@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk
@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

duckwhistle

@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk

Returning Mastodon dabbler.
Interested in: UK politics. Constitutional and Electoral reform. Green energy. Technology being used to improve quality of life, rather than profitability of companies. Psychology of depression and motivation.
Fantasy, sci-fi, horror.
mmorpgs.

https://change.libdems.org.uk/protect-our-rights?recruiter_id=855700

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

sidereal, to random
@sidereal@kolektiva.social avatar

It is impossible for me to get excited about voting when 90% of these people fucking suck and over half of the "super important local elections" are unopposed anyway.

In school I was told the Soviet Union was bad because people ran in elections unopposed but yet here we fucking are. And without even any giant grey apartment blocks.

But I voted, I met you liberals halfway even though it feels like more of a waste of time every year. Will you now please meet me halfway and revolt?

duckwhistle,
@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

@sidereal in the UK write in ballots are not a thing. if someone is standing unopposed by the cut off date, they just get the seat and the vote is cancelled.
I heard a story about an independent who ran unopposed for so long than when he died during an election the council didn't realise and declared him the winner.
They only found out he was dead when they called his wife to find out why they'd not been able to reach him!

CloudyMrs, to Scotland
@CloudyMrs@mastodon.scot avatar

Gove is behind this increasingly restrictive and undoubtedly batshit push for legislation against anti British sentiment. You'd have to be daft to think he doesn't have an eye on Scotland as he drafts it. Look out for SNP, ALBA Scottish Greens, and anyone who supports Scottish independence to be caught in the net. This is by design and won't come as a surprise to anyone who pays attention. https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/rishi-sunak-prevent-extreme-hatred-britain/

duckwhistle,
@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

@CloudyMrs
I'm pretty sure every member of a political party including the Tories are under threat from this one. Since the cabinet are making themselves sole arbitrators of what is deemed British, any political dissent can be designated as anti British.

LeftistLawyer, to climate
@LeftistLawyer@kolektiva.social avatar

This is the first thing I’ve seen from a major press outlet that even resembles a stick in the eye of conventional economic wisdom. And it is absolutely on point.

We must scream at the top of lungs, and shame any who dare, try to defend the conventional orthodox economic machine that is tearing our children’s future down around their ears. !!!

Please, I beg you, circulate this article as far and wide as you can.


https://theintercept.com/2023/10/29/william-nordhaus-climate-economics/

duckwhistle,
@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

@lienrag @LeftistLawyer
Positive feedback loops start runaway effects around +2°C.
+3°C is where entire ecosystems collapse, and human deaths from individual climate events starts being measured in the hundreds of millions.

goatsarah, to random en-gb

I have something to say to those who said to us, when we told you that cryptocurrency was a tulip mania style bubble built on bluster, bullshit and suckers, that we didn’t understand and were just bitter about missing out. It is as follows:

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA SILLY FUCKERS TOLD YOU SO.

duckwhistle,
@duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

@RogerBW @goatsarah
I keep seeing an interview of Musk promoting AI on YouTube recently, and it's left me with only one question.

Why do so many of Musk's video appearances look like mediocre deepfakes?

Terra, to random

deleted_by_author

    •
    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @Terra sounds about right. Although my 8yo can't tie shoelaces, that's mainly because she's never owned a pair of shoes that had them. I wouldn't send her out in shoes she could not do up by herself.
    Maybe others would, but if you doubt the kid is capable you can tell them to ask one of their friends to do it for them.

    pluralistic, to random
    @pluralistic@mamot.fr avatar

    2 gallons to the mile.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @cohomologyisFUN @CAWguy @pluralistic E85 all but disappeared in the UK when E10 became the standard fuel. The increased demand for ethanol lead to supply issues.

    RickiTarr, to random
    @RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

    What is your first experience with the Internet? How old were you? What did you look at?

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @RickiTarr when I was 11 my dad was given an old pc with a 28k modem, by his Bos when they upgraded their work computers. I have no idea what we did first, but I remember downloading updates for Microsofts Encarter encyclopaedia at some point.

    Chron, to news
    @Chron@newsie.social avatar

    At a Texas private school, administrators are replacing educators with AI to teach core subjects to students.

    https://www.chron.com/news/article/texas-ai-schools-18447087.php

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @Chron
    Private School. So people are literally paying fees to have their children spend all day messing around with a glorified spell checker!

    Strandjunker, to random
    @Strandjunker@mstdn.social avatar

    The fact that two former Trump attorneys have now confirmed — via guilty pleas — that Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election included criminal acts should be a much bigger story.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @Strandjunker it should be, but the media can't sensationalise a story where everybody either already knew, or doesn't care.

    davidho, to CDR
    @davidho@mastodon.world avatar

    The people who say CO₂ removal () works when we're still emitting 40 billion tonnes of CO₂ every year are selling you something, most likely CDR.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @kkarhan @davidho more accurately photosynthesis, & the best thing with reforestation would be to not farm the trees at all, but leave them alone. Old growth forests tend to be a better carbon sink, as well as creating a biome that can support a greater variety of life.
    If you want something that can be grown and harvested Kelp is the way to go. It doesn't require any fresh water or fertilizer and grows much faster than trees.

    RickiTarr, to random
    @RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

    If one of your pets started talking in a language you could understand, what is the first question you would ask them?

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @RickiTarr how?

