9309a50f/ Map, Demap and Reroute | Humans 2025-11-22T00:18:12+00:00 https://vocal.media/humans/map-demap-and-reroute robertogreco paulconneally psychogeography 2025 maps mapping illegibility situationist guydebord remapping demapping splacistmanifestowalking https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:8403b080b734/ The Authoritarian Stack 2025-11-07T18:22:22+00:00 https://www.authoritarian-stack.info/ robertogreco authoritarianism democracy us europe visualization economics technofascism broligarchy oligarchy worldview technology surveillance fascism 2025 peterthiel sovereignty palantir governance government marcandreessen anduril spacex elonmusk davidsacks crypto cryptocurrencies oculus 1789capital luxcapital a16z andreessenhorowitz thielcapital alexkarp donaldtrumpjr jdvance foundersfund palmerluckey power siliconvalley imperialism statecapture michaelkrastios michaelobadal gregorybarbaccia clarkminor hhs shyamsankar usarmy army andrewbosworth meta openai kevinwell bobmcgrew military militarism weapons venturecapital infrastructure deregulation regulation ideology finance intelligence 8vc generalcatalyst privatization space energy money data maps mapping francescabria josébautista vc https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:5eed42564cc7/ Post by Viviane Schwarz (Viv Schwarz) @vivschwarz.bsky.social on Bluesky 2025-11-02T19:18:29+00:00 https://bsky.app/profile/vivschwarz.bsky.social/post/3m43jied7cs24 robertogreco vivschwarz books childhood children reading howweread 2025 maps recipes instructions howto adventure howwelearn learning dinosaurs microscopy microscopes education curiosity writing howwewrite magazines reality nonfiction vivianeschwarz libraries tutorials boardgames mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:3f31f2ea4cd2/ Xigagueta: A Vessel for Contemporary Art, Writing and Thinking – KoozArch 2025-10-26T19:13:13+00:00 https://www.koozarch.com/essays/xigagueta-a-vessel-for-contemporary-art-writing-and-thinking robertogreco art writing thinking languagae translation 2025 xigagueta howwethink howwewrite embodiment memory imagination creation reflection anthropology life righttolife humanrights evaposas nieuweinstituut nations nationswithoutastate statelessness state states 2018 research bodies objects territory binnizá diidxazá dormancy oaxaca tehuantepec mexico libraries chiapas miguelcovarrubias diegorivera indigeneity indigenous race mestizo society discrimination ikoots chinanteco zoque chontal ayuuk collectives ombeayiüts hegemony poetry narrative sublevation dellalvarado diegomatus anapalacios oraltradition language languages uniónhidalgo sierramadresur lagunasuperior chicapa esteroguié espiritusanto victorfuentes galeríagubidxa globalization local small textiles textilejustice belonging identity land crime extraction extractivism silence loneliness technology emancipation transgression isthmusoftehuentepec wisdom meaning meaningmaking zá fernandomagariño binnigula'sa guendaabiani' gabriellópezchi https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:6917f12868c1/ Field Notes: A Beginner’s Guide to Soundwalks | Bandcamp Daily 2025-10-24T04:27:19+00:00 https://daily.bandcamp.com/lists/soundwalks-album-guide robertogreco matthewblackwell 2025 soundwalks sound listening walking paulineoliveros rmurrayschafer soundscapes barrytruax johncage 1966 maxneyhaus nyc 1962 yokoono milanknižak 1965 maps mapping 1960s 1970s 1973 hildehardwesterkamp deeplistening vivcorringham terryfox craigshepard chriswatson andrewweathers katecarr anguscarlyle norway sápmi arcticcircle london northcarolina chapelhill valparaíso chile scottishhighlands alecfinlay 2005 aubervilliers france ernstkarel siegfriedsaerberg vancouver britishcolumbia history https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:fbb8dd973082/ Walking around (most of) the Bay - YouTube 2025-10-22T17:37:39+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MUSqkcd7n8 robertogreco walking attoparsec bayarea sanfrancisco via:subtopes 2025 infrastructure matthewdockrey fishdockrey cities urban urbanism maps mapping sidewalks osm openstreetmap https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:11c61e725c9a/ Spatial Computing - Laura Kurgan - GPS for the Brain: Cognitive Maps Revisited 2025-10-18T05:41:13+00:00 https://www.e-flux.com/architecture/spatial-computing/6782991/gps-for-the-brain-cognitive-maps-revisited robertogreco navigation gps laurakurgan 2025 maps mapping ai artificialintelligence memory brain biology technology cyborgs networks