RECOMMENDED VIDEO: ALI TABRIZI'S "TOP 3 PREDICTIONS FOR EUROPE IF ISLAM KEEPS GROWING".

Ali Tabrizi (* 8 October 1993, Ramsgate, UK) is a British filmmaker of Iranian origin whose main claim to fame is the Netflix series Seaspiracy.





It's not going to end well.


But then, I've been telling that to everyone on this here blog for about 22 years.


MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT NEIL DIAMOND, THE HOLLIES.

Neil Diamond with I am...I said. From the 1971 album Stones.





American singer/songwriter from Brooklyn, NY. Still around, still active (somewhat) despite a respectable age of 85 and Parkinson's Disease.



The Hollies with He ain't heavy, he's my brother. From the eponymous 1969 album.





English rock/pop band which formed in Manchester in 1962 and is also still around - unbelievable!


Goede nacht.



MFBB.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO: "BELGIAN BEAUTIES; THE RENARD FIGHTERS" BY ED NASH'S MILITARY MATTERS.

As a Belgian myself AND an aviation enthusiast to boot, I have known about the Renard designs for a long time, but for most of my followers I guess it will come as a surprise that in the late thirties, several sleek fighter prototypes represented an interesting 'what if' for Belgian military aviation. Unfortunately, the promising R36 lost its attractiveness for both the BAF and potential foreign buyers after the prototype crashed. And the R37 and R38 simply came too late to even be considered for purchase, as Belgium had alreay bought Hawker Hurricanes, Fiat CR42s and Brewster Buffaloes. Still, it's an interesting story, told well by Ed Nash:





A Renard type that DID make it in active BAF service was the R31, a parasol monoplane used for recce. In the event, during the so-called 18-Day Campaign in May 1940, it even performed some ground attacks. The type was Remi Van Lierde's mount.



MFBB.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO: "HOW FEMALE POWER CAUSED THE DECLINE OF THE WEST" BY ALEXANDER GRACE.

Highly recommended, and before you start huffing and puffing, WATCH IT TILL THE END. I admit the title is somewhat clickbaity, but the guy is delivering truthbombs in spades... and is NOT targeting females at all. If after viewing you still think so, you have understood zilch.





MFBB.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2026!!!

To all my followers (are you even still there?), my very best wishes for a happy, prosperous and above all healthy New Year!

And another year has passed. One that was fraught with downright depressing developments, be it one the battlefield in Ukraine, on the streets of Western Europe, or in the Pacific.





From the looks of it, it doesn't seem to be getting any better in the short term, although as regards the war in Ukraine, I have modest hopes that this is the last war winter. As for Western Europe, I guess we still have to swallow a LOT more mayhem before sufficient Europeans rise up and hang their traitor politicians from the nearest lampposts. The influx of litterally millions of semiliterate, unassimilable 3rd World welfare seekers continues unabated and one can only conclude that if it is not by design (although more and more I tend to think it IS), then, in any case, it is facilitated.


These are momentous times. On the one hand tech empires in East and West come up with ever more baffling milestones in the field of space exploration, quantum computing, biotech, AI and what not.


On the other hand we are witnessing an incomprehensible desire by the Western Left to obliterate all that is good, noble and worthy of preserving. In most if not all western societies, there are signs that people have had enough and are standing up. But will there be enough time? Will there even be sufficient Europeans and Americans who object to being replaced?


Time will tell. As for me, I will do my damnedest best - modest though my efforts are - to stave off the apparent leftist desire to turn our beautiful countries into the 3rd World hellholes where their favored constituencies come from.



MFBB.

MERRY CHRISTMAS 2025!!!

It's that time of the year again.

Christmas time.


Like every year, I wish my followers and all people of good will a Merry Christmas!




The Adoration of the Shepherds by Bonifazio de'Pitati, painted in or around 1540.


If you are or were able to celebrate Xmas with your loved ones (perhaps enjoying a decent or even exquisite meal with fine wines) please spare a thought for the lonely out there. Try to pay someone falling into that category a visit tomorrow, even if it is only a short one. And a small gift can do wonders.


Have a good night.



MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT COCTEAU TWINS, THE THE.

