A ‘nice’ workplace culture may be more toxic than you think, says this NYU professor - "“Ironically, the biggest way to destroy psychological safety is through a culture of niceness, because you don’t really know what anyone actually thinks,” she added. West likens it to toxic positivity, which is the belief that people should always maintain a positive mindset — even in a bad situation. Not only will a “too nice” workplace damage psychological safety, it can be detrimental to your career too. “At the end of the day, none of us can improve without critical feedback — you won’t get better at your job and you won’t learn how to manage people better,” West explained. “Critical feedback isn’t, ‘I don’t like what you did, this is bad.’ Critical feedback is, ‘This is the way that you did it. Let’s talk about how you can do it better.’”"
Bosnia and Herzegovina's mysterious 'stećci' stones - "Stećci were made from the 12th to the 16th Centuries, and like gravestones elsewhere in the world, they are sometimes decorated with religious crosses and rosettes."
Mystery surrounds identity of man who died at home as fingerprints not in national database - "When a man named Abdul Rahman Majid died at home from coronary artery disease in August 2022, the police took his fingerprints to confirm his identity. Strangely, they did not match the prints of anyone listed in Singapore’s national database... To add another twist to the case, investigations found the real Abdul Rahman Majid was alive and staying at a welfare home in Buangkok... There was no passport or NRIC belonging to the deceased found in the flat. The man’s photo with the name “Abdul Rahman Majid” was found only on an old construction site pass and a UOB Plaza pass. Besides the national database in Singapore, his fingerprints also did not match the prints of anyone in the databases of Malaysia and Indonesia. Investigations found the real Abdul Rahman Majid has been staying in a welfare home since 1994, suffering from chronic schizophrenia. When IO Ng showed the 69-year-old the photo of the dead man, he shook his head, indicating he did not recognise him. When the unknown man’s fourth son and wife turned up in court on Tuesday, they were shown a photo of the real Abdul Rahman Majid. Both said they had never seen him before. A police check into the deceased’s medical history showed that an Abdul Rahman Majid had received treatment at the Institute of Mental Health and Tan Tock Seng Hospital. But it was the real Abdul Rahman Majid who had gone to these hospitals, which meant there were no clear medical reports tagged to the deceased."
Why Can’t the World’s Greatest Minds Solve the Mystery of Consciousness? - "In the 1970s, at what was then the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases in London, the neurologist Lawrence Weiskrantz encountered a patient, known as “DB”, with a blind spot in his left visual field, caused by brain damage. Weiskrantz showed him patterns of striped lines, positioned so that they fell on his area of blindness, then asked him to say whether the stripes were vertical or horizontal. Naturally, DB protested that he could see no stripes at all. But Weiskrantz insisted that he guess the answers anyway – and DB got them right almost 90% of the time. Apparently, his brain was perceiving the stripes without his mind being conscious of them. One interpretation is that DB was a semi-zombie, with a brain like any other brain, but partially lacking the magical add-on of consciousness... The consciousness debates have provoked more mudslinging and fury than most in modern philosophy, perhaps because of how baffling the problem is: opposing combatants tend not merely to disagree, but to find each other’s positions manifestly preposterous... Daniel Dennett, the high-profile atheist and professor at Tufts University outside Boston, argues that consciousness, as we think of it, is an illusion: there just isn’t anything in addition to the spongy stuff of the brain, and that spongy stuff doesn’t actually give rise to something called consciousness. Common sense may tell us there’s a subjective world of inner experience – but then common sense told us that the sun orbits the Earth, and that the world was flat."
The Mysterious Bronze Objects that Have Baffled Archaeologists for Centuries - "Historians have found no written documentation of the dodecahedrons in any historical sources. That void has encouraged dozens of competing, and sometimes colorful, theories about their purpose, from military banner ornaments to candleholders to props used in magic spells. The obvious craftsmanship that went into them—at a time when metal objects were expensive and difficult to make—has prompted many researchers to argue they were valuable, an idea that's supported by the fact that several have been found stashed away with Roman-era coins. But that still doesn't explain why they were made... They have been found across a northwestern swath of the former Roman Empire from Hungary to northern England, but not in other Roman territories such as Italy, Spain, North Africa, or the Middle East... Schwarz points to another theory: The dodecahedrons may have been a type of “masterpiece” to show off a craftsman's metalworking abilities. This might be why they rarely show any signs of wear. “In this respect, the technical function of the dodecahedron is not the crucial point. It is the quality and accuracy of the work piece that is astonishing,” he tells Mental Floss. “One could imagine that a Roman bronze caster had to show his ability by manufacturing a dodecahedron in order to achieve a certain status.”... Other internet researchers, perhaps less seriously, have used 3D-printed models of the Roman dodecahedrons for knitting experiments, and suggested that the true purpose of the objects was to create differently sized fingers for Roman woolen gloves."
