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InitialsDiceBearhttps://github.com/dicebear/dicebearhttps://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/„Initials” (https://github.com/dicebear/dicebear) by „DiceBear”, licensed under „CC0 1.0” (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)MP
Posts 22
Comments 428
What's the most manipulative thing you've ever done?
  • My employer has a “buy American” policy that kicks in for purchases over a certain dollar amount. To get an exemption, you need to identify 2 domestic options and state why they aren’t sufficient.

    Recently I needed to replace a module in an existing system that happens to be made by a non-US company. There is literally no valid alternative - only this one company makes the modules that are compatible with each other.

    So I had to identify 2 American made products that were vaguely similar and state why they didn’t meet our specifications. Though “Vaguely similar” is a stretch - it was equivalent to explaining to someone why you can’t buy AA batteries to replace a car battery.

  • flouride
  • There’s a follow up meta study from 2020.:

    In conclusion, based on the totality of currently available scientific evidence, the present review does not support the presumption that fluoride should be assessed as a human developmental neurotoxicant at the current exposure levels in Europe.

  • Trump Picks Gas Executive as Energy Secretary | Chris Wright is a TV-ready evangelist for fossil fuels who lacks government experience.
  • Hey, he had a degree in “meats” from Texas A&M. That’s basically an alternative prerequisite for nuclear stockpile maintenance.

    Supposedly when he was picked for energy secretary he thought the position would be “symbolic coal baron”. He eventually found out about the nukes part, and to his credit he apparently realized the significance.

  • Big Calm - Morcheeba

    music.youtube.com Big Calm - YouTube Music

    Provided to YouTube by EastWest U.K. Big Calm · Morcheeba Big Calm ℗ 1998 China Records Manufactured and distributed by Sire Records Group Beats And Sc...

    Big Calm - YouTube Music
    0
    Why do People Choose BlueSky Over Mastodon?
  • I’m gonna echo what others have said here. The mastodon signup process is too complex, and searching for instructions just leads to “what is the fediverse and/or activitypub” explainers.

    I created a mastodon account a few years ago and it was my first introduction to the fediverse. It was frustrating and I only persevered because I REALLY wanted to replace twitter.

    Once I got it set up, I realized that no one who I followed on twitter was there. My feed is currently like 2 people, plus a bunch of dead accounts from people who dipped their toe in but didn’t stay.

    Joining Bluesky was simple, and there were already a bunch of accounts I wanted to follow. The recent influx has increased that, and it feels a lot like old school twitter without the nazis.

    People originally joined twitter (and stuck with it for so long) because that’s where everyone else is. Mastadon is too clunky join and use, so people aren’t.

  • What food did you hate in the past, but enjoy now?
  • That’s a shame. If I might ask, have you ever had a properly cooked pork chop?

    I only ask because pork used to need to reach 165 degrees Fahrenheit to be safe, which makes for tough, dry pork. Fortunately the parasite that required this heat was eliminated from the US, and about 15 years ago the USDA lowered the safe temp to 145. The result is so much better.

  • RFK Jr. says a Trump White House would immediately push to remove fluoride from water
  • Those concerns are for unrealistically high doses though. The last sentence of the abstract you linked:

    In conclusion, based on the totality of currently available scientific evidence, the present review does not support the presumption that fluoride should be assessed as a human developmental neurotoxicant at the current exposure levels in Europe.

    Calling concerns about the safety of fluoridated water “founded” is a bit of a stretch.

  • The War That Would Not End: Inside the year-long American effort to release the hostages, end the fighting in Gaza, and bring peace to the Middle East

    www.theatlantic.com The War That Would Not End

    Inside the year-long American effort to release the hostages, end the fighting in Gaza, and bring peace to the Middle East

    The War That Would Not End

    Non-paywalled link

    >[The Biden administration] assigned itself a larger mission than full-throated solidarity in the aftermath of the attack. It wanted to avert a regional war that might ensnare the United States. It aspired to broker an end to the conflict, and to liberate the estimated 251 hostages that Hamas had kidnapped and taken to the Gaza Strip. It sought a Gaza free from Hamas’s rule, and the dismantlement of the group’s military capabilities. And despite the scale of those tasks, it accelerated its pursuit of the Saudi normalization deal.

    >What follows is a history of those efforts: a reconstruction of 11 months of earnest, energetic diplomacy, based on interviews with two dozen participants at the highest levels of government, both in America and across the Middle East.

    6

    Everett confronts the paparazzi (November 13, 1905)

    Apparently an autograph album is “is a book for collecting the autographs of others. Traditionally they were exchanged among friends, colleagues, and classmates to fill with poems, drawings, personal messages, small pieces of verse, and other mementos.”

    They were popular among university students from the 15th to mid-19th century, but have since been replaced by yearbooks.

    10

    Everett provides medical assistance (April 1, 1915)

    Everett’s methods may violate the Hippocratic Oath, but they sure are effective.

    2

    Everett makes an impression (July 27, 1909)

    >Just hold this pose for a while until the cement sets good!

    Ever the artist, Mr. True branches out into mixed media (cement and fool face).

    8

    Everett takes a stand against age discrimination in housing (1907?)

    >Get up out of that so I can take one more punch at you!

    Sadly, Everett would need to wait for the Fair Housing Act of 1968 for this landlord’s behavior to be federally illegal. It’s unclear what state Mr. True lives in (besides anger, obviously).

