Adapting to a Collapse

I've made no secret here that I think that our technological civilization is headed for a collapse sometime around the middle of this century if not sooner (see the ongoing We're Toast topic on this blog). What will emerge from that collapse is an open question. I don't think the human race is doomed but I don't see how our current level of resource consumption can be sustained. Which means what?

That question and others are discussed in a new book. A Darwinian Survival Guide: Hope for the Twenty-First Century by Daniel R. Brooks and Salvatore J. Agosta. SF author and biologist Peter Watts interviewed Brooks and their conversation was published on the MIT Press blog. It makes for fascinating, if somewhat grim, reading. 

For example:

Daniel Brooks: Well, the primary thing that we have to understand or internalize is that what we’re dealing with is what is called a no-technological-solution problem. In other words, technology is not going to save us, real or imaginary. We have to change our behavior. If we change our behavior, we have sufficient technology to save ourselves. If we don’t change our behavior, we are unlikely to come up with a magical technological fix to compensate for our bad behavior. This is why Sal and I have adopted a position that we should not be talking about sustainability, but about survival, in terms of humanity’s future. Sustainability has come to mean, what kind of technological fixes can we come up with that will allow us to continue to do business as usual without paying a penalty for it? As evolutionary biologists, we understand that all actions carry biological consequences. We know that relying on indefinite growth or uncontrolled growth is unsustainable in the long term, but that’s the behavior we’re seeing now.

And: 

 Peter Watts: So to be clear, you’re not talking about forestalling the collapse —

Daniel Brooks: No.

Peter Watts: — you’re talking about passing through that bottleneck and coming out the other side with some semblance of what we value intact.

Daniel Brooks: Yeah, that’s right. It is conceivable that if all of humanity suddenly decided to change its behavior, right now, we would emerge after 2050 with most everything intact, and we would be “OK.” We don’t think that’s realistic. It is a possibility, but we don’t think that’s a realistic possibility. We think that, in fact, most of humanity is committed to business as usual, and that’s what we’re really talking about: What can we begin doing now to try to shorten the period of time after the collapse, before we “recover”? In other words — and this is in analogy with Asimov’s Foundation trilogy — if we do nothing, there’s going to be a collapse and it’ll take 30,000 years for the galaxy to recover. But if we start doing things now, then it maybe only takes 1,000 years to recover. So using that analogy, what can some human beings start to do now that would shorten the period of time necessary to recover? Could we, in fact, recover within a generation? Could we be without a global internet for 20 years, but within 20 years, could we have a global internet back again?

I have not read the book yet but I do have a copy on reserve from the library and I am looking forward to reading it.

I will also recommend, highly, that you read Peter Watt's novels and his blog. 

Featured Links - May 27, 2024

Links to things I found interesting but didn't want to do a full blog post about.

Flower basket

• The Dawn of the Hypercane. "Category 6 hurricanes are here and more are coming."
• Indian Voters Are Being Bombarded With Millions of Deepfakes. Political Candidates Approve. "India’s elections are a glimpse of the AI-driven future of democracy. Politicians are using audio and video deepfakes of themselves to reach voters—who may have no idea they’ve been talking to a clone."
• New study provides the "definitive answer on masks." They work. "In case you still have the patience to try to convince a mask skeptic—or even a rabid anti-masker—that masks *do* actually work, here's a great, brand-new, peer-reviewed study to share with them. The paper, which is based on a narrative review and meta-analysis research project, was written by an international team of 13 researchers from universities including University of Oxford (UK), University of New South Wales (Sydney, Australia), University of Toronto (Canada), University of Otago (Wellington, New Zealand), and University of Calgary (Alberta, Canada)." Nancy and I are still masking in most public indoor situations and we are still COVID-free. 
• Government report warns of dire disruptions coming in the next decade. "The report details things like ecosystem collapse and AI running wild, and even the possibility of world war."
• In Hamilton, film photography is having a comeback. "New film drop box at a Hamilton shop is filling an analogue need in a digital world." I don't think I would be interested in trying film again unless I could get a used medium-format camera (like the Pentax 6x7) cheap. 

Photo of the Week - May 26, 2024

This week's post is of some spring flowers in Alex Robertson Park, taken with my Fujifilm X-S10 and adjusted slightly in Lightroom to correct an accidental overexposure.