spatialcomputing computers computing computation cognition cognitivemapping ui ux architecture urbanism carlschoonove camillogogli santiagoramónycajal physiology may-brittmoser edvardmoser johno'keefe science consciousness neuroscience ricgharmeier macba barcelona fredricjameson illegibility cities sensemaking sensing kevinlynch postmodernism geoffreyhinton intelligences multipleintelligence imagination prediction creativity landmarks knowledge neuralnetoworks makingsense https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:f88577e378eb/ It Must Have Been Dark By Then - duncanspeakman.net 2025-10-15T05:15:55+00:00 https://duncanspeakman.net/catalogue/imhbdbt/ robertogreco location audio location-based via:javierarbona duncanspeakman 2017 books ebooks audiobooks experience place audioguides connection progress memory maps mapping environment listening latvia tunisia 2024 https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:9fd67a2192fd/ Tracing the World: On Radhika Subramaniam’s Footprint – walk · listen · create 2025-09-30T20:24:31+00:00 https://walklistencreate.org/2025/09/11/tracing-the-world-on-radhika-subramaniams-footprint/ robertogreco radhikasubramaniam babakfakhamzadeh 2025 walking history metaphor footprints politics alinear non-linear markleakey colonialism imperialism resistance memory ecology precarity lucylippard rebeccasolnit guydebord occupation capture extraction ethics care impact himalayas arnhemland monuments sidewalks paintings cartography maps mapping surveying tracking greed curiosity suppression lightness persistence mobility via:javierarbona nonlinear linearity https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:a3ecaed29000/ Beirut Urban Lab - City Debates 2025 - Recap and Recorded Proceedings 2025-09-24T15:09:48+00:00 https://beiruturbanlab.com/en/Details/2037 robertogreco cartography maps mapping via:javierarbona geography 2025 datavisualization data visualization scarcity borders https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:a72742debd3f/ List of public stairways - San Francisco Stairways 2025-09-20T21:35:15+00:00 https://www.sfstairways.com/stairways/ robertogreco stairways maps mapping sanfrancisco https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:24ea6307fc6d/ SF STAIRS | A map of the city's public stairways | Urban Hiker 2025-09-20T21:34:54+00:00 https://www.urbanhikersf.com/sfstairmap robertogreco sanfrancisco maps mapping stairs stairways https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:ca6e52c5e922/ Voices of Oakland 2025-09-19T16:29:07+00:00 https://linguistics.berkeley.edu/~kjohnson/VO/index.html robertogreco via:javierarbona oakland maps mapping linguistics experience ethnography school schooling friendship politics religion https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:95394f32681b/ High Resolutions: Catalina Mejía Moreno and Antonio Bermudéz Obregón on reclaiming language – KoozArch 2025-09-15T01:33:13+00:00 https://www.koozarch.com/interviews/high-resolutions-catalina-meja-moreno-and-antonio-bermudz-obregn-on-reclaiming-language robertogreco language maps mapping antioniobermudéz-obregón catalinamejíamoreno federicazambaletti koozarch colombia indigeneity indigenous place method vocabulary words reading howweread knowledge territory decolonization colonialism colonization legibility illegibility plants text texts bogas history landscape understanding glossaries collectivity collectivism generative friction action bodies cosmovision latinamerica dominance domination surveillance resolution https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:96303622b10c/ Navigating a City Without Street Addresses | Direcciones | The New Yorker Documentary - YouTube 2025-09-13T23:10:41+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxWfpBQvfLs robertogreco maps mapping 2025 navigation wayfinding maríaluisasantos carlonasisse addresses referencepoints cartography space time directions connection connections memory poetry nostalgia saudade place placememory legibility illegibility ghosts pain longing sadness mourning grief brain loneliness past existence generation travel monarchbutterflies butterflies canon costarica https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:6dae201ae8fb/ The Star Wars Galaxy | StarWars.com 2025-09-05T17:18:06+00:00 https://www.starwars.com/star-wars-galaxy-map robertogreco starwars movies cartography maps film mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:6c1c6e9b7939/ Hints from Japan's hillsides - by Sam Holden 2025-09-03T04:12:32+00:00 