BobDevney

BobDevney, 10 days ago to USpolitics

Well-known U.S. sports podcaster Colin Cowherd neatly sums up a recent development in politics & the law:

"Donald Trump is now a felon. His campaign chairman was a felon. So is his deputy campaign manager, his personal lawyer, his chief strategist, his national security adviser, his trade advisor, his foreign policy adviser, his campaign fixer, & his company CFO. They’re all felons.

'Judged by the company you keep.' It’s a cabal of convicts."

http://amp.awfulannouncing.com/politics/colin-cowherd-donald-trump-hush-money-trial-guilty.html

#USPolitics #Law

reillypascal, 15 days ago to Meme

"While we were developing common sense, she studied the blade"

Tamsyn Muir did the meme. (From "Gideon the Ninth")

#Meme #Memes #Fiction #SFF #Fantasy #SciFi #ScienceFiction #Book #Books #Bookstodon

yogthos, 1 month ago to random

MRI brain imaging has previously revealed that Covid reduces the thickness of grey matter within the frontal and temporal lobes.

This would mimic symptoms of Frontotemporal Dementia.

It should also be noted that damage to this specific area of the brain within the cerebral cortex can cause sociopathic behaviour. Additionally, this induces the “slow and insidious loss of the capacity for moral rationality.”

#covid

https://today.tamu.edu/2022/03/07/even-mild-cases-of-covid-19-can-leave-a-mark-on-the-brain-such-as-reductions-in-gray-matter/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3139561/

of moral and conventional rules. This report describes four FTD patients who committed criminal violations in the presence of clear consciousness and sufficiently intact cognition. They understood the nature of their acts and the potential consequences, but did not feel sufficiently concerned to be deterred. FTD involves a unique pathologic combination affecting the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, with altered moral feelings, right anterior temporal loss of emotional empathy, and orbitofrontal changes with disinhibited, compulsive behavior. These case histories and the literature indicate that those with right temporal FTD retain the capacity to tell right from wrong but have the slow and insidious loss of the capacity for moral rationality. Patients with early FTD present a challenge to the
The team found marked differences in gray matter – or the neurons that process information in the brain – between those who had been infected with COVID-19 and those who had not. Specifically, the thickness of the gray matter tissue in brain regions known as the frontal and temporal lobes was reduced in the COVID-19 group, differing from the typical patterns seen in the people who hadn’t had a COVID-19 infection.

BobDevney, 1 month ago to music

As surveillance capitalism spies on us ceaselessly from our cars, our refrigerators, our toasters, our TVs — you have no choice but to think of these lines from Leonard Cohen's deathless "Tower of Song."

Especially, I'm afraid, the last words:

Now you can say that I've grown bitter

But of this you may be sure

The rich have got their channels

In the bedrooms of the poor

And there's a mighty judgement coming —

But I may be wrong

#Music #Surveillance #Capitalism

BobDevney, 2 months ago to Sleeping

Wow.

Check out this amazing stat on car crash prevention in the local paper (here in southeast New England, USA) re adjusting school start times so teenagers don't get up at 6:00 a.m.:

"A study…at the University of Minnesota in 2014 found that in Teton County, Wyoming, crashes involving students 16 to 18 years old…reduced by 70% when they changed their school start time from 7:35 a.m. to 8:55 a.m., the most drastic change among schools involved in the study."

#School #HighwaySafety #Sleep

BobDevney, 3 months ago to tv

Loved "Avian Flu," the latest hilarious episode of SYFY TV's "Resident Alien." Harry — the brilliant Alan Tudyk, playing an Octopodiform alien invader in human disguise — as usual claims his species are super-rational and free of silly human feelings. Then acts like a emo clown.

Here he's so smitten with an alien birdwoman bureaucrat that he keeps falling over.

When he recited his suggestive love poem about her, I fell over.

#TV #ScienceFiction #ResidentAlien

BobDevney, 3 months ago to movies

Just saw a 2018 British documentary on Amazon: “Tea with the Dames.” Four fine actresses talking about the old days; plus stills & clips. Maggie Smith, Joan Plowright, Eileen Atkins, Judi Dench.

Atkins relates a story from back then, by the actor Tim West. He returned to his roominghouse one night, turned on the light — and there was his landlady, having sex with a man on the kitchen table.

Looking up, she said, "Oh, Mister West! You must think I'm such a flirt."

#Movies #Theater #Humor

pluralistic, 3 months ago to random

Today's threads (a thread)

Inside: Kelly Link's "Book of Love"; and more!

Archived at: https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/13/the-kissing-song/

#Pluralistic

1/

BobDevney, 4 months ago to design

If you have reached an advanced age (like 6), some designer with the wrong priorities has ruined your day. Or days.

