2024-01-22
etc
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Lessons learned from bringing promotional sweets to a conference – Terence Eden’s Blog
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Boosting fertility by subsidizing child-bearing for young women
- All those years we "fought against teen pregnancy" oops.
Horseshit
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Honest Feedback on a Wallpen Vertical Printer
Co-funded by the European Union
- Note no one prints a billboard "on-site": this is a solved problem. NFI what someone was thinking with "wall printer" but now i fear to ask just how much money got spent on this adventure.
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'Cozy' relationship between Boeing and U.S. draws scrutiny amid 737 MAX 9 mess
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Gamers at risk of irreversible hearing loss and tinnitus, study suggests
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Hugo Nomination Report Has Unexplained Ineligibility Rulings
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An overwhelming majority of the members of WSFS who voted on the site of the 2023 Worldcon (at the 2021 Worldcon in DC) selected Chengdu, China as the host of the 2023 Worldcon. That meant that the members of WSFS who expressed an opinion accepted that the convention would be held under Chinese legal conditions. Furthermore, those people (including me) who suggested that there might be election irregularities were overridden, shouted down, fired from their convention positions, and told that they were evil and probably racist for even suggesting such a thing.
When it comes to local law, this could end up applying anywhere. Here's an example I can use because as far as I know, there are no Worldcon bids for Florida at this time. Imagine a Worldcon held in Florida. It would be subject to US and Florida law (and any smaller government subdivision). Given legislation passed by Florida, it would not surprise me if such a hypothetical Florida Worldcon's Hugo Administration Subcommittee would disqualify any work with LGBTQ+ content, any work with an LGBTQ+ author, or any LGBTQ+ individual, because the state has declared them all illegal under things like their "Don't Say Gay or Trans" laws and related legislation.
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Charlie Stross: "worldcon Hugo nomination statistics suggest the 2023 Hugo awards were rigged"
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E-bikes caused record deaths, fires last year in New York City
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Billionaire CEO: Successful people share pattern recognition skill
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The Rise of the Right-Wing Progressives - by N.S. Lyons
Right-Wing Progressives are what Virginia Postrel, in her 1998 book The Future and Its Enemies, approvingly dubbed “dynamists”: individuals whose primary vision for a good society is a state of constant Promethean invention, discovery, growth, and transformation. They see their true enemies as what Postrel labels “stasists”: nostalgia-ridden, backwards-looking brutes who hate change and for some unimaginable reason want to keep everything old and therefore obsolete from being replaced by new and better things. Today, from the RWP’s point of view, the forces of stasism just happen to include the Woke left in addition to conservatives.
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Billionaire backers of new California city reveal proposed map and details
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F.A.A. Tells Airlines to Check Door Plugs on a Boeing 737-900ER - The New York Times
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Why do dogs wag their tails? Humans liked the rhythm, study suggests
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Woman arrested after police found $2,500 worth of Stanley cups in her car
Electric / Self Driving cars
celebrity gossip
Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering
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WSJ Editor-in-Chief Admits To Davos Elites 'We No Longer Own The News' | ZeroHedge
"I think there’s a very specific challenge for the legacy brands, like the New York Times and like the Wall Street Journal," Tucker said, adding "If you go back really not that long ago, as I say, we owned the news. We were the gatekeepers, and we very much owned the facts as well." "If it said it in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, then that was a fact," she continued, adding "Nowadays, people can go to all sorts of different sources for the news and they’re much more questioning about what we’re saying."
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Why do people believe in conspiracy theories? Here's what the science says
conspiratorial ideation is strongly related to abnormal-range traits, such as schizotypy, paranoia, tendencies to have unusual experiences, trait psychoticism, and hostility. These traits are associated with impaired functioning and a negative perception of others and events. On the other hand, normal-range personality traits (captured by the Big Five model) showed very small correlations with conspiratorial ideation. This indicates that while these general traits have some influence, they are not as pivotal in predicting belief in conspiracy theories as abnormal-range traits.
