We should stop half assing everything and putting up with it. Gonna be a complete shitshow in 10 yrs
.

Nursery rhymes should be banned
We'll be remembering those things all the way to our deathbeds!

Collective nouns for animals
Had fun going through this list, picked out many notables and favorites!

A shrewdness of apes
A herd of asses
A sloth of bears
A family of beavers
An obstinacy of buffalo
A flock of camels
A train of camels
A pounce of cats
A kindle of kittens
An intrigue of kittens
A destruction of cats (for wild cats)
A coalition of cheetah
A memory of elephants
A business of ferrets
A fesnying of ferrets
A tower of giraffes
An array of hedgehogs
A bloat of hippos
A leap of leopards
A mischief of mice
A barrel of monkeys
A raft of otters
A romp of otters
A prickle of porcupines
A gaze of raccoons
A rookery of seals
A Scurry of squirrels
A wisdom of wombats
A zeal of zebras
A dazzle of zebras

A chattering of chickens (for young chickens)
A stand of flamingos
A party of jays
A murder of magpies
A parliament of owls
A pandemonium of parrots
An ostentation of peacocks
A bouquet of pheasants
A storytelling of ravens
An unkindness of ravens
A wreck of seabirds
A venue of vultures

A battery of barracudas
A glint of goldfish
A troubling of goldfish
A shiver of sharks

A quiver of cobras
A congress of salamanders
A turn of turtles

An intrusion of cockroaches
A business of flies
A bike of hornets
A smack of jellyfish
A flock of lice
A bite of midges
A scourge of mosquitoes
A bed of scorpions
A clutter of spiders

2007 Boston Mooninite panic:

On the morning of January 31, 2007, the Boston Police Department and the Boston Fire Department mistakenly identified battery-powered LED placards depicting the Mooninites, characters from the Adult Swim animated television series Aqua Teen Hunger Force, as improvised explosive devices (IEDs), leading to a massive panic. Placed throughout Boston, Massachusetts, and the surrounding cities of Cambridge and Somerville by Peter "Zebbler" Berdovsky and Sean Stevens, these devices were part of a nationwide guerrilla marketing advertising campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters.

Tolerate all but the intolerant.

Changing yourself is hard, but it's a lot easier than changing someone else.

Hallucinogen - LSD (2023 Remaster)

It was the release of this track that led to Posford choosing the project name Hallucinogen. He noted that the Dragonfly white label test pressing for the single had already been produced when he was given ten minutes to come up with a band name. He notes, “I couldn’t think of anything but since the track was called LSD (because of the samples), I went with the name Hallucinogen purely because it seemed appropriate for the track, totally oblivious that I would ever produce another tune under that moniker, let alone that it would provide me with a career. If I’d known this, I would have put some more thought into the name!”

Shūkyō/karuto nisei - religion/cult second generation (children)

Shūkyō nisei is a Japanese phrase, which refers to children being raised by their parents with a strong religious beliefs. These children may be forced to practice the same religion against their will by their parents. These children are reportedly often challenged by hardships, such as child neglect, child abuse and lack of psychological, financial, academic, and social independence because of their religious parents and the predatory practices of the religious organization.

An interesting concept that applies to my childhood, albeit a very mild version. I never really thought about my forced religious upbringing as constituting abuse. But it is a form of psychological abuse that I think over time will become more recognized.


I have one sibling and she remains devoutly religious to this day. Whereas I left the church in my early twenties and never looked back. It's funny to me, the quirk of nature. What is it about me and my mental makeup that led me to leave, and her and hers that kept here there? Feels scarily arbitrary. Flip a little switch and I'd still be a religious zombie. Or from her perspective, flip a little switch and she'd be an evil heathen. Wars are started over such arbitrary tiny differences.

Ricky Gervais on Free Speech
Found some of his old comments on free speech enlightening.

“I think offense is the collateral damage of free speech, and it’s no reason not to have free speech. [...] Having free speech and some people getting upset by it is the lesser of two evils because not having free speech is horrendous.”

