Eleanor Konik @eleanorkonik@scholar.social

Hello, Scholars (& Friends!)

My undergrad degree was in philosophy and I passed the bar exam in 2012 (oof) so now I teach (yay). My interests are broad and varied; I enjoy reading academic papers on random topics like feudalism and the role of priestesses in ancient Rome.

I'm working on an epic fantasy novel inspired by the environmental crises in northeast Africa, but I won't talk much about the writing process nearly as often as I'll squee about obscure research dives.

#introductions

Can anybody recommend alternatives to services like semantic scholar and ResearchRabbit, and https://connectedpapers.com — I seem to remember one that had more of a tree-like structure but I can't find it now. Trying to set up a good workflow for discovering relevant documents. Filters for things like language and ability to read the abstract inside the program (and click to open the doi) are preferred features.

Thanks!

@bookandswordblog awhile back I came across Miles Cameron's Traitor Son Cycle thanks to you and your blog and we talked a little bit about how much I loved it, but I finally got around to writing a proper gushing review about the parts I loved the most:

https://eleanorkonik.com/the-traitor-son-cycle-by-miles-cameron/

I was recently interviewed about my personal knowledge management system, and one of the questions I got asked was whether I would ever teach my students how to use obsidian.md for notetaking, since it's the program I use and I get a lot of value out of it, and it scales really well for studying and academia and such.

The answer I gave in the interview was a resounding "no," lol, but it turns out I had a lot more to say on the topic:

https://eleanorkonik.com/the-difficulties-of-teaching-notetaking/

@bookandswordblog This is sort of a random question and I feel kind of dumb for needing to ask it, but if you have a minute...

What was the basis of the Akkadian class structure? I understand that the Spartan ruling class were soldiers, and the Roman senators were large land-owners, and feudal warriors had a lock on war training and technology, but I'm pretty shaky on Mesopotamian social hierarchy beyond 6th grade level "there were kings and warriors and priests and government officials, yay."

My husband sent me the wikipedia article about aerogels, but I'm having a lot of trouble wrapping my head around them. The wikipedia article alludes to more modern aerogels not being so prone to shattering as the silica ones.

I found this article (http://www.robaid.com/tech/less-brittle-aerogels-increase-the-usability-of-the-lightest-solid-material.htm) which makes me wonder: could aerogels ever be superior to other building materials, like concrete or wood or steel (leaving aside questions of how expensive they are to produce)?

I came across Karen Haegemans' journal article about Dido: "Elissa, the First Queen of Carthage, through Timaeus' Eyes" while I was researching dynastic inbreeding. Since I'm a giant nerd I couldn't resist doing a detailed point-by-point analysis.

https://eleanorkonik.com/haegemans-elissa-of-carthage/

Apparently during the time of Dido, the Tyrian commoners preferred her brother Pygmalion as king, although no explanation is given as to why. Most sources I've come across said he was a murderous, incompetent tyrant.