Tootfinder

Is it just me? Perhaps because I often have only one or two tabs open - I'm a compulsive tab closer. But the new UI in macOS Safari for handling tabs wastes space, is hard to use, and confuses me constantly about where the URL box is and such. I am unsure why it passed muster at product review time.
Perhaps it works well for others. But even if you always have more than one tab open, it still wastes vertical space.

Perhaps if folks took matters into their own hands and captured these old fools and put them in prison….
https://glasgow.social/@Nachtflug/115181507001248283

#ShamelesslyStolenFromTumblr #Shitpost #Shitposting

Hello there! Sorry I’ve been dumping annoying news things the last while here instead of chit chatting.
I really like it here and enjoy it, perhaps, most of any online text box.
But, regrettably, circumstances have conspired to require me to make a living. This takes up an inordinate amount of time. So, the best I have been able to manage is to drop newsy bits or Gist links.
I hope, like all of my vintage, that next month will quieten down a bit.

One day, I might sit in my local cafe,
caught up in angst,
trying to find euphemisms to explain to my children the wherefores and whys of it all.
Perhaps, one day, to sit in silence and think of nothing will no longer be ease but an act of defiance
— of remembering what it means to belong to a world once rooted in continuity again.
What kind of world allows a family to sit in a parlour and think of nothing?
What kind of world might let them look through …

Andy Marshall's Genius Loci Digest: 10 Oct 2025
For Fiona and Tom

Perhaps worth noting usxports, past references, if the same function, appear to have been under .mil names
https://mastodon.social/@botgov/115191994244102322

Fun observation: The CONFIG and CALIB registers on the PIC12F683 contain 12 documented bits each.
The physical die layout, however, contains 25 fuse cell instances not 24. So there is one undocumented bit, perhaps a chicken bit for something or an extra calibration setting, or maybe a parity check over some or all of the other fuses.
If it's an actual config bit my money is on bit 5 of CALIB which is documented as unimplemented/RAZ.
Maybe it's not? Or maybe it's…

When you say "we don't need user research, I already know what users want" this is what you look like
#ux #UXDesign #userresearch

50 years ago tonight, the jerry garcia band in #berkeley, the 1st of 2 fun shows featuring muscle shoals session player tim henson on 2nd keyboards, perhaps in town to contribute to garcia’s in-progress “reflections” sessions. also the 1st full soundboard of the new garcia band:

I'm so tired that I guess I'm going to get up late tomorrow. Perhaps even at 6:30!

I think that if we use fraud, stock manipulation, money laundering, and other financially related crimes - and perhaps brew in sex related crimes - measured on a per-capita basis, my guess is that Palm Beach, Florida will come out near the top of the list of most criminal cities in the US of A.
So send in ICE? I know of a Slovakian who lives there who snuck in the the US on false visa claims, worked as a nude model (too skinny to be interesting), and has been associated with known int…

from my link log —
Elizabeth I and the 'Blackamoors': the deportation that never was.
https://www.mirandakaufmann.com/blog/elizabeth-i-and-the-blackamoors-the-deportation-that-never-was
saved 2025-0…

Elizabeth I and the 'Blackamoors': the Deportation that never was
Today I am compelled to blog. There is a wrong I must right. The world simply cannot be allowed to continue to believe that Elizabeth I expelled Africans from her realm in 1596.  This is perhaps...

#Enshitification alert. Youtube has blocked speeding up playback of videos unless you pay a premium.
That means if you make videos where you speak in a slow drawl, I int gonna be a watching y'all.
Hmm - only seems to beon some video's. Perhaps thats a creator setting.

Australia never disappoints - crocodiles that climbed trees
"Some were also apparently at least partly semi-arboreal 'drop crocs,'"
"They were perhaps hunting like leopards—dropping out of trees on any unsuspecting thing they fancied for dinner." #straya

Australian 'drop crocs' unlock insights into ancient ecosystems
In a local grazier's backyard in the small southeast QLD town of Murgon, scientists have been digging for decades in what looks like an unremarkable clay pit. But within the clay lies one of Australia's oldest fossil sites—a window back in time to when the continent was still connected to Antarctica and South America.