Would have preferred a proper justification rather than the simplistic "not having free speech is horrendous", but it's good overall.

“It’s a good thing to not be racist and sexist and homophobic. But it’s not a good thing to not be allowed to make jokes about those things, because you can tell a joke about race without being racist. I’m happy to play by the rules. It’s just that the 200 million people watching have different rules. That’s the plight. When people say, ‘He crossed the line,’ I say, ‘I didn’t draw a line, you did.’ It’s relative. It’s subjective.”

Source: https://www.mediaite.com/entertainment/ricky-gervais-defends-controversial-jokes-ahead-of-golden-globes-return-offense-is-the-collateral-damage-of-free-speech/

Freedom of speech is freedom of reach.

Sarco Pod Used
The Sarco Pod - an assisted suicide device - was used for the first time today in Switzerland, where it was thought to be legal... and several people were promptly arrested. Will be interesting to see how this develops.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/sep/24/several-detained-in-switzerland-over-suicide-capsule-death-police-say

Fundamentalism - Islamic and Christian - are plagues equally
Speaking of Immovable Objects and Unstoppable Forces, I just finished fully reading Bin Laden's Letter to America for the first time. An interesting, if disquieting read - largely a mirror image of Biblical rantings.

Certainly there are valid grievances: American foreign policy is a horror show covered in a shiny coat of paint.

Both sides are formidable, and delusional. So long as their religions remain widespread, each will force their views on the rest of the world at gunpoint.

As an outside observer, fundamentalism - Islamic and Christian - are plagues equally. Religions believing themselves The One True Religion are existential threats.

Immovable Object or Unstoppable Force. Which wins?
I never could figure it out, but when it comes to Introvert vs Extravert, the Introvert wins. The unstoppable Extravert is stopped by the Immovable introvert.

On a long enough timescale, open cultures thrive, and closed cultures doom themselves to obscurity.

The afterlife is the imprint you left on the world with your existence.

Unnaccountable Anonymous Policy Formation
In Dan Carlin's over 22-hour-long podcast on World War II, filled with things that blew my mind, I found this part especially interesting:

SCM Payne in his book "The Wars for Asia 1911 - 1949" had said that Japan's government had been called a "government by acquiescence" or "a system of irresponsibility" and he said "Because if everyone is responsible for policy, then policy formation becomes anonymous, so that no one is actually held accountable. The primary value emphasized in decisionmaking was a consensus, reached through informal procedures." A consensus that required the most diehard fanatical elements of the military to be on board, and at least the (Japanese) Army, was not.

Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History 67 - Supernova in the East 6 (14:06-14:44)

I found parts of that somewhat reminiscent of American politics (as an example), where the figureheads are for show. All the real decisions seem to be made by unaccountable anonymous people perpetually in power. I'm no expert though, it's just a thought.

An argument for veganism
We can't complain when a superior intelligence decides to use us as energy because most of us are doing exactly that to lower intelligences.

Wait, audio in banner ads is a thing?
I just about always surf with adblock so it's a rare thing I go it bareback. I thought obnoxious auto-loading audio in websites was eliminated literally last century. Like 25 years ago.

Mind fucking blown.

How AI could help us talk to animals

Schizophrenic Contagion
I could have sworn I posted about this already, but a deep search did not uncover the post. Must have been in conversation with a friend.


I once interacted with a mildly (if that's possible) schizophrenic person for a week or so. 10-15 years ago, mostly through Facebook, after having met IRL through a mutual friend. I wasn't in the best state of mind, as I was also sleep deprived at the time.

All I remember is that the more I interacted with this person, the more I started to feel a sense of reality distortion. Almost like schizophrenia could be contagious. You get wrapped up in their reality and it starts to distort your own.

It was a spooky experience, and gave me a new respect for how malleable our psyches are, and how fragile our sense of reality. Also makes you respect the power of sleep deprivation as an interrogation technique.

The experience always left me wondering if Schizophrenia could have a contagious component. Like a mind virus perhaps? Sounds a bit silly, but we really don't understand it that well. Who knows what we'll figure out about it in time.