Fujifilm X-S10 with 27 mm. F2.8 WR at F4. 1/800 second, ISO 640, Velvia film simulation

 

Saturday Sounds - Little Feat - Sam's Place

This week's musical treat is the latest album from Little Feat, a band that's been around since the 1970s and who I managed to see once in 1988 and very much enjoyed. Sam's Place is their first album of original material in more than a decade. Although there's only one founding member left in the group, they still manage to carry on the band's tradition of beat heavy Southern swamp rock. The live version of "Got My Mojo Working" that closes the album shows that they can still kick ass in concert. Enjoy.

The Right Are Planning a Reich and They're Not Hiding It

So we have Trump calling for a "Unified Reich" (the post on his Truth Social has been taken down, but he still said it) and the far right developing a detailed plan to turn the US into an autocratic tyranny. They're not hiding what they want to do and if you are not white, cis male, well off, and Christian, you should be very afraid. 

Look anywhere in the “Project 2025” report, and what you’ll find is visceral disdain for any kind of pluralism and diversity channeled into a policy agenda aiming to extinguish it. “Mandate for Leadership” talks about “eliminating politicization” only to then present the whole laundry list of rightwing culture war grievances. DEI! CRT! Trans people! It is a policy agenda entirely fueled by the desire to take over government in order to make sure that it can’t act as an engine of egalitarian pluralism, and instead turn it into a tool to impose an extreme, reactionary vision on the entire country. 

And just to add spice to the pot, the leader of the "Progressive" Conservative party in Canada is a mini-Trump populist who wants to ban abortion and defund the CBC, and we have extreme conservatives in power in Alberta and Saskatchewan. Our own DoFo (aka Doug Ford) in Ontario is a milquetoast compared to Alberta's Danielle Smith.

Given that Canadian political trends tend to lag those in the US by five years or so, we could be in for a rough ride here in Canada too.

A Bad Hurricane Season May Be Coming

Fair warning to any of my friends who are living the Southern US, along the Atlantic coast, or in the Caribbean. This could be a very bad year for hurricanes. The climatologists are worried, maybe even scared. "Whether hurricane season lives up to this year’s hype is to be seen, but with 90% of the tropical belt immersed in record or near record warm waters, the Atlantic powder keg awaits its first spark."

The article cites several reasons for the worry:

• There is record ocean heat in both the Atlantic and Caribbean.
• South Florida is feeling record heat.
• If the heat persists, rapid intensification could be a threat.

The sea surface temperature graph is rather scary.

Featured Links - May 22, 2024

Links to things I found interesting but didn't want to do a full blog post about. 

Docks on the bay

• NZ-led team of scientists hope to understand why 2022 Tongan volcano was so violent. "The submarine volcano that erupted near Tonga in January 2022 created the biggest atmospheric explosion in 100 years and the fastest underwater debris flow ever recorded. Now a New Zealand-led team of scientists is on the way there onboard the research vessel R/V Tangaroa, hoping to find out why the blast was so powerful and help us prepare for future underwater eruptions."
• Someone connected Windows XP to the internet, and it didn't survive long. "Everyone knows that putting Windows XP online in 2024 is a bad idea, but not everyone knows just how bad an idea it actually is."
• From outer space? Sask. farmers baffled after discovering strange wreckage in field. "Jonathan McDowell, a Harvard astronomer, believes the debris found on Sawchuk’s farm also belongs to SpaceX. His collaborator out of the University of Regina told CTV News he re-tracked a re-entry over Saskatchewan in February."
• How Pope Francis opened the Vatican to transgender sex workers (gift link)  "The outreach, reflecting the most radical stage of his papacy, has prompted backlash while also altering the lives of the nearly 100 people he has met."
• We take a stab at decoding SpaceX’s ever-changing plans for Starship in Florida. "On Artemis III, we anticipate using at least two of the launch sites: one at KSC and one at Starbase." Long and detailed look at what SpaceX has to do as part of the Artemis missions. 
• 24 Hours on Fox News. "What does a viewer of the network see in one day?" I don't get Fox News as part of our cable package and that's just as well. 

Off for the Long Weekend

It's a long weekend up here in the now greening Great White North. Monday is Victoria Day, as it's known in Ontario, or more informally as the May 24 weekend, where Canadians can finally indulge in the traditional practice of knocking back a few cold ones on a dock (or in my case, a backyard patio). And gardening of course; it's the traditional time to plant your garden as we are likely out of the risk for a frost. (We do check the weather forecast, just in case; it has been known to snow even this late in the spring as Nancy and I found out about a decade ago). 

