Add aesthetics post (#42)

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+    "markdown": "---\ntitle: \"The Aesthetics Wiki: an R Addendum\"\ndate: 2024-05-08\nslug: \"aesthetic\"\ncategories:\n  - base\n  - r\n  - tidyverse\n---\n\n\n![They're doing the Lord's work over at [makewordart.com](https://www.makewordart.com/).](resources/passion.png){fig.alt=\"90s-style Word Art saying 'aesethics' in the middle, surrounded by the words 'base R', 'tidyverse' and 'tidy base question' in various egregious fonts and colours.\" width='100%'}\n\n## tl;dr\n\nSome people look at an R script and see code. But I _feel_ something.\n\n## A philosophy\n\nHave you experienced the [Aesthetics Wiki](https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Aesthetics_Wiki)?\n\nIt's missing R-related entries for some reason, which definitely fit [the aesthetic philosophy](https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Philosophy) of having:\n\n> perspectives on beauty and the human condition and a political, economic, or social statement\n\nTell me you don't look at an R script and get an immediate vibe.\n\nI want to suggest two obvious aesthetics for submission to the wiki—_Basecore_ and _Tidywave_—and to introduce the definitely-soon-to-be-mainstreamed _V4 Punk_[^suffix].\n\n## The addendum\n\n### Basecore\n\n![Adapted from [Aesthetics Wiki](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/aesthetics/images/1/15/Chaotic_academia.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20200610213320).](resources/chaotic-academia.png){fig.alt=\"A set of different-sized books haphazardly placed ona bookshelf.\" width='100%'}\n\n#### Overview\n\n* History: emerged as Base Academic in 1993, mainstreamed as Base Core from 2000 to date.\n* Visuals: `[` (square-bracket selector), `$` (dollar selector), `~` (formula-form tilde).\n* Palette: <span style=\"background-color:lightgrey;\">grey</span>.\n* Fashion: Emacs, mailing lists, a wired mouse with a ball in it.\n* Nearest aesthetic: [Chaotic Academia](https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Chaotic_Academia), which 'acknowledges the pretentiousness of classic academia, subtly mocking it at times'.\n\n#### Sample\n\nClassic stuff. Typical base-R code uses a lot of intermediate assignment to create temporary objects for further manipulation. Many actions make use of square bracket notation to indicate some action over rows and columns of a data.frame. Data.frame columns have to be called within the context of the data.frame they belong to, using dollar or square-bracket notation. The tilde is used for formula notation ('this given that').\n\n<details><summary>Set up demo data</summary>\n\n::: {.cell}\n\n```{.r .cell-code}\nsuppressPackageStartupMessages(library(dplyr))\nsw_a <- starwars[, c(\"name\", \"species\", \"height\")]\nsw_b <- starwars[, c(\"name\", \"homeworld\")]\n```\n:::\n\n</details>\n\n\n::: {.cell}\n\n```{.r .cell-code}\nx <- sw_a[sw_a$species == \"Human\", names(sw_a) != \"species\"]\nx <- merge(x, sw_b, by = \"name\")\nx$height <- x$height / 100\nx$homeworld <- ifelse(\n  !x$homeworld %in% c(\"Tatooine\", \"Naboo\"),\n  \"Other\",\n  x$homeworld\n)\nx <- aggregate(x, height ~ homeworld, mean, na.rm = TRUE)\nx <- x[order(-x$height), ]\nx\n```\n\n::: {.cell-output .cell-output-stdout}\n```\n  homeworld   height\n3  Tatooine 1.792500\n2     Other 1.776471\n1     Naboo 1.772000\n```\n:::\n:::\n\n\n### Tidywave\n\n![Adapted from [Aesthetics Wiki](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/aesthetics/images/6/62/Blob-web-exercise.webp/revision/latest?cb=20210410215136).](resources/corporate-memphis.png){fig.alt=\"Colourful stylised cartoon of faceless humans with small heads and large limbs and hands.\" width='100%'}\n\n#### Overview\n\n* History: humble academic origins in 2008, later popularised with the creation of the {tidyverse} in 2016.\n* Visuals: `%>%` ({magrittr} pipe), `.` (data placeholder), `~` (lambda function).\n* Palette: Posit <span style=\"background-color:#1a162d;color:white;\">blue</span>, <span style=\"background-color:#fdeba4;\">yellow</span>, and <span style=\"background-color:#767381;color:white;\">grey</span>.\n* Fashion: RStudio, hex stickers, rapid deprecation.\n* Nearest aesthetic: [Corporate Memphis](https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Corporate_Memphis) because I've literally seen it in Posit marketing.\n\n#### Sample\n\nThe script reads from left-to-right and top-to-bottom, recipe style, using pipes: 'take dataset, then do a thing, then do a thing', etc. Each function is verb that indicates its action. Non-standard evaluation is rampant. A tilde replaces the tedious typing of <kbd>f</kbd><kbd>u</kbd><kbd>n</kbd><kbd>c</kbd><kbd>t</kbd><kbd>i</kbd><kbd>o</kbd><kbd>n</kbd><kbd>(</kbd><kbd>)</kbd>. A titchy inconspicuous `.` acts as a data placeholder on the right-hand side of a pipe.