Links - 6th July 2022 (2)

List of foreign countries with coinage struck at the Royal Canadian Mint - Wikipedia - "Since its opening in 1908, the Royal Canadian Mint has produced coinage and planchets for over 73 countries"

Little Albert Experiment - "Ivan Pavlov showed that classical conditioning applied to animals.  Did it also apply to humans? In a famous (though ethically dubious) experiment, John Watson and Rosalie Rayner showed that it did... little Albert only had to see the rat and he immediately showed every sign of fear. He would cry (whether or not the hammer was hit against the steel bar) and he would attempt to crawl away. This fear began to fade as time went on, however the association could be renewed by repeating the original procedure a few times. Five days later, Watson and Rayner found that Albert developed phobias of objects which shared characteristics with the rat; including the family dog, a fur coat, some cotton wool and a Father Christmas mask! This process is known as generalization... Unfortunately, Albert's mother withdrew him from the experiment the day the last tests were made, and Watson and Rayner were unable to conduct further experiments to reverse the condition response."

Thief woos bank staff with chocolates - then steals diamonds worth £14m - "A thief has evaded one of the world's most expensive hi-tech security systems, and made off with €21m (£14.5m) worth of diamonds - thanks to a secret weapon rarely used on bank staff: personal charm.  In what may be the biggest robbery committed by one person, the conman burgled safety deposit boxes at an ABN Amro bank in Antwerp's diamond quarter, stealing gems weighing 120,000 carats. Posing as a successful businessman, the thief visited the bank frequently, befriending staff and gradually winning their confidence. He even brought them chocolates, according to one diamond industry official.  Now, embarrassed bank staff in Belgium's second city are wondering how they had been hoodwinked into giving a man with a false Argentine passport access to their vaults. The prime suspect had been a regular customer at the bank for the past year, giving his name as Carlos Hector Flomenbaum from Argentina. The authorities, who have offered a €2m reward for information leading to an arrest, now know that a passport in that name was stolen in Israel a few years ago. Although not familiar to the local diamond dealers, the conman became one of several trusted traders given an electronic card to access the bank vault. The heist, believed to have been more than a year in the planning, has astounded diamond dealers. Philip Claes, spokesman for the Diamond High Council in Antwerp, said that the area had been fitted with a security system costing more than €1m. The lesson, he said, was that "despite all the efforts one makes in investing in security, when a human error is made nothing can help".  More than half the world's diamonds are traded in Antwerp's gem district."

Opinion | I wanted to understand Europe’s populism. So I talked to Bono. - The Washington Post
???

Cat Beats Professionals at Stock Picking - "A house cat named Orlando did a better job managing investments over the year 2012 than a team of professional money managers... "While the professionals used their decades of investment knowledge and traditional stock-picking methods, the cat selected stocks by throwing his favorite toy mouse on a grid of numbers allocated to different companies."... 'The result indicates that the "random walk hypothesis", popularised in economist Burton Malkiel's book A Random Walk Down Wall Street, is perhaps truer than we thought. Burkiel's book explores the idea that share prices move completely at random, making stock markets entirely unpredictable.'"

Harambe the Gorilla Faces Charging Bull on Wall Street

France searches for centuries-old oak trees to rebuild Notre Dame's spire - "The deputy director of France’s National Forests Office, Dominique de Villebonne, told Le Parisien that the search for suitable oaks will lead them to trees that are “very old, including plantations ordered by former kings to build ships and ensure the grandeur of the French fleet.”  “At the same time as leaving other trees to stand for a long time, we are also planting new ones so future generations can create their own exceptional works""

Political party identification and romantic relationship quality - "Although there are studies on voting similarity in mate selection, very little research has examined party identification and relationship quality. We assessed associations between reports of personal and partner voting behavior (Democrat, Republican, or Independent) and both relationship adjustment and commitment to one’s partner. We used a national (U.S.) sample of individuals (N = 510) in their 20s and 30s who were mostly in different-sex, serious relationships (Mdn duration = 5.25 years; 50% married). Controlling for age, college graduation, income, religiosity, minority status, and duration of relationship, voting Republican was associated with higher levels of commitment compared with voting Democrat. Similarly, being partnered with someone voting Republican was associated with higher relationship adjustment and commitment compared with being partnered with someone voting Democrat. Notably, differences in commitment were found only among those who were not already married or engaged. Findings were largely consistent with numerous online reports of survey data that have shown modestly greater relationship quality among those who report being politically conservative. Although research has shown that people are less attracted to those who vote differently and that voting differently can be associated with lower relationship quality, we did not generally find perceived voting similarity to be associated with relationship adjustment or commitment. There was one exception: In exploratory analyses, Republicans paired with Democrats tended to report substantially lower relationship adjustment than if paired with Republicans."
In other words, liberals are less committed in their relationships and have poorer quality relationships
I wonder how liberals will spin this into "proof" that conservatives are bad

Research sheds light on the cultural and psychological correlates of religion - "Previous theoretical work has highlighted four main religious dimensions: believing, bonding, behaving and belonging. These four dimensions can be understood psychologically as, respectively, the cognitive (e.g., beliefs about transcendence, truth-seeking, existential questions), emotional (e.g., connection with transcendence and community through religious ritual), moral (e.g., norms, ideals, self-control and a values hierarchy) and social (e.g., insertion into community, continuity of tradition, collective identity) aspects of the religious experience... All four dimensions correlated with religiosity, spirituality, and fundamentalism, with spirituality being more related to believing (cognitive) and bonding (emotional) aspects, and fundamentalism more strongly related to believing, behaving (moral) and belonging (social) dimensions.  Additionally, monotheistic religions (e.g., Judaism, Islam and Christianity) generally showed greater intercorrelation between the dimensions than non-monotheistic (e.g., Buddhism) traditions. Furthermore, in secularized Western European countries, believing and bonding were more prominent than behaving and belonging, while in religious Catholic countries, believing was higher than bonding or behaving.  The authors additionally tested each of the religious dimensions against (the Big Five) personality traits, and found that, for example, all religious measures were positively associated with agreeableness, conscientiousness, need for closure, order-related social-cognitive orientations, and high right-wing authoritarianism."

Meme - "So after I made the pacifist Vulcans shoot enemies on sight, turned the Klingons into dishonourable baby killers, gave Spock a mental handicap, humiliated Picard, had Starfleet use robots as slave labour (FU "Measure of a Man"), turned 7 of 9 into a mass murderer, and destroyed the Federation, I thought... what else could I do to piss on Gene Roddenberry and Star Trek fans? And then it hit me... make the head of Starfleet literally eat shit. Hilarious, right?"

Facebook - "If Rysense had just stuck to conducting surveys, I might have just left the issue alone. Unfortunately, Rysense set up a subsidiary Happydot.sg which not only conducts online surveys but also regularly publishes articles on current affairs and social issues. Happydot.sg does not disclose that it is owned by the Government, and this raises a concern as to whether the articles that it publishes should be construed as undercover attempts by the Government to not just survey public opinion but to secretly influence it. Remember that the M in POFMA stands for “manipulation”.
Strangely enough, even though Rysense now admits that it is Govt-owned, the message doesn't seem to have gotten through to Happydot.sg which still denies that it is controlled by the Government. I tried replying to their comment, but they seem to have blocked me already."

Blaire White - Posts | Facebook - "Had SO much fun in Texas! Comparing Dallas to Los Angeles is like night and day. The streets of a Dallas are clean, it’s very rare to see a homeless person, no tent cities, and people make eye contact and are KIND! Being in a red state vs a blue state is like a different planet. Not to mention everything was CHEAP! Every time I got the bill after a meal I was shocked that it wasn’t triple digits.  Everywhere I went men held doors open for me, and at first I froze because I literally have become so accustomed to rudeness here in Hollywood. I really enjoyed my time in Texas and my desire to move there and start a new chapter is even stronger now ❤️"

Meme - "I will grant you three wis-"
"Billion dollars, huge dick and eternal life!!"
3000 years later: "Spent all my money, dick too big, please kill me"

What It's Like Growing up in a Family That Never Lies - The Atlantic - "After growing up in a family that never lied, I spent decades being off-puttingly truthful... When I moved to New York at 22, it became clear that an honest man would have a hard time getting a job. The nicer interviewers would get concerned and offer sincere advice, telling me that when asked about my biggest flaw, I wasn’t supposed to actually list my flaws. When I told them I hoped some employers would appreciate my honesty, most laughed. In some cases, I ended interviews early on the grounds that the interviewer and I clearly weren’t compatible. But I got lucky and was hired by an eccentric who was charmed by my earnestness. After two months as his assistant, he brought up areas where I needed to improve, and I candidly told him that I didn’t think I could do better, that I wasn’t the best person he could get for this job. I pretty much persuaded him to fire me... As I experimented with small talk, I noticed how others used honesty to establish intimacy. I’d always seen “hiding feelings” as cowardly, but for other people, the selectiveness of their honesty was what gave it meaning. They’d choose who was special enough to hear their secrets"

【Food】Why Do Koreans Like to Consume Pork Belly? These Are The Reasons Of Why Koreans Like to Consume Pork Belly - "Originally, Koreans prefer beef over pork because cows can produce more meat for the people to consume as compared with the pigs due to its larger size.   Besides, the Koreans also did not rear many pigs formerly because pigs consume grain. At the time, grain was low in yield and expensive. Hence, there was no grain to give to the pig.  In the Joseon Dynasty, there was a rumour that eating pork would cause haemorrhoids. Moreover, the pigs were fed with food waste, sewage, and the excrement of human. Therefore, the Koreans perceived porks as unhealthy food. Starting from the year of 1970, Koreans started to raise pigs in large quantities for the purpose of export. A lot of pork meats were exported to Japan.  However, Japan only buys certain parts of the pigs such as pork loin or pork tenderloin to make pork steak dishes.  Consequently, the other parts of the pig such as its head, intestines and belly remain for the consumption in Korea. As the people who used it started to buy gas stoves in the kitchen, the Koreans start to grill the pork belly.   Pork bellies are usually cut into 3 to 4 cm so that it can be easily grilled and eaten.   As the income of workers increased in the 1980s, meat consumption became faster. During the 1997's IMF financial crisis where the economic condition is poor, pork belly became the main dish for many companies' gathering because its price was relatively lower as compared to those of the beef."