Weird. The internet told me that it was obvious that they were for knitting, and that the fact that no one had realised this shows diversity was needed in archaeology
The Birth of Salon Kitty, Wartime Berlin’s Premier Brothel and Nazi Spy Trap - "Heydrich intended to take over Berlin’s most notorious and exclusive brothel, known as ‘Salon Kitty’. Using a combination of hi-tech, state-of-the-art eavesdropping devices, and specially selected and trained women, distinguished both by their erotic charms and their devotion to the Nazi cause, the scheme would be to spy on the brothel’s male clientele. Important foreign visitors to the Reich’s capital would be cultivated by Heydrich’s agents and discreetly directed to sample the joys of the city’s leading ‘house of pleasure’. With his cynical view of human nature and his knowledge of the moral frailties of his fellow Nazi leaders, Heydrich knew that visitors to the brothel would also include leading National Socialists – indeed, he himself made frequent use of such establishments. And he had no qualms about spying on his colleagues and rivals. The information thus gleaned would be added to the stock of damaging secrets gathered in the files that that were steadily accumulating in his office safe... Kitty would produce with the utmost discretion her special ‘private’ album. This picture book would feature alluring photographs of the twenty girls who worked at the salon and – a fact unknown to the men eagerly turning the album’s pages – who were also agents in the employ of Heydrich’s SD (Sicherheitsdienst), the secret service of the SS. Rigorously chosen for their physical attractiveness, high sexual appetites and erotic skills – and with some originating from the upper reaches of the Reich’s high society – these women were also selected for their intelligence, were fluent in at least one foreign language, and above all were blindly devoted and indoctrinated adherents of National Socialism. Specially selected for their roles, they would be initiated into the ranks of the SS and trained to combine professional ‘business’ with their more subtle secret work: extracting indiscreet information from their clients in post-coital pillow talk. At the same time – and unknown to their unwitting clients – their conversations would be recorded on some fifty hidden microphones carefully placed in the salon’s ‘love rooms’... he suspected that his young protégé might have been enjoying a secret extra-marital affair with a young married woman. With delicious irony, the woman in question was none other than his own wife, Lina Heydrich."
No more free coffee on your birthday? Companies rein in customer rewards programs — here's why
In Japan, plenty of inheritances, but no one to claim them - "This demographic trend is translating into a grim windfall: In fiscal 2021, government coffers received a record ¥64.7 billion from the assets of dead individuals who had no heirs, a 7.8% jump from the previous year and almost twice as much as 10 years ago... In the year ended March 31 last year, 52,886, or 24.9%, of all occupied households consisted of tenants age 75 or older living on their own. “That’s compared to 24.2% the year before, and 23.6% the year before that,” Nakagawa says. Meanwhile, there’s been a spike in the numbers of kodokushi, or “lonely deaths,” where those living alone — much like the 76-year-old in Edogawa Ward — are found dead in their homes, sometimes going unnoticed for days, weeks or even months... There is also a psychological factor behind why people aren’t too keen on selling, renting out or demolishing their abandoned properties. A 2015 government study shows that nearly a third of those who own homes that have been abandoned altogether intend to keep them that way. Since inheritance is often the reason behind ownership of these properties, there is strong resistance among owners toward disposing of homes full of memories of their parents or family members. That’s why there companies like Bxia exist. In Japanese, these special cleaners are known as ihin seirishi — literally, experts on sorting out the belongings of the deceased. There’s even a private accrediting organization that offers certifications for those who pass an examination. “In the past, sorting out the homes of the dead often fell to regular cleaning companies, and the sentimental value these belongings hold for the remaining family wasn’t really considered,” says Masayoshi Hasegawa, the executive director of the association. Among the qualities applicants are tested for is this sensitivity toward the needs of the bereaved. And demand is soaring, Hasegawa says. His organization now counts around 48,000 certified members."
Meme - "'SHAG'
Funny word isn't it??...
To a carpet maker, it's a long pile rug...
To a smoker, it's a type of tobacco...
To an American, it's a dance...
To an Ornithologist, it's a bird...
And to you ...ya ugly bastard...
It's just a remote possibility"
Meme - King Koopa: "Peaches Peaches Peaches Peaches"
Aide: "Have you seen her cousin, sire?"