https://www.samholden.jp/p/hints-from-japans-hillsides robertogreco2024 samholden japan slopes hills cities urban urbanism landscape hillsides onomichi craigmod elevation walking tokyo shunyayoshimi kobe nagasaki hakodate atami yokohama kure yokosuka christopheralexander maps mapping topography shioyaproject shinjiishii culture https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:e96efe023639/ BirdWeather 2025-08-02T00:21:40+00:00 https://app.birdweather.com/ robertogreco birds audio data nature maps mapping morethanhuman multispecies science opendata https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:438f0cb93b94/ Map: California summers have warmed fastest in these areas 2025-07-25T02:53:58+00:00 https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2025/california-summer-warming/ robertogrecocalifornia globalwarming climate climatechange maps mapping summer jacklee us bayarea fresno sierras socal https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:959f0449117d/ Exporting the American Aesthetic: filming location maps of Los Angeles | Worlds Revealed 2025-07-18T22:33:01+00:00 https://blogs.loc.gov/maps/2025/07/exporting-the-american-aesthetic-filming-location-maps-of-los-angeles/ robertogrecomaps mapping losangeles 2025 meagansnow film filminglocations history hollywood https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:36171040a148/ Do you live in one of Bay Area’s oldest neighborhoods? Check this map 2025-07-14T23:54:51+00:00 https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/aging-neighborhood-map-survey-20761172.php robertogreco sanfrancisco maps mapping age aging democraphics 2025 bayarea marin marincounty alamedacounty contracostacounty sanmateocounty santaclaracounty https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:af84f7ff7727/ Mapping New York Chinatown | Reflective Urbanisms: 2025-07-12T00:00:53+00:00 https://nyc.reflective-urbanisms.com/ robertogreco maps mapping chinatown nyc architecture history cherylwing-ziwong manhattan https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:e94376c31802/ Poems about Places - Poetry Atlas 2025-07-09T20:00:18+00:00 http://www.poetryatlas.com/ robertogreco maps mapping poetry poems place geography https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:b0284a8999a7/ Medieval Murder Maps 2025-07-09T04:32:04+00:00 https://medievalmurdermap.co.uk/ robertogreco maps mapping medieval middleages history london york oxford https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:fad0f1e9c9a9/ Mapping “Indian Country” - JSTOR Daily 2025-06-13T17:31:38+00:00 https://daily.jstor.org/mapping-indian-country/ robertogreco maps mapping indigeneity indigenous 1800s liviagershon tribes territory race geography https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:241ebf914eb3/ Real-world maps are helping developers make games about trains and farms | The Verge 2025-05-27T00:16:40+00:00 https://www.theverge.com/games/672035/openstreetmap-data-games robertogreco maps mapping videogames osm openstreetmap 2025 jaycastello trains farms farming railroads rail railways games gaming gamedesign buses transit transportation publictransit agriculture https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:2ff43ba41f24/ The 5 best map and transit apps for travel outside the U.S. - Fast Company 2025-05-19T17:38:26+00:00 https://www.fastcompany.com/91324141/best-travel-transit-map-app-abroad-apple-google-maps-citymapper-moovit-rome2rio-naver robertogrecomaps mapping publictransit transportation mobility travel applications ios android transit googlemaps applemaps citymapper moovit navermap europe korea southkorea rome2rio transport https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:3f99e4896345/ Homing pigeons fly by the scent of forests and the song of mountains (Interconnected) 2025-05-09T19:39:27+00:00 https://interconnected.org/home/2025/05/08/pigeons robertogrecowithin a familiar area, pigeons navigate by relying on landscape features memorised during their previous homing flights. Beyond that… Forty years of olfactory navigation in birds (2013): "Forty years ago, Papi and colleagues discovered that anosmic pigeons cannot find their way home when released at unfamiliar locations." The paper covers clever experiments that factor out magnetic and other mechanisms, and there’s evidence for the olfactory hypothesis:
Pigeons housed in aviaries provided with clockwise or counter-clockwise deflectors, once released, displayed a corresponding deflection in initial orientation.
