@petealexharris@mastodon.scot
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petealexharris

@petealexharris@mastodon.scot

SF writer and software engineer.
#Languages, #science, #writing. he or they (shrug)
Glasgow (meetup) Writers Group and Glasgow SF Writers' Circle.
More random stuff at ello.co/petealexharris

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petealexharris, to random
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A fresh hell? In this economy?

petealexharris, to random
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It occurs to me what might be the reason why western authorities are reacting so brutally to protests against genocide in Gaza.

I doubt it's specifically some strategic need to keep Israel as an ally.

I think they're UNEASY that significant popular opinion suddenly objects to tens of thousands of brown people dying far away, if only in this one case.

They weren't expecting that to happen.

Their climate change strategy kind of hinges on us not caring about that.

petealexharris,
@petealexharris@mastodon.scot avatar

@nowan
I think that particular madness plays a part on the US right, but not so much in the UK, and the UK's far-right government are just as happy to let the genocide keep happening.

petealexharris, to random
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German has all these great compound nouns like Schadenfreude, and since English is a Germanic language, there's no reason we can't have them too.

It's easy: whenever the spellchecker wants you to hyphenate a word, mutter "no, fuck you, this is my language" and hit Add to Dictionary.

JackTheCat, to random
@JackTheCat@mastodon.scot avatar

Clever move so soon after Keith said he wouldn't work with me SNP.

John Swinney urges Keir Starmer to work with him to end child poverty | The National

https://www.thenational.scot/news/24314567.john-swinney-urges-keir-starmer-work-end-child-poverty/

petealexharris,
@petealexharris@mastodon.scot avatar

@JackTheCat
It's probably the smartest tactical move in the run-up to the election: keep asking Keir Starmer to commit to various repairs to the damage of 14 years of Tory government, and every time he says he won't, stick it on a leaflet or a billboard with his big boiled-ham face next to a blue rosette.

petealexharris, to random
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May
How do you market your work?

I used to push harder to sell my books on the cursed bird site, but the atmosphere here is different, and also I now know it doesn't matter much, so I only occasionally mention my e-book bundle: https://gumroad.com/l/sHUm

Thousands of people who'd love at least some of my work are out there, but I don't know who they are, they'll probably never hear of my books, and if they do, they might not try them. I've made my peace with that.

petealexharris, to random
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I had to go to the shops but it was warm enough for sandals, so the tyranny of socks is defeated for today at least.

Viss, to random
@Viss@mastodon.social avatar

on todays episode of "tell the public how to break your systems....

petealexharris,
@petealexharris@mastodon.scot avatar

@Viss
Enshrining incompetence as policy because competence is hard and confusing.

Wen, to conservative
@Wen@mastodon.scot avatar

I discovered hydrothermal vents, but I’m only known for finding the Titanic

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/09/robert-ballard-discovery-hydrothermal-vents-deep-sea-ocean-expeditions-titanic-aoe

'We invited biologists but they didn’t want to go because they said there’s nothing going on there. We constantly remind them they weren’t there when we made this historic biological discovery; we have to rub it in.’

petealexharris,
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@Wen I just want to know if anyone tried to eat the beef clam.

petealexharris, to random
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8 May
When writing technical or scientific detail, how much is plausible?

cracks knuckles
Right.

I am aware of how plausible or not the science is in my SF, and purposefully don't explain, and gloss over, parts that I can't make plausible enough to myself.

But I still include too much science.

e.g. in The Source of Fire, the steam ship Great Application of a Terrible Idea is powered by what's basically a nuclear reactor, and the kenner of the ship explains it.

1/n

petealexharris,
@petealexharris@mastodon.scot avatar

2/n
So how the reactor works (the Holy Lead is on interleaving metal discs that are turned into close proximity with a big wheel on the front of the furnace) is explained.