King Koopa: "Cousin?"
"Finally hanging out with my cousin, Princess Melon!"
King Koopa: "MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS MELONS"
Meme - "Dear Mr Truck Driver, My name is Calvin Wyatt Dawson. I am an 8 year old and live on Kanawha Forest Rd. The other day you hit my sister's big yellow cat. I wanted to say thank you. I hated that cat. Dad always called it a mean SOB, whatever that meens. It was a mean cat and when you kit it, it popped like a balloon. Funniest thing I have ever seen. Thank you. Your friend, Calvin Wyatt Dawson."
Meme - "DEAR TERRIBLE ELK-GOD WHO RULES LAND AND STREAM, WHY DO BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE?
"BECAUSE CRUELTY PLEASES TERRIBLE ELK-GOD WHO RULES LAND AND STREAM!"
"SCREW THIS! I'M GONNA FOLLOW THAT NEW RELIGION WITH AN OMNIBENEVOLENT CREATOR DEITY"
"DEAR GOD OF ABRAHAM, WHY DO BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE?"
"NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS, THAT'S WHY."
Meme - "When she has a good job, cooks, and doesn't want you to work. *spreadeagled man*"
TikToker realises how lucky Singaporeans are after spending one month in US and Canada - "when Sophieonggg returned home, her verdict was clear: As expensive as Singapore is, you can’t put a price on safety… and food options... "I witnessed someone who overdosed from drugs with a group of adults, who left that teen alone," she said, adding that she came across drunkards and druggies during her trip, and while she knew some of them were harmless, it always kept her on her toes. "Many times I do get scared and just forget to breathe." She also noted how dirty public spaces could be, to the point that she could smell urine at some place or other every day... the TikToker grew jelak of American fare.
Singaporeans are so sheltered and ignorant
Apparently San Francisco (most probably) is the same as the whole of the US and Canada. And despite some global cuisines being more readily available in some cities than Singapore, Singapore must be better for food (she probably doesn't even realise what Singapore lacks when claiming it "has every ingredient, every type of food, every type of product, everything you need")
She went to a convenience store and complained that the cereal with milk was expensive
Police officer charged after she reportedly sent herself menacing text messages while blaming colleagues - "Officer Emily Hirshowitz with the Ossining Police Department complained for months about receiving alarming text messages from her colleagues. She was taken into custody after investigators alleged she’d been the one sending them all along"
Meme - "Hannah Wallace
Facebook
You're friends on Facebook
New Facebook Account
Studied at Western Kentucky University-Owensboro"
"Hey how are you ?"
"This already seems sketchy"
"I do not think I know you, but I'd like to be your friend on Facebook. If you do not mind?"
"Mohammed, im tired bro. Its late. Let's not do this."
"This person is unavailable on Messenger."
Meme - "These arms allow me to jerk off 6 dicks at once. Feminine dicks, of course, I'm not gay."
"Doctor; wouldn't that make you gay?"
"How right you are. Which is why I developed this Inhibitor ChipTM to protect my higher brain function. It ensures I never forget to say "no homo.""
Meme - "Pain stops here *cemetery*"
Meme - "ELK CITY IS A BIRD SANCTUARY *KFC*"
Meme - "YOU'RE FAT, BUT YOU'RE GOOD FAT.
AVOCADO AFFIRMATION"
Meme - Classy Pooh: ""You cannot pass,' he said. The ores stood still, and a dead silence fell. 'I am a servant of the Secret Fire, wielder of the flame of Anor. You cannot pass. The dark fire will not avail you, flame of Udûn. Go back to the Shadow! You cannot pass."
Retarded Pooh: "I am good. There is a tempest on me! The sea is always right"
Philip Cross: The Wall Street Journal asks a good question — does Canada belong in the G7? - "Canada is not a leader on the international stage. In his 2012 book Every Nation for Itself, global affairs expert Ian Bremmer wrote that: “Leaders have the leverage to co-ordinate multinational responses to transnational problems. They have the wealth and power to persuade governments to take actions they wouldn’t otherwise pursue. They pick up the checks that others can’t afford and provide services no one else will pay for. On issue after issue, they set the international agenda.” Name the last time Canada did any of those things... Canada is limited by more than our relatively small population and economy, however. We are also constrained by the mindset that “people in Canada don’t think big,” as art historian Barbara Dodge put it. Canada today strives to be nice and progressive rather than great or strong. The Wall Street Journal editorial quoted from Justin Trudeau’s mandate letter to the minister of defence in 2021, establishing it as a priority that she “build an inclusive and diverse Defence Team, characterized by a healthy workplace free from harassment, discrimination, sexual misconduct and violence.” As the Journal editorialists sarcastically remarked, “See how that cultural manifestation works on the Ukrainian front lines.”"
