@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com
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gwcoffey

@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com

I contain singletudes.

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RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Writing Prompt:

Write the saddest sentence you can think of.

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@RickiTarr In the words of John Prine: "We lost Davey in the Korean War, I still don't know what for, don't matter anymore."

gwcoffey, to random
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My wife sends me these dinosaur comics sometimes to remind me how lucky I am to have her.

gwcoffey, to random
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

I need a neuroscientist to tell me what is going on in the brain when we use the wrong word.

I just called my glasses "my headlights". Sometimes I accidentally call a pillow case a "cookie sheet".

I just feel like something interesting is going on in there to make funny misattributions like this.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Y'all, did you know there's a sex move with genitals in mouth?!

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@RickiTarr I'm blown away by this.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Why do you think so many people are obsessed with murder?

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@RickiTarr @notroot @Jennifer You might like the book “The Anatomy of Violence” by Adrain Raine. It goes deep into this very question and is fascinating, eye-opening, sad, and empathy-inducing.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Something I've noticed a lot lately, is that especially Boomer women, but honestly, women in general, don't seem to ask for what they want or need in a direct way. I notice this a lot with my Mom and her friends. Instead of just asking for what they need directly they tell a story, to ask in a roundabout way. For instance, my Mom needed help this morning, and Instead of just saying, "Hey, I dropped my remote, can you pick it up for me?" She tells a one minute story about what happened, no ask, and eventually I get the point, and then suggest that I come pick it up. Or if one of her friends wants to do something like have a birthday party for a friend, they don't say "We should have a party!" They say, It's Sarah's Birthday coming up, you know she likes surprises, what does everyone think we should do?"

I often wonder if this is why older people think younger women are rude and demanding, because younger people often just ask for what they want and need in a more direct way. But also it's probably just straight up sexism, because men are supposed to make decisions, and women are supposed to make suggestions.

What do you all think? Is this just me? Have you experienced something similar?

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@RickiTarr Is this in any way related to how my wife will, like, buy the plane ticket for herself that is $12 cheaper even though it's a TERRIBLE flight, but then an hour later gladly pay the full price of her dad's ticket to the funeral and make sure he has a good flight?

I have to push so hard to get her to take her own comfort and needs seriously.

JamesGleick, to random
@JamesGleick@zirk.us avatar

Mitch McConnell did so much to destroy our democracy that it’s hard to pick just one thing. But Josh Marshall says this is the worst:

"These days you often hear reporters and commentators saying matter of factly that legislation requires 60 votes in the Senate. This is truly McConnell’s greatest accomplishment. People say this like it’s in the Constitution, like the two-thirds requirement for conviction at impeachment or to approve a treaty. (1/2)

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@JamesGleick Couldn't agree more. The filibuster was a mistake. The rule changes that made the filibuster infinitely abusable was a mistake. But the active abuse of the filibuster was McConnell's intentional baby.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Alright Ya'll I have a strong appreciation for The Grateful Dead, but imagine going to a concert for the first time, and then imagine Track 15 just happening for nearly 30 MINUTES. I'm listening to it high as hell right now, and I'm like WHAT?!

https://archive.org/details/gd74-09-11.sbd.powell.12183.sbeok.shnf/gd74-09-11d3t01.shn

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@RickiTarr Haha my dad's huge deadhead and he dragged some friends to a concert once. They said it was "pretty good" but they didn't understand why they had to "tune their instruments for half an hour in the middle."

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

Okay, you can choose a real person you'd love to see a movie made about, who is the person, and who would you cast in the starring role?

I'm picking Tiny Tim, played by Finn Wolfhard.

A black and white photo of Finn Wolfhard

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@RickiTarr I’m gonna go with Ada Lovelace played by Bella Ramsey. Mostly because I’d love to see an Ada Lovelace biopic.

image/jpeg

EeveeEuphoria, to random
@EeveeEuphoria@translunar.academy avatar

google has unleashed ungodly AI nightmares beyond my comprehension

so awhile ago, i've set up screen call on my android phone, because it's pretty useful for stopping robocalls from annoying me, since usually they just hang up, or google knows it is just a scam call.

well. i got another call in, but it couldn't get the transcript. so, i played the audio back.

to my fucking horror, GOOGLE IS USING MY OWN VOICE TO ANNOUNCE IT'S PRESENCE AS THE VIRTUAL ASSISTANT.

nowhere, i mean fucking NOWHERE did they ever tell me this was a thing they'd do. in fact, i'm not able to find a single fucking thing about this online!

i don't even have the fucking option set for them to preserve my voice history, the fact they have audio recordings of my voice, and enough of them to make a fucking AI-generated version of my voice, without my god damn consent, is... i don't even know how to put it.

google, i sincerely hope someone burns down all your data centers

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@EeveeEuphoria Sometimes legislators overthink regulations but I gotta say a simple law that says:

A machine must alway identify itself as a machine and can never pretend to be a person.

Is something we desperately need.

mshelton, to random
@mshelton@mastodon.social avatar

A fun news story going around: HP's CEO says using third-party ink cartridges brick your HP printer because of the risk of malicious cartridges. So they are gouging you for printer ink that costs more than human blood AND their CEO is saying their printers don't mitigate the most basic security risks.

