[kenberg]

y66, on 2021-September-06, 19:28, said:

A Century Ago, Miners Fought in a Bloody Uprising. Few Know About It Today.

Thanks, I pursued the links a bit. For example https://www.loc.gov/item/cmns001540/

I knew a bit about the battle, but not much. An uncle was an iron miner, as was my first wife's father, but they did not much speak of "issues". My history classes in elementary school and high school seldom got much past Teddy Roosevelt. I kept thinking "Next time through, could we skip the damn pilgrims so we can make it into the 20th century?" "Speak for yourself, John". Got that, I got that. Now how about speakeasies, the roaring 20s, prohibition, the depression, and two world wars? Maybe some time for that? I suppose they would have had to re-write the syllabus that was maybe created in 1912. And maybe some little things, such as "Taft means well, but he means well feebly". Basic TR.

[y66]

I watched a couple videos on the Criterion Channel about the making of "Harlan County" by Barbara Koppple (director) and John Sayles (fan). Kopple and her crew were viewed initially as a bunch of hippies from New York. After putting their lives on the line to make their documentary they ended up winning the respect of a lot of the locals and the 1977 Academy Award for best documentary feature. After watching the Sayles video, I re-watched "Return of the Secaucus Seven". Wow. So good.

[pilowsky]

Speaking of cheating - here are a few easy ways to solve a Rubik's cube quickly.

[y66]

My wife got her hair cut today and I was slow to complement the new look. So she asked if I liked it and I said it was nice but I really liked the way so and so had cut it, couldn't she go back to his salon? Now she keeps imitating David Bowie imitating Mick Jagger.

[y66]

Good read: https://www.nytimes....mic-advice.html

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Some of the world’s best extreme athletes shared what they do when they think they’ve reached their last straw. How do they not only endure, but thrive in daily challenges?

One message they all had: You are stronger than you think you are, and everyone is able to adapt in ways they didn’t think possible. But there are a few techniques to help you along — 100-mile race not required.

[Winstonm]

Boomer Sooner.

Quote

Oklahoma had the highest rate of police violence against Black Americans, the study found.

[pilowsky]

How to random using lava lamps - Cloudflare.
https://www.youtube....hannel=TomScott

[y66]

This story really got me: 52 Years in 11 Days: A Son, Facing Death, Finds His Father

[pilowsky]

I just watched the press conference where the announcement of the winners of the Nobel prize for chemistry (2021) was made.
The award was made for an impressive breakthrough in the way that chiral molecules can be produced using organic molecules.
Imagine for a moment if someone discovered a way to make squeeze play comprehensible to average club players.
The press corps was extremely well-prepared and were able to think of 6 questions before they gave up and went back to their more usual onerous tasks.

After the winner had gone back to having coffee with his wife in Amsterdam the guy from the associated press asked why the prize wasn't given to someone else.

The prize is commonly divided amongst 3 people and totals $1,000,000. This is 25% less than the person who comes second gets in a tennis game.

Nobel presser said:

it says it's about 20 years ago that you found these uh catalysts could you briefly um summarize where um how where are you today in comparison to 20 years ago? A. Much further along.

um what was your first feeling when you got this famous uh telephone call from Stockholm this morning? A. Happy. (this is not always the case - sometimes the call comes in the middle of the night).

uh congratulations on this uh this award a professor when these discoveries were made 20 years ago did you realize immediately the impact that this would have did you foresee a little bit where this field of studies would go or has it surprised you at the same time as science has progressed on through these discoveries over these last 20 years? A. See answer to first question.

I wonder these organocatalysts how does it work that they only make one of these mirror images and not the other? A. Who knows.

What is your favourite catalyst? This is my favourite question - there used to be a show on TV in Australia called "The Inventors" where people would compete for the best invention. One of the judges invariably asked if it came in different colours.

What will winning do for your future research? A. ???

This was all the interest the international press was able to muster.

THEN:
No more questions. Prof List goes back to coffee with his wife.

The Chair of the committee then asked-
Any questions for the committee.

At which point an English reporter asked a long and winding question that went something like:
COVID blah blah - mRNA technology is important. Is this a future Nobel prize?

[kenberg]

y66, on 2021-October-09, 18:03, said:

This story really got me: 52 Years in 11 Days: A Son, Facing Death, Finds His Father

A nice story, I am glad they succeeded in reaching each other.

