PicoBlog

Israel currently has two recognized systems of law operating side by side: civil and religious. Israeli religious courts possess the exclusive right to conduct and terminate marriages. There is no civil marriage or divorce in Israel, irrespective of one’s religious inclinations. All Muslims must marry and divorce in accordance with shariya laws, all Catholics in accordance with canon law, and all Jews in accordance with Torah law (halakhah). The interpretation and implementation of Torah law is in the hands of the Orthodox religious establishment, the only stream of Judaism that enjoys legal recognition in Israel.

When I was growing up, my dad made a rule that we were not to watch movies that had kissing in them. He didn’t want his children to grow up to kiss anyone before marriage, and he figured that keeping them from even witnessing an onscreen kiss would help to accomplish this goal. The only exception to the rule was if the actors kissing were married in rea… ncG1vNJzZmivn6Kur7vFr5ilp6JjwLau0q2YnKNemLyue89ooKxlmal6onnSoqVmrJ9iuKq%2F0maZnp6fp7JuucCrqaKZl5o%3D

Dress code: Acres of flammable polyester. Ambiance: Bright multicoloured lights, wooden walls with a ski chalet feel. Mojitos on tap. Merchandise: Branded teatowels, woollen hats and scarves, enamel cups. Audience median age: Late 50s. Audience energy: Fizzing with giddy anticipation. Welcome to Abba Voyage… I’ve had ‘write newsletter about Abba gig in London’ on my to-do list for a few weeks. It took a while to get to it for a few reasons, mostly last-stages work on the Aforementioned Big Project (news on that imminently, sorry for being a juicy dangler).

The other day, my literary agent texted me a photo of the Brooklyn Public Library. Its front entrance was adorned in unusual garb: Jay-Z’s lyrics. “I believe we may be at a surprise Jay-Z show,” my agent mused. That’s exactly what it was—and will continue to be through the fall—although perhaps not a “show” in the sense most observers might have expected.… ncG1vNJzZmiyn5yvrbvGZ6qumqOprqS3jZympmegZLa0ecmasGayXay8s7fIp55mp55irm66xLBkmqSSqro%3D

There’s a scene near the beginning of Killers of the Flower Moon that serves as an exercise in patience. Lily Gladstone’s character, Mollie, invites Leonardo DiCaprio’s Ernest, who is trying to win her heart and oil rights, inside for dinner. After she offers Ernest whiskey (the good kind), a storm erupts outside. Ernest gets up to close the window, but Mollie tells him to stop. “We need to be quiet for a while,” she tells him.

Is Linda Vista going to seed? Don’t worry, because “going to seed” is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, contrary to what you may think, “going to seed” could turn out to be a great opportunity for the community. This past Saturday afternoon a few local Linda Vista residents “went to seed” while getting together at the Bayside Community Center for a “Seed Starting Basics Class”. In the process, these residents learned quite a few things about planting seeds to grow micro-greens, as well as learning about the Seed Library maintained by Bayside’s Environmental Learning Center (BELC).

If you’re new to this Substack, one of the things I’m offering subscribers in 2023 is A Year with Jane. We’re reading through Austen’s six novels this year and Sense & Sensibility is our read for August and September. This is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. And psst! During September you can become a paid subscriber for 20% off for the next 12 months!

Three times a year the planet Mercury moonwalks across the galaxy to travel backwards. This regressive motion, known as the retrograde, returned on Friday and will persist until mid-May. If you’re someone who consults the stars or someone who consults TikTok’s For You Page, you likely have already been primed to be extra cautious during a Mercury retrograde. As Mercury rules language, intelligence, news, technology and memory, this season is conveniently offered as the scapegoat for why our communication is disrupted, why our emotions are in a funk and why the vibes are generally off.

Reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF) is one of the key reasons behind the success of LLMs such as ChatGPT. RLHF enables LLMs to follow user instructions and align their answers with user goals. However, RLHF has some fundamental challenges that reduce its efficiency and make it inaccessible to organizations with limited resources. SteerLM, a new technique developed by researchers at Nvidia, promises to solve the challenges of RLHF and provide better results at lower complexity.