~metafilter | Bookmarks (940)

The problem is that, for a book that's supposed to be about wrestling with God, Peterson doesn't actually want to fight that hard. It turns out that, upon reflection, the Almighty's views are pretty straightforwardly those of the average North American conservative. God doesn't much like "Marxists," trans people, environmentalists, atheists, materialists, ChatGPT wokeness, or "Tinker Bell, the porn fairy." from Jordan Peterson's Take...

Formerly known as "Queen of Shitty Robots," YouTube's plucky "Inventor and breaker of things" Simone Giertz has been featured a lot on the blue, and deservedly so. Recently Simone invited YouTube channel Never Too Small to tour her exceedingly charming and efficiently laid out 630 square foot (58 square meter) house. Expect to observe loads of DIY, and delightful use of space.

Because better things aren't possible, an enlightened centrist at The Atlantic tries to move liberals more to the right on the topic of RFK Jr, mask mandates, medication, MMR vaccines, flu vaccines, birth control, IUDs, vaccination incentives, "vaccine hesitancy is not the same thing as anti-vax", fluoride, and the FDA. (Side note: Here's how to cancel your Atlantic subscription.)The Behind the Bastards podcast has...

LinkMe, 2025 Edition: Come across an interesting link recently that you'd like to share, but don't want to work it up into a full post? Share it here for our perusal, nbd. And if you'd like to post something but need some inspiration, check out the links here to see what other members have found interesting and would like to read more about! Just...

Seedlings of an Animalic Imagination. In recent years, some cinema has taken a bold turn away from anthropomorphism in its depiction of nonhuman animals, refusing to "make tame." (Olivia Popp, MUBI Notebook)

[tw celebrity deaths] The annual Death List has been posted for 2025. What famous people will probably drop in the coming year? Only 6 of the predicted 50 died in 2024 (the worst prediction in 30 years); the record was 2020, when 20 died. (Previously from 2010)

Digital Threat Report: Telegram's Toxic Recommendations (SPLC, BBC)"Telegram users are regularly suggested extremist channels, even when browsing channels that are ostensibly about nonpolitical subjects such as celebrities or technology. Even users who elect to consume extremist content from one ideology or belief system, such as antigovernment conspiracies or election disinformation, can find themselves being "suggested" channels from other extremist ideologies such as antisemitism or...

"If you go woke, famously you always go broke. That's why the woke miniatures of Trench Crusade smashed their Kickstarter fundraising target just hours after launching. At the time of writing, the Kickstarter has reached 12x its initial goal, with well over half a million pounds raised to bring these miniatures to life. So is this game woke? Because it's definitely not broke. Maybe...

You could think of a mind as having a dial that is usually turned way down, except on those occasions when we need to solve a specific problem, but even then, we only turn it up a little. What would happen if you set it to maximum, all the time? from The torture of an unphilosophical life by Agnes Callard in Unherd.

Caltrops: 33 minute video exploring the weapon from Ancient Rome to modern Ukraine.Javelin and warbow experts teach each other how to use their weapons (34m). How would a katana master fight with a longsword (7m)? Was the seax even Saxon (8m)? Did Normans wear chainmail onesies (20m)? Were knights muscle-bound or skinny (11m)? Should you defend your tower with a crossbow or longbow (11m)?...

The Carol Reed series (Facebook), the annually-released Swedish indie point-and-click adventure game series (similar to the formerly annual but still going Nancy Drew game series), has just released its TWENTIETH installment, Murder Malady. If you don't want to buy/play any of them, YouTuber Arglefumph has done Let's Plays of the first eighteen (Ctrl+F 'Carol' in the playlists), and here's someone else's commentary-free playthrough of...

Sea sponges under WA tourist attraction could hold cancer-fighting compounds. Scientists from the University of Western Australia are investigating the anti-cancer properties of sea sponges found under Busselton Jetty in Western Australia.

Against Access, an essay by DeafBlind author John Lee Clark about the Protactile movement and the pitfalls of focusing on accessibility: "Companies, schools, nonprofits, and state and federal agencies approach me and other DeafBlind people all the time, demanding, "How do we make it more accessible?" Such a frenzy around access is suffocating. I want to tell them, Listen, I don't care about your...

With Bible sales up 22% over last year, let's revisit The New Yorker's 2006 article "The Good Book Business". (Wayback Machine link)Bible publishing in the twenty-first century involves an intersection of faith and consumerism that is typical of contemporary American evangelicalism. Peter Thuesen, a religious historian and the author of In Discordance with the Scriptures, a history of Bible translation controversies in America, sees...

Browser extension Honey promises to find you the best coupon deals for various goods and services online. But does it really? (Spoiler alert: no.) Apparently they've been doing two things surreptitiously: a) substituting affiliate links with their own, so that they get credit for the sale, and b) making sure that the "best" coupon deal for any given product isn't necessarily the actual best...

A new website, GovernorParson.com, purports to publish a goodbye message from Governor Mike Parson, whose term ends next month. This is just one of the satirical websites that former South Park and MADtv writer Toby Morton (wordclown on instagram) has set up and then emailed to Republican supporters.Other projects include: Chaya Raichik/Libs of TikTok Moms for Liberties (and Daily Beast article about the site)...

One executive in the entertainment industry said younger people were less inclined to go out raving until 6am as they are more health conscious and less frivolous with money than previous generations. from Who killed the rave? Late-night dancing falls into global decline [Financial Times; ungated]

On this day over a dozen years ago, we talked about filmmaker Sam Klemke's decades-long record of year-end reviews, a series of "annual personal status updates" reflecting on the past and hoping for the future that eventually became a poignant documentary film. It's just one example of the surprising emotional power of the "time passing" montage, an under-discussed narrative art that has often been...

Torricelli's trumpet is not counterintuitive – There is nothing counterintuitive about an infinite shape with finite volume, contrary to the common propaganda version of the calculus trope known as Torricelli's trumpet. Nor was this result seen as counterintuitive at the time of its discovery in the 17th century, contrary to many commonplace historical narratives...

Martina makes things. A custom binding for The Lord of the Rings. A suit of armor for her dog. A replacement for her missing finger