How the Njemmish at a steam-engine tech level got hold of what we can only assume is enriched uranium, without even really understanding the physics of how it works (Storvin explicily says so) is NOT explained. At least, not until The Trovador, if I ever get that finished.

simon_brooke, to random
@simon_brooke@mastodon.scot avatar

Last night, I was thinking that Kuenssberg wasn't really a journalist, she was more a groupie; this morning, The Bunker is talking about politics as fandoms. I think this says a lot about modern political discourse in the UK.

There is little serious interest in, or analysis of, policy; the focus is on who is briefing against who, sleeping with who, plotting against who, winning arcane popularity contests.

This is essentially unserious.

https://pod.link/1496246490/episode/1974664bc579725097d9cb038c45092d

petealexharris,
@petealexharris@mastodon.scot avatar

@simon_brooke

Sometimes I just want to shake people and scream in their face: POLICY. Policy, policy policy!

What is the detail of the policy? What is it intended to do? Why is that worth doing? Is there evidence it will work? How and when will you check if it's working? What is the plan B if it isn't?

QasimRashid, to random
@QasimRashid@mastodon.social avatar

Watching the bear vs man in forest stories & I remember when our 9-year-old son said some boys at recess offered to play with him if 'he hugged & kissed a girl.'

He replied, "No, that's inappropriate," & told us he didn't mind not being able to play with those boys after all. Later his teacher shared she was happy he stood up to peer pressure.

Y'all—it's never too early to teach boys about consent & boundaries. Have the convo. Then again. And again. Boys will be the boys we teach them to be.

petealexharris,
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@wagesj45 @QasimRashid
Let me help you understand what you're missing, friend.

You are taking this personally, when it's about what people other than you have experienced. The set of men they are talking about either includes you (in which case you have no valid complaint) or does not (in which case you also have no valid complaint).

You can say the ever-vacuous and useless "not all men", or you can just not do that. It contributes nothing.

petealexharris,
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@wagesj45

Pure empty sophistry.

This situation, the one we're talking about now, is women are saying they don't feel safe in the presence of men they don't trust.

You can acknowledge that or ignore it, but what you can't do is credibly argue against it.

There is literally no reason for a woman to prioritise the feelings of random internet strangers nobody asked over her own actual physical safety.

Wen, to UKpolitics
@Wen@mastodon.scot avatar

It’s time to end the UK’s divisions: Labour is for everyone

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/may/04/its-time-to-end-the-uks-divisions-labour-is-for-everyone

Right on Keir. Your primary thoughts seem to be ending divisions by centralising power in Westminster and denying process and control to the other three countries in this ‘so precious Union’ - one that is long past its use by date.

You don't care about or even care to represent Scottish interests - what is nonsense really about?

petealexharris,
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@Wen As always the authoritarians call for unity but not solidarity.

simon_brooke, to random
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"this is why any government in Holyrood is destined not to deliver. It can't, because London created a system that was bound to fail as a way of securing continuous control whilst ensuring that blame would be directed inward in Scotland itself, as might well happen now" -- @RichardJMurphy

https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2024/04/26/scotlands-political-problem/

petealexharris,
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@simon_brooke @iaruffell @RichardJMurphy

Dissolution after independence would be an ideal outcome of course. Once you are an independent state, you definitely don't want any political parties named after the country. Fucked vibes at that point.

fkamiah17, to UKpolitics
@fkamiah17@toot.wales avatar

From the people who couldn't build a high-speed train to Birmingham after 10 years 🙄

petealexharris,
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@fkamiah17 Unbelievably irresponsible and ghoulish to talk of smashing missiles into a civilian population, but then it's the Mail.

They're probably just still salty about how the battle of Stalingrad went.

Adam_Cadmon1, to random
@Adam_Cadmon1@mastodon.online avatar

Someone else pointed it out but ya'll...it's not normal for cops to slam people to the ground and put knees on necks in the course of making a routine arrest.