Reading this article as I listen to Joan Baez (coincidentally): https://archive.is/pky5Q And I think: is it a bad thing that it's almost impossible for AI companies to license music for training their models…? I don't think it is, actually. Perhaps they should look for business models that don’t in…

"Labour has also won every time the Senedd has been contested, as it will be again in May. Yet, if the most recent Wales-wide poll holds good, that is set to change. Plaid will instead be the largest party, just ahead of Reform UK, with Labour third. Though still a minority, Plaid would be in government. In Welsh terms, that would be a political earthquake. Perhaps in Britain-wide terms too"
#UKPol

Perhaps they'll have to change their brand name to Beyond Dead Animals now?
https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/10/08/when-is-a-sausage-no-longer-a-sausage-european-parliament-answers-a…

When is a sausage no longer one? EU Parliament answers after grilling
The European Parliament has voted to ban meat-related terms like “burger” and “sausage” for plant-based products, prompting backlash from consumer and environmental groups. #EuropeNews

The Application of Imagination: Where Thought Becomes Matter
Imagination without application remains a private theater, brilliant perhaps, but ultimately sterile. The history of human achievement suggests that genius resides not in the capacity to imagine alone, but in the peculiar ability to transform mental constructs into material reality. This transformation requires something more demanding than pure creativity: it requires the discipline to translate vision into…

The Application of Imagination: Where Thought Becomes Matter | David Boles, Blogs
Imagination without application remains a private theater, brilliant perhaps, but ultimately sterile. The history of human achievement suggests that genius resides not in the capacity to imagine al…

RE: https://hachyderm.io/@thomasfuchs/115510783495155340
One thing that, to my surprise, sells really quickly is old computer books from the 1980s (stuff like "Machine Programs for the Apple II").
I guess perhaps they're cheap to ship (in the US, the post office has a special low rate for packages with books or music) and nice small treats for people?
Regardless, it's a nice win, I free up space and get some pocket money, the books go to someone who will love and care for them. :)

🫘 Caffeine blocks adenosine, the same pathway used by fast-acting depression treatments
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-caffeine-blocks-adenosine-pathway-fast.html

Caffeine blocks adenosine, the same pathway used by fast-acting depression treatments
Perhaps the most intriguing implication of recent breakthrough research lies in an unexpected connection: the most rigorous mechanistic dissection of rapid antidepressant action identifies adenosine as the critical mediator, yet adenosine receptors are the primary target of caffeine, the world's most widely consumed psychoactive substance.

Series C, Episode 03 - Volcano
AVON: If they have been picked up, perhaps I won't be. [Stands in teleport bay.]
VILA: I'd rather be picked up than burned up.
CALLY: Ready?
AVON: Yes. Put me down.
[Obsidian surface, near volcano]
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/303/221

If Lingua Franca had survived, we would be much better off. Perhaps we would not even have Trump, or at least Trump 2.

Now perhaps might be a good time for the reminder of a truth always obscured:
Black People (not Black "women" -- ALL BLACK PEOPLE - you have to watch how they do black men dirty here) are the practical always-voting correctly BASE of the Democratic party -- which in turn makes them the moral center of voting in America.
#uspol

Picture the human body. Zoom in on a single cell. It lives for a while, then splits or dies, as part of a community of cells that make up a particular tissue. This community lives together for many many cell-lifetimes, each performing their own favorite function and reproducing as much as necessary to maintain their community, consuming the essential resources they need and contributing back what they can so that the whole body can live for decades. Each community of cells is interdependent on the whole body, but also stable and sustainable over long periods of time.
Now imagine a cancer cell. It has lost its ability to harmonize with the whole and prioritize balance, instead consuming and reproducing as quickly as it can. As neighboring tissues start to die from its excess, it metastasizes, always spreading to new territory to fuel its unbalanced appetite. The inevitable result is death of the whole body, although through birth, that body can create a new fresh branch of tissues that may continue their stable existence free of cancer. Alternatively, radiation or chemotherapy might be able to kill off the cancer, at great cost to the other tissues, but permitting long-term survival.
To the cancer cell, the idea of decades-long survival of a tissue community is unbelievable. When your natural state is unbounded consumption, growth, and competition, the idea of interdependent cooperation (with tissues all around the body you're not even touching, no less) seems impossible, and the idea that a tissue might survive in a stable form for decades is ludicrous.
"Perhaps if conditions were bleak enough to perfectly balance incessant unrestrained growth against the depredations of a hostile environment it might be possible? I guess the past must have been horribly brutal, so that despite each tissue trying to grow as much as possible they each barely survived? Yes, a stable and sustainable population is probably only possible under conditions of perfectly extreme hardship, and in our current era of unfettered growth, we should rejoice that we live in much easier times!"
You can probably already see where I'm going with this metaphor, but did you know that there are human communities, alive today, that have been living sustainably for *tens, if not hundreds of thousands of years*?
#anarchy #colonialism #civilization
P.S. if you're someone who likes to think about past populations and historical population growth, I cannot recommend the (short, free) game Opera Omnia by Stephen Lavelle enough: https://www.increpare.com/2009/02/opera-omnia/