So just get a Brother laser printer. End this once and for all. Reenact the Office Space printer scene with your HP. Settle your spiritual well-being. Brother laser printer https://www.theverge.com/23642073/best-printer-2023-brother-laser-wi-fi-its-fine

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@mshelton The HP logic is so ridiculous you almost have to laugh.

  1. We put chips in our cartridges to ensure they're "authentic".
  2. We require "authentic" cartridges because inauthentic ones might use the chip we put in there to do bad things.

Folks I'm not a print cartridge engineer but I think I have come up with a solution… … …

ryanpendell, to books

@bookstodon "In a way, both sides of the debate were directly and indirectly responding to World War II. The absurdity of wartime led many to the view that all this talk of principles, ideals, and values was bullshit. At the same time, the horrors of Nazism stirred many toward an even stronger moral sense. Evil was real. And any attempt to turn it into mere personal preference couldn’t last a minute outside the walls of academia."
https://www.letustalkbooks.com/p/where-our-values-come-from

gwcoffey,
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@ryanpendell @bookstodon This was great. Thanks for sharing. Have you ever read Ernest Becker’s Denial of Death?

gwcoffey,
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@ryanpendell @Stone1glo @bookstodon I read it a looong time ago but as I recall it touches on some of the things you wrote about but from the very different perspective of psychology. As a psychology book it is very dated but it is also super fascinating and really influenced my own thinking.

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@ryanpendell @Stone1glo @bookstodon (Oh sorry I replied to the wrong post… but this looks great too!)

cabel, to random
@cabel@panic.com avatar

@gn what have you done to our slack

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@cabel @gn Apple ][?

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

Do you know your spouse/SO's cell phone number (without looking it up)?

#poll

Please boost for a wider demographic 😉

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@dancinyogi Girl I remember the phone number my wife’s family had when she was 15 and told it to me as she hopped in her mom’s car.

She said “do you want me to write that down” and I said “I’ll remember it” and I still do 33 years later.

JamesGleick, (edited ) to random
@JamesGleick@zirk.us avatar

“The sight of Elon Musk charging towards Wikipedia with his trademark guile and delicacy was so predictable that it was almost relaxing. He saw a collective resource that people prized and he wanted to hurt it.”

Zoe Williams in the Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/23/why-is-elon-musk-attacking-wikipedia-because-its-very-existence-offends-him

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@JamesGleick Total aside, but 15 years ago some friends and I dreamed up an idea for a site called "Dickipedia" that was just a compendium of assholes with citations. If that existed today, Musk would be on page 1.

TarkabarkaHolgy, to random Hungarian
@TarkabarkaHolgy@ohai.social avatar

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@TarkabarkaHolgy My nibbling at Golden Gate Park!

SmudgeTheInsultCat, to random
@SmudgeTheInsultCat@mas.to avatar

Okay…

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@SmudgeTheInsultCat But… I thought god is everywhere? Probably the education speaking but I don’t think you can move away from something that is everywhere.

shanselman, to random
@shanselman@hachyderm.io avatar

FYI to the couple I overheard arguing about this at the grocery - Brown eggs and white eggs are the same. Brown eggs aren’t better for you AND they aren’t whole wheat eggs. 🤦🏻‍♂️

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@shanselman I can never pass up a chance to link to an EB White essay. https://www.nytimes.com/1971/12/31/archives/farmer-whites-brown-eggs-cont.html

ianRobinson, to Astronomy
@ianRobinson@mastodon.social avatar

Wow!

James Webb telescope makes 'JuMBO' discovery of planet-like objects in Orion

Jupiter-sized "planets" free-floating in space, unconnected to any star, have been spotted by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).
What's intriguing about the discovery is that these objects appear to be moving in pairs. Astronomers are currently struggling to explain them.
The telescope observed about 40 pairs in a fabulously detailed new survey of the famous Orion Nebula.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66974738

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@ianRobinson I haven’t been keeping up on JWST news so this picture was staggering to me. Unreal that those are planet sized objects outside the solar system. 😍

JamesGleick, to random
@JamesGleick@zirk.us avatar

Regulating AI is a complex problem. But let’s start with this: Counterfeiting humans should be illegal. https://flipboard.social/@CultureDesk/111166916789025736

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@JamesGleick I would go further. Pretending to be human should be illegal. Any AI agent I encounter during an interaction with a business or app should be required to identify itself as such at the moment of contact.

DocCarms, (edited ) to books
@DocCarms@mstdn.social avatar

There was a poll that stated—Rowling’s opening line in the HP series is one of best in the world. Someone posted about how there are a bunch of other opening statements that are better.

Here’s one of my personal favorites, from Gabriel Garcia Marquez (in English):
“It is inevitable — the scent of bitter almonds always reminded him of the fate of unrequited love.”

What are some of your favorite opening lines in literature? 😊
@bookstodon

gwcoffey,
@gwcoffey@bookstodon.com avatar

@DocCarms @bookstodon I will always believe the best opening line is Charlotte’s Web: “Where’s papa going with that axe?”

But I have so many favorites. How about one from a short story:

“I looked up from my book this afternoon and thought, ‘Wow, the light is beautiful.’” – from Thanksgiving by @matociquala

gwcoffey,
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@keira_reckons @DocCarms @bookstodon On so many lists because it deserves to be! Iconic.

gwcoffey,
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@negative12dollarbill @DocCarms @bookstodon This is so great. Thanks for the link!

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