    LauraKT, to random
    @LauraKT@mas.to avatar

    This was the most convincing piece of acting I've ever seen in my life. Hugely impressive 👇
    https://normalislandnews.substack.com/p/sunak-and-netanyahu-pretend-to-care

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @LauraKT
    "Rest assured Sir Keir Starmer has vowed to exactly emulate Rishi’s policies but do so with a more serious expression on his face. Exciting times lie ahead x"

    Love this.

    girlonthenet, (edited ) to random
    @girlonthenet@mastodon.social avatar

    What's more satisfying...?

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @girlonthenet
    I've never even attempted to make a room full of people come. But I've made a group of people laugh, and that was quite satisfying.

    Garwboy, to random
    @Garwboy@ohai.social avatar

    "We need another mammal predator"

    "Like a wolf, or those big cats?"

    "No. Bigger, stronger, fiercer! This is the most formidable mammal predator yet!"

    "OK. And we make it look really dangerous to match?"

    "No! Cuddly as fu*k! Adorable, if anything"

    "...why?"

    "..." (belch)

    [God inventing bears]

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @Garwboy
    It's never the most dangerous looking mammals that are the most dangerous predators.
    https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(23)01169-7

    Faintdreams, to random
    @Faintdreams@dice.camp avatar

    I understand why some people auto delete older posts, I do, but it fundamentally breaks the utility of past interactions.

    It destroys discussion threads and removes access to established answers to niche/edge case questions.

    I know that the entire web is - in some sense - ephemeral but this makes it unnecessarily so.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @Faintdreams I have auto delete on, but the thresholds for not deleting are the bare minimum. It's only things that get no interaction that disappear.

    mkwadee, to science
    @mkwadee@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    Scientists find is subject to | Gravity | The Guardian

    What? Antimatter has opposite and compared to . I’ve never heard a hypothesis that it also could have negative mass.

    https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/sep/27/scientists-find-antimatter-is-subject-to-gravity

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @mkwadee @firewyre Um, proving unproven theories in particle physics is precisely what CERN is for!

    JenLucPiquant, to random

    David McCallum, star of 'The Man From U.N.C.L.E.' and 'NCIS,' dies at 90 https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/tv/story/2023-09-25/david-mccallum-death-ncis-man-from-uncle

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @JenLucPiquant
    My favourite in joke, is the scene from NCIS when Abby asks Gibbs what Ducky was like when he was younger, and Gibbs says "A lot like Illya Kuryakin".

    futurebird, to random
    @futurebird@sauropods.win avatar

    For me, right to to repair isn't just about ewaste, and preventing corporate gouging.

    It's about mental health. Being able to fix your gadgets is therapeutic. Empowering. Good for the soul.

    In a world full of complex technology it's easy to feel small and helpless. And maybe I'm too much of an idealist, but I think that if everyone could experience the joy of fixing or modifying a gadget now and then we'd all be a little more open minded, a little more daring. A little harder to push around.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @dx @futurebird
    Or you end up hoarding junk.

    dancinyogi, (edited ) to random
    @dancinyogi@mastodon.sdf.org avatar

    Only ONE of the four can exist in the universe:

    Please boost for a wider demographic 🙏

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @dancinyogi
    Three of these are just flavours and one is technically a drug. It's hardly a fair competition.

    signalapp, to random
    @signalapp@mastodon.world avatar

    Announcing PQXDH! The first step in post-quantum resistance for the Signal Protocol, PQXDH protects your Signal calls & chats from potential future threats of breakthroughs in quantum computing. And it's already rolling out to Signal clients everywhere.

    https://signal.org/blog/pqxdh/

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @signalapp is this technology now illegal in the UK?

    StillIRise1963, to random
    @StillIRise1963@mastodon.world avatar

    While white people seem very well versed in oppressing others, they don't seem to fucking recognize when they're being oppressed themselves. I find this FASCINATING.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @StillIRise1963
    1500 years of fudalism depended on making everyone believe getting shat on, was a price worth paying for the ability to shit on others with impunity.

    feditips, (edited ) to random
    @feditips@mstdn.social avatar

    (Fediverse survey post, asking people to click on a web link to a Mastodon post and say what their app does with it.)

    UPDATE: Aaaarrgghhhhhhh! 😱 I had a number of people asking me for clarification of the poll, so I edited option wording, but this caused it to reset the responses to zero. I am so sorry! 🥴

    The latest figures before I messed this up were this:

    About 75% of people clicking on a link to a Mastodon post saw it displayed a normal post, 25% saw it displayed in a browser window.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @feditips I chose the 1st option , but I did notice a slight pause and the words "performing lookup" appear briefly at the bottom of my screen, before it appeared in the app looking the same as a normal post.

    Jyoti, (edited ) to random
    @Jyoti@mas.to avatar

    If you're very old and British, this one's for you:

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @Jyoti that's an easy logic puzzle, my daddy eats my chips, but my chips never eat my daddy. Clearly the chips are better.

    dgar, (edited ) to random
    @dgar@aus.social avatar

    One Two Three Four!
    I declare a meme war!
    Do NOT neglect your !!

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @dgar

    llamasoft_ox, to random
    @llamasoft_ox@toot.wales avatar

    Finally, after copious amounts of bilingual swearing from the both of us, a gnarly bug has been dislodged and I finally have something approaching the seamless transition between levels that I'd hoped to have last Friday.

    People sometimes ask what is the most important skill to develop as a coder, and I'd have to put in a vote for developing a broad and robust swearing vocabulary, preferably in more than one language.

    duckwhistle,
    @duckwhistle@mastodon.org.uk avatar

    @llamasoft_ox that's just practical life advice.

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