Grilled Pork Belly: A South Korean Love Story - "  The practice of grilling may have been adopted as a necessity. “I believe grilling meat became popular during the Korean War (1950-53),” Joo told me via email. “At that time, people had to grill and eat the meat right away once they had any.” He added that the word bulgogi, literally ‘fire meat,’ had “entered the popular lexicon after the war.”  On top of that, Joo said, Koreans had preferred steaming over grilling due to a lack of available utensils. But from the 1960s, when briquets became more widespread as a source of fuel, people started grilling meat on griddles over briquet fires.  “Steel drums from the fledgling oil industry and U.S. military bases proved to be effective for grilling meat outdoors,” Joo said. Some barbecue restaurants still emulate drum-turned-table designs, with round steel plates that encloses the griddle atop a drum. Meat consumption saw a rise in keeping with South Korea’s steep economic growth in the 1970s and thereafter. Overall meat consumption grew over tenfold between 1970 and 2016 (from 5.2 to 55.9 kilograms per person). But pork still stands out for its popularity, having been the most heavily consumed type of meat since 1970 (when data first became available)...   1977 was a pivotal year for the nascent domestic pork industry. Exports to Japan faltered that year, leading to a significant drop in price of pork on the South Korean market due to oversupply. Seeing it as a cheap alternative to beef, South Koreans started turning to pork. The government’s deliberate agenda of reducing the national preference for beef, which led to price fluctuations, also affected consumption.  Daily newspaper Donga-ilbo’s 1977 editorial section gave support for the government’s tentative plan, which was to designate Saturday “Let’s Not Eat Beef Day.”  “In terms of nutrition, beef, pork and chicken are the same,” said the paper. “For the cost of a man eating beef at a restaurant, his entire family can eat pork three to four times at home”... By the early 80s, pork belly became a popular match with soju — cheap alcohol industrially distilled from surplus grains and vegetables — making barbecue a quintessential social experience at restaurants, homes and up on mountains (grilling meat in mountains was outlawed only in 1998, due to fire hazard and environmental contamination)...   So strong is the association between grilled pork belly and socializing that some who live alone, like 27-year-old Noh Young-eun, are deterred from eating it...   Once, craving pork belly but lacking a companion to go out and eat it with, she went to a neighborhood butcher who scoffed at her for wanting to buy only one portion. “That’s when I truly felt how difficult it is to eat pork belly alone,” Noh said.  But as the number of single households increases in South Korea, businesses are starting to offer one-person samgyeopsal options"

Pork Preference for Consumers in China, Japan and South Korea - "Competition in global pork markets has increased as trade barriers have opened as a result of free trade agreements. Japanese prefer both loin and Boston butt, while Chinese prefer pork offal. Frozen pork has increased in terms of imports into China. Japanese consumers consider pork meat origin along with pork price when making purchase decisions. While the Chinese prefer a strong tasting pork product, South Korean consumers show very strong preferences to pork that is higher in fat. Therefore, South Korean consumers have a higher demand for pork belly and Boston butt. Consequently, the supply and demand of pork in Korea is hardly met, which means that importation of high fat parts is inevitable. In Korea there is lower preference toward low fat parts such as loin, picnic shoulder, and ham"

Emily Blunt says Ina Garten’s roast chicken helped her land proposal | Toronto Sun - "Emily Blunt is convinced her roast chicken sealed the deal for John Krasinski and led to his proposal."

'Cod fish' sold in S'pore might be Chilean Seabass & here's why you should eat less of it - "Right after we published this story on smoked salmon trout masquerading as smoked salmon, a friend said to me: "You should check out what's going on with cod too."... the term "cod" is used in Asia to refer to three very different types of fish:
Atlantic Cod
Sablefish (also known as Gindara and Black Cod)
Chilean Seabass (also known as Patagonian Toothfish and Silver Cod)  
I reached out to three suppliers of "cod fish" on Qoo10 — The Seafood Company, Snow Treasures, and Silversea.  The first two confirmed that they're selling Chilean Seabass. Silversea did not respond"

Why does it feel like yearly overseas trips are the only way S’poreans can truly escape from life? - "Hobbies can't seem to fill that Japan-shaped hole in our hearts... *When Singaporeans were asked about aspects of their lives that they find fulfilling or meaningful, “family” and “material well-being” were among the top-cited themes. Interestingly, hobbies also seem much more important to people in the UK (22 per cent) than respondents in Singapore (4 per cent)... The need to scratch that wanderlust itch is apparent, given how Singaporeans made an average of 3.51 overseas trips per person in 2017. More recently, after VTL flights to 14 cities were announced, the Singapore Airlines website promptly crashed right after. Coincidence? I think not... Travel, to most Singaporeans, likely entails leaving Singapore’s borders. But in other countries, it’s perfectly possible to get a complete change of scenery without getting your passport stamped.  For instance, a friend living in Bangkok tells me that it’s possible to travel to any province domestically, and several of her friends have made use of this for a short getaway to Chiangmai.  Seeing as how we can’t just waltz to the next province or drive into a neighbouring state for a holiday, this is also why it makes perfect sense for Singaporeans to covet overseas getaways for a change of scenery. Or to at least seek out other distractions that provide a temporary illusion of "escape", even if they are far from ideal."

Why Do Low-Cost Carriers Avoid Jet Bridges At Many Airports? - "The jet bridge was a great innovation in aviation. It was first introduced in the US in the 1950s. United Airlines began experimenting with a fixed 'Air Dock' in 1954. This developed into the extending jet bridge design by 1959, with United Airlines installing them at New York JFK, Los Angeles, and San Fransico airports. Use expanded quickly around the world, with most major airports using them by the 1970s and 1980s... Airports charge usage fees for many facilities, which are not included in the standard airport landing fees. This usually includes jet bridges... To put costs into perspective, consider London Gatwick airport. This charges a "departing passenger charge" of £14.95 ($20.46) per passenger. This is reduced by £3.48 ($4.76) if using a remote stand without a jet bridge. Daytime parking charges are also tripled if using a jet bridge stand (from the base rate of £10.68 ($14.62) per five minutes for the largest aircraft, for example)... It is not just the cost of using the jet bridge that is a consideration here. The whole process and infrastructure come into play. As well as paying to use the bridge, airlines will require jet bridge operators and have staff located at the bridge area. Boarding via the bridge could mean operating in different parts of the airport. If the airline is set up to operate with buses, then it is likely simpler to use this method for all flights. This is why you will sometimes see aircraft parked at a gate with a jet bridge but not using it.   We have seen other changes recently from low-cost airlines along the same cost reduction lines. Adding built-in stairs to the aircraft is one such change. This is common in smaller aircraft but not on standard commercial narrowbodies. Adding them, though, allows for independent operation. There is certainly no need to use a jet bridge, but no need to hire stairs either. You also do not have to wait for stairs to be available - a common delay at busy airports. Speeding aircraft turnaround is a significant consideration for low-cost airlines, with tight schedules that maximize the number of flights an aircraft can make each day."

Wind shatters Chinese glass bridge, stranding tourist 100 metres above ground - "The man was on the 100-metre-high bridge in the Piyan Mountain, outside the city of Longjin, when a wind gale blew out several panels of the glass deck... The tourist held on for dear life for over 30 minutes, before a team of firefighters, police and forestry and tourism personnel were able to assist him and he crawled back to safety...   At least 60 glass-bottom bridges have been or were being built in the country in 2016, according to Earth magazine published by the Geological Museum of China."

Leah Greenberg on Twitter - "It's almost like if you saddle a generation with massive debt, then hit them with the 2nd economic crisis of their working lives, while simultaneously showing how little your society cares about children or care-giving, they will make choices accordingly"
Weird how the UK which has universal healthcare also saw a decline in births in 2020.
Americans are always so insular

Facebook - "Considerate marathon organizers in Taiwai invited a beautiful Japanese like ghost figure clothed in red to cheer on contestants. As a result, most athletes finished quicker than expected."

lizzie 𓃱 on Twitter - "Told my Dad I ran out of alcohol and didn’t have any money to buy any for the weekend..so he gave me the huge bottle of vodka from the cupboard that I stole and replaced with water when I was 16... life really does come back to bite u in the ass"

Meme - Neil deGrasse Tyson @neiltyson: "In a mirror, you can kiss yourself only on the lips."
Neil deGrasse Tyson @neiltyson: "You can kiss yourself in the mirror, but only on the lips." Neil deGrasse Tyson @neiltyson: "Just an FYI: In a mirror, you can only kiss yourself on the lips."
Neil deGrasse Tyson @neiltyson: "For Narcissists Only: Laws of reflection require that if you kiss yourself in a mirror, it will always be on the lips."
Neil deGrasse Tyson @neiltyson: "Another thought to disturb restful sIumber especially if you are vain: in a mirror you can kiss yourself only on the lips."

'We conclude' or 'I believe?' Study finds rationality declined decades ago - "Scientists from Wageningen University and Research (WUR) and Indiana University have discovered that the increasing irrelevance of factual truth in public discourse is part of a groundswell trend that started decades ago... Analyzing language from millions of books, the researchers found that words associated with reasoning, such as "determine" and "conclusion," rose systematically beginning in 1850, while words related to human experience such as "feel" and "believe" declined. This pattern has reversed over the past 40 years, paralleled by a shift from a collectivistic to an individualistic focus as reflected by the ratio of singular to plural pronouns such as "I"/"we."   "Interpreting this synchronous sea-change in book language remains challenging," says co-author Johan Bollen of Indiana University. "However, as we show, the nature of this reversal occurs in fiction as well as non-fiction. Moreover, we observe the same pattern of change between sentiment and rationality flag words in New York Times articles, suggesting that it is not an artifact of the book corpora we analyzed...   The authors did find that the shift from rationality to sentiment in book language accelerated around 2007 with the rise of social media, when across languages the frequency of fact-related words dropped while emotion-laden language surged, a trend paralleled by a shift from collectivistic to individualistic language."

Japanese firefighter punished for moonlighting as YouTube gamer - "A Japanese firefighter moonlighting as a gaming YouTuber had cold water poured on his career by public officials who uncovered the secret side hustle by identifying his voice in the lucrative videos.  An anonymous tip-off prompted Wakayama city in western Japan to launch an investigation into the 33-year-old's channel, which had around 15,000 subscribers.  But because the firefighter never appeared on screen, a local official had to painstakingly comb through the clips for vocal clues to his identity"

Facebook - "Pedestrian dynamics at the running of the bulls in Pamplona, Spain, suggest that the presence of the bulls led to instances of runner speed increasing with runner density, in contrast with most pedestrian systems, in which speed decreases with density. The festival enabled the collection of real data on pedestrian dynamics under extreme conditions and provided counterintuitive insights that could help improve infrastructure management in a range of scenarios"

RNC Research on Twitter - "Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says she helped "huge amounts" of illegal immigrants get stimulus checks."
If course, if you criticise this you are racist for criticising either her or illegal immigrants

The relationship between physical and mental health: A mediation analysis - "There is a strong link between mental health and physical health, but little is known about the pathways from one to the other. We analyse the direct and indirect effects of past mental health on present physical health and past physical health on present mental health using lifestyle choices and social capital in a mediation framework. We use data on 10,693 individuals aged 50 years and over from six waves (2002-2012) of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing. Mental health is measured by the Centre for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES) and physical health by the Activities of Daily Living (ADL). We find significant direct and indirect effects for both forms of health, with indirect effects explaining 10% of the effect of past mental health on physical health and 8% of the effect of past physical health on mental health. Physical activity is the largest contributor to the indirect effects. There are stronger indirect effects for males in mental health (9.9%) and for older age groups in mental health (13.6%) and in physical health (12.6%). Health policies aiming at changing physical and mental health need to consider not only the direct cross-effects but also the indirect cross-effects between mental health and physical health."