I'm spending a lot of time looking at #SanFrancisco's proposed #FamilyZoningPlan. Perhaps that's why reading about Pope Leo XIV's just released Dilexi Te (

Pope Leo XIV criticizes wealthy elite's bubble of comfort and luxury
Pope Leo XIV has criticized how wealthy people live in a “bubble of comfort and luxury” while the poor suffer. Leo confirmed on Thursday that he is in perfect lockstep with Pope Francis on matters of social injustice. The Vatican released the document, entitled “I have loved you,” which Francis had begun to write in his final months but never finished. Leo credited Francis with the text, cited him repeatedly, but said he had made the document his own. The conclusion Leo draws is that th…

I'm spending a lot of time looking at #SanFrancisco's proposed #FamilyZoningPlan. Perhaps that's why reading about Pope Leo XIV's just released Dilexi Te (

Pope Leo XIV criticizes wealthy elite's bubble of comfort and luxury
Pope Leo XIV has criticized how wealthy people live in a “bubble of comfort and luxury” while the poor suffer. Leo confirmed on Thursday that he is in perfect lockstep with Pope Francis on matters of social injustice. The Vatican released the document, entitled “I have loved you,” which Francis had begun to write in his final months but never finished. Leo credited Francis with the text, cited him repeatedly, but said he had made the document his own. The conclusion Leo draws is that th…

In YouTube TV-ESPN impasse, perhaps the Eagles and Packers can bring sides together https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6782284/2025/11/06/youtubetv-espn-disney-alphabet-google-nfl/

Perhaps I will give FreeBSD another shot (after 30 years). Looks like it may better align with my philosophy than Linux does these days.

WTF with an anthill on the top!!!!
I just got off a Zoom call - and zoom sent me an AI generated summary of our conversation.
WTF? I did not ask for that.
Making that is perhaps a violation of California's laws about two party consent and wiretapping.
Grrrrr.

@… The Wikipedia page for it perhaps? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comma
That’s about the only result I would expect.

What’s Where?
In this blog, I mostly post things on which I have an opinion, or perhaps a discussion that I want to start or continue. I also have a blog at where I'll post more of the daily activity type of stuff, although I certainly do not post to it daily! I also have a micro.blog account at the contents of which get federated around very platforms, such as Mastadon, BlueSky and Threads. I'm currently building a photography website at So, have a wander around, and,…

What’s Where?
In this blog, I mostly post things on which I have an opinion, or perhaps a discussion that I want to start or continue. I also have a blog at where I’ll post more of the daily activity type …

Bar pattern speed modulation across LMC stellar populations
V. Araya, L. Chemin, O. Jimenez-Arranz, M. Romero-Gomez
https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.07537 https://

Bar pattern speed modulation across LMC stellar populations
The bar pattern speed of the LMC has been measured using Gaia data, suggesting the presence of a slow pattern, perhaps not rotating at all. Numerical simulations of interacting LMC-SMC systems were able to reproduce a bar stoppage. Here, we report on the first measurement of the bar pattern speed of the LMC as a function of the evolutionary phase of its stellar populations. Astrometric and photometric data of 11 million LMC stars from Gaia DR3 were used to build five evolutionary phases, from l…

Perfect cartoon from @…
#Humour #Politics #AusPol

From Gary Marcus (via Brian Merchant) on OpenAIs latest predicaments:
"My guess is that they have cumulatively raised on the order of $100 billion since they launched, perhaps more than any other company in history, but have already spent most of it, and likely don’t have much more than a year’s runway left.”
#AI

Ireland’s Minister for justice, (who is about to spend the next year or so constantly saying things for media attention as he jockeys to remain top of mind in FF member’s heads) has also said he wants to break encryption (as soon as he finds out what it is. A kind of cupboard? A vase of some sort? A nut, perhaps, of Asian origin?)