One interesting finding was the role of humility. Both general humility and intellectual humility were significant, negative correlates of conspiratorial ideation, particularly when measuring honesty–humility and comprehensive features of intellectual humility. This suggests that a lack of humility is a notable marker of conspiratorial thinking. These findings highlight that conspiratorial ideation is more closely linked with psychopathology and certain personality disorders than with general personality functioning.
Musk
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Texas Is Considering a Controversial Land Swap Deal with SpaceX
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(Apr 2022) The lost thread
The speed with which Twitter recedes in your mind will shock you. Like a demon from a folktale, the kind that only gains power when you invite it into your home, the platform melts like mist when that invitation is rescinded.
Trump / War against the Right / Jan6
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“On what basis did Treasury/FinCEN conclude that purchasing or possessing of religious texts, may be indicative of extremism?” Scott said, adding “Who made the decision for Treasury/FinCEN to warn financial institutions that religious texts may indicate extremism?”
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Jamie Dimon thinks Trump was 'kind of right' about a lot of things. What?
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Donald Trump Reacts To DeSantis Dropping Out And Makes Nickname Announcement
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Trump may testify in E Jean Carroll defamation case: Here’s what’s to know
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Retired Lt. General Reveals What Pushed Him 'Over The Edge' With Trump
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NBC's Kristen Welker Presses GOP Governor Over Head-Spinning Trump Take
Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp
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Tedros Tells the World Economic Forum the WHO Pandemic Treaty Is Needed
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Arctic zombie viruses in Siberia could spark terrifying new pandemic, scientists
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A COVID mea culpa from former NIH director Francis Collins
It comes three years too late. But Francis Collins, the former head of the National Institutes of Health, has finally admitted that the COVID-19 lockdowns caused a massive amount of harm — harm to which he and other government public-health experts, such as Anthony Fauci of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, were oblivious because they were obsessed with doing things their way.
Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation
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The group is explicitly religious (across religions and denominations) and also right-leaning and explicitly elitist. Robert George of Princeton has a leadership role in the group.
Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts
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Does preschool help kids -- or harm them?
"The originally observed benefits largely faded, and the impacts for the later cohort of students were largely negative (more likely to be diagnosed with a learning disability, more behavior problems at school, more idleness as an adult, more teen parenthood)."
Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising
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Google Is Tracking You Even in Incognito Mode, New Disclaimer Is Up
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Get Woke, Go Broke: Mass Layoffs At Sports Illustrated After Publisher Loses License | ZeroHedge
Sports Illustrated rights holder Arena Group has had its license to publish the magazine revoked by Authentic Brands Group after inability to make $3.75 million quarterly payment at the end of 2023. In other words, the publisher likely isn't bringing in enough profit to maintain the brand. Under contract, Arena Group is required to pay another $45 million to ABG because of the loss of the license. As a result, Sports Illustrated has been forced to layoff their entire staff while discussions are underway to salvage the arrangement.
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Google has no visionary leaders and a pervasive sense of nihilism
TechSuck / Geek Bait
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The Open Source Sustainability Crisis
Just as the security crisis is adjacent to the sustainability crisis, so is the Open Source diversity crisis: Open Source is markedly less demographically diverse than software engineering in general. We have not just inequality of outcome but inequality of opportunity. 35% of people don’t even have Internet access yet, let alone free time to hack on Open Source projects. Structural inequalities can be thought of as the largest of hoops to jump through in order to get paid fairly for producing widely adopted Open Source software. We should directly address this wider diversity crisis, and, we should work on resolving the sustainability crisis.
AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World
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OpenAI bans developer of Dean Phillips bot - The Washington Post
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Yesterday: + Silicon Valley insiders are trying to unseat Biden with help from AI - The Washington Post
A new super PAC tied to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and billionaire Bill Ackman is backing Democratic challenger Dean Phillips
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OpenAI suspends developer over bot that impersonated presidential candidate
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The Metaverse Flopped, So Mark Zuckerberg Is Pivoting to Empty AI Hype
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Musicians union 'prepared to do whatever it needs' for AI protections
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AI Means Kids Should Learn Good Judgment, Not Code, Centerview Founder Says
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Artists can poison their pics with deadly Nightshade to deter AI scrapers
Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO
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Opinion | Commercial Landings Will Change the Moon Forever - The New York Times
This new era of lunar missions is likely to change humanity’s relationship to the moon. Before this happens, we owe ourselves — and the moon itself — a more thoughtful consideration of what our planet’s only natural satellite represents. Anything we do to it will last forever. We have an enormous responsibility to the moon’s future, and to the future of anyone else who lives here beside it.