Wikipedia Or Encyclopædia Britannica: Which Has More Bias? - "  History, they say, is written by the victors, and can read very differently depending on who is telling the tale. Even modern-day issues such as immigration, gun control, abortion, and foreign policy are open to fervent debate depending on who is doing the opining. Over the years, Britannica has handled this uncertainty by seeking out the most distinguished experts in their fields in an attempt to provide a sober analysis on topics; while Wikipedia has urged its civilian editors to maintain what it calls a neutral point of view (NPOV). But is objectivity better achieved by considering one viewpoint or thousands? Along with cowriter Shane Greenstein of Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management, Zhu asks that question in a new paper, Do Experts or Collective Intelligence Write with More Bias? Evidence from Encyclopædia Britannica and Wikipedia... Zhu and Greenstein took a database of terms developed by University of Chicago economists Matthew Gentzkow and Jesse Shapiro to examine newspaper bias. Gentzkow and Shapiro studied speeches in the 2005 Congressional Record to scientifically identify the top 500 unique phrases used by Democrats (e.g., tax breaks, minimum wage, fuel efficiency) and Republicans (e.g., death tax, border security, war on terror), rating each according to political slant.  Zhu and Greenstein then identified some 4,000 articles that appeared in both Encyclopædia Britannica and Wikipedia, and determined how many of each of these code words were included, in an effort to determine overall bias and direction.  They found that in general, Wikipedia articles were more biased—with 73 percent of them containing code words, compared to just 34 percent in Britannica.  In almost all cases, Wikipedia was more left-leaning than Britannica. Dividing articles into categories, the researchers found, for example, that stories on corporations were 11 percent more slanted toward Democrats, while observing similar leanings on topics such as government (9 percent), education (4 percent), immigration (4 percent), and civil rights (3 percent)...   Of course, those findings don't say which of the two sources is correct in its viewpoint—only how they compare to one another. "We can only say [that] Wikipedia is more left," says Zhu. "We can't say which is reflecting true reality" What's more, much of Wikipedia's bias seems to be due to the longer article length of the online publication, where word count is less of an issue than the historically printed Britannica. When compared word to word, most (though not all) of Wikipedia's left-leaning proclivities come out in the wash. In other words, for articles of the same length, Wikipedia is as middle-of-the-road as Britannica"
Of course, liberals will still claim that it's a myth that Wikipedia is biased
This was in 2015, no less

Spider-tailed horned viper - Wikipedia - "The spider-tailed horned viper (Pseudocerastes urarachnoides) is a species of viper, a venomous snake in the family Viperidae. The species is endemic to western Iran, and was originally described in 2006. The head looks very similar to that of other Pseudocerastes species in the region, but the spider-tailed horned viper has a unique tail that has a bulb-like end that is bordered by long drooping scales that give it the appearance of a spider. The tail tip is waved around and used to lure insectivorous birds to within striking range."

Anasyrma - Wikipedia - "Anasyrma (Ancient Greek: ἀνάσυρμα) composed of ἀνά ana "up, against, back", and σύρμα syrma "skirt"; plural: anasyrmata (ἀνασύρματα), also called anasyrmos (ἀνασυρμός), is the gesture of lifting the skirt or kilt. It is used in connection with certain religious rituals, eroticism, and lewd jokes (see, for example, Baubo). The term is used in describing corresponding works of art.  Anasyrma is effectively "the exposing of the genitals". This is a form of exhibitionism found in religion or artwork, rather than a display for arousal, and it always refers to the act of a woman exposing herself. The act of lifting up one's skirt to display the genitals can be an apotropaic device; it can, in circumstances of war, evoke the fear of the enemy. It can also be an act that evokes surprise and subsequent laughter and a letting go of sadness. What is significant about anasyrma is that it reflects the numinous quality of the female genitals and the genital region through which birth ensues. In several cultures, there is a myth of anasyrma used for emotional healing. Anasyrma may be a deliberately provocative self-exposing of one's naked genitals or buttocks. The famous example of the latter case is Aphrodite Kallipygos ("Aphrodite of the beautiful buttocks"). In many traditions, this gesture also has an apotropaic character, as a mockery or means to ward off a supernatural enemy, analogous to mooning"

Greeeen - Wikipedia - "Greeeen (stylized as GReeeeN) is a Japanese pop rock/hip hop/breakbeat vocal group from Kōriyama in Fukushima Prefecture, comprising the all-male four members: HIDE, navi, 92 (read as "kuni"), and SOH... One notable characteristic is that none of the members have ever shown their faces in the public sphere as a part of GReeeeN, whether in their promotional videos, CDs, television performances, or the Internet. In their only performance on TV-U Fukushima's music show Music Bar Palo Palo (broadcast on January 19, 2007), the group even went as far as censoring their faces during the performance. The members' identities are still unknown, as their faces have never been made public. At first, the group stated that they would wait until all of the members passed the 2009 dental license exam before revealing their faces, but later in late 2009, they indicated that they will still keep their identities secret to avoid any interference with their careers as dentists."

Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar - Wikipedia - "According to Hasan-e Fasa'i's' Farsnama-ye Naseri, during Agha Mohammad's stay in Shusha, one night "a quarrel arose between a Georgian servant named Sadegh Gorji and the valet Khodadad-e Esfahani. They raised their voices to such a pitch that the shah became angry and ordered both to be executed. Sadeq Khan-e Shaghaghi, a prominent emir, interceded on their behalf, but was not listened to. The shah, however, ordered their execution to be postponed until Saturday, as this happened to be the evening of Friday (the Islamic holy day), and ordered them back to their duties in the royal pavilion, unfettered and unchained, awaiting their execution the next day. From experience, however, they knew that the King would keep to what he had ordered, and, having no hope, they turned to boldness. When the shah was sleeping, they were joined by the valet Abbas-e Mazandarani, who was in the plot with them, and the three invaded the royal pavilion and with dagger and knife murdered the shah"

David Epstein Knows Something About Almost Everything

David Epstein Knows Something About Almost Everything - Freakonomics

""EPSTEIN: I mean, talk about Einstein — he talked about this specifically, he wrote about his concern that as physicists and scientists in general became more specialized, journals would become more remote from one another. They become like these little intellectual archipelagos and you wouldn’t have people making the kind of connections that he and some of his most impactful colleagues were making across disciplines. There was way less journal specialization when he was saying that than there is now. If you look at the history of science, so many of the breakthroughs have been from people connecting knowledge that was available already — but tying it together creates a new frame. One of the great examples is Claude Shannon, who was an electrical engineer at the University of Michigan who was forced to take a philosophy course to fulfill a requirement. And in it, he learned about an almost century-old system of logic by which true and false statements could be coded with ones and zeros and solved like math problems. This had accomplished nothing in the 80 years since its creator passed away, except for getting in philosophy courses. And then he did an internship at a phone company and realized he could use the relay circuits like ones and zeros and code information into circuits. And that gave rise to binary code upon which all of our digital computers rely today. And as Shannon said, it just so happened that nobody was familiar with those two areas at the same time. And I think we lose a lot if we’re forcing people to stay in their own trench since so much of the innovation has come from connecting information across trenches...

EPSTEIN: Well, to give an example of that short-term, long-term trade-off, a study that came out too recently for me to get it into my book randomized different types of math learning. Some got what’s called blocked practice, where you get problem type A-A-A-A-A, then B-B-B, and so on. And the students make quick progress. The other classrooms got randomized to what’s called interleaved practice, where it’s like, as if you took all the problem types and threw them in a hat and drew them out at random. The students are more frustrated. But instead of learning how to execute procedures, they’re learning how to match strategies to a type of problem or the structure of the problem. And then when all the classrooms got the same test, where now they were facing problems that they had not exactly seen before so they had to transfer some of their knowledge, the interleave group blew the block practice group away. Studying the same stuff, just an order that slowed them down and made it more difficult and more frustrating but forced them to learn some more general skills — it slows learning down, but makes it a lot more effective. Frustration is not a sign that you aren’t learning, but ease definitely is. And the fluency of learning experience is a really bad indicator of how well you’re learning. And I think that’s just an incredibly hard thing to sell to parents and students and teachers...

LEVITT: What I took from your book was that there are a lot of forces, parental and societal, that push people towards being quite specialized in what they do. And your argument was that both from a societal and from a personal perspective that fighting against that tide and trying to push yourself to be more general for many or most people would be a good idea. Is that a fair assessment or do you think I’m off base with that?

EPSTEIN: No, I think that’s a fair assessment. When I was at Northwestern spending some time with a woman named Dedre Gentner who’s one of the world’s experts in analogical problem solving — so using analogies to solve problems, especially novel problems, things that maybe nobody has seen before. So, drawing on analogies becomes a useful problem solving engine and long-story short, she and her colleagues created this test that tests whether students are good at solving novel problems. And they would structure these problems in different ways. And what she basically found was that most of the students were good at solving problems that looked like things that were very familiar to them from their major. But then not good at solving even problems that were basically the same problem, but just with different window dressing of a different domain. Their problem solving skills were very narrow. They weren’t recognizing similar problems in other areas. The exception to that was these students in this program where they had no major, they just had a bunch of different minors. Essentially, they would dip a toe into each of the sciences and see how those areas examine problems, how they approach problems, what different tools they use. Those were the students who did the best at solving novel problems. But when I went around and talked to her colleagues, they would say, “Oh, we don’t like that program because those kids are getting behind.”...

LEVITT: So, in some ways, your first book, The Sports Gene was a 300-page debunking of the 10,000 hours argument, or at least an argument that the 10,000 hours mantra is way too simple. Is that an accurate reading?

