¡Páguenme, asquerosos campesinos!

the-milk-eyed-mender:

Tweenbots by Kacie Kinzer:

Given their extreme vulnerability, the vastness of city space, the dangers posed by traffic, suspicion of terrorism, and the possibility that no one would be interested in helping a lost little robot, I initially conceived the Tweenbots as disposable creatures which were more likely to struggle and die in the city than to reach their destination. Because I built them with minimal technology, I had no way of tracking the Tweenbot’s progress, and so I set out on the first test with a video camera hidden in my purse. I placed the Tweenbot down on the sidewalk, and walked far enough away that I would not be observed as the Tweenbot––a smiling 10-inch tall cardboard missionary––bumped along towards his inevitable fate.

The results were unexpected. Over the course of the following months, throughout numerous missions, the Tweenbots were successful in rolling from their start point to their far-away destination assisted only by strangers. Every time the robot got caught under a park bench, ground futilely against a curb, or became trapped in a pothole, some passerby would always rescue it and send it toward its goal. Never once was a Tweenbot lost or damaged. Often, people would ignore the instructions to aim the Tweenbot in the “right” direction, if that direction meant sending the robot into a perilous situation. One man turned the robot back in the direction from which it had just come, saying out loud to the Tweenbot, “You can’t go that way, it’s toward the road.”

The Tweenbot’s unexpected presence in the city created an unfolding narrative that spoke not simply to the vastness of city space and to the journey of a human-assisted robot, but also to the power of a simple technological object to create a complex network powered by human intelligence and asynchronous interactions. But of more interest to me, was the fact that this ad-hoc crowdsourcing was driven primarily by human empathy for an anthropomorphized object. The journey the Tweenbots take each time they are released in the city becomes a story of people’s willingness to engage with a creature that mirrors human characteristics of vulnerability, of being lost, and of having intention without the means of achieving its goal alone. As each encounter with a helpful pedestrian takes the robot one step closer to attaining it’s destination, the significance of our random discoveries and individual actions accumulates into a story about a vast space made small by an even smaller robot.

Bowls very similar to this one have Slavic inscriptions that indicate they were made in northwestern Bulgaria in the 1570s, when the country was part of the Ottoman Empire. This bowl’s neutral imagery makes it uncertain whether it was used by Christians or Muslims. To a Christian, the peacocks on it would symbolize the garden of paradise; to a Muslim, they would allude to luxury and courtly pleasures.

Mapa del Mundo para 1489

mabelmoments:

Deep in the rainforests of the Indian state of Meghalaya lie some of the most extraordinary pieces of civil engineering in the world. Here, in the depths of the forest, bridges aren’t built - they’re grown. Ancient tree vines and roots stretch across rivers and streams, creating a solid latticework structure that appears too fantastical to be real. The Cherrapunji region is considered to be one of the wettest places on the planet and this is the reason behind the unusual bridges. With Cherrapunji receiving around 15 metres of rain per year, a normal wooden bridge would quickly rot. This is why, 500 years ago, locals began to guide roots and vines from the native Ficus Elastica rubber tree across rivers using hollow bamboo until they became rooted on the opposite side.

Piódão, Portugal

theworldwelivein:

Vue sur mer (by nalo.soul)

Megalithic Tomb, Achill Island, Co. Mayo, Ireland
Overlooking Keel & Keel Lake on the side of Slievemore.
“Megalithic Tombs on the South slopes of Slievemore date to around 4000BC.”

fuckyeahprettyplaces:

Tuscany, Italy.