Homing pigeons do particularly well in the Mediterranean "characterised by an environment richer in natural odours than elsewhere due to its high biodiversity of plant species." Utterly fascinating to imagine what that smell-map is like:
the odour-based map does not have the structure of a map defined by a bicoordinate system, thereby giving the exact position and distance of two points with respect to each other. The olfactory map is supposed to provide information exclusively about the direction of displacement.
So homing pigeons don’t what3words themselves to a specific point but rather hot-and-cold themselves towards home. They also memorise the smell-trajectory on the way out:
odours perceived during transportation indeed constituted a source of positional information
(Although it’s not essential.)
stable ratios, rather than the absolute concentrations, of at least three different volatile compounds are sufficient
It takes a while to learn. Homing pigeon navigational ontogeny (2024): "Learning of an olfactory map occurs during the first months after fledging, when pigeons memorize the odours carried by winds blowing at their home loft in association with the wind’s direction." These are very dry statements. So there’s also Odors as navigational cues for pigeons (2020) talking about work in Tuscany:
Some of these compounds are emitted by trees, the pine fragrance one smells during a walk in the forest. Other pungent natural emissions come from the sea, while still further VOCs can be emitted from industry.
And what an insight into the world of a homing pigeon! Beyond the smell-map range? Beyond ~200km, at a continental scale? Homing pigeons listen to infrasound. Infrasound detection by the homing pigeon: A behavioral audiogram (1979):
Homing pigeons could detect extremely low frequency sounds (infrasounds) as low as 0.05 Hz in a sound isolation chamber. … Natural infrasounds come from many sources including weather patterns, topographic features, and ocean wave activity. Infrasounds propagate long distances and can be detected hundreds or even thousands of km away from their sources.
That is to say: "thunderstorms, magnetic storms, earthquakes, jet streams, mountain ranges, and rocket launchings" are all global landmarks for these birds. Homing pigeons listen to the song of mountains and the ocean swell. What a picture of our planet they have. Although homing pigeons don’t rely on it, other birds do indeed use the geomagnetic field. It’s in their eyes. How evolution has optimized the magnetic sensor in birds (2024):
magnetoreception is based on a complex quantum mechanical process that takes place in certain cells in the retinas of migratory birds.
It’s migratory birds specifically: "cryptochrome 4 is more sensitive in robins than in chickens and pigeons." Imagine being able to see an extra colour and that colour is north. I went through a period attempting to imagine my way into the umwelt of a dog, how dogs perceive the universe (2004): "You don’t smell a lion, you smell 70% of the likelihood of a lion – is it nearby in space, or in time?"
There is no cognition step between sense and act with smell. Smell is all about moving through the insides, through a field of intensities, of potential.
Whereas the world of vision, of surfaces, gives us room to think before acting. Learning about homing pigeons takes me right back to those thoughts."]]> mattwebb 2025 pigeons nature wildlife navigation geomagneticfields homingpigeons smell senses maps mapping wayfinding sound olfaction smellmaps infrasounds sounds weather magnetism sensors sensing https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:96cd370ccb15/ The Welikia Project 2025-05-08T19:24:22+00:00 https://www.welikia.org/map-explorer robertogreco nyc maps mapping ecology https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:743b36481816/ The Manifesto - Dark Mountain 2025-05-04T23:42:49+00:00 https://dark-mountain.net/about/manifesto/ robertogreco manifestos darkmountainproject myth resilience civilization poetry collapse dougaldhine paulkingsnorth darkmountain 2009 ralphwaldoemerson robinsonjeffers fragility josephconrad bertrandrussell politics karlmarx enlightenment christianity progress salvation history overdevelopment development environment sustainability socialbreakdown crime humanity humanism class convention individualism understanding existence climatechange climate globalwarming powerlessness technology slow small bubbles fossilfuels ecocide philiplarkin consumerism consumption capitalism greens greenparty ecosystems ecology denial johnberger transcendence relgion secularism science mysticism myths rationalism scientism stories storytelling reason rationality entertainment reality narrative uncivilization degrowth inhumanism writing howwewrite wendellberry wsmerwin maryoliver cormacmccarthy geoffdyer geoffreydyer maps mapping stoicism humility questioning criticalthinking williamwordsworth morethanhuman multispecies nonhuman place roots ide https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:7120cbc98bb3/ SFMTA | Ever wonder what 452 moving parts of the Bay Area look like in perfect sync? 