EPSTEIN: Yeah, definitely. I think the most popular conception is that there’s no such thing as talent. It takes 10,000 hours of so-called deliberate practice — this is effortful, cognitively-engaged, error-correction-focused practice to become an expert in anything and this is based initially on the work most prominently of a man named Anders Ericsson. The original work was at a world-class music academy and it studied 30 violinists. So a small study to start with, but the 10 best violinists, those who the instructors deemed capable of being international soloists, had spent on average 10,000 hours in deliberate practice by the age of 20. And the next two groups down, lesser. The first thing that raised my eyebrow about that paper was that there was no measure of variance included. So my question was, “What was the range of this?” Because I had read other expertise research, like in chess, where it took 11,053 hours on average for people to reach international master status, which is one down from Grandmaster. But some people made it in 3,000 hours and others were being tracked at 25,000 and they still hadn’t made it. So you could have an 11,053 hours rule, but it didn’t really tell you much about the reality of skill acquisition. And so that was the first thing that made me skeptical. When I asked after that data, the responses I got were basically like, “People were inconsistent on their retrospective accounts of how much practice they did and we’ll have better measures of variants when we have video diaries that people can keep.” So the answer is that your data aren’t very good? Like lots of people face that problem, but they still have to include measures of variance. 

And then as I started to get into more research about skill acquisition, what I was realizing was that it was the rate of learning. So there was something underlying the 10,000 hours rule called the monotonic benefits assumption that basically meant that every person at the same level of skill should progress the exact same amount for the same hour of deliberate practice. And that turns out to be true, essentially, nowhere, except in very simple perceptual motor skills... rates of improvement differed gigantically between individuals, which made seeking out the place where you improve and learn more quickly, something that I think is important to encourage people to do. Whereas, in the 10,000 hours thinking, that makes no sense. You should just pick the first thing that comes and stick with it... in most studies, the athletes who went on to become elite, actually had less deliberate practice early on in the sport in which they had become elite. More sort of free-form activity, wider variety of physical activity... [Gladwell] says something like, “Yeah, I think I made an error where I conflated the fact that a lot of practice is important to become great, which I think is true with the idea that that implies you need early specialization, which I now think is false.”"

Links - 6th July 2022 (1 - Covid-19: Joe Rogan & Spotify)

Artists urge Spotify users to cancel subscriptions after CEO invests in AI defence technology
Why you should never cave to the woke - their wishlist is unlimited and they'll never be happy and only demand more

White House urges Spotify to take further action on Joe Rogan: ‘More can be done’
So much for all the idiots who pretend that it's not a free speech issue because the government isn't involved. Even if your parochial view of free speech is that it only involves the first amendment, you've lost that excuse

David Sacks on Twitter: - "Unnecessarily wading into the Rogan story to support the censorship of a figure wildly popular with young voters (who previously endorsed a Democrat for president!) is the type of political blunder that I just don’t see the Obama White House making."

Lauren Boebert on Twitter - "Spotify’s CEO said that he won’t be censoring Joe Rogan’s content because the company sees itself as a distribution platform rather than a publisher. Can he spread that mentality through the rest of Silicon Valley? That’s all we’ve been trying to get them to understand."

Richard Hanania on Twitter - "Joe Rogan apologizes for past conduct and promises to change, 70 of his shows removed from Spotify. If this is what a “victory” against cancel culture looks like, I’d hate to see a defeat."

So, I'm Right-Wing Now? - YouTube - "I've been categorised as "right-wing" in a list of Joe Rogan podcast guests. Let's take a look at my credentials.  #JoeRogan #RightWing #Tucker #Democrat #Republican"

Joseph Massey on Twitter - "Soon we'll need speakeasies just to listen to podcasts."

Full Clip Rogan Fans Posting of Joe Biden Saying N-Word - "Joe Rogan Defenders Have Been Circulating Video of Joe Biden Saying the N-Word — Here’s the Full Story"
Context is important for Joe Biden, and anyone the left love. Context is irrelevant for Joe Rogan, and anyone the left disapprove of

I Don't Need White People Telling Me What's Supposed to Offend Me - "I have noticed that it has been mostly white people sharing the montage of video clips of Rogan and telling us that the videos are proof that Joe is a "racist." We live in strange times where we are too often told what is supposed to offend us—and if we're not offended, we're told that we're part of the problem... I posted a short tweet, simply stating my feelings on the matter: "I don't feel Joe Rogan is racist, and I don't need white people telling me what he says is supposed to offend me."...   In response, a few people called me an "Uncle Tom" and a "company man." But the last time I checked, I am a free Black man with my own thoughts and feelings... what Joe said isn't racist. I know that because I've experienced real racism, and this isn't it. Racism is prejudice, discrimination or antagonism directed against a person or people on the basis of their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group.  Granted, it was unnecessary for Joe to use that word. But as someone who has listened to him throughout the years, I've never felt singled out, less than or spoken down to. The word was always used in the context of an event or larger circumstance. So here is the context: Joe Rogan wasn't calling someone the "n-word," and he wasn't using the word to speak condescendingly about the Black community. He is a storyteller, and it carries over into his conversations... At the end of the day, Joe's actions speak louder than that one word in context. There have been a lot of Black people who have been on his show that have benefited from his platform. And the truth is that if we call everything racist, then nothing will be racist.  I do hate the word. But then I remember we live in a beautiful country that offers us freedom of speech. As a free Black man, I can say what I want. And what I want to say is this: I'm not letting anyone pressure me to complete their agenda."

Facebook - "The only real loser here is Spotify. If Joe gets taken off the platform, they lose the people that support him. If he stays, they lose the people that want him gone. Joe will be fine either way. His audience will follow him even if he goes independent again, which I'm sure at this moment is looking like a great option. Make no mistake, Joe Rogan is winning here. Not losing. It doesn't matter what the legacy media is saying about this. They're becoming less relevant by the day. By the minute. This is the sound of an animal in its death throes.   His reach is going to go further because of this. His numbers are going to go up. Not down.  At the end of the day, this is nothing more than grown adults throwing tantrums because they don't like someone's ideas. It's like you being on a diet and insisting that everyone else not eat."

Mercedes Schlapp on Twitter - "CNN spent a year giving cover to the many scandals involving the Cuomos while the president of the network was having an affair with his colleague, who happened to be Andrew's former comms director.  And corporate media wonders why we trust Joe Rogan more than them."

Meme - "People: Joe Rogan is spreading information that isn't accurate.
Same people: *pregnant man emojis*"

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter - "Who died from listening to Joe Rogan's show? I can give you the names of many, many people who died because of the wars his media critics lied the country into. But who died from listening to Joe Rogan? Anyone?"

Meme - Michael Malice @ @michaelmalice: "One of the reasons blue-pilled people are concerned about Rogan is they cannot distinguish between the man on the screen giving his opinion and the man on the screen telling them what to do"

Tim Pool on Twitter - "Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young Reunite… in Removing Their Music From Spotify"
"As expected Spotify caving wasn't enough for them Give an inch they take a mile"

Michael Shermer on Twitter - "The claim @joerogan & guests are "intentionally spreading misinformation" is wrong: they don't think what they're saying is misinformation—They think they have a valid point. They may be wrong but that's different. Instead of accusing them of lying explain why facts say otherwise"

Justin Amash on Twitter - "The problem isn’t @joerogan; it’s people who demand submission to their views and seek to silence others rather than persuade."

John K. Blake on Twitter - "Joe Rogan's use of the n-word is another January 6 moment - CNN"
Imagine this level of hysteria. Not to mention that January 6 itself is a moral panic

Joe Rogan's use of the n-word: Why shrugging it off is so dangerous - CNN - "The podcaster Joe Rogan did not join a mob that forced lawmakers to flee for their lives. He never carried a Confederate flag inside the US Capitol rotunda. No one died trying to stop him from using the n-word. But what Rogan and those that defend him have done since video clips of him using the n-word surfaced on social media is arguably just as dangerous as what a mob did when they stormed the US Capitol on January 6 last year. Rogan breached a civic norm that has held America together since World War II. It's an unspoken agreement that we would never return to the kind of country we used to be. That agreement revolved around this simple rule: A White person would never be able to publicly use the n-word again and not pay a price. Rogan has so far paid no steep professional price for using a racial slur that's been called the "nuclear bomb of racial epithets." It may even boost his career. That's what some say happened to another White entertainer who was recently caught using the word. It is a sign of how desensitized we have become to the rising levels of violence -- rhetorical and physical -- in our country that Rogan's slurs were largely treated as the latest racial outrage of the week. But once we allow a White public figure to repeatedly use the foulest racial epithet in the English language without experiencing any form of punishment, we become a different country. We accept the mainstreaming of a form of political violence that's as dangerous as the January 6 attack... When people in positions of power use dehumanizing language to describe other groups, atrocities often follow. This is not ancient history: Consider what happened less than 30 years ago in Rwanda when some 800,000 civilians were slaughtered in a three-month period in 1994. Hutu extremists targeted both the Tutsi minority, who were a majority of those killed, as well as moderate Hutus."
They changed the headline but the body seems unaltered and is still insane
I don't know what world the author is living in where since World War II white people have never been able to use the word "nigger" in public (for one, in 2006, long back Slate gave in to liberal excess, Christopher Hitchens wrote an article using the word - not to mention Biden using it)
Naturally, the author claims January 6 was "deadly"; liberal logic: non-liberal words are violence, liberal violence is not violence
So since liberals dehumanise white people and conservatives all the time... white genocide is a possibility?
Comment: "What? An inadvisable, regrettable, but also an over exaggerated event that has been pushed by histrionic opposition? Yes."

Meme - Mainstream News Enjoyer @truthtobugmen: "My adopted gay black non-binary 6 yr old came up to me with tears in their eyes, asking "Is Joe Rogan going to kill me?" I started sobbing but I couldn't lie. "Yes," I said and hugged them as we cried together."

Chef Andrew Gruel on Twitter - "Taking daily vitamin D and fish oil supplements may help protect older adults from developing autoimmune disorders, a new study found"
"I remember when @joerogan said this"

#DeleteSpotify: 19% of Spotify Users Cancel Over Joe Rogan or Plan to - Variety - "There’s another caveat with Forrester’s Spotify/Rogan study: It had a relatively small size, polling 657 online consumers in the U.S., U.K. and Canada, of which about one-third were Spotify users. That implies a sizeable margin of error given Spotify’s massive user base of 406 million worldwide overall (including 180 million paid subscribers) at the end of 2021. In addition, the researchers pointed out that the data is not weighted to be representative of total country populations."
So only 41 people said they'd cancel Spotify. "Misinformation" is only bad when not from the left

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter - "Compare the edited video clip to make it seem like Joe Rogan was agreeing with this to what he actually said and you'll see: a) how you should treat everything you see with a large dose of skepticism and b) how casually they play with race and racism to smear anyone they dislike"

Shayne in the Blockchayne on Twitter - "I will not be releasing any podcasts until further notice. To our #UnlockingUs and #DaretoLead communities, I’m sorry and  I'll let you know if and when that changes.  Stay awkward, brave, and kind. ❤️👊🏼"
"@BreneBrown You’re not protecting me by leaving Spotify. I’m an adult that can listen to open and honest conversations between differing opinions and make up my own mind. You don’t believe I’m capable and therefore advocate for the nanny state which only leads to mistrust and tyranny."