    32

    Everett goes bananas (1907?)

    >“There’s no hope of my beating any sense into you, but I’ll knock some of the ignorance out of you!”

    >-Everett True

    Sometimes Everett’s angry chastising gets downright poetic. Here he throws out a one-liner worthy of an 80’s action movie, all because of a messy banana eater.

    18
    www.theatlantic.com What Europe Fears

    American allies see a second Trump term as all but inevitable. “The anxiety is massive.”

    What Europe Fears

    American allies see a second Trump term as all but inevitable. “The anxiety is massive.”

    > Fear of losing Europe’s most powerful ally has translated into a pathologically intense fixation on the U.S. presidential race. European officials can explain the Electoral College in granular detail and cite polling data from battleground states. Thomas Bagger, the state secretary in the German foreign ministry, told me that in a year when billions of people in dozens of countries around the world will get the chance to vote, “the only election all Europeans are interested in is the American election.” Almost every official I spoke with believed that Trump is going to win.

    Paywall removed: https://web.archive.org/web/20240603193105/https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2024/06/nato-trump-europe-allies/678533/

    5

    Trump says some undocumented immigrants are ‘not people’

    48

    Primitive Technology: One-Way Blower Iron Smelt & Forging Experiment

    7

    XKCD: Banana Prices

    0
    www.nytimes.com Congress Clears Stopgap Spending Bill for Biden, Moving to Avert Shutdown

    Hours after the Senate passed the measure, the House followed suit, with Democrats supplying the bulk of the votes, a day before funding for some government agencies was slated to lapse.

    Congress Clears Stopgap Spending Bill for Biden, Moving to Avert Shutdown

    Congress on Thursday sent legislation to avert a partial government shutdown to President Biden, racing to fund federal agencies through early March one day before money was to run out.

    Over the strenuous opposition of far-right Republicans, the House voted 314 to 108 to approve the stopgap funding just hours after the Senate provided overwhelming bipartisan backing for the measure in a 77-to-18 vote, allowing lawmakers to narrowly beat a Friday deadline.

    In the end, Mr. Johnson was only able to cobble together a bare majority of Republicans voting on the bill, with 107 backing it and 106 opposed. Democrats supplied the bulk of the support.

    Alternative non-paywalled source: ABC News

    14

    Harvard President Claudine Gay Resigns, Shortest Tenure in University History

    www.thecrimson.com HARVARD PRESIDENT CLAUDINE GAY RESIGNS, SHORTEST TENURE IN UNIVERSITY HISTORY | News | The Harvard Crimson

    Harvard President Claudine Gay will resign Tuesday afternoon, bringing an end to the shortest presidency in the University's history, according to a person with knowledge of the decision.

    HARVARD PRESIDENT CLAUDINE GAY RESIGNS, SHORTEST TENURE IN UNIVERSITY HISTORY | News | The Harvard Crimson

    Gay’s resignation — just six months and two days into the presidency — comes amid growing allegations of plagiarism and lasting doubts over her ability to respond to antisemitism on campus after her disastrous congressional testimony Dec. 5.

    Gay weathered scandal after scandal over her brief tenure, facing national backlash for her administration’s response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and allegations of plagiarism in her scholarly work.

    66

    Overcome - Tricky

    4

    Archive - Nothing Else (Version) (Official Music Video)

    0

    You'll never guess the most popular internet country code

    16
    apnews.com Texas Supreme Court pauses lower court's order allowing pregnant woman to have an abortion

    The Texas Supreme Court has put on hold a judge’s ruling that approved an abortion for a pregnant woman whose fetus has a fatal diagnosis.

    Texas Supreme Court pauses lower court's order allowing pregnant woman to have an abortion

    The Texas Supreme Court on Friday night put on hold a judge’s ruling that approved an abortion for a pregnant woman whose fetus has a fatal diagnosis, throwing into limbo an unprecedented challenge to one of the most restrictive bans in the U.S.

    The order by the all-Republican court came more than 30 hours after Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother of two from the Dallas area, received a temporary restraining order from a lower court judge that prevents Texas from enforcing the state’s ban in her case.

    In a one-page order, the court said it was temporarily staying Thursday’s ruling “without regard to the merits.” The case is still pending.

    19

    Primitive Technology: Downdraft Kiln

    6

    University of North Carolina police respond to ‘an armed and dangerous person on or near campus’

    www.cnn.com University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill issues all clear after 'armed and dangerous' person on campus | CNN

    The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill issued an “all clear” on Monday afternoon, hours after police responded to an “armed and dangerous person on or near campus,” the university said.

    University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill issues all clear after 'armed and dangerous' person on campus | CNN

    Edit: AlertCarolina issued an all clear message at 4:15pm local time.

    From WRAL

    >One person, a UNC faculty member, has died in the shooting.

    >One person was taken into police custody as of 3:15 p.m.

    > Police at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are responding to an “armed and dangerous person on or near campus,” according to an alert from the university on Monday.

    >“Remain sheltered in place. This is an ongoing situation. Suspect at large,” the university said in an alert sent just before 2:30 p.m., about 90 minutes after the first alert was sent.

    According to the student paper The Daily Tar Heel, at least one person has been wounded.

    University police are advising students, faculty and staff to:

    Go inside immediately. Close windows and doors. Stay until further notice. Follow directions from emergency responders or University officials.

    8

    Recontextualizing the scientific method

    5