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Because, sadly, no one has yet stepped up, it seems it falls to me *AHEM* SOMETHING ABOUT SOME SALMON AND TOAST/ SOMETHING ABOUT A CROCKETY BLOAT/ SOMETHING ABOUT A DRUNK ON THE DOCK/ HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME TURN ON YOUR CAPS LOCK [more inside]
posted by provoliminal at 2:10 AM - 0 comments

Human History Gets a Rewrite (SLAtlantic) William Deresiewicz reviews the forthcoming The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity , by David Graeber and David Wengrow. [more inside]
posted by clark at 10:07 PM - 7 comments

The Two Envelope Problem - a Mystifying Probability Paradox (YouTube, 28m23s) presents and analyzes a paradox that the kind of person who likes to argue about the Monty Hall Problem (previously) will probably enjoy.
posted by flabdablet at 9:52 PM - 7 comments

Alec Baldwin fired a prop gun while filming a scene in New Mexico on Thursday, causing the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounding director Joel Souza. An on-set tragedy ends in the death of the DP and and an injured director. Too soon to place blame, but in the face of IATSE labor issues and intense focus on dangerous work conditions, is it time to reconsider real guns on movie sets. Sincere condolences to all . . .
posted by pt68 at 9:36 PM - 26 comments

Kindness, Acts of
posted by storybored at 5:39 PM - 3 comments

The animals that may exist in a million years, imagined by biologists.
posted by Lyme Drop at 4:55 PM - 12 comments

In the depths of Pornhub, buried beneath a mountain of hardcore erotica, a 34-year-old Taiwanese man named Changhsu (張旭) taps away at a green chalkboard while speaking a steady stream of Mandarin. In nearly all of his 226 videos, he wears a gray hoodie and black-rimmed glasses, and he never once does anything even remotely pornographic — no blow jobs, no 69s, no anal. He’s on Pornhub for a different reason: To teach calculus. From The Determined Math Tutor Teaching Calculus on Pornhub [Mel Magazine] [CW: calculus]
posted by chavenet at 3:09 PM - 37 comments

In the midst of the pandemic Sam Sutherland is back and exploring online subcultures and communities. The second five episode season just finished with Angry Queer Gloom Cult: How Queer Metal Bands Built Their Own Scene [YT ~15min]. [more inside]
posted by forbiddencabinet at 3:01 PM - 3 comments

Two short, triumphant fantasy stories about well-worn prophecies and magical customs that take a left turn. "Another End of the Empire" by Tim Pratt (audio version): "The probability witches hit an impasse." A short story by Dyce (a.k.a. Sarah Blackwell): "No, I was resigned to death. I was only angry that my death would be so meaningless."
posted by brainwane at 9:53 AM - 4 comments

While just published evidence based on the rings of trees felled by Norse people in Canada has largely confirmed what we already know about medieval sailing in the North Atlantic, two recent finds have changed what we thought we knew. A recently published paper by medievalist Paulo Chiesa shows that knowledge of Labrador had reached as far south as Genoa and Milan in the 14th Century. And in a recent paper by ecologist Pedro Raposeira, evidence has been found of human habitation in the Azores before the archipelago’s discovery by the Portuguese in 1427, backing up findings from 2015 of Norse visitations of the Azores and Madeira from an unlikely source, mouse DNA. Biologist Jeremy Searle talked about the biological evidence with archaeologist Cat Jarman on the Gone Medieval podcast.
posted by Kattullus at 5:32 AM - 42 comments

Realists of a larger reality wanted: Ursula K Le Guin prize for fiction to launch in 2022
posted by domdib at 12:25 AM - 12 comments

"We feel as if we've succeeded in poisoning ourselves, and the word is that we have. The word "toxic" hides in the midddle of intoxication, like a rat in a gift box." Mark Edmundson, English Professor at the University of Virginia, goes beyond just the gruesome hangovers from drinking, and considers hangovers of all sorts, the downsides of intoxications of all sorts. re The Hedgehog Review
posted by dancestoblue at 7:39 PM - 45 comments