Fabio Manganiello (@fabio@manganiello.social)
Another day, another Western country that clumsily tries to find legal ways to put backdoors in end-to-end encrypted services.In the case of the UK it’s allegedly to protect kids (the oldest excuse...

@… Good question. It doesn’t seem to mess with display scaling, but I think perhaps they’re using fonts now that require a Retina/HiDPI display to look usable

Sora 2 is scary, but I don't disapprove of its existence. The technology is coming one way or another. Might as well showcase how it can be used for good, which the TikTok-like format does effectively.
However, I do disapprove of the lack of transparency. This is not a raw text-to-video model. If other companies' services are any guide, it's probably using LLMs to enhance the prompt, generate the script, perhaps much more. But that’s all hidden from the user, who only …

"PR firms are spreading climate misinformation on behalf of fossil fuel companies. Could Australia stop them?"
#Australia #FossilFuels #Energy

PR firms are spreading climate misinformation on behalf of fossil fuel companies. Could Australia stop them?
Have you heard offshore windfarms kill whales? (They don't.) Or that electric vehicles catch fire more often than petrol cars? (It's the opposite.) Perhaps you've heard "natural" gas is clean? (It can be worse than coal.)

The Perverse Beauty of Regex: A Love Letter to the World’s Most Efficient Torture Device
— by @…
🔣 https://www.<…

The Perverse Beauty of Regex: A Love Letter to the World’s Most Efficient Torture Device
It starts innocently. You just want to search for something. A word, a phone number, perhaps the occasional email address belonging to your former classmate who still owes you £60 for books. You could do this the normal way, with a search box like a civilised human, or you could

Such a peaceful man, so peaceful, more peaceful than Jesus or Ghandi.
Did I mention that this peaceful man is in charge of the world's most powerful military and has nuclear launch codes?
So why is Norway in a panic about the retribution that this peaceful many may inflict if he does not get the Nobel Peace Prize?
Perhaps he is not really a peaceful man? (I wonder if he is a man at all.)
"Norway braces for Trump’s reaction if he does not win Nobel peace prize…

Perhaps the Dallas Cowboys aren’t as great in the draft as we thought https://www.si.com/nfl/cowboys/draft/perhaps-dallas-cowboys-arent-as-great-in-nfl-draft-as-we-thought

Any user interface element in any app should, by law, have to disclose if your data goes anywhere that's not directly in said app, in minimum font size and contrast; perhaps with some standardized icons.
We list ingredients on food and composition on clothing; why don't we do this for data?

Heyo, I want to share this #photo from a walk in June near #Ebersberg. It's been quite a nice walk, yet no SUPER photos. But maybe enough to bring a smile on your face :)

Sometimes it is handy to use archives formats that do not confuse our windows friends. Or perhaps you want a quick listing, or to update files without reading and writing the entire thing (i.e. non-solid archives).
Zip or 7z can be handy. The problem is that with their Windows hertitage they do not (reliably) retain certain UNIX-y 'things'. Be that permissions or symlinks.
Here is an example symlink workaround. Permissions left as an exercise for the reader:

A simple shell‑based workaround for archiving projects with symlinks in formats that don’t preserve them (e.g. .7z or certain .zip files). It generates a script that records all symlinks, excludes them from the archive, and later recreates them after extraction.
A simple shell‑based workaround for archiving projects with symlinks in formats that don’t preserve them (e.g. .7z or certain .zip files). It generates a script that records all symlinks, excludes ...

🎲 Randomness reveals hidden order in the plant world
#plants

Randomness reveals hidden order in the plant world
In the intricate architecture of plant tissues, beauty often emerges from chaos, according to new research from Cornell researchers. Findings from a recent study show how randomness and growth together create the striking cellular patterns that shape plant organs—and perhaps all multicellular life.

