For a little while

Adult, she/they. I'm also on YouTube as ChaosFlute.

[marithlizard]

It's been a while since I said "this person wins the internet", but today it is merited.

(via bsky)

(The classic XKCD comic)

[nitewrighter]

We're barely a week into pride and we're already getting into it huh.

[creekfiend]

How autoimmune conditions can unexpectedly drive mental illness

Antibodies mistakenly attacking the brain are linked with conditions including schizophrenia, dementia and OCD, prompting a revolution in ho

it may interest some of you to know that there is likely an autoimmune/inflammation component of many mental illnesses that we do not fully understand yet. the immune system and the nervous system are very connected both to each other and to all our other systems in ways that, again, we do not fully understand

reminder that psychology is both a very new and also a very SOFT science. if someone in psych is confidently positing that science understands the way the brain functions and malfunctions, they don't know enough to know how little they know. we do NOT understand the brain like we act like we do.

[prokopetz]

The whole "Elvis sighting" thing is hilarious because, like, the first documented career Elvis impersonators began working over twenty years before the guy even died. I wonder why a public figure who has a whole industry of people who look and sound like him would generate an unusual number of posthumous sightings? It Is A Mystery.

[stealingpotatoes]

people raised some good questions on that marrocrow post about what vader would think of two inquisitors dating so here's some potential answers <3

[oberonsson]

Dame Archer kicks McDougal’s Scots ass there in the rain at the Washington Midsummer Renaissance Faire - August 11, 2018 - Photo by Douglas Herring

[anarcho-wormism-deactivated2019]

😮

[garrettauthor]

Oh NO.

[treacleaergia]

me, a sheltered noblewoman: Pray who is that brave knight? Dame Archer:*turns around* me: gasp! *instantly in love*

[dirtyriver]

Alicia Archer

[ex-sang-uination]

my bi heart………

[ohmightysmiter]

I’VE NEVER SEEN THE ADDED PICS

[hrefnatheravenqueen]

[nyx-belial]

*dies*

[garrettauthor]

Oh shit.

[notlostonanadventure]

GAY KNIGHTS

[unicornofdarknessstuff-deactiva]

Fellas I’m real gay

[thecarrott]

@0hheytherebigbadwolf HELP!!

[0hheytherebigbadwolf]

Every June this inevitably winds up back on my dash. And I appreciate that. And I will reblog it. Every time.

[rockitcat]

Hey, it’s @archerinventive, and the Pride Knights!

[pocketss]

Ummm she's literally sensitive :/

[light-camera-bitch-smile]

[foxes-in-love]

[luulapants]

Story time:

In middle school biology, we did an experiment. We were given yams, which we would sprout in cups of water. We then had to make hypotheses about how the yams would grow, based on descriptions of yam plants in our books, and make notes of our observations as they grew.

Here’s what was supposed to happen: we were supposed to see that the actual growth of the plant did not resemble our hypotheses. We were then supposed to figure out that these were, in fact, sweet potatoes.

What actually happened was that every single student in every single class lied in their notes so that their observations perfectly matched their hypotheses. See, everyone assumed the mismatch meant they had done something wrong in the process of growing the plant or that they had misunderstood the dichotomous key or the plant identification terminology. And, thanks to the wonders of a public school education, everyone assumed the wrong results would get us a failing grade. We were trying to pass. We didn’t want to get bitched out by the teacher. Curiosity, learning, science - that had nothing to do with why we were sitting in that classroom. So we all lied.

The teacher was furious. She tried to fail every student, but the administration stepped in and told her she wasn’t allowed to because a 100% fail rate is recognized as a failure of the teacher, not the class. It wasn’t even her fault, really, though her being a notorious hard-ass didn’t help. It was a failure of the entire educational system.

So whenever I see crap like Elizabeth Holmes’s blood test scam or pharmaceutical trials which are unable to be replicated or industry-funded research that reaches wildly unscientific conclusions, I just remember those fucking sweet potatoes. I remember that curiosity dies when people are just trying to give their superiors the “right” answers, so they can get the grade, get the job, get the paycheck. It’s not about truth when it’s about paying rent. There’s no scientific integrity if you can’t control for human desperation.

[lazyscience]

This is the problem writ large in our current scientific communities, not just industry but academic - only correctness is rewarded, and this stunts us both in the types of questions we ask and in what we’re willing to do to answer them. The guardrails of science work when you are free to disprove your hypothesis, to find out “oh. that did NOT, in fact, work.” That is not a failure! That is still information about what you were trying to learn about! however, nobody wants to publish that. nobody wants to make stuff from that. So if you conduct your study accurately with an ambitious premise but fail? Welp. No more money for you, then.