Merlin Tuttle studies bats! You can read about his conservation efforts, or just browse his 2000+ image photo collection which encompasses 19 families, 125 genera, and 298 species from 38 countries. You can also listen to a two-part interview with him with Alie Ward on Ologies (or just read transcripts).
posted by curious nu at 7:20 PM - 10 comments

r/VintageObscura is a subreddit for crate diggers. Since Halloween 2014, u/kaptain_carbon has celebrated shocktober by compiling spooky obscurities and campy exotica submitted by fellow redditors into virtual HellPs, most of which are handily located in this youtube playlist. (Most recent reddit FPP). Consider putting one on before your next screaming of a Vincent Price film!
2014 ᄽὁȍ ̪ őὀᄿ 2015 (ᅇ) 2016 Side A, Side B (˼●̙̂ ̟ ̟̎ ̟ ̘●̂˻) 2017 (((༼•̫͡•༽))) 2018 ヘ(◕。◕ヘ) 2019 Side C ↜(͛ ꒪͒৫͏̈́꒪͒)͛⌰ 2020 Side A, Side B, Side C, Side D /╲/\ºo;88;oº/\╱\ 2021 Side A, Side B, Side C, Side D
posted by Going To Maine at 6:03 PM - 3 comments

The Ideological Battlefield of the "Mamasphere." Anne Helen Petersen interviews Kathryn Jezer-Morton - currently writing her PhD dissertation on the topic - about "momfluencers" and the rise, growth, and transmogrification of mommy-blogging. "I’m not a mom but I like to know what the moms are up to. You should too, regardless of your identity, because “the moms” — meaning, the moms embodying and directing ideals of femininity and domesticity and parenting — have a lot of power, and power demands attention." [more inside]
posted by soundguy99 at 4:34 PM - 26 comments

Meta? Horizon? Facebook Renaming Report Sparks Speculation [Bloomberg] [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 3:05 PM - 140 comments

In 2018, tech blog The Verge posted How to Build a $2000 Gaming PC. The video; rife with terminology, editing, performance, and safety errors; was heavily criticized and mocked by other Youtubers and internet commenters and then eventually removed. Three years later, the original Verge host Stefan Etienne explains what went wrong and rebuilds the original PC with tech blogger LinusTechTips.
posted by meowzilla at 12:44 PM - 34 comments

On Youtube, animator David James Armsby has been creating the Dinosauria series (preview), extraordinary, quiet films about the daily struggles and rewards of the lives of dinosaurs. (cw: violent animal combat, death)
Our Frozen Past (6:36): In a bleak winter landscape, a mother troodon must use her wits to protect her chicks from nanuqsaurs.
Old Buck (4:29): An aging bull styracosaurus must defend his position from a rival or be left for dead among the scavengers.
An earlier dinosaur film, with narration: Sharp Teeth (3:21). Predators and prey, mothers and young. [more inside]
posted by Countess Elena at 10:08 AM - 9 comments

Three short, eerie fantasy stories about water and beasts. "Hokkaido Green" by by Aidan Doyle (2010) is bittersweet fantasy about emotions, grief, and tradeoffs. "Talisman" by Tracina Jackson-Adams (2002): Horses, a family feud, dark ceremonies in the wood, high stakes and slow-burn reveals. "Riverine" by Danielle Jorgensen Murray (March 2021): the river man, his bride, permission, respect and care. [more inside]
posted by brainwane at 9:53 AM - 5 comments

According to Clayton Crockett, postsecularism indicates the breakdown of the modern divide within liberalism that assigns religion to a private sphere of belief that is separate from political-civil reason. Postsecularism attends to the ways that what we call religion exceed their modern frames and become deprivatized and politicized. In this process, spiritual-political forces are liberated from the modern framework of religion. Recent movements called New Materialism and New Animism can be seen as attempts to conceptualize this development. [more inside]
posted by No Robots at 9:42 AM - 9 comments

How the American Right Fell in Love With Hungary Some U.S. conservatives are taking a cue from Prime Minister Viktor Orbán — how to use the power of the state to win the culture wars (NYT Magazine, October 19, 2021).
posted by box at 9:32 AM - 14 comments