In the meantime enjoy these flowers that I found growing along one of our neighbourhood streets. .

Update: I had planned to do a post for Tuesday, but I was just too busy over the weekend. Maybe it'll go up on Wednesday.

Spring flowers

We're Toast 49

This post is a collection of links that support my increasingly strong feeling that the human race (or at least our technological civilization) is doomed. It is part of an ongoing series of posts. 

A pothole

• The emergence of heat and humidity too severe for human tolerance. "Humans’ ability to efficiently shed heat has enabled us to range over every continent, but a wet-bulb temperature (TW) of 35°C marks our upper physiological limit, and much lower values have serious health and productivity impacts. Climate models project the first 35°C TW occurrences by the mid-21st century. However, a comprehensive evaluation of weather station data shows that some coastal subtropical locations have already reported a TW of 35°C and that extreme humid heat overall has more than doubled in frequency since 1979."
• The AI Deepfakes Problem Is Going to Get Unstoppably Worse. "Deepfakes are blurring the lines of reality more than ever before, and they're likely going to get a lot worse this year."
• Staggering Rise in New Cancer Cases Projected in 2050. "New cancer cases are projected to rise by 77% to more than 35 million in 2050 from an estimated 20 million new cases and 9.7 million deaths in 2022, according to new data released Thursday by the World Health Organization’s cancer agency, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC)."
• World war threat everyone is ignoring. "One thing is stressing nations and populations worldwide and exacerbating tensions in already strife-torn regions.Fire. Floods. Drought. All are impacting the fundamentals of life, economics and politics the world over. Now a new analysis says the increasing tempo of these “stressors” will increase the frequency – and scale – of war. 
• Is Private Equity as Dangerous to Your Dog as Kristi Noem? "Fully 20% of American business is now controlled by private equity, which is draining billions out of our economy every week to stash in the money bins of its morbidly rich owners."
• Out Farmers' Tractor GPS Systems During Peak Planting Season. "The accuracy of some critical GPS navigation systems used in modern farming have been "extremely compromised," a John Deere dealership told customers Saturday." Given our reliance on GPS and space-based communication, this does not bode well for the future unless we harden our current systems or develop alternatives like eLORAN. 
• The world's oceans just broke an important climate change record. "Temperature records in the ocean have been broken every single day of the past year, according to new research."
• Brutal heatwaves and submerged cities: what a 3C world would look like. "Climate scientists have told the Guardian they expect catastrophic levels of global heating. Here’s what that would mean for the planet."

Trying to Be Positive About November

I try not to get too wrapped up in the rabbit hole of US politics, but it is hard to avoid without cutting off all my news feeds. There's a lot of negative news about Biden and poll results recently (the New York Times seems to have a special hate on for Biden these days) but as Jay Kuo points out in this Big Picture article, we're still six months out from the election and a lot of things can change in six months. 

And there's many reasons to be cautiously optimistic. A few (out of ten) that he points out are:

• Biden needs to re-win just 3 of the 5 battleground states
• The GOP is disorganized and near bankrupt in key states
• Voters have not focused on Trump yet

I think the last is particularly important. Trump is clearly experiencing a significant mental decline and the pressure of the election campaign is not going to help him be more coherent. The Democrats are going to have many opportunities to savage him in the next few months. 

At this point, I'm more worried about the next Canadian election, where Canada's own mini-Trump is likely to unseat the current government and replace it with a right-wing kleptocracy. 

2024 Locus Awards Finalists

The finalists for the Locus Awards have been announced. The awards are voted on by readers of Locus Magazine and will be announced in mid-June. Over the years, they've become one of the major awards in the science fiction and fantasy field.

These are the finalists for Science Fiction Novel.

The Jinn-Bot of Shantiport, Samit Basu (Tordotcom)

A Fire Born of Exile, Aliette de Bodard (Gollancz; JAB Books)

Red Team Blues, Cory Doctorow (Tor; Ad Astra)

Furious Heaven, Kate Elliott (Ad Astra; Tor)

Translation State, Ann Leckie (Orbit US; Orbit UK)

The Terraformers, Annalee Newitz (Tor; Orbit UK)

Starter Villain, John Scalzi (Tor; Tor UK)

Lords of Uncreation, Adrian Tchaikovsky (Orbit US; Tor UK)

System Collapse, Martha Wells (Tordotcom)

The Road to Roswell, Connie Willis (Del Rey)

The only one of the finalists that I've read is The Terraformers, though I have Starter Villain and will probably read Red Team Blues after I finish The Bezzle.

