Philosophy on billpg industries™

Notes from a Helpful Glober — “Stationary”

Tue, 12 May 2026 16:50:32 +0000

Dear flat earthers,

You might not realise it, but I do genuinely want to help you. I grew up in an environment where you question everything and take no one’s word for it, so I understand the instinct. I am a glober, but I don’t think you’re stupid — I just think you’re wrong. But this isn’t about that.

I’ve noticed something in your messaging that could use a little clarification.

2001: A TV Series

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 17:47:38 +0000

What if 2001: A Space Odyssey was a TV series?

(If you’ve not seen the movie, Spoilers! Also none of this post will make any sense without knowing the movie. But mostly spoilers.)

Episode 1: The Signal

Cold Open

A silent, eerie shot of the buried lunar monolith, half‑revealed by excavation lights. No explanation. Cut to black.

Main Plot

Dr. Heywood Floyd travels to Space Station V amid growing secrecy and political tension. His briefing on the lunar discovery hints at something ancient and potentially dangerous.

"All files are numbers"

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 17:46:42 +0000

You hear this a lot. Someone wants to make a point about censorship, cryptography, or the futility of banning a particular blob of data. The argument goes like this: a file is just a sequence of 1s and 0s, and numbers are also sequences of 1s and 0s when written in binary. Therefore, banning a file is like banning a number. What next? Will the government outlaw 85?

It’s a neat rhetorical trick. But every time I see it, I wince just a little, because here’s the awkward truth…

The Short History of a Very Confused Plant Pot

Tue, 17 Mar 2026 20:25:39 +0000

Years ago, I was watching a feel‑good segment on the local news about a garden centre that had launched a recycling scheme for their used plastic plant pots. Customers were encouraged to bring back the empties once they’d transplanted their new purchases into the garden. A wholesome little initiative, I thought.

My warm glow lasted about thirty seconds.

In my head, those pots were being returned to the supplier, washed, de‑labelled, and stacked up ready for another round of seedlings. A simple loop. A sensible loop.

Gravity on a Flat Earth? Notes from a Helpful Glober.

Tue, 24 Feb 2026 20:52:43 +0000

Lately, I’ve been posting in flat earth social media, mostly asking why ships appear to sink behind the horizon when they sail away. Why? Because of XKCD number 386.

One thing I’ve noticed is the flat‑earther’s need to deny gravity. I’m not sure why because gravity is one of the easiest things to demonstrate. You drop something, it falls towards the ground instead of hanging in mid-air. That’s it.

Flat earthers seem to tie themselves in knots trying to replace gravity. They’ll invoke buoyancy without realising that it depends on gravity to work. They’ll invoke electrostatic forces which doesn’t depend on gravity but breaks down when you ask where the like-charges-repel effect has gone.

What's a kWh? (And other money-saving tips)

Fri, 09 Dec 2022 19:21:30 +0000

When I was at school, they taught us how electricity works only as part of science lessons. It was something future engineers might need, yet we all use electricity at home every day.

The problem with electricity is we’re a little bit separated from its cost. With cars, we fill up the car with fuel and pay for it right there and then. With electricity, we use many different appliances which all add up to an eye-watering bill at the end of the month.

You don't have to wear a blazer to school on a hot day!

Mon, 18 Jul 2022 16:57:13 +0000

Remember, if you’re going to school on a hot day, you can leave your blazer at home if it’s normally part of your uniform.

"When you say bronze doesn't need to be chipped, my questions is this, doesn't it?"

Teachers who insist that you wear a blazer on hot days can be ignored. They have a callous disregard for the discomfort caused by excess thick layers in hot weather and such callousness does not deserve respect.

What's a gallon?

Wed, 06 Feb 2019 23:16:00 +0000

A little while ago, I wrote a post on Facebook complaining that my new car’s fuel efficiency gauge was expressed in miles per gallon. “What’s a gallon?” I asked.

Over here in England, fuel has been sold by the litre for decades. Gallons are an archaic unit which no-one under 40 has ever had to deal with.

Unitary council

Two friends very helpfully commented with conversion rates. “3.78 litres in a gallon” said one friend. “4.54 litres in a gallon” said another. While both answers were significantly different, both my friends were equally quite correct.

Clever and totally pointless - my first publication

Fri, 24 Jun 2011 20:28:00 +0000

Way back in the early 90s, I subscribed to a magazine (think of it like a big website but printed on paper and sent through the post) called ‘PC Plus’. It included a section called “Wilf’s Programmers Workshop” where every month, Mr Wilf Hey would present a project (usually written in GW-Basic) and discuss the principles at work. It was here where I first managed to get something clever into print, except I didn’t do it quite right.

'First Past the Post' isn't.

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 22:03:00 +0000

I’m a bit of a nerd for vote counting systems. So I discovered with delight that in the UK, there will soon be a referendum on changing the way votes are counted. As I write this, most of the UK (and the USA) uses a method we call “First past the post”.

It’s called “First past the post”, but it isn’t. The name is about as ridiculous as calling North Korea; “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea”. The country is on the Korean peninsula, so at least that name is a little bit honest.

Google snooping WiFi? Don't panic! Don't panic!

Sat, 22 May 2010 21:40:00 +0000

Google have got into a bit of hot water when it emerged that while their cars drove around taking pictures for their Street View service, they collected and stored people’s private WiFi traffic. People have understandably got angry with Google for doing this, but I think some demystification is in order.

Did they collect my private data?

If your WiFi access point uses WPA with a good pass-key, don’t worry. Your network traffic is encrypted and is just noise without that pass-key.

Paying for Power

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 23:31:00 +0000

Being an evil genius, I’m obsessed with getting as much power as possible. If only I could get power for nothing, but alas, I have to pay for it.

In England, and most of the western world, we have a well established system of sending electricity from the power stations to me and sending money in the opposite direction. It works, but I think we can improve on it.

The Making of an Evil Genius

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 16:32:00 +0000

When I was around 9 or 10 years old, my school, as they would every year, put on a Christmas show. The younger children would re-enact the birth of Jesus of Nazareth and then the older children would perform a play. That year, we were performing Grimm’s Snow White.

I wasn’t performing on stage though. Instead, I was in charge of the music. We had a cassette of all the music and the children on stage would sing along. I would press play when its time to sing and after, position the cassette for the next song.