3 in 5 workers try to be 'active' online even while not working, a new Slack report says - "the report's authors found no direct correlation between employees feeling pressure to be seen doing performative work and real, measurable gains in productivity. These findings come amid an ongoing debate about hustle culture and performative productivity. Last year, Insider's Reed Alexander reported JPMorgan was tracking its employees' activities, even monitoring when they swiped their ID cards and how frequently they attended meetings. An employee told Insider at the time: "At JPMorgan, nobody trusts you. The higher-ups don't trust you to do your job if they're not constantly watching you in the office."
From Ketchup to Pineapples: The Food That Should Never Be Kept in a Fridge - "The Love Food Hate Waste campaign has a fairly definitive A-Z of food storage on its website, full of interesting titbits such as “tucking in” your mushrooms under a tea towel in the fridge. Adorable. According to the site, eggs are best kept in the fridge. Bananas and uncooked pineapple should live in the fruit bowl, but most other fresh fruit and vegetables can be given an extended shelf life by being refrigerated. Just be sure, they suggest, to bring them back up to room temperature before cooking or eating to increase the flavour. Potatoes and onions belong in a cool, dark place such as a vegetable basket, ideally in a cloth bag (except spring onions, which should be kept in the fridge). You can also store soy sauce, ketchup, brown sauce, mustard, olive oil, pickles and chutneys in a cupboard away from sunlight, even if the label advises refrigerating after opening, according to Which?... The broad message seems to be that keeping things in the fridge can keep them better for longer and therefore cause less food waste. Pesto, mayonnaise, avocados, butter and dips will last longer in a fridge than they might in a cupboard. But when it comes to honey, bread, pastries, grains, nuts, cake and bagels, a cool, dark cupboard with well-sealed containers is fine."
How Python Helped Select My New Home — Part 2 | by Zhun Hung - "I shared how Python can be used to automate the mundane processes in my BTO application such as keeping track of the availability of units and notifying me whenever units were taken up... As it began to free up my time from monitoring units, I was able to spend more time comparing the units and deciding how to rank them. Along the way, I realised I had to manually compute the ‘factors’ (e.g. type of sun a unit gets, window direction) of each unit before I could compare them"
Why Canada’s seafood market is so bad, and costs so much - "we’re too busy freezing and processing it all for export."
Colby Cosh: Yet another famous psychology study turns out to be pure bunk - "Dan Ariely (a Duke University prof and best-selling author) and Nina Mazar (then at the U of T’s Rotman School of Management), cut a deal with an insurance company to perform a harmless experiment on customers. Their goal was to study aspects of cheating, something insurers have a powerful incentive to understand. An unnamed company “in the southeastern United States” was asking customers to report the current odometer readings on insured vehicles, and the forms required those customers to sign a statement saying “I promise that the information I am providing is true.” The particular question that Ariely and Mazar were interested in is this: would it make a difference whether you put the honesty attestation at the top of the form or at the bottom?... It’s unusual that the bad Excel sheet was preserved for a decade, and unusual that it was ever openly distributed. This is not yet a strong ethical norm in the soft sciences, but, as the Data Colada guys observe, “We have worked on enough fraud cases in the last decade to know that scientific fraud is more common than is convenient to believe, and that it does not happen only on the periphery of science. … There will never be a perfect solution, but there is an obvious step to take: data should be posted.” Many economics journals now insist on this, they add, but social psychology largely doesn’t. Psych experiments are expensive, and often involve hunting for small statistical effects in limited samples, so psych researchers are chronically defensive. They have strong incentives to fiddle with study parameters, or, as in this case, to accept too-good-to-be-true data at face value. As a news consumer, you don’t have to be taken in: I would conclude by saying “Don’t believe everything you read in the science section of a newspaper, but when it comes to psychology, don’t believe anything.”"
Meme - "When a soccer player gets touched: The attempt on my life has left me scarred and deformed
When a hockey player gets hit: This is where the fun begins.
When a boxer gets punched: That's... why i'm here"
Meme - "Don't take advice from people like me ...who got very lucky. Taylor Swift telling you to follow your dreams ...is like a lottery winner saying, "Liquidize your assets! Buy Powerball tickets! It works!"
Meme - "Thank you so much for being patient, I work by myself today. All my crew go TAYLOR SWIFT concert today. I do my best to serving you."
