Experimental History

Pakistan have opened their home T20 season against Sri Lanka at Rawalpindi with a new captain and an experimental line-up. Salman Farhan expressed hope the new combination takes off, while Sri Lanka's Lahiru Udara hit a brilliant 91 in the first T20I. Pakistani media also made history references and debated whether the side needs a system rather than constant experimentation.

A roundup of twelve of the strangest gadgets invented during the 1970s is drawing attention online. The piece revisits odd consumer technology from the decade, highlighting how experimental and unusual product design was at the time. Readers are sharing it as nostalgic, entertaining trivia about tech history and the strange ideas companies once brought to market.

Dolly, the sheep famously cloned from an adult cell in 1996, is presented at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, where her remains have long been on public display. A science history discussion is asking people to share other museum exhibitions featuring animals used in scientific research and experimentation, inviting examples from around the world.

A listener is sharing the music they turned to roughly a month after hearing Everywhere at the End of Time, The Caretaker's six-part series depicting dementia through degraded ballroom-era records. The accompanying video is heavily glitched and flickering, and the poster warns viewers with a history of epilepsy to take care. The material sits in experimental, glitch and minimal techno territory.

A feature explores the unlikely roots of the internet, arguing that 1960s counterculture, psychedelic experimentation and early hacking communities shaped the personal computing and network technologies that followed. It highlights how figures tied to the era's drug culture helped drive ideals of open information and decentralized computing that defined the early web, drawing fresh attention to the movement's overlooked role in tech history.

An essay on Experimental History argues that the popular 'ideas are getting harder to find' thesis is wrong, framing believers in the idea-decline narrative as cowards. The piece challenges claims that scientific and technological progress is slowing because low-hanging fruit has been exhausted, and it is drawing attention and debate on Hacker News.

Victor Sebestyen has published a new book, 'Weimar Germany,' examined in a review by The New York Times. The work revisits the short-lived German republic of 1919–1933, its cultural experimentation and political instability, and the conditions that led to its collapse. Reviews of new histories of the era tend to attract attention amid ongoing debates about democracy's fragility and echoes of the period in current politics.

Guillaume Amontons, the French physicist and inventor of scientific instruments, died on this day in 1705. He is remembered as one of the pioneers in the study of friction, laying early groundwork for what became known as Amontons' laws. Posts marking the anniversary also point readers to the history of electricity in France, where his work fits into the broader story of early experimental science.

Enthusiasts are discussing an experimental VTOL aircraft concept inspired by the Doak VZ-4, the 1950s American tilt-duct research aircraft. The Doak VZ-4 was built for the US Army and NASA to test vertical takeoff and landing using tilting ducted fans. Aviation history buffs are revisiting this obscure aircraft, with some commenters skeptical about its practicality.

Adam Mastroianni, writing on his Experimental History blog, argues that the influential claim that scientific and technological ideas are getting harder to find is wrong, and he does so in characteristically combative style, saying anyone claiming otherwise is a coward. The piece challenges a widely cited view among economists and tech commentators who blame slowing innovation on exhausted 'low-hanging fruit'.