Meme - Jack Hunter @jackhunter74: "Joe Rogan's humble response to Neil Young's childish demand is a big part of why people like Rogan."
Abigail Marone @abigailmarone: "Joe Rogan's podcast is literally just unfiltered conversations with different people who have different perspectives. Why is the left so threatened by that?"
Jordan Chamberlain @jordylanc...: "The Olympics is being held in a genocidal security state but God forbid Joe Rogan has a podcast"
Sarah Haider @SarahTheHa...: "Fauci should go on Joe Rogan Podcast."

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will NOT cut ties with Spotify

Meme - "The Corporate Media"
"Decades of deceit and lies"
"This is all Joe Rogan's fault"

How an Open Letter to Spotify Regarding Joe Rogan Exposes the Absurdity of It All - "In case you haven’t heard, a group of “doctors” wrote an open letter to Spotify to complain about Joe Rogan’s podcast, specifically one which interviewed Dr. Robert Malone.  It isn’t actually a group of doctors, it is a group of some doctors, some nurses, at least one veterinarian, one family counselor, one dentist, some post-doctoral fellows, and – I kid you not – “Cole Kraten: Director of Research, Grasshopper Farms,” and there were, I believe, two or three epidemiologists.  NOT an impressive list. And they cited Media Matters as a source for God’s sake.   On the other hand we have Doctor Robert Malone, who, whatever semantic games the left wants to play, was intimately involved in mRNA vaccine development. He has been working in the field of epidemiology his entire life. Has written over a hundred peer-reviewed, published papers. Has served as a consultant to government agencies on this topic.  And many other doctors, such as PeterMcCullough, search in PubMed and you will find over 650 published papers, on various topics. Has written 50 papers on Covid alone. Has testified to the Texas State Senate, and the US Senate, and again has served as a consultant to the government.  Or Martin Kulldorf, a biostatistician and epidemiologist. He is a professor at Harvard Medical School and biostatistician at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He is a member of the Food and Drug Administration’s Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committee and a former consultant for the Centers for Disease Control. He co-authored the Great Barrington Declaration.  These are highly credible people, in positions of responsibility. There are others, like Pierre Kory and Byram Bridle, experts in the field who are treating patients, doing research, publishing papers on covid.  But Cole Kraten from “Grasshopper Farms” – a pot farm – signs a letter and we’re supposed to care?   The first step to solving any problem is to identify the problem, so let’s identify the problem here: the media presents information in a way that is designed to serve a narrative – and not to actually inform.  The media dismisses highly credible professionals as “crackpots” and elevates pot farmers as experts, because the pot farmer fits the narrative and the professionals do not. And the useful idiots see the biased presentation of information – and accept it as reality when the opposite is the case"

Thread by @cIass_man on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "the really funny part about that spotify letter is that it's like 2/3 - 3/4 women and a shocking amt of the signees are either students or part of the healthcare bureaucracy blob (read: do not practice medicine, post on twitter all day)
here are some of my favorite "medical expert" titles
- Host/Science Correspondent, Ologies Podcast
- Director of Research, Grasshopper Farms
- Senior Communications Consultant, NYU
- Science Teacher
- Executive Director, Skype a Scientist, University of Connecticut"

‘Who’s behind the attack on Rogan?’ –> Tweep pulls BACK curtain on large, well-funded Leftist troll accounts in brutal, receipt-filled thread

Bestselling author Don Winslow slammed Joe Rogan for that N-word clip. Then someone looked through his books.

‘The Rock’ Seems To Denounce Joe Rogan, Then Video Resurfaces Of His WWE Chinese Impression - "Hours after Dwayne Johnson, a.k.a “The Rock,” seemed to publicly retract his support for popular podcast host Joe Rogan, Twitter users published old video clips of Johnson playing “The Rock” for the WWE, giving a mocking impression of the Chinese language."

Luke Gromen on Twitter - "I would pay good money to see a debate between 1970 Neil Young (protest the government narrative about Vietnam) and 2022 Neil Young (censor anyone that questions the government narrative about COVID.)"

Colby Cosh: Is Neil Young's stand against Joe Rogan the natural outcome of 1960s anti-corporate spirit? - "Readers hoping to understand Neil Young’s position can still consult an editorial he wrote for his personal website. He seems to consider Spotify as being a hypnotizing vector for the mass distribution of COVID-19 misinformation, and indeed he sounds quite a bit like the Joe Rogan guest who accused the media and public health establishments of propagating “mass formation psychosis.” Young states all but explicitly that Joe Rogan wouldn’t have such overwhelming credibility among listeners without the Spotify imprimatur — a frankly silly thing to imply. Refresh my memory, Neil: did Rogan pay Spotify US$100 million ($128 million) to join forces with it, or was it the other way around?   This affray naturally presents itself to the media and the public as part of ongoing Sturm und Drang over the social responsibility of media platforms. Young seems to be taking a maximalist position: if you sell your music to Spotify, you are accepting responsibility for everything else that Spotify distributes. This seems like a pretty sizable burden, considering that Spotify distributes three million podcasts...   The problem, if there is one, is perhaps not so much with Neil Young, but with the endless number of journalists hurling themselves forward to celebrate him as a beacon of eagle-eyed anti-corporate ’60s spirit. Surely this is recognizable as the same ’60s spirit that has turned other rock stars of Young’s generation into babbling critics of big government and pharmaceutical companies? Was the age of Aquarius meant to end up with a choosing of sides between Pfizer Inc. and Spotify? Perhaps it is only the grace of God that separates Neil Young from Eric Clapton and Van Morrison, after all."

Censoring Joe Rogan Is No Solution to Vaccine Misinformation - "a group of two hundred seventy credentialed figures — most of whom, it seems, aren’t actually medical doctors as some of the headlines suggested — demanded that Spotify censor Rogan...   Usually, in arguing against this kind of thing, I would point to the dangers of letting unaccountable bureaucrats in a profit-seeking company pick what counts as “false and societally harmful assertions” and what doesn’t, especially since they get it wrong or make decisions colored by their own biases so often. But there’s a more fundamental issue going on here — namely, that censoring Rogan likely wouldn’t do what his most ardent critics want it to, and is at worst a distraction... How is it that in an era where we are surrounded by the miracles of unprecedented technological and scientific advancement, millions of people have chosen to trust a stoned MMA enthusiast during a health crisis over public health experts?... if we were being honest about the situation, we’d admit that Rogan’s just one of many purveyors of COVID misinformation that “add to the problem,” as his would-be censors put it — and that the others include a who’s who of liberal politicians, public health officials, and mainstream press outlets, the very sources we’re told are the most trustworthy and mainstream voices on the pandemic, and who are pointing the finger at Rogan now.   That’s not a new or groundbreaking point nearly two years into this thing, but it’s a fact. From the very start, the messaging on the pandemic from these quarters has been abysmal — politically calibrated, contradictory, and smugly confident in its wrongness. First, the coronavirus was obviously nothing to worry about, then avoiding it became the most important thing in the world. Everyone knew masks were useless and not worth wearing, until everyone knew it was the opposite.  Some of this owed to the initial lack of information about the virus, as well as its constantly evolving nature. But as that last, entirely unforced error by public health experts shows, far too much of it wasn’t.  There are too many instances of this incessant intellectual whiplash to list, especially in the United States. Public health experts overwhelmingly agreed a national stay-at-home order was needed to stop the virus, until the liberal, science-believing candidate they backed won and ruled it out, at which point they never mentioned it again. Trump’s pledge to roll out a vaccine within a year was an objective falsehood, to the point that it was “fact-checked” at the time, only for media outlets to criticize him for rolling it out too slowly once exactly that happened. His challenger’s liberal running mate publicly aired a vaccine hesitancy talking point, an attitude that became unconscionable and beyond the pale among her supporters once she entered the White House.  Joe Biden spread pandemic misinformation on CNN as president, and all but declared “independence” from the virus in a major speech just as a new, more dangerous strain took hold in the country. More than once, his administration has claimed basics like sending tests to American homes is impossible, only to reverse itself and do that very thing.   The government’s top science advisor, Anthony Fauci, has contradicted himself and admitted to intentionally lying or fudging the numbers in his public messaging, before repeatedly prevaricating before Congress about his agency’s role in the kind of risky research that we still can’t rule out was the source of the virus. At times, he’s sounded like a pharma lobbyist defending the intellectual property rights of companies over the desperate public health need to get the world vaccinated as quickly as possible. To top it off, this publicly discredited figure, trusted mostly by the cable-news-obsessed base of the current president’s party, then claimed attacking him was actually attacking science itself. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the agency meant to give people the cold, hard facts of health advice about this pandemic while staying above the political fray, spent the second half of last year publicly undermining itself...   Let’s be honest with ourselves: Has Rogan’s podcast really done more to “damage public trust in scientific research and sow doubt in the credibility” of medical advice than this non-exhaustive litany of own goals from the experts?...   As always, censorship and similarly heavy-handed measures are the desperate resort of someone who refuses or has simply given up on tackling the root causes of a problem. The liberal calls for internet censorship as a means for dealing with the virus has been a depressing staple of the US pandemic response. Meanwhile, the structural factors that keep people unvaccinated and mistrustful of public health — a private insurance-based health care system, a lack of money and time, decades of neoliberal policy — go largely unmentioned. Just as well, otherwise people might actually start demanding some serious changes to the US economy."