Economicon / Business / Finance
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Yield curve adds to mystery over US economy
There is rising confidence in a US economic soft landing but a classic recession-predictor in markets is still flashing red — the so-called inversion of the yield curve. Normally, the longer the term of a bond, the higher the yield as investors seek compensation holding the debt at a greater time and the extra risk that entails. When the yield curve inverts, yields on short-term bonds rise above longer-term ones. It has been seen as a harbinger of bad economic times because it implies expectations that interest rates will be lowered in the longer term to stimulate growth.
Perhaps the way to conclude the yield curve puzzle is to remember that a soft landing does not necessarily preclude a shallow recession. The five-plus quarter-point interest rate cuts currently being priced in by investors imply something potentially more painful. Otherwise, why would the Fed slash rates so speedily without a rapidly weakening economy to rescue? A gradual slowdown is certainly a simpler story, but it still does not quite account for all the facts.
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How America accidentally made a free-money machine for banks
investors are betting the central bank will cut rates significantly, the cost of borrowing today is only 4.8%. Yet because those rate cuts have not yet happened, the Fed still pays banks 5.4% on their cash balances. In other words, banks can draw loans just to make a spread of 0.6 percentage points, risk-free, at the expense of the central bank. Should the expected rate cuts take place, the banks need not suffer a negative interest margin, because they are free to repay the loans early, a valuable option the Fed, in effect, gave away for nothing. Borrowers’ identity will eventually be made public, so the only constraint on them is the risk to their reputations—but some may consider such shameless opportunism a virtue.
Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making
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Americans Are Fighting For Control Of Federal Powers That Shouldn’t Exist
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FEMA to overhaul its disaster aid system after decades of criticism
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BREAKING: Ron DeSantis Suspends Presidential Campaign, Makes Endorsement.
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'Fire Sale On Merch!' Democrats Kick Up Their Heels At Demise Of DeSantis Campaign
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Ron DeSantis Ends Presidential Bid After Polls Show Him Falling Far Short of Trump
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In A Surprise To No One, DeSantis Ends His Campaign By Falsely Quoting Winston Churchill
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Ron DeSantis ended his campaign on an optimistic Churchill quote that's actually fake
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DeSantis Appears to Misattribute a Quote to Churchill as He Drops Out of Primary
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DeSantis Campaign Uses Fake Churchill Quote in Final Message
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Georgia reporter Amber Connor, who has been sitting in the courtroom during the trial for the past two weeks.
When he analyzed the BMD (ballot marking device) in Georgia… he holds down the power button for between five to 10 seconds, probably 7 seconds, and it automatically puts the machine in safe mode. …And this reboot happens. And he then shows the judge the display and it shows a picture of the on off button as he’s pushing it for five to 10 seconds to instigate the reboot. But before you reboot the whole thing there’ll be something that comes up to ask if he wants to go into safe mode, and then he pushes. Yes. So it doesn’t shut it down or reboot. He just goes into safe mode. And that allows him to open up files and change the content of files.
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Fake Joe Biden robocall tells New Hampshire Democrats not to vote on Tuesday
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Biden’s name won’t appear on New Hampshire ballots – where does that leave Democrats?
As a consequence of the party scrap, Biden’s name will not even appear on the ballot in the Granite state on Tuesday. While the president remains the favorite to win his party’s overall nomination, his absence here has opened a window for Dean Phillips, a Democratic congressman from Minnesota, and Marianne Williamson, an author and self-help guru who ran for president in 2020, to mount longshot presidential bids.