\n\n\n::: {.cell}\n\n```{.r .cell-code}\nsw_a %>%\n  filter(species == \"Human\") %>%\n  select(-species) %>%\n  left_join(sw_b, by = \"name\") %>%\n  mutate(\n    height = height / 100,\n    homeworld = if_else(\n      !homeworld %in% c(\"Tatooine\", \"Naboo\"),\n      \"Other\",\n      homeworld\n    )\n  ) %>%\n  summarise(\n    height = mean(height, na.rm = TRUE),\n    .by = homeworld\n  ) %>%\n  arrange(desc(height))\n```\n\n::: {.cell-output .cell-output-stdout}\n```\n# A tibble: 3 × 2\n  homeworld height\n  <chr>      <dbl>\n1 Tatooine    1.79\n2 Other       1.78\n3 Naboo       1.77\n```\n:::\n:::\n\n\n#### V4 Punk\n\n![Adapted from [Aesthetics Wiki](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/aesthetics/images/d/d1/Magnum-pi-hawaiian-shirt.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20200507215616).](resources/vacation-dadcore.png){fig.alt=\"Tom Sellick in a Hawaiian shirt at the beach, leaning against a palm tree. He is smiling.\" width='100%'}\n\n#### Overview\n\n* History: incremental emergence following R version 4.0 in 2020, boosted greatly in 2022 with the release of the base pipe.\n* Visuals: `|>` (base pipe), `_` (data placeholder), `\\()` (lambda function).\n* Palette: <span style=\"background-color:#ff0000;\">r</span><span style=\"background-color:#ff00ff;\">a</span><span style=\"background-color:#00ffff;\">i</span><span style=\"background-color:#00ff00;\">n</span><span style=\"background-color:#0000ff;color:white;\">b</span><span style=\"background-color:#4b0082;color:white;\">o</span><span style=\"background-color:#ee82ee;\">w</span>?\n* Fashion: hubris, moustaches, troll-face emojis.\n* Nearest aesthetic: [Vacation Dadcore](https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Vacation_Dadcore), so you can 'escape to a simpler time without sacrificing any of the fun'.\n\n#### Sample\n\nHear me out: what if tidyverse, but made entirely of base R functions[^modern]? This is now possible with the base pipe and by using obscure functions that help you avoid square brackets[^poorman]. It's also sketchy as heck; just see the help files for `subset()` ('unanticipated consequences') and `transform()` ('you deserve whatever you get!'). The death of Basecore and Tidywave, for sure.\n\n\n::: {.cell}\n\n```{.r .cell-code}\nsw_a |>\n  subset(\n    species == \"Human\",\n    select = -species\n  ) |>\n  merge(sw_b, by = \"name\") |>\n  transform(\n    height = height / 100,\n    homeworld = ifelse(\n      !homeworld %in% c(\"Tatooine\", \"Naboo\"),\n      \"Other\",\n      homeworld\n    )\n  ) |>\n  aggregate(\n    height ~ homeworld, \n    \\(x) mean(x, na.rm = TRUE)\n  ) |>\n  sort_by(~ height, decreasing = TRUE)  # hot off the v4.4 press\n```\n\n::: {.cell-output .cell-output-stdout}\n```\n  homeworld   height\n3  Tatooine 1.792500\n2     Other 1.776471\n1     Naboo 1.772000\n```\n:::\n:::\n\n\nCan't wait to see this roll out into production code. \n\n### Environment {.appendix}\n\n<details><summary>Session info</summary>\n\n::: {.cell}\n::: {.cell-output .cell-output-stdout}\n```\nLast rendered: 2024-05-08 23:33:15 BST\n```\n:::\n\n::: {.cell-output .cell-output-stdout}\n```\nR version 4.4.0 (2024-04-24)\nPlatform: aarch64-apple-darwin20\nRunning under: macOS Ventura 13.2.1\n\nMatrix products: default\nBLAS:   /Library/Frameworks/R.framework/Versions/4.4-arm64/Resources/lib/libRblas.0.dylib \nLAPACK: /Library/Frameworks/R.framework/Versions/4.4-arm64/Resources/lib/libRlapack.dylib;  LAPACK version 3.12.0\n\nlocale:\n[1] en_US.UTF-8/en_US.UTF-8/en_US.UTF-8/C/en_US.UTF-8/en_US.UTF-8\n\ntime zone: Europe/London\ntzcode source: internal\n\nattached base packages:\n[1] stats     graphics  grDevices utils     datasets  methods   base     \n\nother attached packages:\n[1] dplyr_1.1.4\n\nloaded via a namespace (and not attached):\n [1] digest_0.6.35     utf8_1.2.4        R6_2.5.1          fastmap_1.1.1    \n [5] tidyselect_1.2.1  xfun_0.43         magrittr_2.0.3    glue_1.7.0       \n [9] tibble_3.2.1      knitr_1.46        pkgconfig_2.0.3   htmltools_0.5.8.1\n[13] rmarkdown_2.26    generics_0.1.3    lifecycle_1.0.4   cli_3.6.2        \n[17] fansi_1.0.6       vctrs_0.6.5       withr_3.0.0       compiler_4.4.0   \n[21] rstudioapi_0.16.0 tools_4.4.0       pillar_1.9.0      evaluate_0.23    \n[25] yaml_2.3.8        rlang_1.1.3       jsonlite_1.8.8   \n```\n:::\n:::\n\n</details>\n\n[^suffix]: These [suffixes are meaningful](https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Suffix_Meaning): core 'implies a system, a set of rules', wave 'a significant shift within a genre' and punk 'reject[s] social norms'.\n[^modern]: I called this 'The Modern Base Aesthetic' in [my talk, 'Base Slaps!'](https://www.rostrum.blog/posts/2023-10-17-nhs-r-2023/), at the NHS-R conference 2023. But now I realise the aesthetics run deeper.\n[^poorman]: If you truly want something that looks like {dplyr} code but depends only on base R, then check out [the {poorman} package](https://nathaneastwood.github.io/poorman/).",
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