[Spoilers in links] Squid Game is a popular Netflix series (really popular), themed around socio-economic inequality and nostalgia, where contestants play six (adapted) childhood games for money, there being somewhat negative consequences for the losers. Like Battle Royale, classical music is often used. Some criticism has been levelled, for the acting and the subtitles. In England, councils are urging parents to stop children watching and copying it. Why Squid Game? Comparisons are drawn with Battle Royale, the Hunger Games, Kaiji: Ultimate Survivor, and erm Mario Party. Inevitably there are Halloween costumes, or play it in a cafe. [Squid Game on Fanfare]
posted by Wordshore at 9:12 AM - 70 comments

The Limits Of Dave Chappelle And Kyrie Irving’s Free-Thinking (Defector, alternate link from archive.org) [more inside]
posted by tonycpsu at 8:57 AM - 86 comments

There's something in the air, your food, your fuel, your lipstick... Most of this will not surprise many of you, but it is shocking that Colombia mandates patented corn and their agricultural institute has destroyed thousands of native seeds.
posted by kozad at 7:39 AM - 10 comments

Looking for non-Spotify/whatever other streaming service you use Halloween playlists? Let ole Jack Fear over at PopDose give you the trick AND treat of FOURTEEN downloadable mixtapes. [more inside]
posted by Kitteh at 7:11 AM - 9 comments

The website Electrek brings you news from the electric vehicle industry, but even if you aren't in the market for a new vehicle, you might just enjoy a closer look at the bizarre and at times deeply cursed world of electric vehicles available on Alibaba, including such favorites as a standing scooter with an alleged top speed of 60 MPH (100 km/h) or a racing motorcycle clearly designed by Dr. Seuss. [more inside]
posted by DoctorFedora at 3:59 AM - 30 comments

The full concert footage of Kate Bush's 1st & only tour has surfaced (SLYT)
posted by CarrotAdventure at 11:00 PM - 27 comments

Nearly 20 years after winning an Oscar and staking his claim as one of his generation’s most serious actors, Adrien Brody is finding a glorious new gear. After the Oscar, every interaction with other people was somehow different. “It was as if a storm rolled in,” he says. “Everything started blowing away—the life I knew.” Don't change, people kept telling him. Don't change. So he didn't. But then they went off and changed. They talked to him differently. Friends wanted to go into business with him. Photographers wanted to take his picture. Directors wanted him for their movies. None of it quite felt right. “It feels like it was a decade of finding out who and where I was. A lot of living and losing and winning and losing,” he says.
posted by folklore724 at 9:02 PM - 14 comments

Inque Magazine will launch next month. It will be a printed literary magazine with a limited run of 6000 copies issued once a year for 10 years. It will feature no advertising, no web-equivalent, and will not be reprinted. In addition to a wonderful list of contributors and a hell of a masthead, Jonathan Lethem will publish a 10-chapter novel in the mag, one chapter per issue for the decade. [more inside]
posted by dobbs at 7:37 PM - 42 comments

Why The Wire is the greatest TV series of the 21st Century out of The 100 greatest TV series of the 21st Century [BBC] [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 3:01 PM - 154 comments

A thread (reader, original tweets) on the Authoritarian disposition -- 33% of the population take the stance and there's little benefit to reasoning with them, "how do you manage a democracy containing them?"
posted by k3ninho at 1:17 PM - 94 comments

#striketober isn't just for the US. Half a million workers in South Korea are prepared to stage a one-day general strike. [more inside]
posted by toastyk at 12:54 PM - 4 comments

The Birdability Map is a crowdsourced map that describes in detail the accessibility features of birding locations all over the world. It is a work-in-progress, and anyone can contribute to it by submitting a Birdability Site Review. [more inside]
posted by jessamyn at 10:03 AM - 16 comments

"But no matter: you can be made perfect; you can put on the immerser and become someone else, someone pale-skinned and tall and beautiful." "Immersion" is a short science fiction story by French-Vietnamese author Aliette de Bodard that won the 2012 Nebula Award and Locus Award for Best Short Story. It never explicitly uses the word "assimilation," or "immigrant."
posted by brainwane at 9:46 AM - 5 comments