Tucker: Weak people call for censorship - "When Rogan does talk about politics, it's pretty clear, he is not an ideologue. He interviews everybody liberals and conservatives, as well as a lot of people like Mike Tyson who could be either one, and he does it most of the time with respect and self-deprecation. He's not an expert on politics. He is not pretending to be one.  Rogan just asks questions and he notes the obvious. It's this last quality that makes the people in charge hate and fear Joe Rogan.  If you're trying to sell an absurd, obviously untrue idea, it is possible that Joe Rogan is going to call you on it, not because he's a partisan, he's not, but because he just can't help but notice, that's his secret.   A few months ago, Rogan watched the White House Press Secretary lie about the F.D.A.'s approval process for Pfizer's COVID vaccine. So he said something about it... Anyone with internet access could have verified that what Jen Psaki said was a total crock from the podium, too.  But when Joe Rogan points this out, it really stings. A lot of the people listening to him believe him, and the White House took notice. So what happened next? Well, here is Jen Psaki from yesterday calling on Joe Rogan's employer to censor him... pressure to censor Joe Rogan over his views is coming from other content providers on the site and most of them are D-listers, you should know.  The other day that annoying fake Duchess from LA and her brain dead husband threatened to walk if Spotify refused to muzzle Joe Rogan, quote: "Hundreds of millions of people are affected by the serious harms of rampant mis and disinformation every day." They yelped through a publicist.  But of course they don't mean it. They are not going anywhere. These two Grifters have a $25 million podcast deal with Spotify for essentially no work. So far, we believe they produced just over 30 minutes of content. That means these two have been paid about a million dollars for each minute of talking they've done. That's a good gig. It's too good to leave.  But their performance does raise the question. What exactly about Joe Rogan's podcast has caused quote, "serious harm"? We are literal, too, so we scoured his archives to find out. And it turns out as usual, the opposite is true. Joe Rogan is actually a force for safety in this world.  Watch this clip in which he warns the public about the dangers of approaching gorillas in the wild. It turns out, sneaking up on a gorilla, as Joe Rogan pointed out could lead to actual serious harm... People in the media are paid to be curious, to ask questions, to wonder about other people. None of them do. They just want to lecture you. This guy actually is interested. But no one is criticizing him seems to know that. It doesn't seem like they've actually listened to his show, Neil Young probably never has...   "Variety" Magazine, for example, still exists, informed us that Neil Young stands against Joe Rogan makes him quote "a hero" to the younger generations. Right? Because if there's one person kids of today revere, worship like a god, it's 76-year-old Neil Young. They take Neil Young over Joe Rogan any day, because young people everywhere are anxious to side with the Biden administration and demand the firing of any podcast or interviews people Kamala Harris disagrees with. It's hilarious.  They're more out of touch than Neil Young is. But at CNN, they have convinced themselves, it's all totally true because Joe Rogan is peddling misinformation, therefore he must be stopped... notice what Joe Rogan didn't do in the face of that information. He didn't call for CNN to be censored because they spread disinformation. He did say we've got to pull CNN off the air, they are killing people. Because he's not for censorship. You know who is for censorship? Weak people are for censorship...
why do hate Tulsi Gabbard so much? Because like Joe Rogan, you're a threat, because you defend the essential, the ancient American values of the country was based on. You do it in very reasonable way that is nonpartisan and that's the threat.

Facebook - "More and more we are learning the unintended consequences of streaming services and platforms that make accessing all the contact you want convenient without you ever actually owning it - the ideological zeitgeist of the day will control what you can and cannot have access to.  We probably should have thought twice before jumping on board to centralizing all activities on the Internet for the sake of convenience."

Jon Stewart says cancel culture isn’t real: ‘People that talk about it never shut up about it'
Jon Stewart calls ‘overreaction’ to Joe Rogan, Spotify ‘a mistake’

Sharon Stone Says Joe Rogan’s An ‘A**hole’ Who ‘Personally’ Caused ‘Losses’ Of ‘Lives,’ Brags About Work With Dr. Fauci - "Award-winning actress Sharon Stone called popular podcast host Joe Rogan an “a**hole” who has “personally” caused “losses” of “lives” by speaking to people with differing opinions about COVID-related policies, treatments, and vaccines... Stone said her opinion is based on experience, while suggesting Rogan’s podcast guests lack in the area. “I don’t know how many of these people’s opinions come with fact-based experience,” she said.  Notably, one of the most controversial “Joe Rogan Experience” episodes features Dr. Robert Malone, a vaccine scientist who worked on the development of mRNA technology... Months ago, Stone came out swinging against cancel culture, noting of people’s diverse backgrounds and advising them to “grow up” and employ some “empathy.”"

1619 Project Founder Says Joe Rogan Is Guilty Of ‘Open Racism’ - "New York Times journalist and 1619 Project founder Nikole Hannah-Jones accused podcaster Joe Rogan of “open racism.”"
Of course, she had to play the race card, since she had nothing valuable to contribute (as usual)

Aging Rockers Quietly Crawl Back To Spotify After Short-Lived Joe Rogan Protest - "Crosby, Stills & Nash have ended the protest they began against Spotify five months ago over the streaming service’s deal with podcast king Joe Rogan."

Links - 5th July 2022 (2)

Meme - "Operation: Destroy reddit ... reddit is going public with an expected $15B valuation...
We encourage Reddit moderators (who are unpaid) to unionize and demand wages from Reddit admins, and to shut down their subreddits unt they are paid fairly. Reddit is absolutely full of leftwing Marxist types who hate big business and who love unions. If do this we could Iiterally see hundreds of leftwing mods on the site start shutting down every part of the website. Admins could ban the mods who do this but then guess what? The site would become completely unusable without mods, since the whole thing relles on free labor from no-life losers to keep things running"

Reddit moderators do $3.4 million worth of unpaid work each year | New Scientist
They get paid in the form of being able to go on power trips and push the liberal agenda

Meme - "Chung Hua High School Seremban N.S.: 19308 CHEW MAN DICK"

YAF on Twitter - ""Pride, envy, wrath, sloth, greed, gluttony and lust: have you ever heard a more concise description of leftism?" - @michaeljknowles #YAFCon"

Meme - "Caught a cicada that was keeping me awake at night. Well guess what asshole, it's Baby Shark on a 12 hour loop"

Wojtek (bear) - Wikipedia - "He accompanied the bulk of the II Corps to Italy, serving with the 22nd Artillery Supply Company. During the Battle of Monte Cassino, in Italy in 1944, Wojtek helped move crates of ammunition and became a celebrity with visiting Allied generals and statesmen. After the war and mustering out of the Polish Army, he was billeted and lived out the rest of his life at the Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland... Wojtek initially had problems swallowing and was fed condensed milk from an old vodka bottle. He was subsequently given fruit, marmalade, honey, and syrup, and was often rewarded with beer, which became his favourite drink. He later also enjoyed smoking (or eating) cigarettes, as well as drinking coffee in the mornings. He also would sleep with the other soldiers if they were ever cold in the night. He enjoyed wrestling with the soldiers and was taught to salute when greeted. He became an attraction for soldiers and civilians alike, and soon became an unofficial mascot to all the units stationed nearby. With the 22nd Company, he moved to Iraq, and then through Syria, Palestine, and Egypt... As an enlisted soldier with his own paybook, rank, and serial number, he lived with the other men in tents or in a special wooden crate, which was transported by truck... This service at Monte Cassino earned him promotion to the rank of corporal. In recognition of -Wojtek's popularity, a depiction of a bear carrying an artillery shell was adopted as the official emblem of the 22nd Company"

Facebook - *Chinese BBQ moving piano*
Originally from Twitter

Sean Dillon — son-of-drogo: mithrils-hanger: the-crashr: ... - "$137 million?"
Joker: "Yes, and if I don't pay up, I'll go to jail for tax evasion! I'm crazy enough to take on Batman, but the I.R.S.? No, thank you!"
"failing to properly declare income from illegal sources (as per the tax revision in 1927) is what did in Al Capone.  plus you can’t plead ‘not guilty on account of insanity’ in a tax evasion case.. if batman gets him, he can’t be properly tried because batman is a vigilante and can’t submit valid evidence (which leads to a mistrial), if the cops get him he gets off easy due to sanity. if the IRS gets him he’s in real trouble."
"The IRS: The only thing scarier than Batman."

Facebook - ""I Sacked 6 Pinoy Nationals And 1 Indian National On Friday"
"Guys, on friday i sacked 6 pinoy nationals and 1 indian national at the MNC i work for fraud basically. One of the pinoy that was sacked was a HR personnel (Pinoy), another was an IT personnel (Indian National). What happened was that these two clowns had colluded in hiring their own nationals (mainly pinoys) in the company. Basically we had put up Job adverts looking for some people, now when the people sent the email, anyone that was singaporean was deleted, they kept only the foreigners (pinoys.) The IT personnel was basically bribed by the Pinoy to delete the log files on our SMTP server as well, making it seem that no singaporeans applied for the job. What the IT personnel does not know, i keep another log file separately (disguissed as a system file) sent to another server. When i saw the log files did not match the IT personnel gave some rubbish story only after i threatened to report him to the police, he told me the story. Basically the Pinoy hr had people from the phillipines apply for any openings in the MNC i work and deleted any resumes that were singaporeans and he managed to get 5 pinoys past me. They work on the idea that he gives the job their first salary belongs to the Pinoy HR. The Pinoy HR then gives 20% of that to the indian national to do cleanup on the server to clear traces. The HR and IT guy were sacked without notice on Friday. The 5 pinoys that got in were also sacked. These were not small jobs but jobs that payed more than 6K/mth. Purpose i am making this post is so that you guys can be aware
of the fraud going on in certain companies and games that foreigners are playing on singaporeans. Also for employers, you should also have a copy of a log file only you have access to, this will help when the HR lies about no singaporean applied for the jobs"

