Break Time

Check out some of my previous work while I take a rest

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**Note that all articles referred to below have recently been edited to include my updated contact info.

Greetings to my cherished subscribers and readers—and welcome to my newest subscribers! After a long year of toiling, it is time to take a short break. I want to thank everyone who reads, comments, or likes my various posts. My reader base has grown substantially in recent months, with hundreds of subscribers and thousands of site visits each week. At a recent peak, I had just under 10,000 unique visits, which is remarkable! If you find my work interesting or compelling for whatever the reason, I urge you to share with others and consider subscribing if you currently are not. I receive a lot of emails and occasional social media comments on various subjects. Far fewer, however, like the posts here on Substack. If you enjoy a post, please hit that like button or drop a comment. It lets me know the topic is well-received and also helps introduce my work to more people through the Substack algorithm. The reason for this is not to profit—I don’t charge for anything. Rather, I do this because I love the intellectual exercise, and it becomes more enriching when it induces conversation with and among readers. What’s even more exciting to me is that my subscribers hail from 17 US states and 20 other countries. That alone is what makes the internet and this connective world so fascinating and fun. I would love to grow the diversity of that audience.

In an effort to complete something I have been working on for some time and, perhaps more importantly, to enjoy a few days’ rest, this will be my last post for about 7 to 15 days. In the hopes of providing some interesting items to keep you occupied, I am using this post to highlight ones that I wrote early on, that I really enjoyed, or that received a lot of attention that you may have missed. Before I start, note that my latest podcast episode is now on YouTube.

With the housekeeping handled, allow me to suggest some works.

Nepal

In one of my favorite pieces related to Nepal, Tammy Conti and I wrote about the street dog problem in Kathmandu. Tammy is a professional dog trainer in the United States; visit her Facebook page here. We discussed the general issues plaguing Kathmandu’s dogs—such as health afflictions and overpopulation—but we also provided some possible solutions based upon how organizations in other places have handled their own problem. Tammy did not contribute merely based on other world experience, she has witnessed firsthand the situation.

If you have never been to Nepal, but are considering going, I have also written a number of travel pieces to help guide you. These described trips to places like Dolakha, Pokhara, Pharping, Shivapuri, and Mulkot. For those currently in Nepal, I reviewed several businesses I patronized and like: The Backyard (restaurant) and Buddha Bar, Vajra Books, Sekuwa Bank (restaurant), The Little Kitchen (restaurant), and Le Patio (restaurant). If you visit any of them, tell them I sent you!

If it is the Himalayan Mountains themselves that interest you, check out my conversation with the man who has been to the top of the highest peak more times than anyone else by clicking the link below. Or, click here to read about the two authors who chronicled the lives of sherpas in their New York Times bestseller—Sherpa: Stories of Life and Death from the Forgotten Guardians of Everest.

Tech

As a tech enthusiast, instructor, and researcher, I pen many articles on tech topics. Choosing one to promote here turned out to be impossible. As such, let me introduce my favorite of them. First, as Artificial Intelligence continues to excite, intrigue, or strike fear in people, I think it is important to convey as much information as I can on the subject. In my article about whether AI is in fact intelligent at all, I wrote a detailed piece based upon what the genius Alan Turing thought of computers’ ability to ‘think.’ To begin that article, I articulated Turing’s views (offered back in the 1950s), then used them as a foundation for my own analysis of the current situation.

Related to that, I explored a method by which we might detect actual intelligence in AI, even perhaps within a Large Language Model (LLM). My overall thesis is that we need to first find what we might call an ‘emotional motivation’ behind an output made by such an LLM. If we do, we may then have discovered an intelligent AI.

There are other articles for you to look into if you really enjoy thought exercises related to AI. These cover AGI (Terminator-Level Intelligence), what venture capitalists say (and how they lie) about AI, releasing flawed AI, and a general explication on how AI works. If you like tech, but care less about AI, I provide several explanations of various tech operations, such as obfuscated malware code, fuzzy hashing, and how VPNs or QR codes work.

Law and Crime

Having spent a decade working in law enforcement, and possessing a Juris Doctor degree, I am acutely interested in how the law works, the philosophy behind it, and cases in which a person or entity violates it. Much of this area focuses on American law, but I think it is relevant nonetheless given its vast historical canon and its significant impact upon other jurisdictions across the globe. Perhaps my deepest exploration of this kind was of 2nd Amendment jurisprudence in the United States. Most people know that the USA has a serious gun problem (and associated murder problem). I believe that there exist obvious solutions, but such solutions continue to be rejected by certain Supreme Court justices and legislators, predicated on intellectually flimsy legal reasoning, bolstered by a culture of guns built almost entirely on myths.