Compactification Without Orientation, or a Topological Scenario for CP Violation
Brian Greene, Daniel Kabat, Janna Levin, Massimo Porrati
https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.05270 https:…

Compactification Without Orientation, or a Topological Scenario for CP Violation
In higher dimensional theories, we often assume that the extra dimensions form an orientable space, perhaps with singularities. However, many physical theories are well-defined on non-orientable spaces, and many spaces are not orientable, so it is reasonable to explore what happens if the assumption of orientability is relaxed. Here we consider the simplest example of free 6D theories compactified on a flat Klein bottle. We focus on a Dirac fermion in 6D, with boundary conditions that define ${…

❝There was no warning whatsoever. Besides the student programming, there were a number of nationality-based shows, some with 40 years history, displaced and with no chance to transition.❞ https://clevelandstater.com/news/news/csu-shuts-dow…

Toilet model names are something else. What would you rather shit into?
A Kohler "Memoirs Stately"? Perhaps you are daring enough for an "Intrepid"?
If you want something more personified, Toto offers "Guinevere" or "Carolina".

Stephen Miller has a theory about this political moment.
As President Trump expands his lawbreaking and dictatorial rule,
the powerful MAGA disinformation apparatus
—at Miller’s direction
—is supercharging public attention to the debate over Trump’s conduct in a way that’s designed to deeply polarize it.
That will force Americans to take a side in that standoff, Miller clearly believes,
driving them to embrace authoritarian rule,
though perhaps witho…

Inside Stephen Miller’s Secret Plan to Normalize Trump’s Dictator Rule
He wants to supercharge searing civil tensions to get low-information voters to embrace their inner authoritarian. Exactly two Democrats appear to fully grasp this.

I've a question about #PointAndClick games: why does the character seem to shrink & grow as they move around a room?
They look like they're shrinking or perhaps walking down stairs as they move towards the viewer. (The opposite of real life when things close to you seem big!)
It's not just this game, I've seen the same issue in lots of other games.
Is it because the character is staying the same size but the room is drawn with perspective?

Reducing fossil fuel dependency is perhaps the best way to fight thugs.
https://passivhaustrust.org.uk/news/detail/?nId=1500

Jane Goodall was one of perhaps a handful of people I've ever heard speak, like the Dalai Lama, who you just feel their presence and aura as someone truly special.
Truly was glad I got to be around her in person, once - something I won't ever forget. 🙏.
https://

So many conversations about AI literacy and training for museum, library and archive staff at #FF2025! Perhaps we need a RAG chatbot for finding existing training resources in whatever flavour you need

If the referee could perhaps block our players a little bit less often, that would be great. Twice in under a minute.
#LFC

It would be necessary for the Nobel Prize Committee to credibly and unequivocally declare that Darth #Trump has no chance of winning the #NobelPeacePrize—not even for the long list.
Then perhaps he would stop waving his arms around so desperately and trying to bring about “peace” everywhere through…

Anonymous help:
#OpenSource #FreeSoftware

Series D, Episode 02 - Power
TARRANT: Well, that's what your Seska friend did with the hatches. Perhaps she can show us how it's done.
DAYNA: Tarrant, it's serious.
TARRANT: I'm being serious.
[Control room. Tarrant enters, followed by the other two.]
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/402/252

Without even planning it, I got myself two vaccinations just in time for Yom Kippur
We'll see how tonight's Day of Atonement goes; perhaps I'll sweat out my sins with a fever

"You may not notice this—but perhaps, on some level, you do? Every presidential election since 2005’s DST expansion has arrived two days after the time change."
Is daylight saving time secretly helping Republicans win elections?
https://archive.ph/NJu8W#selection-1265.0-1265.158

What kind of egg is this?

Day 13: Patricia C. Wrede
If you know me you know I'm not exactly a fan of monarchy-praise, even (or perhaps especially) in "fairy tales" and adjacent writing, but even though Wrede's Princess Cimorene doesn't quite completely get away from that, I still love the character and her adventures in "Dealing With Dragons" and the sequels. It's honestly pretty cool that Wrede started out writing a trope-flipping fairy-tale adventure-comedy with a male teen prince protagonist, and then decided it was much more fun to focus on a princess who takes the trope-flipping to the next level and completely abandons most of the trappings of a fairy tale in order to both have fun with what's left of the genre and develop a story centered on wholesome friendship (with a dragon) and practical solutions to improbable problems.
I read these books as a kid, and then again as an adult, and then again out loud with my wife, and I'll be reading them again before long with our kids. I'm still on the lookout for more kids books with even better politics, but Wrede's work is definitely part of a solid childhood reading foundation from my perspective.
#20AuthorsNoMen

In Ukraine, Trump's "Peace Efforts" result in even more savage attacks on civilians by Russia.
Those who see supporting Ukraine as a waste of resources are cheering as innocent lives are ruined and ended prematurely.
Perhaps even more disgusting and shameful than the genocide Russia wages on Ukraine, is the indifference shown by so many people around the world.
Monsters and ghouls who insist they are decent humans.
Giorgio is a true journalist reporting…

Resisting Indifference: How Pokovsk Is Not the Gateway to Donbas
Live from Ukraine 🇺🇦

Did the cram in too many features over time?
Perhaps, but that didn’t really affect the basic functionality.
Calling it “bloatware” is funny when in our current era of personal computing everyone and their dog ships Electron apps.