BBC World Service - The Food Chain, Should China ban 'wet' markets? - "‘20 years ago, it's quite often to get live animals especially chicken. We want to have our chickens freshly slaughtered. But since the bird flu, I think most big cities banned live animal trading in such markets.’
‘And Chang says contrary to some reports, live wild animals are just as rare.’...
‘To depict all of China's food markets as dirty and chaotic is unfair.’... ‘In the past few decades, the Chinese government has invested a lot of money to upgrade the facilities of this wet markets. And a lot of this markets were actually relegated to indoor buildings and now they are indoor markets. For example, in Nanjing, the government has invested more than $35 million, US dollars, in upgrading the facilities of its more than 350 wet markets in the city since 2008’…
‘Why are they called wet markets? It's not a term I'd heard of before now. And Chang says it's not recognized in much of China. So where did it come from?’
‘These wet market term is originated from a Hong Kong English. One of the reason is that the floors of this markets are sometimes wet because of the spraying of vegetables and slaughtering and cleaning of chicken and fish. It is also because they are mainly selling fresh produce, as opposed to dried products.’...
‘Wet market selling live wild animals, reportedly like the one in Wuhan, are the exception, not the rule.’
‘These are not wildlife market. So we should be clear of the difference here. And majority of these wet markets, or I think we prefer to call them public markets now because of the conflation, they are the most important source of vegetables and fruits and meat, actually, for Chinese urban residents. Wet markets is pretty much like a farmers’ market in the western context, it was easier for people to understand. The only difference is that most of the vendors in this wet market are resellers. They are sourcing food from larger markets, especially a wholesale markets, and they are not farmers who produce those food. And also another difference is that this wet markets is operating seven days a week year round.’...
‘There are multiple reasons that this markets are popular First is that the produce there is much fresher compared to supermarkets. And also, the price of the food in wet markets are typically cheaper according to our research in Nanjing. And also this wet markets are widely distributed in cities, close to residential neighborhoods, and they're very easy to access… more than 70% of fresh produce consumed by Chinese urban residents actually came from this wet markets. And according to our research in Nanjing, 93% of households actually shops at wet markets in the past year, and 75% of them wet to this market at least five times a week. It’s mainly because a lot of these markets are located within walking distance in Chinese cities. It's very accessible. While supermarkets are located in, much more, you know, remote areas for most of this urban residential complexes. So this is a very important kind of part of urban life from the majority of households in cities… I have been emphasizing the importance of wet markets in the urban food supply chain. It’s ridiculous actually, for most Chinese to hear this suggestion that we should ban all wet markets. It's like a Western government asking, you know cities to ban supermarkets in western cities. And I believe banning wet markets will create a huge problem for urban food security. It will significantly reduce the access to fresh produce and healthy food and cause a lot of public health problems.’
‘And the other problem is the potential loss of thousands of jobs’...
‘Well, I'm afraid Beijing actually has shut down many of such markets in the past three to 10 years, different policy incentives behind that, I’m afraid’
‘Can you tell me what those incentives were?’
‘Beijing is under great pressure to reduce its population. And somehow the government believes that shutting down some of the markets: not only food markets, but also other wholesale and small retail markets, too, will get rid of the traders in these markets so that they would leave Beijing. But you've seen the population of the city.’
‘Chang says the plan worked.’...
‘When I go to such a market, people are always more relaxed there. In supermarkets, all you can talk to is the cashier and they're always very busy. You don't want to waste their time, but in wet markets it's quite different. People like to talk to you’...
‘Wet market is just like your local food market. I think in America, they call it public markets. Our market is just like that, but with different scale, maybe selling slightly different kinds of vegetables and meat. So to be honest, I don't quite understand how our markets are different from markets elsewhere. And how would those people feel if someone's from a different country saying you should shut down your own local market.’
‘Do you feel like it's prejudiced in some way?’
‘I think it's more ignorance. It's the ignorance of people who don't understand the other kind of lifestyle, and will respect that. Don't believe that people will make the right decision and choices for themselves.’"
Ironically, many of the people who insisted that China needed to ban wet markets also (at other times) cast doubt on the official origin story of covid-19

Martina on Twitter - "The cute Coffee Shop we’re in is playing a song whose lyrics are “I WANNA F*CK” over and over again. No joke. Like, 100 times."

Rob Henderson on Twitter - "Back in the day, nobody believed anything people posted online Phrases like "Pics or it didn't happen" "Everything on the internet is true" Now someone posts something on Twitter, no proof. And people just believe it"

Blaire White on Twitter - "A lot of my followers are kids who ask me how to deal with being BULLIED.. My answer is not PC: Learn how to fight. The only way bullies left me alone when I was in school was fighting back. Don’t ever let anyone put their fucking hands on you. PERIOD!! 🗣"

Adolescent Bullying, Dating, and Mating: Testing an Evolutionary Hypothesis - "Traditionally believed to be the result of maladaptive development, bullying perpetration is increasingly being viewed as a potentially adaptive behavior. We were interested in determining whether adolescents who bully others enjoy a key evolutionary benefit: increased dating and mating (sexual) opportunities. This hypothesis was tested in two independent samples consisting of 334 adolescents and 144 university students. The data partly supported our prediction that bullying, but not victimization, would predict dating behavior. The data for sexual behavior more clearly supported our hypothesis that bullying behavior predicts an increase in sexual opportunities even when accounting for age, sex, and self-reports of attractiveness, likeability, and peer victimization. These results are generally congruent with the hypothesis that bullying perpetration is, at least in part, an evolutionary adaptive behavior... bullying is associated with a 1.5–2x greater likelihood of having had sexual intercourse. Bullying was also a small but statistically significant predictor of the number of sexual partners"

Prof Francois Balloux on Twitter - "I'm bemused and intrigued by claims I'm seeing on Twitter that the intellectual competence of scientists can be measured by the number of peer-reviewed publications they churn out. Peer review helps filtering out low quality publication, but regularly fails to do so.
More importantly, peer review often discards the most interesting, novel and disruptive ideas. Scientific papers that go against the consensus can be very difficult to get published and often end up in less prestigious journals after multiple rejections.
For example, from >1,000 articles submitted to three top medical journals (AIM, BMJ and the Lancet), all 15 that ended up attracting most citations (and thus are likely the most important pieces of science) got rejected."

Dozens of camels barred from Saudi beauty contest over Botox, touch-ups

Arabisation and the threat to Singapore culture - "A segment of the community is relegating its own culture and heritage while opting for Arabic culture and lifestyle. Malays are evidently more comfortable wearing Arabic-style garments compared to their traditional baju Melayu.  More Malay women are putting on the niqab, the head dress that covers the face, revealing only the eyes. Arabic phrases are preferred by some over their Malay equivalents: For example, hijab to replace tudung (headscarf), Eidul Fitri rather than hari raya (a day of celebration after the fasting month of Ramadan), and syukran instead of terima kasih (thank you)... rituals conducted during Malay weddings, such as the merenjis (sprinkling ceremony  to bless the couple and ward off evil spirits), might have originated from Hinduism, yet the religious elites of the past did not censure them simply because they were not found in the Quran or hadith (sayings of the Prophet Muhammad).  However, these days, there are some who view Malay music, dress, dance, and arts as not conforming to Islam, by which they are referring to its Arabised form.  For example, the baju kebaya is not commonly worn by Malay women anymore. Instead, many are opting for the abayas worn by the Arabs. Increasingly, more women are also wearing the niqab. Such outfits, alien to Malays 50 years ago, are now a more common sight.  This cultural erosion was cited as one of three challenges faced by Singapore’s Malay/Muslim community by Minister Masagos Zulkifli earlier this year. It is a theme he has spoken of before.  Radicals who espouse violence are not the only threat - non-violent exclusivists are, too... There have also been instances in which groups actively discussing Western philosophy, theories, and development models are publicly castigated."
Colonialism is something only white people can do

The teapot from hell? Why the classic Chinese design needs a rethink – fast - "“Yeah, it leaks and it’s purely just a bad spout design. The tip of the spout is too fat, and the angle is wrong,” says Mr Kenny Son Yong-soo, a Sydney-based object designer, whose creations include a famous line of teapots. “But it’s impossible to craft a thin spout with the cheap material they use,” Mr Son adds.  The handle is too flat, making it almost impossible to hold, and the recessed lid keeps falling off because of how far one must tip the wide teapot to get all the tea out.  “Ergonomics have not been thought out at all in making that teapot,” he concludes.  The traditional Chinese teapot has been sold by ceramic suppliers since the 60s...   “The teapots have a lot of wear and tear in a busy restaurant. The spout and the lid suffer the most damage and this design lasts a bit longer than others.” In an attempt to reduce the damage from the ravages of daily yum cha use, Mr Tam and other restaurateurs have attached a plastic tube to extend the teapot’s spout, which reduces the leak and protects the ceramic. They’ve also attached fishing lines to tie the lid to the handle, preventing the lid from falling off...   Economical, durable and very practical for diners to serve themselves, this white ceramic teapot ticks all the boxes for restaurant owners and customers. The only thing it does not do well is pour a cup of tea properly."

Singapore's Succession Problems Continue - "Nine months after it became apparent that Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s designated successor Heng Swee Keat was “incapable of operating beyond his talking points,” in the words of the political analyst Michael Barr of Flinders University in Adelaide, the People’s Action Party is still at sea in attempting to find a replacement... Analysts say Lee’s caution in designating the new leader may reflect not just a lack of his confidence in the party’s leadership ranks but a desire to control the process despite public proclamations of the apparatchiks’ ability to democratically come up with a new party supremo. The aborted succession plan, which led to Heng’s departure last April, may mirror Lee Hsien Loong’s caution over the handover. There is also considerable suspicion that what Hsien Loong would like to see is another Lee – possibly his son, Li Hongyi, currently a director of a government technology firm, although the son has said he is not interested in a political career. Between Kuan Yew and Hsien Loong, there was only an interregnum by Goh Chok Tong from 1990 to 2004 to interrupt the 63-year sway in power by the Lee family."

As Singapore’s PM Lee Hsien Loong turns 70, no clear successor is in sight | South China Morning Post - "Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in office now for 18 years, turned 70 on Thursday, an age that the city state’s political class has long viewed as a kind of self-imposed deadline the leader had given himself to hand over power. Yet there is no clear successor in sight and observers are predicting that Lee may continue in his role until at least the middle of this decade. For years, they frequently referenced an interview Lee gave a decade ago when he was asked whether he saw himself continuing as prime minister beyond the age of 70. “I hope not,” Lee was quoted as saying by The Straits Times in September 2012. “Seventy is already a long time more. And Singapore needs a prime minister who is younger, who’s got that energy, and who is in tune with that very much younger and very much different generation.”... “My sense is that Singaporeans prefer to see a decision be made soon,” said Inderjit Singh, a former member of parliament in the prime minister’s group representation constituency. Singh underscored that the PAP had for decades had a “very structured succession plan”, and that a longer wait could mean the public might “lose confidence” in the ruling party’s ability to recruit future leaders.  Any sort of delay in the naming of Lee’s successor past 2022 could also lead to the outside world wondering if the “4G” or fourth-generation PAP leaders will be able to govern as well as Lee and his contemporaries, Singh said. “We must also show to the world that the current group of 4G leaders are capable enough to lead the country,” he said. “Giving confidence to the rest of the world is important as we see big structural changes globally that can affect Singapore’s position on the world stage.” Garry Rodan, a veteran scholar of Singapore’s politics, said the current state of affairs was “likely to further fuel public scepticism about the PAP’s long-standing claims that the party is defined and distinguished by its exceptional stocks of talent due to its meticulous and rigorous recruitment process”... Part of the reason he remains prime minister is the Covid-19 pandemic. Amid the uncertainty caused by the health crisis and the ensuing economic downturn, Lee in 2020 pledged to remain in power to steer Singapore into calmer waters. Then, the takeover plan was further derailed after his designated successor, Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat, said last April that he was stepping aside. Elevated to the PAP’s No 2 position in 2018, Heng, 60, said he believed he would be too old for the job by the time the crisis subsided. After that development, three other PAP ministers are now viewed by local media and commentators as prime contenders to succeed Lee: Education Minister Chan Chun Sing, Finance Minister Lawrence Wong and Health Minister Ong Ye Kung. At the ruling party’s annual conference last November, Lee said the successor would be named “in good time” before the next general election due in 2025. Within the usually tight-knit establishment, however, sources offer differing accounts of the progress that has been made in the process."