Speaking of the Supreme Court, America has a judicial corruption problem with the rot starting right at the top. Around Thanksgiving of 2023, I tried a different writing style to highlight this abject corruption in a piece within which I used numerous quotes from Supreme Court cases and the Justices themselves. The title comes from a Shakespearean work. Justices themselves are wont to quote the famous bard, so it seemed an appropriate caption.

In comparison to the corruption of the highest court, the man formerly holding the highest office of the US executive branch (the presidency) is exponentially worse. This guy quite literally tried to overthrow the government through deception, fraud, and then violence. This is not a political viewpoint—no matter how much American media and his allies or supporters try to portray it as such—the facts speak for themselves. In two articles, I carefully laid out the conspiracy as it unfolded in two states: here and here. The article below describes how inadequately the American justice system has so far handled the commander-in-chief of this criminal conspiracy.

Aviation

During COVID, I attended flight school with the goal of eventually obtaining a pilot’s license. The aviation industry interests me so much because I find the technology supporting it to be among the most advanced in the world, and it exhibits the indelible ingenuity of humans who put science, engineering, and innovation above profits. For this reason, I explore incidents with both good and bad outcomes to introduce the reader to the complex, but fascinating world of flying. One of my most in-depth reports of this type deconstructed the Yeti Air crash in Nepal that occurred in January 2023. Sadly, that disaster resulted in the deaths of around 70 people, but it provided a prime example of how things work (and what leads them to failure).

Innovation seems no longer a priority over profit even in aviation, however, as illustrated by the myriad problems facing aerospace manufacturing and engineering giant Boeing. I grappled with this over two articles, here and here.

Aviation also gave me an opportunity to debunk a conspiracy theory, something I am perennially interested in doing. People believe in a lot of hokum for a variety of reasons—lack of education, the belief that they are “in the know” on something others are not, or simply out of a desire that something be different than it really is. Chemtrails, as some call them, represent a pointed example. The problem is that facts and logic simply do not support their widespread existence. Nonetheless, a lot of hucksters take people’s money by preying upon the mistaken belief that they do. With detailed knowledge of how piloting aircraft works, I explained why this particular conspiracy theory is simply ridiculous.

The Voynich Manuscript

As articulated in the first article of this series, the Voynich Manuscript is an intriguing historical work that emerged sometime in the early 15th century. What makes it such a center of attention is that no one yet has been able to figure out what it says. Backed by a rich history of scholarship focused upon unlocking its secrets, my fellow faculty and students at Softwarica College have endeavored to contribute to that scholarship, employing computer vision and narrow artificial intelligence. To understand the background and context of our work, start by clicking on this article. Subsequent articles in the series zero-in on the way in which researchers have sought to analyze the manuscript further.

Sustainability

Our ecosystem suffers from centuries of bad decisions, decisions that continue to proliferate because of patently corrupt, greedy folks who persist in downplaying the enormity of the problem. There remains plenty to feel dour about, but not everyone has succumbed to the idiocy of denialism or the depravity of promulgating it. In my sustainability section, I introduce the reader to three instances in which I had the honor of some personal interaction or involvement with people committed to improving the world by developing sustainable practices, educating others on them, and living by the concepts. Click below for the first in this series.

Commentary

While I generally avoid crafting strictly opinionated pieces, every once in a while certain happenings in the world compel me. When I do, I nonetheless provide as much factual evidence to support my views as possible. As in every article I post, supporting evidence is linked, discernible by the underlined text. Perhaps the most important opinion I have written so far was a strenuously documented outline of the policies and practices of the two current candidates for President of the United States. I highlight this piece because I know it had a profound effect. It is one of my most-read pieces. When I shared it with some people I know personally who harbor concrete opinions in opposition to mine, the strongest response I received was that the article was “insightful.” This tells me that even among some who are deeply “in the tank” for a certain candidate—meaning that they ardently support that candidate but for reasons they themselves cannot sufficiently articulate—the facts may yet matter in their electoral decisions. My goal is not to persuade them directly, but to educate them on the facts and why people like me hold the views that we do about either candidate. This is how rational discussion and sensible elections happen.

Science and Environment

By far my favorite category, science and environment encapsulates a wide variety of topics. I am intensely interested in maths and physics, and how they help make sense of this bizarre existence of ours. While I am fervently in pursuit of tackling our environmental crisis, I also recognize that many others are not. For this reason, I engage in many different topics that will interest others to elucidate how the scientific method works, what people mean when using the word science, and why it remains the only legitimate process we have as humans to understand our world and thereby solve its myriad problems. Not everyone needs to be a so-called environmentalist. But I do believe that if more people recognized that that much maligned word (by some)—science—simply describes the process by which we approach solving problems and mysteries, the world would function far more effectively and efficiently, it would benefit so many more people, and it would drastically reduce the severity of many of our current global maladies.