It would be ironic if the shooting of a right wing influencer lead right wing US gov to 'taking aim at Big Tech algorithms' (interesting choice of words CBC!) and embrace the Fediverse perhaps!
“At the news conference, [Republican Governor] Cox... addressed young people specifically….. "Social media is a cancer," he said. "And I would urge people to log off, turn off and touch grass.””
#Fediverse #Algorithms #CharlieKirk #RIghtWing #SocialMedia #BigTech
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/kirk-shooting-investigation-fri-1.7632106

I'm making a personal website.
Anyone got a #NoNazis themed badge I can put on it? Something like a simple crossed-out hakenkreuz in a circle, or perhaps a similar one you think I might like.

The universal icon for LLMs have become sparkles, as in "magic," which is, perhaps apt because it's ultimately mostly illusion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKcBYI82_28
I think, perhaps, it should instead be a reverse ouroboros. I can't think of a more apt iconography for LLMs than a snake infinitely shoving it's head further and further up it's own ass.

Before I go writing my own, is anyone aware of a python package for solving employee scheduling type problems? Perhaps backed by Google's OR-Tools?
They have all the math covered, but the interface is a bit unwieldy. So I'd like to use or write something that is written with the domain in mind, not abstract optimization.
#LazyWeb

Just a reminder:
Each of you ought to take a look at your state's "unclaimed property" website. You may find something owed to you or to someone you know.
The amounts can be trivial or they can be large - and you won't know until you check.
Usually getting the funds owed to you is as simple as filling out a government form on a web page (and perhaps submitting something that proves you are who you say you are.)
Here is the link for California:

Why Things Won't Get Any Easier for New-Look Raiders https://www.si.com/nfl/raiders/onsi/las-vegas-why-things-wont-get-any-easier

The whole of human history is one group or another deciding it has exclusive rights to exist on some arbitrary piece of soil. All are migrants, perhaps excepting a few incels still living in grandma's basement.

Today is September 11722, 1993
so says perhaps the last remaining free #USENET server
https://eternal-september.org/

My eyes are suggesting that El Cheato may not have long before either a stroke or other disabling failure.
Should such an event occur, I do not wish for his death. Rather I would prefer that he and JD get into a 25th Amendment match that results in the effective immobilization of the R-party.
But should Cheato die in office, I am wondering what would be an appropriate way to honor his passage into the underworld.
Given his NYC history, perhaps a parade of garbage scows in …

40 years ago tonight, the #GratefulDead in richmond. a pretty fun evening with an obnoxious cop scene (& perhaps even police riot) & bad gatecrashing that makes it all the way to the AP news wire. fall ’85, show #7.
soundboard: h…

At least two different people on this train car are watching stuff on their phones — without headsets; thus forcing the rest of us to listen to whatever they’re interested in…
Perhaps I should play some music out loud? My iPad is louder than their phones… Some Gangstagrass, perhaps?

Bogus #BGP routes that were little noticed. The origin ASN appears to have been a typo for #AS327885 (Viettel Tanzania), perhaps in a failed attempt at a government directed shutdown?

Just finished this, and it's extremely great throughout.
I think the one reservation I have is that it's not a narrative that promotes an inclusive growth-mindset attitude towards who can be a scientist, but being a memoir that's perhaps more reflective of the (still changing) realities of federally-funded science than of how the author would like things to work.
I learned a ton of cool facts about plants, while also being taken on a deeply personal journey of human connection and survival in hostile environments. And Jahren is just actually a damn good writer, picking again and again, as she quotes it, words that skewer the heart.

This is a genuinely good idea, and I'd urge you to sign it. Make #AI generated works immediately identifiable. It would be interesting also to require a similar 'watermark' in generated texts -- perhaps a particular sequence of whitespace characters.
#generativeAI
H/t

Petition: Require generative AI watermarks & ban using people’s likeness without consent
As AI generated content becomes increasingly realistic, we think laws should be put in place to prevent misuse. All such media should carry a permanent watermark or disclosure, alongside a blanket ban on using anyone’s likeness in AI-generated content without consent.