Featured Links - May 13, 2024

Links to things I found interesting but didn't want to do a full blog post about.

Frenchman's Bay with clouds hiding the aurora

•  I Went To China And Drove A Dozen Electric Cars. Western Automakers Are Cooked. "A trip to the Beijing Auto Show reveals just how advanced China's EVs are. So what are the so-called "foreign" automakers doing about it?" The US and Canadian automakers will never allow Chinese EVs to be sold here in quantity.
• AI makes it easier for anyone to become a cybercriminal, top official says. "Generative AI is not just teaching cyber bad guys new tricks — it's also making it easier for anyone to become a bad guy, said Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency chief Jen Easterly." It's already too easy.
• Automakers hedge their bets with plug-in hybrids as EV sales slow. "Originally regarded as stopgap solutions, hybrids are in it for the long haul." Our next car may very well be a hybrid. I don't think we're quite ready for a full EV yet. 
• I worked at SpaceX. It was the most ruthlessly efficient company I've ever worked for. "Vincent Peters worked in military compliance when he was poached to work at SpaceX. He said the work culture was ruthlessly efficient and you could see Musk on the office floor. However, if you need your hand held, the former employee said to avoid Musk's companies."
• Largest 3D map of our universe could 'turn cosmology upside down'. "Scientists using the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument have unveiled the largest 3D map of the universe ever. The results suggest that dark energy, the mysterious force pulling the universe apart, may be weakening, challenging prevailing theories of cosmology."
• Record-shattering Tonga volcanic eruption wasn't triggered by what we thought, new study suggests. "Scientists think Tonga's record-breaking 2022 eruption was triggered by gas building up to a "critical point" rather than by a reaction between magma and seawater as previously assumed."
• The Volvo VNL, a heavy truck purpose-designed for North American roads. "Blindspot cameras and radars, a more efficient engine, and lower-drag cab all help."
• The surprise is not that Boeing lost commercial crew but that it finished at all. "The structural inefficiency was a huge deal." I would not fly on a Boeing spacecraft. 
• A Potentially Fatal New COVID-Related Syndrome Has Emerged. "Even mild infections may be sufficient to trigger this serious condition." Am I reading this wrong? Does the article imply that the researchers are implicating COVID-19 vaccination as well as the infection itself?

Photo of the Week - May 12, 2024

This week's photo is from a walk I took earlier in week through Alex Robertson Park and Beachfront Park along the shore of Lake Ontario. It's of part of the kids' play area. I had to edit it slightly in Photoshop to straighten the horizon and compensate for an accidental overexposure (the exposure compensation dial on my Fuji X-S10 is all too easy to move without noticing).

Waterfront play area, Fujifilm X-S10 with Fujinon 27 mm. F2.8 WR at F4, 1/3000 second, ISO 640, Velvia film simulation

Saturday Sounds - Kamasi Washington - Fearless Movement

I've been a fan of Kamasi Washington ever since hearing his first album, The Epic, almost a decade ago, and saw him perform once in the Before Times. He played in Toronto earlier in the week but it was at a standing only venue (History) and despite how much I would like to see him (or anyone else for that matter), there's no way I can handle standing on a cement floor for several hours for a concert.

So I have to console myself with listening to his excellent new album, Fearless Movement. Like most of his work so far, it's an eclectic mix of jazz, rap, hip hop, rock, and orchestral music. My only complaint is that there isn't enough of his playing in the mix, but what's there is excellent. 

If you want to sample just one track, try Road to Self (KO). 

The New Cold War

I'm a child of the Cold War. I lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis, the periodic tests of the air raid sirens, and the B-52 bombers flying low over my uncle's cottage on their way to Kincheloe Air Force Base. That settled down to a dull background anxiety with the fall of the Soviet Union, with the occasional proxy war flareup. But the Cold War is back though it's being fought on a different and less tangible front using propaganda, disinformation, and misinformation, and hacking to destabilize societies. 

In Tuesday's Big Picture post, Jay Kuo outlines how the US Republican party has become an ally, if not an outright tool, of Russia's propaganda machine. 