You have probably seen enough of my posts to know that I also am adopted. As to finding my biological parents I knew who and where they were, but I never made use of that. A child very much needs a father and a mother, a child very much does not need two fathers and/or two mothers. As an adult I sometimes thought of finding my biological mother, it would not have been difficult, and telling her that it all worked out well, but I decided to leave well enough alone. Possibly that sounds cold, I don't mean it to be, I could easily imagine her married to a guy who knew nothing about her earlier life. I was fine, I have always hoped that she was fine, let it be.

In the last few years I have been in touch with some biological relatives. We are all old enough now so that it will not disturb anyone. I have been invited to visit if I get back to Minnesota, and when covid slacks off enough to make travel easy I might do that.

As to a man's rights, something the article discusses a bit, I regard it as a simple matter. If you want to have a say over what happens with any children you have, you marry the girl. If you don't do that, you are out of the discussion. I realize the law now takes a different view. I like it my way.

[Winstonm]

kenberg, on 2021-October-09, 19:56, said:

A nice story, I am glad they succeeded in reaching each other.

You have probably seen enough of my posts to know that I also am adopted. As to finding my biological parents I knew who and where they were, but I never made use of that. A child very much needs a father and a mother, a child very much does not need two fathers and/or two mothers. As an adult I sometimes thought of finding my biological mother, it would not have been difficult, and telling her that it all worked out well, but I decided to leave well enough alone. Possibly that sounds cold, I don't mean it to be, I could easily imagine her married to a guy who knew nothing about her earlier life. I was fine, I have always hoped that she was fine, let it be.

In the last few years I have been in touch with some biological relatives. We are all old enough now so that it will not disturb anyone. I have been invited to visit if I get back to Minnesota, and when covid slacks off enough to make travel easy I might do that.

As to a man's rights, something the article discusses a bit, I regard it as a simple matter. If you want to have a say over what happens with any children you have, you marry the girl. If you don't do that, you are out of the discussion. I realize the law now takes a different view. I like it my way.

Quote

What is a man, what has he got
If not himself, then he has naught
Not to say things he truly feels
And not the words of one who kneels
The record shows I took the blows
And did it my way

[y66]

Quote

Wait, the Grail is a cup? We're looking for a cup?

[pilowsky]

Why you lose at Monopoly: Hannah Fry and some random Australian guy.
It's 18 minutes long and includes a (wildly inaccurate) Python simulation of the game.

[pilowsky]

The Australian government is so concerned about the environment it has decided to release a FFS discussion paper.
You can discuss it, FFS, right here - https://www.industry...r-have-your-say
If you want to say something FFS you can even send them an email:
I mean...


If we manage to make up our tiff with the French we can form a FAUKUS alliance - to go with it.

[y66]

Fun read: Paul McCartney Doesn’t Really Want to Stop the Show

[y66]

From Helen MacDonald's review of "Dune":

Quote

Earlier this summer, sitting in a London cinema for a screening of Denis Villeneuve’s hugely anticipated, pandemic-delayed adaptation of Frank Herbert’s classic sci-fi novel “Dune,” I found myself unexpectedly close to tears. I’d not been in a movie theater in almost two years, and I’d forgotten what it was like. Forgotten how the light inside a big auditorium always feels dusty and late-night weary, no matter what time it is. Forgotten the particular smell of popcorn and carpet cleaner, how it evokes a childhood memory of brushing my fingers across the static on the glass of a just-switched-on TV set; forgotten the vertiginous scale of the space and the screen.

When the film began, I heard the thump of a heartbeat working in counterpoint to my own, bursts of percussive discordance as Hans Zimmer’s score cut in, and then harsh desert light was burning the backs of my eyes and I was somewhere else entirely, witnessing the brutal quelling of an insurgency on a distant planet — and after a while, I realized I was whispering, “Oh, my God” under my breath over and over again. Afterward, I walked along empty streets with my head full of deserts and burning date palms, vast ships, monstrous sandworms and a sense of wonderment that the book’s visions had been so exquisitely realized. Josh Brolin, who plays the warrior-minstrel Gurney Halleck in the movie, took a lifelong “Dune”-fan friend to a screening in New York, and at the end of the movie the friend started screaming: “That was it! That was it! That’s what I saw! That’s what I saw when I was a kid!”