Cocteau Twins with Cherry-coloured Funk. From the album Heaven or Las Vegas (1990).





Scottish dreampop/shoegazing band, active from 1979 to 1997. Elizabeth Fraser's ethereal voice is perfect for the genre!



The The with Uncertain Smile. From their 1983 debut album Soul Mining, although it had been released as a single the year before.





English rock band from London, formed in 1979 by Matt Johnson, it's sole constant member. Still around!



Good night.



MFBB.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO: HOW DID 'NOTHING' EXIST BEFORE THE BIG BANG?

Via Space Matters:





Wild that for the first 380,000 years or so the nascent universe was so unbelievably hot that it precluded nuclei and electrons from combining to atoms, with as a result that the hot soup of elementary particles prevented light - photons - litterally from 'shedding light' on what was happening!



MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT GEORGE HARRISON, SIMON AND GARFUNKEL.

First George Harrison with Beware of Darkness. From his 1970 album All things must pass.





Heavily influenced by the Radha Krishna Temple, of which Harrison had become a devotee.



Then Simon and Garfunkel's The Boxer. From the album Bridge over Troubled Water (1970). Although it was released as a standalone single one year previously.





I'm hard pressed to find a more iconic folk rock duo. No, scrap that. There isn't a more iconic folk rock duo.



Goede nacht.



MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN, JOHN FARNHAM.

Sorry for the inexcusably long hiatus. Too much going on, still trying to keep the company afloat (but for now we are still heading in the right direction), still undergoing chemo (73rd cycle of Darzalex/Lenalidomide now, but situation still stable), trying to give our kids a decent start in life (daughter just graduated as a Graphics designer, son finished High School, still has to decide what to study next), and overall we are witnessing the breakdown of society, what with levels of migration reaching unprecedented levels and I am already feeling as being a minority in my own country.

And on August 6, I turned 60. Did me nothing. I don't even feel old yet.

My goals in life - I still have them - are, if I survive long enough despite Kahler, pay off the debts for the two company buildings (in five and seven years, respectively), liquidate it all, and with the proceeds making sure my wife and kids are safe and sound financially, then write books (again, my remaining time permitting), and embark on astronomy.

And the most important book I have in mind is intended to be a roadmap for young white people in the West. They have been betrayed and sold out by the most wretched class of politicians ever to walk this Earth.

But this is a Saturday night evening, so...


... let me start with Olivia Newton-John's A little More Love. From her 1978 album Totally Hot.





It's incredibly how good this number has withstood time - in three years it will be half a century old! Sadly, Olivia Newton-John passed away too soon in 2022 already.



John Farnham with You're the Voice. From the album Whispering Jack (1986).





Australian singer/songwriter, but born in Essex, UK.



Good night.



MFBB.

MAY 2ND, 2025.

Another year has passed. It's been fourteen years now since my father died.

On Monday, May 2nd, 2011, at about 22.05, my father left this world after four weeks on Intensive Care.

Only some weeks before, on March 24, 2011, he had turned 77. Apart from some minor troubles normal for a man his age, he was a healthy person. Not a week before being admitted to the hospital, he went with my mom to the annual dinner event of his old Institut Technique Ath schoolmates, and was by all accounts the healthiest and fittest of the group. Four days later he was on Intensive Care. Four weeks after that he was dead.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me." ~ Psalm 23:4 ~

I went with my mom, 85 now, to the cemetery this afternoon. Since she's having major troubles with her back, right hip and right knee, it fell to me to clean pa's gravestone. I was grateful that we interred him the way he always insisted was the right one: in a coffin, under a sculpted granite slab, with a cross and a headstone. Like me, he abhorred cremation and putting away the ashes in an urn. Or worse: these days they disperse them on a small grassfield for the purpose. Good riddance! Typical for this cursed age of hedonism, broken families, vanity and emptyness. In 2011 it hadn't become mainstream yet, now it is. Dad would have bristled at the practice.


Anyway, because of his insistence on being buried the classical way, my mom, siblings and I have an anchor to get back to, a digified place where his mortal remains rest, having been reclaimed by Earth. Earlier this Spring, I reserved the plot just behind his - and my mom's. I want to be buried near those who gave me Life.