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Biden administration announces new abortion initiatives on Roe anniversary
Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security
External Security / Militaria / Diplomania
World
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UK Navy ship collision: Watch: The Chiddingfold Hits The Bangor | ZeroHedge
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Ministers' 99% mortgage idea could overheat UK housing market, say experts
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More than 100k protest across Germany over far-right AfD's deportation plan
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Will Milei Make Argentina Great Again? - by Bryan Caplan
What is the most likely scenario for Argentina? The monetary and fiscal stabilization is very likely to work. Argentina has faced far worse crises before: The hyperinflations of the 70s to the 90s multiplied prices 100 billion times. That’s like turning a billion dollars into a penny. Yet Argentinians ultimately overcame all these problems and more using the orthodox medicines of monetary restraint and fiscal responsibility. Since even politicians who ideologically opposed these treatments ultimately endured their short-run costs, it is a safe bet that a libertarian economics professor will do the same.
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Military interests are pushing new nuclear power; UK gov finally admits it
Iran / Houthi / Red Sea / Mediterranean
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US Mulls More Aggressive, Stepped-Up Measures Against Houthis | ZeroHedge
Biden responding when asked whether the strikes are deterring Houthi aggression: "Well, when you say ‘working’ — are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they going to continue? Yes," the president said.
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Iran has almost enough uranium for nuclear bomb, US expert reports
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Red Sea crisis: What it takes to reroute the biggest cargo ships
Israel
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Why Israel Will Never Manage to Destroy All Hamas Tunnels in Gaza - Israel News - Haaretz.com
The Israel Defense Forces will not destroy all the Hamas and Islamic Jihad tunnels under Gaza. Probably not even most of them. This assessment, which has yet to be voiced publicly, is shared by all levels of the IDF. From the generals, trying to plan what they call a "year of warfare" in 2024, through the brigade and battalion commanders who are spending entire weeks on the ground to destroy just one section of the tunnel system, all the way down to the combat engineering troops, who are now starting to come out of Gaza after three months of fighting with mixed feelings. On the one hand they have carried out an unprecedented number of tunnel demolition missions. On the other, they know many more such tunnels remain intact.
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Sports Emerges as New Front in Israel-Hamas War | RealClearWire
The International Ice Hockey Federation, or IIHF, first banned Israeli athletes from international competitions, then abruptly reversed that decision on Wednesday. The Federation this week determined that it did indeed have the “safety and security support needed” to allow Israel, which won the silver medal last year in its division, to take place in a tournament being held in Bulgaria. Previously, the IIHF had decided to exclude the Israeli team from all of its competitions “for the time being” out of concern for athletes’ safety.
Russia Bad / Ukraine War
China
Health / Medicine
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Trying to see a doctor in Maine? Why your wait could be months
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A Weight-Loss Drug Changed My Life. Will It Solve My Problem? - WSJ
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Big Pharma hiked the price of 775 drugs this year so far: Report
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There is way too much serendipity - by Malmesbury
It is therefore a fact of the world that virtually all the popular synthetic sweeteners were discovered accidentally by chemists randomly eating their research topic.I think this is a suspiciously high amount of serendipity. If you add the history of LSD to the history of artificial sweeteners, it follows that chemistry researchers are constantly tasting everything they touch, and I will believe that until someone gives me a better explanation. If you are a chemist, explain yourself.
Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda
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American society wasn't always so car-centric. Our future doesn't have to be
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Climate change bringing challenges for Superfund site cleanup
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The World Hasn’t Seen Cicadas Like This Since 1803 - The New York Times
This spring, for the first time since 1803, two cicada groups known as Brood XIX, or the Great Southern Brood, and Brood XIII, or the Northern Illinois Brood, are set to appear at the same time, in what is known as a dual emergence. The last time the Northern Illinois Brood’s 17-year cycle aligned with the Great Southern Brood’s 13-year period, Thomas Jefferson was president. After this spring, it’ll be another 221 years before the broods, which are geographically adjacent, appear together again.
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After a temperature roller coaster, a wildcard: the polar vortex - The Washington Post
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States with big climate goals strip local power to block green projects