Quote

“Dune” the movie has clear contemporary relevance: It’s an ecological epic that warns against religious and imperialist dogma and portrays a people suffering under colonial occupation, a film whose main character is forced to adapt to a new reality or die. When Villeneuve describes “Dune” as a “coming-of-age story,” it feels far more than the coming-of-age of Paul Atreides. The phrase speaks more generally of our need to adapt and evolve, shed the ghosts of how we have always lived, in order to survive. For the strangest thing happened to me after watching “Dune” this summer: It slipped into a different part of my memory than films usually do. It felt like news. Images from it have unexpectedly become part of the way I’ll always remember this summer and fall: images of burning ships and glittering sands interspersed with forest fires, the terrible legacies of colonial crimes, failed wars, the constant drumbeat of the pandemic, waves of religious and neo-religious fervor spurred by societal inequities and the constant, dreadful background knowledge that the climate is breaking down around us. “Dune” was always an allegorical novel; sci-fi’s ability to hold up a mirror darkly to culture is one of its primary aims. But “Dune” the film has somehow become part of the world for me, less a reflection than a refraction of reality, burnished with desert dust and shadow.

[Winstonm]

5 claims from social media that are total Bull-Shiite.

Quote

CLAIM: A new tax policy allows the IRS to "monitor all transactions involving bank accounts worth more than $600." Another new policy taxes all payments of more than $600 made through applications like PayPal and Venmo.

CLAIM: The owner of five restaurants in Terminal C at Denver International Airport told employees they needed to get vaccinated for COVID-19 by Nov. 1 or they would be fired. None of the cooks, dishwashers, bussers or hosts showed up to work, so there were no restaurants open in Terminal C. The owner immediately sent an email reversing the vaccine mandate.

CLAIM: A Delta Airlines pilot who had recently been vaccinated for COVID-19 died mid-flight within the last 10 days, forcing the plane to make an emergency landing.

CLAIM: A 2018 study that looked at the effectiveness of N95 masks versus medical masks found that masks don't stop the spread of viruses.

CLAIM: Video shows people dropping "dead" outside a COVID-19 vaccination clinic in London after receiving a shot.

[pilowsky]

Out of interest, where do you find these people and their claims?
Sometimes, when bored, I try to find them on Facebook or youtube - but they only appear when they are being mocked.
Maybe we need a thread for ridiculous conspiracy theories.
OTOH, Here is a transcript of an interview with mad King Rupert feeling a little sad about the Maldives, but oh well.
(there was an equally bananas face to camera interview with Gina Rinehart.

Quote

Murdoch (https://www.youtube....annel=KevinRudd)

We should approach climate change with great scepticism.
um climate change has been going on as long as the planet is here and there'll always be a little bit of it at the moment the north pole is melting a bit but the south pole is getting bigger things are happening but how much are we doing uh with emissions and so on well as far as Australia goes nothing in the overall picture china has but if you talk about environment and health and smoke and so on of course we're all environmentalists we all want clean air um but in terms of the world's temperature going up the worst asp the most alarmist things have said maybe three percent three sets three sorry three degrees centigrade in 100 years at the very most one of those would come from man-made be man-made now what it means is if the sea level rises six inches that's a big deal in the world the Maldives might disappear or something but okay we've got to learn to we can't mitigate that we can't stop it we just got to stop building vast houses on seashores um and go back a little bit uh you know the world had been changing for thousands and thousands of years it's just a lot more complicated today because we're so much more advanced

[Winstonm]

pilowsky, on 2021-October-16, 15:32, said:

Out of interest, where do you find these people and their claims?
Sometimes, when bored, I try to find them on Facebook or youtube - but they only appear when they are being mocked.
Maybe we need a thread for ridiculous conspiracy theories.
OTOH, Here is a transcript of an interview with mad King Rupert feeling a little sad about the Maldives, but oh well.
(there was an equally bananas face to camera interview with Gina Rinehart.

The claims came from an article on Yahoo.

[pilowsky]

OK, it was a bit of a struggle but it turns out that birds aren't real because the US government replaced them all with drones.
The group has a large following and sells excellent merch.
https://www.youtube....nel=NowThisNews