whelmer @ whelmer @beehaw.org

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Joined

2 yr. ago

Does your Libby have the same shit as mine?

Recently listened to The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow, Wendell Berry: Unsettling of America, Steve Coll: Directorate S, also Coll: Shadow Wars, Raven by Tim Reiterman, Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakaeur,The Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel. We Carry Their Bones by Erin Kimmerle.

All non-fiction but all good. The two books by Coll are two of the best books I've ever read, if you're at all interested in the Afghan war or the CIA. And David Graeber is definitely a favourite of mine as well.

Also, if you don't know about it, Librivox is a cool source for audiobooks. It's all volunteer-read from Project Guttenburg. The quality can be a little rough if you're used to profressional audiobooks, but some of the readers are really good and there's a lot of great stuff. A reader I really like on that platform is called Expatriate, loved his reading of Don Quioxote.

…oh…now I see why they are on strike.

😆

They believe that the long-term intent is to force people to remain within their designated "15 minute" zones.

My understanding is that reactionary lunatics of the Q type have gotten hold of the idea and are convinced that it is part of a plan to limit people within particular zones, enforced by digital surveillance, as part of some grand Orwellian plot. I believe that is how the weird right-wing reaction to this started, anyways.

My mental effort produced the theory that they have an alternative subscription service in mind that is more investor-friendly but that clashes with the coin thing.

I get much of my news from podcasts. Democracy Now, Popular Front, Canadaland, the Guardian, stuff like that.

I dunno if my life is easier because I'm a vegetarian or what but we mostly make our food and most of what we make is not time consuming. Steamed greens and carrots with boiled potatoes. Roasted veggies in the oven. Stir fries. Beans and whatever stewed in a crock pot with canned tomatoes.

For breakfast, oatmeal with chia seeds, hemp hearts, flax meal, sunflower seeds, peanut butter and fruit goes together real easy. Alternatively, frying some eggs and having the above things on toast instead of oatmeal.

Usually we make a bunch of stew or soup that will be used for lunch over several days. Cook like 4 cups of rice to go with it. Then for dinner, usually steamed stuff or perhaps roasted veggies or a stirfry with rice or noodles.

Homemade pizza is also pretty easy. It takes about 5 minutes to throw the dough together, then you can prepare whatever toppings you want while the dough rises for 45-60 mins. Takes ~10 min to bake when ready. I can post the recipe if anyone wants it but I'm sure you can find stuff online.

There's so much more that bees do, too. Managing hive temperature (as to be exactly 36c), collecting pollen, nectar, propolis, and water, cleaning the cells, removing dead bees, dealing with infections, raising drones...

Bees are cool.

I prefer honey. But what I do most mornings is toast with peanut butter, flax meal, hemp hearts, and sunflower seeds.

Hello, cis male here. My 2 cents would be not to worry so much about what you "really" are and just do what feels right for you today. You can play and experiment with gender as much or as little as you like. It's entirely up to you, and that's what determines what you "really" are.

For me, I've always been attracted to women (and to girls when I was younger). That's never felt to me like wanting to look like them. If you want to look more like the girls your age, then try it and see how it feels.

Your logic is flawed in that derivative works are not a violation of copyright. Generally, copyright protects a text or piece of art from being reproduced. Specific characters and settings can be protected by copyright, concepts and themes cannot. People take inspiration from the work of others all the time. Lots of TV shows or whatever are heavily informed by previous works, and that's totally fine.

Copyright protects the reproduction of other peoples work, and the reuse of their specific characters. It doesn't protect style, themes, concepts, etc. IE. the things that an AI is trying to derive. So like if you trained your LLM only on Tolkien such that it always told stories about Gandalf and the hobbits, then that would be a problem.

I don't believe the only options are to do nothing or to use horrific weapons which primary kill civilians and which have been banned by over 100 countries, including major U.S allies who, unlike almost everyone in this thread, are quite critical of the United States for sending these munitions to the battlefield.

If the logic of supporting Ukraine and ending the conflict as quickly as possible supports the use of cluster bombs, why not chemical weapons? Why not nuclear weapons? Where do you draw the line with this logic of escalation?

What I said was that Western nations funneling increasingly deadly weapons into a brutal war might not be the best of all options, and that maybe, maybe, working towards a negotiated settlement that ends the war, even if it means territorial losses for Ukraine, would be better. That is not "saving lives at all costs", that is not "blaming the victims for not giving up quicker". The idea that the only options are complete and unambiguous Ukrainian victory or the extermination of everyone in Ukraine, (an argument being made here by people, incidentally, who clearly have no skin in the game), is the logic of armageddon.

The logical gymnastics here are just astonishing. To suggest an alternative to military escalation makes me a tanky. To suggest negotiations makes me an authoritarian. To advocate for peace is to advocate for "might makes right". This is the logic of nationalism.

I'm sorry, did you just accuse me of being a far-right tanky for suggesting that a negotiated peace might be the best of bad options?

What exactly do you think the word "tanky" means?

It's interesting how everyone is anti-war until there's a war, then everyone is suddenly a nationalist. This isn't a video game, this isn't a movie.

There is a very real possibility that Ukraine is going to lose this war, and I've not heard realistically say this war will be over soon. In which case a plausible argument could be made on humanitarian grounds that a negotiated settlement as quickly as possible is the best of the bad options. But seems not to be what the United States or Ukraine wants, so. It's really quite fucked up.

Like I don't know how I would feel if I were Ukrainian. I absolutely think they are on the right side of this. What the Russian soldiers have been doing to Ukraine is despicable. But with cities being destroyed, nuclear power plants at risk, massive oil pipelines being bombed in the ocean, millions of people displaced...

if dropping ten of these prevents the Russians from dropping one of theirs you are coming out ahead in terms of UXO

Hmm. However justified one feels Ukraine's struggle is, it's hard to understand how sending more weapons into a brutal war will result in less violence. NATO supplying Ukraine with weapons is not having the effect of shortening the conflict, it's having the exact opposite effect. You can make an argument that the U.S and its allies should continue to support Ukraine so that Ukraine can hopefully win this conflict, but that's a different argument than the humanitarian angle of shortening the conflict.

This is a very, very dangerous game that is being played. Russia has nuclear weapons. It's a real tragedy what's happening one way or another.

To me the most significant advantage of the fediverse is that it isn't run by sociopathic billionaires and I'd like a wall to protect me from them.

People will always use this logic to justify whatever horrendous crime their "side" is committing.