I kinda just assumed all mammals have belly buttons. But then I realized, I've given many dogs many belly rubs, and I've never noticed a navel. So whats the deal with that? We're not the only one's that got em, right?

It turns out the world may not be quite so contaminated, it's just the research laboratories.

Scientists may have been unknowingly inflating microplastics pollution estimates, and the surprising source could be their own lab gloves. A University of Michigan study found that common nitrile and latex gloves release tiny particles called stearates, which closely resemble microplastics and can contaminate samples during testing. In some cases, this led to wildly exaggerated results, forcing researchers to track down the unexpected culprit.

I love science. I don't mean that disingenuously . I do kinda love that years of research on this topic asking the big important questions, and it all gets tripped up by someone eventually asking the small, easily forgettable, procedural question.

link to thread

maaaaybe these unnamed instances are using this to root out reactionary content? (still silly, AI gives you yes or no answers basically on an overcomplicated coinflip and spits out text to justify that initial answer) But c'mon. Freaking out about "people we strongly disagree with" using a sketchy moderation tool on "their instances"?

A specter is haunting the fediverse, and that spectre is . Well really its mostly lemmy.ml but sometimes they remember we exist too.

It sounds like they're using this to find "tankie" users and they're scared that the "tankie" instances will use this (stupid, counterproductive) moderation style on them (lol). Admittedly conjecture on my part.

~~western civilization~~ - meaningless nonsense you can project anything onto (especially reactionary shit)

~~North Atlantic countries~~ - what about Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and sometimes South Africa?

~~NATO~~ - ditto

english speaking world

simple, if slightly reductive. Adequately describes most geopolitical actors in the bunch, pisses off europeans that see themselves as distinct from the United States despite being joined at the hip (and the french won't even speak french to anyone anyway)

taking the Echopraxia approach: is it a vampire? no. Does vampire get the gist across well enough that you neatly skip over expending energy delving into the minutia? yes

“The term ‘indentured servant’ is more accurate,’ but yes, Mr. Bowser does technically work for Nintendo against his will,” the spokesperson said.

"[...] but with that said, we have no intention of freeing Mr. Bowser."

I apologize for the flashy, rage-bate title of this post. Here is the point I actually want to make:

Christian Millenarianism is severely understated in the analysis of US foreign policy.

Over the last few years, I've seen a lot of talk and articles about the role of Zionism in US policy, in how we analyze it, and what framework gives us the best explanatory capacity. And it absolutely does have a real and dangerous role in US politics and policy.

But I have seen virtually nothing on the role of fundamentalist, evangelical Christians and their project to use the US state to manufacture biblical prophesy from the book of Revelation. In so far as I have seen it talked about, it's always as an aside and shunted under the Zionist label.

That seems... mistaken? It's its own project, albeit in ally-ship with the Zionist movement.

stolen from https://boppeepudding.tumblr.com/post/804941018362445824

A quick reverse search suggests that this was initially made with HL3 news in mind. I found (a lot) of very recent reposts of it.

I don't have much more to say, other than to express mild cynicism that the same joke used in waiting for a computer game gets reused for very serious historical events.