🚍 This mesmerizing timelapse by Brian Greenlees animates 352... | Instagram 2025-05-01T01:21:20+00:00 https://www.instagram.com/reel/DJFw1m2TWLI/ robertogreco sfmta muni bart sanfrancisco publictransit maps 2025 briangreenlees googlemaps mapping timelapse buses trains davebrubeck https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:bc4bca0934ac/ Long-Range LA Metro Plans - YouTube 2025-04-30T18:03:53+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caskG8S8qww robertogreco losangeles metro publictransit nandert 2021 nickandert transportation maps mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:295e39673a29/ Toward an Ontology of Style - Journal #73 2025-04-30T06:46:53+00:00 https://www.e-flux.com/journal/73/52555/toward-an-ontology-of-style/ robertogreco giorgioagamben fernanddeligny philosophy ontology drifting maps mapping children entanglement drift https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:ef99b6fb8990/ Maps and Monsters: Why and how did sea monsters find their way into the art of cartography? — Maeve Silvia Mulligan Nolan 2025-04-27T22:46:58+00:00 https://www.maevenolan.com/blog-1/l59yz0t46py8xomm70jk7f4p54s42u robertogrecomaps mapping cartography beowulf monsters renaissance seamonsters medieval maevesisisilviamulligannolan https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:d883c6424a1c/ Israel Is Doing WHAT To Children? - YouTube 2025-04-25T04:42:48+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqXvc_wL8Xg robertogrecoisrael children gaza palestine warcrimes 2025 violence terrorism media mainstreammedia massmedia atrocities genocide dehumanization ethniccleansing westbank occupation settlercolonialism colonialism colonization impunity evil apartheid torture rape decapitation assassination brutality snipers lifeexpectancy starvation burial maps mapping erasure dispossession displacement hospitals electricity water sanitation housing scholasticide civilians canon icc icj donaldtrump benjaminnetanyahu yoavgallant internationallaw eastjerusalem iof idf west us europe eu https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:b60f72d9db88/ How Sonic DNA Connects Generations of Music 2025-04-19T04:59:52+00:00 https://pudding.cool/2025/04/music-dna/ robertogreco music history visualization datavis samples sampling audio 2025 timelines maps mapping https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:d49b20a89b13/ The Original Beaver Map & Its Legacy - Swann Galleries News 2025-04-13T18:43:59+00:00 https://www.swanngalleries.com/news/maps-and-atlases/2018/06/the-original-beaver-map/ robertogreco maps mapping beavers multispecies morethanhuman animals nature 2018 https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:aeba73be5e35/ Map - Al-Marsad - المرصد 2025-04-05T23:51:55+00:00 https://golan-marsad.org/category/map-en/ robertogreco maps mapping syria israel colonization settlercolonialism history golanheights water https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:ac79eefad03b/ What Can an Image Do? | Are.na Editorial 2025-04-04T04:48:47+00:00 https://www.are.na/editorial/what-can-an-image-do robertogreco2025 agnescameron maps mapping images imagery soil sensors symphosius erinsebo christianity creation religion culture literature aldhelm riddles puzzles öyvindfahlström satelliteimagery bellingcat light photography tayanhilir mining australia mines riotinto jakobstausholm environment ecology gaza stweartbrand situated situateknowledge knowledge donnaharaway google nasa lockheedmartin danielmurray westbank garyzhexizhang permaculture omartesdell gis stephengillmurphy childballads history web online internet wikipedia danielzargham knowledgecreation kevinbewersdorf michaelalexander localism lolaolufemi imaging present innocence jamesaber susanaber kansas cheyennebottoms multitemporal multispectral https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:dfd883b3ffcd/ United States Disappeared Tracker | Tableau Public 2025-04-02T01:16:33+00:00 https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/danielleharlow/viz/UnitedStatesDisappearedTracker/Map robertogrecomaps mapping us civilrights fascism government politics data law ice legal sanielleharlow immigration mccarthyism zionistmccarthyism freespeech firstamendment redscare freedomofspeech https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:67fc75018087/