Maybe AI Was Never a Tool
They can deliver conclusions that feel complete but skip the struggle that gives thought its humanity. This is what I call anti-intelligence—not stupidity, but perhaps better expressed as a kind of counterfeit cognition. It's intelligence without friction that results in output—built in that shared cognitive dynamic—that looks like insight but has bypassed the work that makes insight truly yours.

Maybe AI Was Never a Tool
Using artificial intelligence "responsibly" assumes it is just another tool—it isn't.

🎶 Focused sound energy holds promise for treating cancer, Alzheimer’s and other diseases
https://theconversation.com/focused-sound-energy-holds-promise-for-treating-cancer-alzheimers-and-other-diseases-262622

Focused sound energy holds promise for treating cancer, Alzheimer’s and other diseases
Ultrasound is perhaps best known as an imaging technique to monitor pregnancy or disease. When these sound waves are highly concentrated, however, they can be used to treat a host of diseases.

I was supposed to go home via Wrocław.
But then, I thought: perhaps I could change trains in Legnica, Głogów and Leszno? Turns out, I can do that.
And then, I thought: I've got a long ait in Głogów, perhaps I should add a change in Rudna? Well, I can do that as well.
Of course, there's an increased risk that I'll end up being stuck somewhere along the way.
#rail

I'm listening to the music track of the yet to be released Netflix "Train Dreams" by Dessner. (He also did the interesting music for the "Manhunt" series.)
It seems to me that some of the better compositions and performances are in sound tracks and credits of movies and series.
(Such as the "Strange Game" tune by Mick Jagger in the Slow Horses series. But perhaps the greatest are some older things, like the B. Hermann music from Hitchock's …

I've finally seen the match. A good win, but my god, West Ham is terrible. I have no idea why Nuno took that job.
As much as it hurts, I applaud Slot's courage to sit Salah. I hope he has more to give, but this was perhaps overdue. That this didn't happen a game or two earlier is because Salah has earned the right to battle inconsistency.
Wirtz was spectacular. Should have scored and absolutely should have had another assist. The midfield passing in tight spaces was g…

“Recalls are meant to address breaches of trust, serious misconduct, or a sustained failure to represent constituents, not political disagreements”
I mean... sure she's right. You really shouldn't use a recall petition just because you don't like the result of a vote.
But when there are *20 recall petitions* for government MLAs, perhaps it is time, as a government to look into ways you might be going wrong?
#CanPoli #ABPoli #CdnPoli #Democracy
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/danielle-smith-recall-petition-approved-9.7001541

Series A, Episode 01 - The Way Back
VARON: Perhaps they should have.
MAJA: What do you mean?
VARON: I don't know. Perhaps Blake is guilty. Even so it's... too perfect.
MAJA: Where're you going?
VARON: The Public Records computer.
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/101/259…

Day 5: Robin Wall Kimmerer
I'm taking these liberty of changing my hashtag and expanding the intent of this list to include all non-men, although Kimerer is a woman so I'll get to more gender diversity later... I've also started planning this out more and realized that I may continue a bit beyond 20...
In any case, Robin Wall Kimmerer is an Indigenous academic biologist and excellent non-fiction author whose work touches on Potawotomi philosophy, colonialism (including in academic spaces), and ideas for a better future. Anyone interested in ecology, conservation, or decolonization in North America will probably be impressed by her work and the rich connections she weaves between academic ecology and Indigenous knowledge offer a critical opportunity to expand your understanding of the world if like me you were raised deeply enmeshed in "Western" scientific tradition. I suppose a little background in skepticism helped prepare me to respect her writing, but I don't think that's essential.
I've only read "Braiding Sweetgrass," but "Gathering Moss" and her more recent "The Serviceberry" are high on my to-read list, despite my predilection for fiction. Kimmerer incorporates a backbone of fascinating anecdotes into "Braiding Sweetgrass" that makes it surprisingly easy reading for a work that's philosophical at its core. She also pulls off an impressive braided organization to the whole thing, weaving together disparate knowledges in a way that lets you see both their contradictions and their connections.
The one criticism I've seen of her work is that it's not sufficiently connected to other Indigenous philosophers & writers, and that it's perhaps too comfortable of a read for colonizers, and that seems valid to me, even though (perhaps because I am a colonizer) I still find her book important.
An excellent author in any case, and one doing concrete ideological work towards a better world.
#20AuthorsNoMen