In any case, as an example, I enjoyed writing about whether humans will ever be able to invent a workable warp drive allowing us to travel among the stars. It provoked several conversations on Facebook and in my in-person life. I particularly loved learning that some of my colleagues find the concept fascinating and, even more enlightening, how much detail they knew about the subject. Many conversations were educative for me, one of the very goals that launched this Substack in the first place!

Another article that inspired considerable conversation was the one in which I questioned whether an intrinsic limitation exists on how much humans can know and comprehend. To set the foundation, I defined it as such:

“Know” here means to be aware of, but does not imply technical knowledge. As an example, most people know cryptography exists and for what it is generally used. This differs from “comprehend.” To comprehend means to grasp the fundamental principles behind a thing we know. Returning to cryptography, then, we know it exists and what it is used for (protecting our data on the internet or coding military messages), but we also comprehend how it works. On the latter, comprehending requires understanding the mathematical and programmatic principles necessary to implement cryptography in some real-world application.

From there, I pondered the question of whether it is possible that there are simply things humans cannot know. If we can potentially know everything, can we also understand it all?

One trend of articles also led to several email comments on each. I wrote about the Champawat Tigress and a few other big cats who earned a reputation for killing humans. It turned out that humans may have been the underlying cause for the cats’ behavior in the first place, having injured them to where they were forced to change their prey choices from more difficult larger animals, to the softer and weaker people. In another, I introduced Port and Starboard, two Orcas with a savage preference for murdering sharks. Orcas—also known as Killer Whales—are among the most intelligent creatures on Earth. So, when they make decisions to engage in unusual activity, it garners great attention. These two killing partners captured a lot of local fame when they took their brutality to such levels that it literally changed shark population numbers and feeding habits in the adjacent waterways for a very long time, possibly decades!

Finally

My most important work to date has been read by at least twice as many people as any other article I have written so far. In fact, the engagement with this piece has been so profound, that it still grows faster in unique reader numbers than any other except on the specific days I post something new. That’s a remarkable metric, considering I wrote it back in August of 2023. So, which one was it?

With perhaps the largest sum of wealth of any one person at his disposal, Elon Musk has crafted a robust narrative that paints him as an innovative genius. He heads companies of public fanfare—SpaceX, Tesla, and Twitter/X are the most well-known—and he often talks of colonizing Mars. The problem with this story, and his fans who eat it up, is that it is provably false. Musk exhibits no extraordinary comprehension about anything, despite his emphatic declarations otherwise. He regular reveals he lacks any moral character. And, most importantly, a careful look at the true history behind this figure proves that he is, plain and simply, an inveterate fraud. The more realistic conclusion one should draw about this guy is that he belongs in jail. And, if he were any other person, especially a less wealthy one, he would already be there. But one need not take my word for it. Read the article and then, if you disagree, offer the compelling counterargument. After thousands upon thousands of reads, not a single person has even attempted to proffer one yet.

Thanks again to all of my readers, and especially to my subscribers. I look forward to dropping my next post after my brief interlude of mental and physical recharging. Coming up, I plan to return to some conversations about AI. I am working on drafting a proposal for a full regulatory framework that will enable innovation while diminishing the harms that continue to plague the technology. I also have a piece on the way inspired by some of my favorite astrophysics and astronomy professors, David Kipping, Brian Cox, and Neil deGrasse Tyson. It explores the (seemingly strange) intersection of black holes, AI, information, and being ‘alive’ or sentient. Visit Professor Kipping’s excellent YouTube Channel, Cool Worlds, here; Cox’s conversation with Jeff Forshaw here, and Tyson’s StarTalk here. In addition, Softwarica student Suraj Raj Yadav and I have a new piece in progress on a mobile application designed as a public service. Specifically, we illustrate how such an application can be developed with enhanced accessibility to people of varying disabilities to ensure it assists the whole public, not just the fully-abled segment of it. See our previous piece on the History of Human-Computer Interaction here. And more remains in the developmental process still!

Thank you all again. Go forward with an open mind and open heart. Find the wonder in the world that lives between the waves of noise. We all will be better for it.

With love and respect, Rob.

Click below to read more about me.

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I am a Certified Forensic Computer Examiner, Certified Crime Analyst, Certified Fraud Examiner, and Certified Financial Crimes Investigator with a Juris Doctor and a Master’s degree in history. I spent 10 years working in the New York State Division of Criminal Justice as Senior Analyst and Investigator. Today, I teach Cybersecurity, Ethical Hacking, and Digital Forensics at Softwarica College of IT and E-Commerce in Nepal. In addition, I offer training on Financial Crime Prevention and Investigation. I am also Vice President of Digi Technology in Nepal, for which I have also created its sister company in the USA, Digi Technology America, LLC. We provide technology solutions for businesses or individuals, including cybersecurity, all across the globe. I was a firefighter before I joined law enforcement and now I currently run a non-profit that uses mobile applications and other technologies to create Early Alert Systems for natural disasters for people living in remote or poor areas.