Ontario man who missed oil changes responsible for $19,000 engine replacement - "Fosuo said it was also comforting to know the truck came with a 100,000 kilometre warranty... At the time the engine seized, the truck had 91,000 kilometres on it and Fosuo thought the repairs would be covered. "When I asked them why it was not covered under warranty, they mentioned at 50,000 kilometers the oil switch came on and I didn't get an oil change done right away""

The Jesus Trilemma of C.S. Lewis - "What we have here is a false dilemma (or trilemma, since there are three options). Several possibilities are presented as if they are the only ones available. One is preferred and defended strongly while the others are presented as necessarily weak and inferior. This is a typical tactic for C.S. Lewis...   When it comes to his argument that Jesus must necessarily be the Lord, there are other possibilities which Lewis does not effectively eliminate. Two of the most obvious examples are that perhaps Jesus was simply mistaken and that perhaps we don’t have an accurate record of what he truly said — if, indeed, he even existed. Those two possibilities are so obvious that it's implausible that someone as intelligent as Lewis never thought of them, which would mean that he deliberately left them out of consideration.  Curiously enough, Lewis’ argument is unacceptable in the context of first century Palestine, where Jews were actively awaiting rescue. It’s unlikely in the extreme that they would have greeted incorrect claims of messianic status with labels like “liar” or “lunatic.” Instead, they would have moved on to await another claimant, figuring that there had been something wrong with the most recent contender.  It isn’t even necessary to go into much detail about alternative possibilities to dismiss Lewis’ argument because the options of “liar” and “lunatic” are themselves not refuted by Lewis. It’s clear that Lewis doesn’t regard them as credible, but he doesn’t give good reasons for anyone else to agree—he’s trying to persuade psychologically, not intellectually. This fact is suspicious given that he was an academic scholar—a profession where such tactics would have been soundly denounced had he tried to use them there.   Is there any good reason to insist that Jesus isn’t similar to other religious leaders like Joseph Smith, David Koresh, Marshall Applewhite, Jim Jones, and Claude Vorilhon? Are they liars, lunatics, or a bit of both?  Of course, Lewis’ primary goal is to argue against the liberal theological view of Jesus as a great human teacher, but there is nothing contradictory about someone being a great teacher while also being (or becoming) insane or also lying. No one is perfect, and Lewis makes an error in assuming from the outset that Jesus’ teaching aren’t worth following unless he is perfect. In effect, then, his infamous false trilemma is based upon the premise of this false dilemma.  It's just logical fallacies all the way down for Lewis, a poor foundation for a hollow shell of an argument."
Related: Campus Crusade for Christ pamphlet for Dan Brown readers - 1/3 (as well as the other 2 parts)

Manchester man draws penises around potholes so the city will fix them - "Apparently a penis is worse than a giant hole in the road...   "[The potholes] don't get filled. They'll be there for months," the artist, who calls himself Wanksy, told BBC's Newsbeat. "Suddenly you draw something amusing around it, everyone sees it, and it either gets reported or fixed."... The artist notes the drawings will fade away in "a week or two," so the vandalism isn't permanent — it's just a temporary, creative way of getting something done."

New Zealand man faces legal action for painting penises around potholes - "Geoff Upson has been drawing very large, colourful penises around potholes in his home city of Auckland since 2018 to draw attention to a problem he says authorities are not taking seriously.  Now, Auckland Transport has taken legal action against the road safety campaigner, following a complaint over his artwork. Upson says he has given a formal statement to the police, and faces a fine or possible community service...   He says he was inspired by a similar campaign by the U.K. street artist who goes by the name Wansky. In 2015, the anonymous artist began spray-painting giant penis shapes around the potholes in Greater Manchester."

Earley cars lifted for double yellow line-painting then fined - "A council has apologised for issuing fines to cars after lifting them up to paint yellow lines underneath.  The double yellow lines were painted by contractors in Earley, Berkshire, on behalf of Wokingham Borough Council on Sunday.  One councillor said it was "like a trick has been played" on residents.  The local authority said it accepted the fines were "issued in error" and would be cancelled... in a nearby road contractors painted double yellow lines only for the road to be resurfaced two days later, erasing the new paint"

Project Veritas Released A Sting Video It Says Shows Democrats Who Conspire On Voter Fraud - "One of the operatives, Scott Foval, has been fired from his job at Americans United for Change, according to multiple news outlets.  The second, Robert Creamer, has said he's stepping back from his position at Democracy Partners.  Both firms have been doing political work for Democrats this year.  Unaware that he was being recorded by a hidden camera, Foval appeared to walk through how operatives could commit voter fraud by shipping in out-of-state people to vote. "You can prove conspiracy if there's a bus," he says at one point. "If there are cars, it's much harder to prove." He also detailed how he and other operatives recruit and train people to protest Trump events and to try to draw Trump supporters into physical confrontations. "There's a script," he says. "Sometimes the 'crazies' bite ... sometimes they don't bite."  "It is not hard to get some of these a******* to pop off," Foval said at another point. "It's a matter of showing up to want to get into the rally in a Planned Parenthood T-shirt, or 'Trump is a Nazi,' you know. You can message to draw them out, and draw them to punch you.""
Of course, the usual claim of selective editing is made - but it's not substantiated

How I Became a ‘Far-Right Radical’ - WSJ - "a comedian approaching 39, who finds his work labeled “far-right” in an academic paper titled “Evaluating the scale, growth, and origins of right-wing echo chambers on YouTube.”... For five years I was responsible for making hundreds of videos about current events, politics and culture. I was an equal-opportunity offender. Our comedy channel made fun of everybody—left, right, center... Researchers from prestigious institutions including the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard already went to the trouble of demonstrating that I am somehow responsible for “the phenomenon of right-wing radicalization on YouTube.” It’ll be easy to cancel any success I find in mainstream media. Which videos did it? I wonder. Was it “Burglars for Gun Control” or “Your Gun Makes You Look Like a D—”? The videos lambasting the alt-right or the anti-antifa one? The sketches critical of President Obama’s drone strikes or the one mocking YouTube commenters leaving racist insults about the 44th president?  I don’t know. I have never faced my accusers. I would like to scroll through the We the Internet TV library with them and point out the kind of “far-right” material that won us a Webby Award in 2017. Other winners that year included the Women’s March and CNN’s Van Jones.  At first I found it odd that the words “fascism,” “racism” and “terrorism” were missing from the paper, because these terms have become inextricably linked to the far right. Then I realized it was a smart (and cowardly) move on the part of the authors to leave them out: just use the umbrella term “far right” and allow your readers to fill in the tacit isms. That way, you don’t risk being called out for labeling people who are not fascists, racists and terrorists as such. Instead, the study is peppered with nebulous adjectives like “extreme” and “radical,” which allow readers to see their own bogeymen.   I’m not the only one who takes issue with being mislabeled. This gives me some hope for my future.  In the study’s view, former Evergreen College professor Bret Weinstein —a self-described progressive and Bernie Sanders supporter—is far-right too. Joining us are neuroscientist Sam Harris (a self-confessed liberal), podcast host Joe Rogan (who considers himself “pretty liberal”) and Bloggingheads.tv (whose regular contributors include Vox co-founder Ezra Klein )... Even Mark Ledwich, whom the paper’s authors thank for sharing data with them, took issue with “the way the labels were converted into far-right and far-left.” (To wit: On his site Transparency.Tube, which tracks political channels on YouTube, We the Internet TV only scored “Right” and “Anti-woke.”)  Lumping together all these creators with vastly different political persuasions is lazy at best. At worst it undermines criticism of actual far-right content. As YouTuber Rebel Wisdom put it, “if everything is far right, then nothing is.” He is of course also “far right” by the paper’s standards.   It’s the type of analysis you’d have to be living in an echo chamber to come up with... But the walls of their bubble must not have been adequately soundproofed, because the authors are revising their paper ahead of its official publication to include a new category: Intellectual Dark Web. This IDW category would include channels that are “Anti-Woke” or “Anti-Social-Justice-Warrior.” In the current labeling system, any channel labeled IDW automatically qualifies as far right.  I can’t speak for all those other “radical” YouTube channels. But when it came to We the Internet TV, its “growing appeal” had a lot to do with it being funny. I even dared to do the type of comedy that gets you put on lists."

Labour-supporting teacher says kids need 'Marxist’ teachers to stop ‘far-right parents' brainwashing them - "Julie Reid sparked fury after insisting most teachers are “lefty Marxists” and warned students are being exposed to alternative views while at home. The Manchester councillor made the controversial remarks in an online discussion hosted by the left-wing activist group ‘People Before Profit’...   The Education Act of 1996 forbids “the promotion of partisan political views in the teaching of any subject in the school”.  Also, present on the call was NEU trade unionist and teacher Kiri Tunks, who called for the “decolonization of the curriculum” and “for anti-racist training for teachers”.  It's not the first time Ms Reid has made controversial comments.  She previously fell foul of her town hall's ban on dog roaming- only to insist it was because the pup had Alzheimer's...   She also appears to have a made a history of anti-Semitic posts on Facebook, sharing a number of deeply offensive articles.  These included pieces claiming Israel was testing chemical weapons on Gaza protesters, and conspiracy theories about the Rothschild family."
Clear proof teachers are not trying to indoctrinate their students

"Books by the Foot" in which people purchase books to create the illusion of being well-read is a real business in Washington DC. - "Books by the Foot is a book-as-decor service located in Frederick, Maryland, just north of Washington, DC, and is run by bookseller Wonder Book. As the name implies, they literally sell books by the foot, not to be read, but to appear to have been read, or sometimes to serve as pure decoration.  Much of what they do is basic commercial status building, providing books to hotels, TV sets, and the like to create an atmosphere of serious erudition where none exists...
'Roberts said residential orders, which had previously accounted for 20 percent of business, now accounted for 40 percent.  When the coronavirus pandemic arrived, Books by the Foot had to adapt to a downturn in office- and hotel-decor business—and an uptick in home-office Zoom backdrops for the talking-head class'"

Meme - "Bought my first temple in my 20s. this is what working 60 hour weeks can get you. we all have the same 24 hrs a day."

How Many Words is That? - "Below we have listed some standard word counts for different types of writing. We have also given explanations for these lengths below.
   Tweet (original) - 140 characters
   Tweet (2018) - 280 characters
   Poem - 3 words to book length
   Children's Picture Book - usually 32 pages
   Chapter Length - varies greatly
   Short Short Story - about 1,500 words
   Short Story - up to 10,000 words
   Dissertation - 100 to 200 pages (25,000 to 50,000 words)
   Novelette - 7,500 to 17,500 words
   Novella - 17,500 to 40,000 words
   Novel - 60,000 to 100,000 words
   War and Peace - 587,287 words
   King James Bible - about 780,000
   Longest Novel - over 3 million words"