Meme - "Why does taylor always pose with the microphone like she's about to let one rip and wants the entire stadium to hear it *Taylor Swift*"
Taylor Swift Seattle concert generates seismic activity - "Taylor Swift's concerts in the US city of Seattle generated seismic activity equivalent to a 2.3 magnitude earthquake, a seismologist has said... Seismologist Jackie Caplan-Auerbach said the activity was caused by Swift's fans or the sound system. The shows beat the previous record in Seattle, known as the city's "Beast Quake" in 2011. That was generated by American football fans celebrating Marshawn Lynch's touchdown for the Seattle Seahawks during a game against the New Orleans Saints. Dr Caplan-Auerbach, a geology professor at Western Washington University, told CNN the difference between the NFL game and Swift's recent concerts was just 0.3, but the "shaking was twice as strong" and "absolutely doubled it"... Music concerts have been known to cause seismic activity before, for example during a 2011 Foo Fighters concert in New Zealand."
Taylor Swift Calls Out Soros Family in Fight With Private Equity - Bloomberg - "Taylor Swift renewed her criticism of private equity, calling out the Carlyle Group and the Soros family for helping her nemesis Scooter Braun purchase the rights to her old music."
Anti-semitism! Time to cancel her
Texas university students will analyse Taylor Swift lyrics in new undergraduate course - "Prof Scala noted that the course is a new way to expose formal literary criticism to younger people... This is not the first university course inspired by the 32-year-old pop star. Earlier this year, New York University's Clive Davis Institute launched a course about her life and career as a "creative music entrepreneur". It culminated in Swift herself showing up at the university's commencement ceremony in May to receive an honorary doctorate, and deliver a speech to her "fellow" graduates... Elsewhere in Texas, undergraduates at Texas State University will have the opportunity to study another pop star - English singer Harry Styles, formerly of boy band One Direction. The course, titled Harry Styles and the Cult of Celebrity: Identity, the Internet and European Pop Culture, is expected to begin next year."
Meme - "Can we talk about how in zombie shows/movies/books they always find a veterinarian and not a surgeon? Are veterinarians deemed more likely to survive the apocalypse?"
"Yup
* One of our professional skills is 'not being bitten by patients'
* We actually have a good broad knowledge base for both surgical, medical, and GP things
* We're used to improvising equipment because a lot of stuff is just not made for animals
* Meat safety is part of our training
* Our cars are often full of equipment, especially in mixed practice
* We probably weren't in the human hospital at the initial outbreak"
El Salvador Decimated Its Ruthless Gangs. But at What Cost? - The New York Times - "El Salvador, the smallest country in Central America, was once known as the hemisphere’s murder capital — with one of the highest homicide rates anywhere in the world outside of a war zone. But in the year since the government declared a state of emergency to quell gang violence, deploying the military onto the streets in force, the nation has undergone a remarkable transformation... But that achievement, critics say, has come at an incalculable price: mass arrests that swept up thousands of innocent people, the erosion of civil liberties and the country’s descent into an increasingly autocratic police state. Most Salvadorans appear willing to accept that deal. Fed up with the gangs that terrorized them and forced so many to flee to the United States, the vast majority of people here support the measures and the president behind them, surveys suggest... As politicians from Mexico to Guatemala vow to emulate Mr. Bukele’s iron-fisted approach, critics have grown concerned that the country could become a model for a dangerous bargain: sacrificing civil liberties for safety... Human rights groups have documented mass arbitrary arrests, as well as extreme overcrowding in prisons and reports of torture by guards."
Maybe the moral of the story is that in the hierarchy of needs, safety comes before human rights. A good reason not to be pro-crime and let things get even close to that extent, or the backlash will be strong
Duterte did something similar. And we know there was collateral damage (e.g. Jee Ick-joo). Just because the collateral damage is politically popular does not mean it does not exist. It is one thing to say that the collateral damage is justified because a lot of criminals are caught, and this is like convicting 1 innocent man in the course of convicting 100 guilty ones. It is another thing to claim that there is no collateral damage and anyone who claims there is any is pro-crime. I remember when someone was claiming that all critics of Duterte were idiots. I told him not to go to the Philippines on business
American citizens arrested in El Salvador as part of nationwide crime crackdown - "U.S. citizen and Los Angeles native Walter Huetes was detained in El Salvador in May when he attended a party with some friends, according to "The World." Huetes has Salvadoran roots and was in the country to help his stepdaughter with a visa application when he was arrested due to tattoos on his wrist and hand. He allegedly has not been able to call his family, but he has spoken to a U.S. consular officer."