This piece walks through the three types of compromise—disinformation, extortion, and bribery—to give a sense of what we know and what we don’t really know, and, importantly, where we should be on our guard. As this summary will show, from the 2016 election till now, there’s enough Russian smoke now to assume there is a fire, one that compromises not only the integrity of our own system of elections, but the safety and security of the free world.

Given that so much of modern society depends on computers and automated systems, they've become a target for government-sponsored hacking groups. Wired reports on one such group that calls itself the Cyber Army of Russia Reborn or People's Cyber Army of Russia. 

Whether or not it's winning hearts and minds, Cyber Army of Russia—which also at times calls itself the Cyber Army of Russia Reborn or People's Cyber Army of Russia—seems to at least be getting some of the attention it seeks. Last week, a group of government bodies including the US National Security Agency, the FBI, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the UK's National Cybersecurity Center, and several others issued a joint report warning of “Russian hacktivists” targeting so-called operational technology targets like control systems for water and wastewater utilities. The report warned that victims had “experienced minor tank overflow events” and other disruptions—although it noted the effects were temporary, and the hacktivists had historically exaggerated their hacking's impact.

The Financial Times reports that Russia could be planning more serious attacks including bombing, arson, and attacks on infrastructure. (archive.ph link)

European intelligence agencies have warned their governments that Russia is plotting violent acts of sabotage across the continent as it commits to a course of permanent conflict with the west. 

Russia has already begun to more actively prepare covert bombings, arson attacks and damage to infrastructure on European soil, directly and via proxies, with little apparent concern about causing civilian fatalities, intelligence officials believe. 

 Finally, the Washington Post reports (gift link) that Putin is " re-engineering his country into a regressive, militarized society that views the West as its mortal enemy."

In “Russia, Remastered,” The Washington Post documents the historic scale of the changes Putin is carrying out and has accelerated with breathtaking speed during two years of brutal war even as tens of thousands of Russians have fled abroad. It is a crusade that gives Putin common cause with China’s Xi Jinping as well as some supporters of former president Donald Trump. And it raises the prospect of an enduring civilizational conflict to subvert Western democracy and — Putin has warned — even threatens a new world war.

Putin's plans were also covered by CBC Radio One on their morning news show, The Cuurent.  

I grew up with the Cold War. Now it looks like I might die with it. 

Rescuing the Doves Type

 A famous typeface that was thought to be lost forever has been resurrected. 

Early in the 20th century, London printer T.J. Cobden-Sanderson dumped the beautiful Doves Type into the river during a business dispute. As the only lead they had, that meant the end of the distinctive old-timey typeface. But they were found and restored in the 21st century, and now enjoy a revival thanks to the work of Robert Green.

Due to the efforts of a determined historian, some of the original type has been recovered from the muck of the Thames river. 

The typeface is quite beautiful and would be ideal for some books. You can now buy a digitally recreated version or download an open source variant.  

Featured Links - May 6, 2024

Links to things I found interesting but didn't want to do a full blog post about.

A lonely swan

H5N1 update: We have to do better, faster. An update from an epidemiologist.

12-sided Roman relic baffles archaeologists, spawns countless theories. "Since 1739, some 130 of these objects have been discovered across Northern and Western Europe. While archaeologists have dated the relics to Roman times, they have been baffled by the objects for centuries, with no consensus ever emerging on what they were for. There is no known written description of them in ancient texts; nor do any pictorial references exist."

SpaceX reveals EVA suit design as Polaris Dawn mission approaches. "SpaceX has unveiled long-awaited spacesuits intended for spacewalks that will first be used on an upcoming private spaceflight." This is the first new US spacesuit in many years. 

These dangerous scammers don’t even bother to hide their crimes. "Cybercriminals openly run dozens of scams across social media and messaging apps."

mRNA Brain Cancer Vaccine Shows Promise In Early Trials In Humans – And Dogs. "It’s unusual to have the opportunity to test a treatment in both human and animal patients." This is very good news should it pan out. 

NASA veterans propellantless propulsion drive that physics says shouldnt work just produced enough thrust to defeat earths gravity. I should have a tag for "Wouldn't this be nice if it works" category, but I have serious doubts (Remember cold fusion?).

Columbia University has a doxxing problem. "Protesters wanted to expose Columbia; Columbia exposed its students."

Photo of the Week - May 5, 2024

Spring flowers are blooming. Here are some tulips from my front yard taken with my Pixel 8 Pro.