Rest in Peace father. It's been fourteen long years, but we still think of you. God Bless.


MFBB.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO: PAPER SKIES' "HOW SOVIET PILOTS CHEATED ON GUNNERY TESTS."

Truly an interesting YouTube channel! Well, uh, for aviation geeks at least!



MFBB.

HAPPY EASTER 2025!

To all DowneastBlog's followers, like every year I sincerely wish you a Happy Easter!





May God bless you and your loved ones, and give you the strength to face and conquer the challenges life throws at you.



MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT MOLCHAT DOMA, BILLY JOEL.

Molchat Doma with Volny (Waves). From their second studio album Etazhi (2018).





Molchat Doma (Russian: Молчат Дома, lit. 'Houses Are Silent'), is a Belarusian post-punk band from Minsk, formed in 2017. Its current lineup is Egor Shkutko (vocals), Roman Komogortsev (guitar, synthesizer, drum machine), and Pavel Kozlov (bass guitar, synthesizer). Hat tip OutlawSon.



Billy Joel with A Room Of Our Own. From the 1982 album The Nylon Curtain.





The album through which I got to know Billy Joels music, and a masterpiece in my opinion. I would say that 6 out of its 9 tracks are hit material, and the other three are decent songs. Produced by Phil Ramone, it is one of the first albums to be digitally recorded, mixed, and mastered.


Goede nacht.



MFBB.

RECOMMENDED READS: "A BRIEF HISTORY OF QUANTUM COMPUTERS."

Via Physics in History (X: @PhysInHistory):

A brief history of Quantum computers 👇

1905: Albert Einstein explains the photoelectric effect and suggests that light consists of quantum particles or photons

1924: Max Born uses the term quantum mechanics for the first time

1925: Werner Heisenberg, Max Born, and Pascual… pic.twitter.com/qdKJMT8GLa

— Physics In History (@PhysInHistory) April 1, 2025

Further interesting tweets from this account:

Distributed quantum computing across an optical network link https://t.co/mwsbyoRtaR

— Jim Bergquist (httprover2) (@httprover2) April 2, 2025

Nite.



MFBB.

RECOMMENDED READS: SOMMERFELD's FINE STRUCTURE CONSTANT.

Over at Space dot com, astrophysicist Paul M. Sutter has this interesting column on Sommerfeld's Fine Structure Constant, a universal constant which is a measure of the strength of the interaction between charged particles and the electromagnetic force. It's value is approximately 1/137.






MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT THE SMITHS, STILL CORNERS.

The Smiths with Well I wonder. Album Meat is Murder (1985).





Possibly the best The Smiths song, Johnny Marr outdoing himself with wondrous guitar work and sound effects, and the ballad fittingly concluded with the sound of falling rain. The images are from the 1958 French crime thriller Ascenseur pour l'Echafaud (Elevator to the Gallows) featuring, a.o., young and pretty Jeanne Moreau.



Still Corners with The Trip. From the album Strange Pleasures, released in 2013.





British/American dream pop duo, formed in 2007 and consisting of songwriter/producer/multi-instrumentalist Greg Hughes and vocalist/keyboardist Tessa Murray.


Nite.



MFBB.

CHINA'S ZUCHONGZHI-3 BASED QUANTUM COMPUTER OUTPACES GOOGLE'S SYCAMORE BY SIX ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE.

🇨🇳CHINA’S NEW QUANTUM COMPUTER CRUSHES GOOGLE—BY A MILLION TIMES

China just pulled ahead in the quantum race, unveiling Zuchongzhi-3—a 105-qubit machine that makes Google's Sycamore processor look slow.

Researchers say this quantum beast performs calculations one million times… https://t.co/qhKsd2H9p3 pic.twitter.com/gCgCuk5h7S

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) March 8, 2025

Via SciTechDaily:

"...A new quantum computing breakthrough has sent shockwaves through the tech world. Researchers at USTC unveiled Zuchongzhi-3, a 105-qubit machine that processes calculations at speeds that dwarf even the most powerful supercomputers. It marks another leap forward in the quest for quantum supremacy, with the team demonstrating computational power orders of magnitude beyond Google’s latest results.