The collection of Ricky Jay, actor, sleight-of-hand master, and scholar of magic history, is going to auction. [more inside]
posted by PussKillian at 9:46 AM - 26 comments

You must construct additional antibodies.
posted by alby at 8:03 AM - 2 comments

Are you lost in the world like me? CW: Images of Suicide [more inside]
posted by y2karl at 9:22 PM - 30 comments

Just in time for the holidays, a camp horror stage musical about a guy who didn't like musicals [1h52m]. NSFW for adult words and adult humor. Find your personal apotheosis.
posted by hippybear at 8:24 PM - 18 comments

After a big race, professional athletes and amateurs often face the same challenge: how to react when the run doesn’t go according to Plan A, B or C. “I think there is a really powerful shift that we need to make between outcome goals and performance standards,” Ross said. Outcome goals are usually time or place goals. Performance goals can be much more about mentality. “When the day is not your day, we get lost and upset because we are able to recognize that the outcome goal is out of reach. That’s when falling on performance standards is so important. It’s less about the outcome. It’s how you show up.” It’s a concept that Sara Hall took to heart in the days after the Chicago Marathon. She loves being process focused, looking to little victories and identifying the next goal. “Out there, you have to do whatever you can to stay positive, and I did stay positive the whole time,” she said. “That was a win in itself. I told myself I was still in it. I focused on how good my stride felt and how grateful I was to be in the race.”
posted by folklore724 at 8:09 PM - 4 comments

You do know what's been missing in your life, right? Yep, that's right. A skipping-stone storage belt from Japan.
posted by slater at 6:35 PM - 19 comments

Dr. Sarah Taber explains why gun-toting military robot dogs will be disabled by water balloons full of pickle juice.
posted by meowzilla at 1:53 PM - 137 comments

Harriet Parry Flowers recreates artwork and photographs using flowers. [more inside]
posted by carolr at 1:19 PM - 10 comments

“Speak of the devil and he appears” and parallel idioms in Chinese and English.
Things Confucius Never Said. "When you are about to make a major decision, your family or friends may cite Confucius and advise you to act prudently and 'think three times before acting.'" In fact, Confucius said to stop waffling and that thinking twice is enough. [more inside]
posted by spamandkimchi at 12:50 PM - 25 comments

Amid mounting pressure from players and advocacy groups, Major League Baseball said on Sunday it will require teams to provide housing for minor league players starting in 2022. [more inside]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:10 AM - 24 comments

Colin L. Powell, former secretary of state and military leader, dies at 84 [Washington Post]

Mr. Powell was a path breaker serving as the country’s first African American national security adviser, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and secretary of state. [New York Times] [more inside]
posted by riruro at 6:53 AM - 149 comments

Are you daring enough to take a look at Vienna laid bare on OnlyFans? Vienna and its art institutions are among the casualties of this new wave of prudishness – with nude statues and famous artworks blacklisted under social media guidelines, and repeat offenders even finding their accounts temporarily suspended. [more inside]
posted by 15L06 at 12:58 AM - 24 comments

In this interview in Jacobin, Calvin University's historian Kristin Kobes Du Mez address the conundrum of evangelical support for Donald Trump. She points outs that much of modern liberalism (feminism, acceptance of alternatives to heterosexuality, etc.) threatens White male authority. Trump's morality (or lack thereof) can be handily overlooked given his male dominance displays and his ability stoke the fear that "they" (non-evangelicals) are out to get "us" (real Americans). In her book, Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, she connects the historical dots and shows the dark underbelly of misogyny and toxic agression has always been present.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 5:43 PM - 55 comments

Weaves of India Journey across India, as Live History India takes you to stories behind the most famous and historic textiles of India. Eg. Kanchipuram saris
posted by dhruva at 4:38 PM - 4 comments

Develop your film: with coffee, red wine, Croatian rosé, drain cleaner and acetaminophen, beetroot, ajvar (capsicum chutney), or gas station beer. [more inside]
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 3:31 PM - 20 comments

Hint: it’s not the money. [more inside]
posted by No Robots at 12:35 PM - 86 comments