Bonifratz

Well, I learned English as my second and French as my third language, and I see it the other way around. Agree to disagree I guess.

There’s nothing worse in terms of pronunciation than English. French is silly for writing twice as much as what’s pronounced, but at least it mostly follows some rules.

To be fair, this is about June 2025, so they still have some 15 months to accomplish it all. /s

How much does that cost?

https://youtu.be/IQBC5URoF0s

Figs fresh off the tree.

For a long time, I was convinced they would actually turn around and stop the whole endeavour, as it was clearly a giant, unforced blunder. But here we are…

A Nokia 3330 if I remember correctly.

Most people I know hate it, but I absolutely love the feeling of a fly crawling on my arms or legs. It gives me this wonderful comfortable tingling sensation and I can’t get enough of it.

Even if AI did make psychology redundant in a couple of years (which I’d bet my favourite blanket it won’t), what are the alternatives? If AI can take over a field that is focused more than most others on human interaction, personal privacy, thoughts, feelings, and individual perceptions, then it can take over almost any other field before that. So you might as well go for it while you can.

As long as the political class and the wealthy few have such a large overlap, it’s a great idea for them.

Yup, that’s me, too.

If I had to name just one, it would always be Satie, simply because I admire how he did his own thing completely and basically composed some sort of minimalism a century before it was cool. Others I love (to name just a few): Saint-Saëns, Debussy, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, late Mozart. More recently I’ve been a fan of Messiaen for his harmonic style and of Schnittke for his versatility and humour (and sometimes breathtakingly beautiful pieces). If we’re talking musicians (not composers), I’d name Alicia de Larrocha, Maria João Pires and Sviatoslav Richter for piano, and Isaac Stern for violin.

An interesting read, no doubt, but I still disagree with

Is this something we actually have to worry about?

Maybe.

The “threat” here would entail no negative emotions, no human (or other) suffering, just… nothing. Plus, it sounds like if the universe were indeed unstable/meta-stable, there’s nothing we could change about it anyway. So of all the things I can worry about, I feel this deserves the least amount of worry.

Thanks, I didn’t know about that!

Slightly off topic, but I’ve been wondering: Is the “a single member of the House can call a vote to remove the Speaker” rule still in effect, or did things go back to default after McCarthy’s removal?

It’s a fascinating example of the psychology of (face) perception. I scanned the entire image several times with no success, but literally the second I decided to turn my phone around, Kanye jumped out at me.

Well when you find a guy with an exploded face, it obviously warrants some further Investigation. I could imagine them looking for a bullet and not finding any, then investigating further. The info about him dipping his chewing gum in citric acid might have been given by friends, they also found the explosive, and from there it’s not a huge jump to the explanation they found.

A bit morbid, but there’s https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unusual_deaths. Features stuff like:

Sergio Millán, 59, was alone in his apartment in Torreforta, Tarragona, Spain, when an explosion in a petrochemical plant 3 kilometres (2 mi) away launched a one-ton iron plate into the apartment above him, causing the ceiling to collapse, killing him.

or

Vladimir Likhonos, 25, a student of Kyiv Polytechnic Institute from Konotop, was killed when his chewing gum exploded. Likhonos had a habit of dipping his chewing gum in citric acid to increase the gum’s sour taste. On his work table police found about 100 grams (3.5 oz) of unidentified explosive powder which he used for chemistry studies at home. It resembled citric acid, and it is thought that he confused the two, having accidentally coated his gum in the explosive powder before chewing it. The explosive was found to be four times stronger than TNT, and the explosion was possibly triggered either by reacting with Likhonos’s saliva, or the pressure exerted by him chewing on the gum and explosive powder.

I’m closing in on 40 and life satisfaction has been rising consistently over the past couple of years. I think the peak is still ahead.