So people ask questions in ways they know they can get right. And especially if the data is CLOSE, but not quite over the line of significance? Well. That could have been circumstance or error too, couldn’t it? Couldn’t we tweak it JUST a little, because I know in my heart what’s really happening, and keeping my lab open and my techs and students paid, my mortgage and student loans up to date…oh, we set these things in front of people and then expect them to be moral when all our current metrics are poised to punish them for it, and then we blame people for falsifying data. And that before taking into account the grifters who think they’re owed personal fame and glory and have NO compunctions about lying as long as they think they can get away with it.

Don’t get me wrong. I think falsifying data is bad and we pay for it in coin up to and including peoples’ lives, and a lot of people who do it are not poor little meow meows but privileged and powerful people who feel entitled to whatever they want, including success. But i also think when this is the system they operate in, it’s going to keep selecting for liars rather than keeping the honest people, not because they’re bad scientists but because they weren’t profitable for their company or their university.

[draconym]

i would rather see the information for an event handwritten in sharpie on a paper towel than see another AI generated flyer

[aj-living-life]

Saving this post to show my boss who I told the AI flier makes us look lazy and ignorant, and offered to hand draw one. She still printed tons of ai fliers and I'm tempted to make a better one just because it annoys me so much.

[aj-living-life]

Fun update: event was canceled because literally nobody rsvp'd to the AI flier.

[monsterblogging]

You've heard of "nice is different than good," now get ready for "love is different than good."

[bumblebeebats]

Why is it that every time I google something like "Are olives poisonous to cats" the top results are always like "Fun fact: Cats are carnivores! This means that they eat meat. There is no reason to include olives in a cat's diet. You should feed your cat cat food, which is dry or wet food especially designed for cats. You can purchase this at a store." like is there a single person alive on the planet who's googled "Are blueberry muffins safe for cats" because they're planning on switching their cat to a muffin-only diet??? No, I'm asking because the little bastard somehow popped open the packet while I was putting away the groceries and dragged one under the couch before I could react and now I need to know if I should call the after-hours vet. "Cats should not eat spaghetti." NO SHIT, SHERLOCK!!!! "Try to keep human food away from cats." i live in a studio apartment with a completely silent and permanently hungry apex predator who has the intelligence of a toddler and the desperate Machiavellian cunning of a creature who spent his formative months on the streets. He can already open doors and he is this 👌 close to learning how to open the microwave. He is stronger than me and covered in knives. So im gonna do my best but for the moment i just need you to tell me whether this yoghurt is going to kill my son y/n

[spectralhauntings]

I've been using the pet poison hotline's poison list cause it has a search function. It also tells you whether something is mildly, moderately, or severely toxic which can be very handy! It doesn't contain like everything but it might be a good place to start, it also includes plants for fellow houseplant lovers <3

Explore Pet Poison Helpline®s vast knowledge on poisons by reviewing our pet poison list. Explore our top 10 poison and holiday poison lists

[littlemousling]

For plants specifically, there’s also a wildly detailed set of posts and listings about toxicity on the old, wonderful, Plants Are the Strangest People blog

[o-fortunate-adulescens-deactiva]

sometimes, people don’t understand that we are hated for being autistic. “But I don’t hate autistic people!”.

That’s right! Because you don’t know how autistic people are.

You know, people never bullied me for being autistic. Because neither me nor they had the terminology. Nah, they punished me for being weird. And what made me weird to their eyes? I spoke weird and often stumbled, and I spoke like a grownup anyway, and I wouldn’t shut up about Ancient Greece. I moved weird too, because I was (am) really clumsy, and I didn’t have any friends. I was boring and didn’t catch jokes (made at my expense) and I didn’t look them in the eye, and so on and on.

If you asked any of the people who bullied me for years whether they hate autistic people, they’d say “no!”. Because they don’t hate autistic people, but oh boy do they hate weird people. Perhaps they don’t hate autistic people, but surely they hated me for being obviously autistic.

[t0rnado0fs0uls]

I’ve been trying to explain this concept to a lot of people. You did a really good job summing it up.

[quasi-normalcy]

I feel like a bad transgender, transhumanist, left-wing science fiction fan because I never enjoyed cyberpunk as a genre.

Like, I'm sorry, but give me livable futures; not just futile, individualistic resistance to an eternity of corporate rule.

[quasi-normalcy]

#godssssss same#it's so exhausting#you're not even predicting anything anymore you're just throwing up your hands in resignation#'yea sorry an eternity of capitalist suffering is all I've got'#we really need to be imagining tangible positive futures

[stealingpotatoes]

i don't know what older adults were on about when they said being a teenager was good <3

[paleo-bug]

Life-sized Microraptor, done with alcohol markers

[naamahdarling]

YES!!!!