Breakthrough in Quantum Computing with Zuchongzhi-3

A research team from the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with its partners, has made significant progress in random quantum circuit sampling using Zuchongzhi-3 — a superconducting quantum computing prototype equipped with 105 qubits and 182 couplers. Zuchongzhi-3 operates at an astonishing speed, performing computations 1015 times faster than the most powerful supercomputer available today and one million times faster than Google’s latest published quantum computing results. This achievement marks a major breakthrough in quantum computing, building on the success of its predecessor, Zuchongzhi-2. The study, led by Jianwei Pan, Xiaobo Zhu, Chengzhi Peng, and other researchers from both China and abroad, was published as a cover article in Physical Review Letters.


The Road to Quantum Supremacy

Quantum supremacy, the ability of a quantum computer to perform tasks beyond the reach of classical computers, has been a key goal in the field. In 2019, Google’s 53-qubit Sycamore processor completed a random circuit sampling task in 200 seconds, a feat estimated to take 10,000 years on the world’s fastest supercomputer at the time. However, in 2023, USTC researchers demonstrated more advanced classical algorithms capable of completing the same task in 14 seconds using over 1,400 A100 GPUs. With the advent of the Frontier supercomputer, equipped with expanded memory, this task can now be performed in just 1.6 seconds, effectively challenging Google’s earlier claim of quantum supremacy.


Pushing the Boundaries: Jiuzhang and Zuchongzhi Milestones

Subsequently, using the optimal classical algorithm as its benchmark, the same team at USTC achieved the first rigorously proven quantum supremacy with the Jiuzhang photonic quantum computing prototype in 2020. This was followed in 2021 by a superconducting demonstration using the Zuchongzhi-2 processor. In 2023, the team’s development of the 255-photon Jiuzhang-3 demonstrated quantum supremacy that surpassed classical supercomputers by 1016 orders of magnitude. In October 2024, Google’s 67-qubit superconducting quantum processor, Sycamore, demonstrated quantum supremacy by outperforming classical supercomputers by nine orders of magnitude.


Zuchongzhi-3: A Leap in Quantum Performance

Building upon the 66-qubit Zuchongzhi-2, the USTC research team significantly enhanced key performance metrics to develop Zuchongzhi-3, which features 105 qubits and 182 couplers. The quantum processor achieves a coherence time of 72 μs, a simultaneous single-qubit gate fidelity of 99.90%, a simultaneous two-qubit gate fidelity of 99.62%, and a simultaneous readout fidelity of 99.13%. The extended coherence time provides the necessary duration for performing more complex operations and computations.To evaluate its capabilities, the team conducted an 83-qubit, 32-layer random circuit sampling task on the system. The results demonstrated a computational speed that outpaces the world’s most powerful supercomputer by 15 orders of magnitude and surpasses Google’s latest quantum computing results by six orders of magnitude, establishing the strongest quantum computational advantage in a superconducting system to date..."

MFBB.

SATURDAY NIGHT GENESIS, LED ZEPPELIN.

Genesis with Hairless Heart. From the album The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway (1974).





English rock band Genesis formed at Charterhouse School, Godalming, Surrey, in 1967. In their heyday, the band's line-up consisted of keyboardist Tony Banks, bassist/guitarist Mike Rutherford, drummer/singer Phil Collins, singer Peter Gabriel and guitarist Steve Hackett.



Led Zeppelin with Immigrant Song. Found on Led Zeppelin III (1970).





Legendary English rock band, formed in 1968 by guitarist Jimmy Page (ex-Yardbirds), singer Robert Plant, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones and drummer John Bonham.


Nite.



MFBB.

PRAGER UNIVERSITY: THE WRAP UP , JANUARY 11, 2025.

NEW: Los Angeles is devastated by massive wildfires, as criticism of California’s leaders heats up.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the social media company is abandoning third-party fact-checkers.

Nations across the world are making digital IDs mandatory.

And McDonald’s… pic.twitter.com/NjfgmnAwc8

— PragerU (@prageru) January 11, 2025

As regards the havoc being wrought on LA, while there is certainly a lot of blame to go around, it is worth giving some serious thought to Leighton Woodhouse's POV. Give it a read please.


Good night.



MFBB.