Spring tulips

Saturday Sounds - Black Jesus Experience - Good Evening Black Buddja

This week's musical treat is an album that Spotify popped up after I finished listening to Somi's Zenzile. Like that album, it's heavily influenced by African music, but in this case Ethiopian instead of Nigerian. Good Evening Black Buddha is a heady mix of Ethiopian Afropop, rap, funk, and jazz by Black Jesus Experience who are centered in  Melbourne, Australia but whose members hail from five countries. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Producing a Newspaper in the 1950s

If you ever wondered what it was like working for a newspaper in the 1950s, have a look a the pictures in this Facebook post, showing the premises of the Sault Star in the early 1950s. 

My dad worked in the composing room, using linotype machines to produce lead slugs that were laid into beds of type from which the paper was printed. He's in the second picture below, second from the right. I used to have a lead slug with my name on it that he had made me. By the time he retired, the printing technology had gone went from hot lead type, to photo offset, to fully computerized typesetting. Dad had to take a typing course when he was fifty (Linotype machines didn't have a standard keyboard). 

If you look at the other pictures, you'll see that there is no computerized technology at all. The most advanced office equipment in sight is a dictaphone being sed by a typist. Desks are cluttered by piles of paper. The Star would have had teletype machines but fax machines hadn't been invented at the time these pictures were taken. The accounting office might have had IBM tablulators or their equivalent but not computers. (Alogoma Steel had a mainframe in the late 1960s; the first time I saw a computer was when I toured their offices during a high school visit). 

Thanks to the Sault Ste. Marie Museum for posting these pictures. They bring back some memories.

Working on the Linotype machines

The Sault Star composing room in the 1950s

Movie and TV Reviews - April 2024

Movies and TV shows that Nancy and I watched in April. I do these posts mainly so I can keep track of what we've been watching, so the reviews are cursory. The next few months will probably be sparser than usual because ... baseball.

Movies

• Steve MARTIN!: A Biography in Two Parts. I've been enjoying Steve Martin's comedy ever since the days of Saturday Night Live and Roxanne, and now Only Murders in the Building. This revealed a lot about his early life and career that I wasn't familiar with. He's a very complex man, and yes, still funny. (Apple TV+)
• Snatch: We missed this when it came out in 2000 and since we like Guy Ritchie's movies (mostly his older ones) and Jason Stratham (ditto), we decided to rent it. I'm glad we did. Ritchie is at his flashy, kinetic, best and Stratham hasn't turned into a dull action-film hunk. The cast is solid and Brad Pitt brilliant as a completely unintelligible gypsy bare-knuckle fighter. (Prime)
• The Beekeeper: Since we had just watched an early Jason Stratham movie, we decided to watch his latest outing. It's a competent enough movie, but I am getting tired of the over-the-top superman action hero trope. (Prime)

TV Shows

• Whitechapel (season 4): This moved away from the police procedural into full suspect with a strong horror element. Definitely not for the squeamish. (Prime)
• Constellation: This starts out as a more or less straight space disaster movie and turns into something much deeper and complex. I enjoyed it but it could have been shorter. (Apple TV+)
• Celebrity Antiques Road Trip (season 1): This doesn't work as well as the original series. If you're British and know the celebrities, it would probably be more enjoyable. (PBS)
• Hope Street (season 3B): The second half of the season ratchets up the relationship tensions in the show more than the police procedural element. (BritBox)
• Beyond Paradise (season 2): This is a spin-off from Death in Paradise but lacking the Caribbean setting. Too light for my taste. (BritBox)
• Fallout: This was a big spend for Amazon and given the popularity of the game, it'll probably be a big hit. But neither Nancy or I have played the game and the show didn't click with us. We gave up after two episodes. (Amazon Prime)
  
• The Reluctant Traveler (seasons 1 and 2): Follow Eugene Levy to exotic locations around the world. If you want to see what a $7,000 a night hotel room looks like then this is your show. (Apple TV+)
• The Tower (seasons 1 and 2): A good British police procedural. The first season reminded me of Line of Duty with cops investigating cops. (BritBox)
• Antiques Road Trip (season 1). Now working our way through the early episodes of this show. (PBS)
• Shogun: I had to turn on subtitles to watch this because of the Japanese dialog, which is not my favourite way to watch a show, but worth it in this case. I can't vouch for the historical accuracy, but it is compelling drama and very well made. (Disney+)