Big example: dying to attract more trendoids, Toyota has restyled its newest Prius—including puckering the back window to the size of a capitalist's, um, heart. Screw safety! (Right, Boeing?)

Small example: streaming video platforms that cut short the end credits and start some new show you didn't ask for. Or want.

More here:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90338379/i-wrote-the-book-on-user-friendly-design-what-i-see-today-horrifies-me

#design #enshittification

DenisCOVIDinfoguy, 4 months ago to australia

COVID-19 was detected in Australia 4 years ago today.

"It's still a serious human pathogen" - Prof Bennet

"It's hard to get the balance right, but we want people to still be aware of it, but you can't keep up a state of panic" - Prof Bennet🤦‍♂️

#COVIDisNotOver #Australia @auscovid19

Source: https://abc.net.au/news/2024-01-25/four-years-since-covid-19-detected-in-australia/103386876

toussaint, 5 months ago to random

Spanking new Boeing planes have nosedived out of the sky, their fuselages have blown out mid flight, yesterday you had a door fly off mid flight in Alaska and Boeing has admitted to defrauding the FAA on their safety —
AND YET
the only person at Boeing who has been prosecuted is literally a technician.
Remember that when your boss ask you to do some questionable shady shit 'for the team' #CapitalismIsKillingYOU #StrikeReady2024

BobDevney, 5 months ago to movies

The U.S. TV channel TCM (Turner Classic Movies) is out already with their memorial reel for 2023.

I mostly wish the acrobat would get out of the way. And the terrible beauties of youth and age pummel you in too-quick succession.

But it does make me feel some feelings. You?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-OggxFtRLE&list=RDCMUCv0R5T2xkjGfk9UR90iZG1A

Credit: Found this on Mark Evanier's invaluable showbiz blog, at https://www.newsfromme.com/2023/12/19/todays-non-xmas-video-link/

#movies #TurnerClassicMoves #RIP

BobDevney, 5 months ago to random

Scary article on COVID, & the many ways it's worse than flu. And that ANY COVID bout, "mild" or not, brings a probability of multiple troubles later. Perhaps for the rest of your (shortened) life.

If a big biz mag is worried, we should all be. Though notice they don't take the next step of what to do about it: because masks & vax are icky & politicized, & businessmen want to ignore their profound responsibility to spend money on ventilation etc.

https://fortune.com/2023/12/14/covid-19-v-flu-more-serious-threat-new-study-health-carolyn-barber/

#COVID #COVIDIsNotOver

cstross, 7 months ago to random

I grew up reading Heinlein novels too; the difference (I think) is that I learned (a) how to read critically and (b) that Heinlein loved to play fake-out mind games using unreliable narrators, to study ideological positions he didn't necessarily agree with but enjoyed playing with. Oh, and (c) he had some weird unexamined cognitive biases.

ScottEdelman, 7 months ago to random

My final post-NJ/NYC trip COVID-19 test is once again negative, which means I've survived another trip without infection. Extremely grateful to have made it safely through so many events over the past two years. It proves masking indoors at conventions plus staying up to date on vaccinations works.

BobDevney, 9 months ago to music

Just heard beloved Boston WGBH music presenter Brian O'Donovan — on an encore broadcast of his "Celtic Sojourn" — discussing old guard vs. new guard in Irish traditional music. He capped it with this perfect line from Gustav Mahler:

"Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire."

#Music #IrishMusic #Boston #Mahler #GreatQuotes

BobDevney, 9 months ago to ai

Too good not to share the greatest post ever on this subject, even if @ZackBornstein only posted this on, uh, another site:

Struggling to figure out how 8 billionaires who want to replace workers with robots are losing the narrative to 10,000 professional storytellers and the 150,000 hottest people in the world

#Hollywood #Strikes #AI #Writers #Actors #hahaha

thetyee, 10 months ago to random

We may have disastrously underestimated one of the most serious sequelae of COVID-19: infection of the brain and nervous system. Crawford Kilian explains. 🦠

https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/07/20/Long-COVID-Disabling-Kids/?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_content=072023-m&utm_campaign=editorial

tzimmer_history, 10 months ago to random

Calling on “Is This Democracy” listeners: We want to interrupt our summer break for a mailbag/Q+A episode - and we need your questions!

Certainly seems like a lot has happened since we last recorded. And we are ready to talk about it!

Multiple ways to get your questions in: Leave them in the replies, send them via DM on any of our social media platforms, or send them to the show email. (Almost) Anything goes. We are excited to hear from you!

https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/is-this-democracy

iraantlers, 1 year ago to random

#portals