Trump’s plan to rig the 2026 midterm election
by pressuring states to create more Republican congressional seats
will face a major test in a federal courtroom in El Paso, Texas
starting Wednesday,
as a panel of judges considers whether to block the state’s new gerrymandered map.
At stake in the hearing,
scheduled for ten days,
are as many as five congressional seats
— perhaps enough to determine control of Congress in next year’s midterms

Texas Gerrymander Goes to Court, With 5 Congressional Seats, and Minority Representation, at Stake
Read about the fight for democracy from activists, elected officials, legal experts and others.

Series C, Episode 02 - Powerplay
CALLY: Then he's alive.
SERVALAN: The condition I hope is purely temporary.
[Scene - cabin on the Liberator]
DAYNA: Must you do that?
AVON: It won't fit into any logical pattern.
DAYNA: What won't?
https://blake.torpidity.net/m/302/279

Like there's no leak or anything, I think the pump just stopped working?
Wonder why that's failure point, perhaps over time there is some out-diffusion liquid and eventually it starts to cavitate?

There is a word for this ... and that word is "Viet Nam".
'President Donald Trump said that Hamas “is going to disarm” but if they don’t the US would act to disarm them “quickly and perhaps violently.”'
https://www.aljazeera.com/video/newsf…

Trump warns Hamas will be disarmed ‘quickly and perhaps violently’
President Donald Trump said that Hamas “is going to disarm” but if they don’t the US would act to disarm them.

Just finished "Thief of the Heights" written by Son M. and illustrated by Robin Yao. It's a very cool graphic novel about the illusions of meritocracy and loyalty to one's roots, with an interesting setting and better politics than most stuff out there, even if the plotting is a little rough and perhaps a bit too straightforward. The neat ending and reliance on heroism are themes I don't love in these kinds of tales, but I'm grateful for more stories in this category to exist in the first place, so I can't complain too much.
It's got disability, queer, and POC representation and some of that is #OwnVoices, which is cool, although those dimensions of the work aren't its focus.
#AmReading

This is compounded by confusing the message with the messenger.
“I hate what you’re telling me, therefore obviously you must hate me” is a fallacy itself.
I hope people going down this path will eventually recognize what they’re doing and perhaps learn something and improve themselves.

To my mind the following article suggests that the present day "AI" approach is very wrong.
Why? Because biological RI (Real Intelligence) out performs CI (Computer Intelligence) by orders of magnitude on many dimensions: power required (perhaps 20 to 50 watts for the human brain), weight, size, cooling, and ability to innovate in new ways.
Our present digital computer approach to intelligence seems about as apt as trying to power passenger airplanes using onboard coal…

OpenAI Signs $38 Billion Cloud Computing Deal With Amazon
After signing agreements to use computing power from Nvidia, AMD and Oracle, OpenAI is partnering with the world’s largest cloud computing company.

The whole thing is optimized for scams, deception and other criminal behavior:
- user interface that deceptively pretends it's a human you're talking to
- claims from companies highly exaggerate capabilities
companies and "experts" constantly hype "AGI" which they (funnily enough) do to both make investors greedier and spread fear and as a distraction because these algorithms can't actually do what they keep promising
- large-scale accounting and financial fraud (e.g. what Nvidia is doing with circular selling)
- biggest case of copyright infringement in history
Note: I think the underlying technology is really cool, and definitely has use cases and can be used for actually good things. But: some technology just has more downsides than upsides, and some should only be used by experts in controlled environments. Leaded gasoline, asbestos and chlorofluorocarbon are also all really cool technology.
In this case perhaps the techology itself doesn't do anything inherently bad, however the people making it are lying about what it can do, the people selling it are motivated purely by greed and the people using it (often forced to do so) are being deceived.

Finished "Espada - The Will of the Blade" by Anabel Cozalo.
The art is lovely, but I found the plotting/story to be a bit weak. Perhaps more pointedly, I felt like the plot setup was great but the landing was a bit off, and the telling of the story didn't nicely convey all the nuances I expect the author had in mind. Felt like a lot was left in the gutters.
#AmReading #ReadingNow