Please pay attention. They are brutal by choice, not necessity. But also, notice who they brutalize and who they respect. Smh.

petealexharris,
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@Adam_Cadmon1 @Joe_Hill

Even if I was unpolitical to an unbelievable extent, and thought these student protests were silly or naive, I don't think there's anything that would radicalise me quite like knowing the cops brought in to suppress the protest were looking at my kid's face through a gun sight.

anaribeiro, to uk
@anaribeiro@toad.social avatar

Brexiteers destroyed Britain’s future, says former Bank of England governor - The Independent https://apple.news/Ar71p875HSBGLcSxpnEMyTA

petealexharris,
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@Wen @MadeyeTheCarnaptious @anaribeiro
Also sometimes the call is coming from inside the house.

TheConversationUS, to USpolitics
@TheConversationUS@newsie.social avatar

Is being ‘woke’ a badge of honor?

Historically, the word was used as a warning to be aware of racial injustices.

https://theconversation.com/back-in-the-day-being-woke-meant-being-smart-215635
@blackmastodon

petealexharris,
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@TheConversationUS @blackmastodon

Being anti-woke does still seem to mean the opposite of being smart, from the available evidence.

petealexharris, to random
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One gratifying thing about the AI hype wave is watching "consulting" companies desperately trying to find real companies that make or do real stuff to give them money to "explain" the opportunities of AI and get them "AI ready".

And binning their emails as spam, which feeds the main known-successful machine learning algorithm: Bayesian spam email detection.

LOL and indeed LMAO.

petealexharris, to random
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It's an election year in the US and maybe the UK, and a strain of H5N1 flu has jumped from birds to mammals (cattle).

Now is a good time to be insufferable about the importance of wearing a mask to protect others, and getting the flu vaccine as soon as it is available.

Wen, to UKpolitics
@Wen@mastodon.scot avatar

Meanwhile in Little England..

More defiance of the ‘will of the people’. The judges will be the next lot up against the wall, followed by anyone who does not meet their exacting purity (in deed, thought and form) standards.

As well as being stupid, they can't count. But maybe ‘unthinking intentions of a minority of the people' would not look as good? How long before the Daily Heil takes up the cry?

Photo: front page of the Daily Mail, ‘Hurrah for the Blackshirts’ headline

petealexharris,
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@Wen
When the Daily Express talks about the will of the people, it's important to remember which people they mean.

Not the electorate, for sure, who never voted for the Rwanda scheme. It wasn't in the manifesto at the last general election, which was two Prime Minsters ago

thomasfuchs, to random
@thomasfuchs@hachyderm.io avatar

Computers as tools for humans are so useful exactly because they can’t think and do tedious work like calculations or information storage and retrieval for humans in a deterministic way.

It took like nearly 90 years of digital computers to make them powerful enough to run a wasteful algorithm that pretends to think (but doesn’t) and to deliver bullshit non-deterministic results while using absurd amounts of computational and environmental resources.

petealexharris,
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@agbuckley @rbclark @beans_please @thomasfuchs

Yep, if you have significant boilerplate code, you already lost at software engineering.

The goal when you see boilerplate is to design how to get rid of it, not automate it so junior programmers can keep pumping more of it into your codebase without thinking. Nobody grows in the craft that way.

trochee, (edited ) to random
@trochee@dair-community.social avatar

Sometimes it's really great working with a team of linguists.

Today I transcribed the chorus of Sweet Child O'Mine into IPA for some of them

oʊʔoʊʔoʊ:swiːtʃɑjldəvmɑ̃j̃ĩj̃ɑ̃j̃n

and they ARGUED WITH ME ABOUT THE GLOTTAL STOPS

and then one of them went and reported back on exactly which "oh oh oh" s had glottal stops and which ones didn't.

With timestamps.

Stay nerdy, my friends.

petealexharris,
@petealexharris@mastodon.scot avatar

@trochee
The nasalised vowels at the end of the line really make me hear it.

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