the oh well of loneliness

But that's not how any of this works. Heiroglyphs have meaning because people used them for language, the fact that they sometimes are images is accidental. Imagine, for instance, a picture of bread with vertically-facing wavy lines above it. That could mean anything. It could mean "hot bread" or "rotten bread" or maybe it has nothing to do with bread. Maybe I've established with friends that when I text that picture of bread to them, I'm saying that eating fresh bread. Maybe I've established with other friends that when I text that picture of bread to them, I'm saying that I have a stomach bug. Then the meaning of that picture of bread is "I have a stomach bug". Signs have no meaning apart from their use. A picture of bread doesn't mean anything unless it's being used to mean something.

Heiroglyphs have meaning in the same exact way that modern alphabetic orthographic written scripts do - people used them to mean things in the same way we use written words to mean things now. Emojis aren't used by people to communicate certain propositions, ergo they're not language, ergo they're not heiroglyphs. There's no organized system of meaning people follow to impute meaning to strings of emojis. Because people aren't using them that way. As soon as people start using emojis as language, then they'll be heiroglyphs. As soon as people start using strings of solely emojis to communicate propositions, then they'll be heiroglyphs. But not until then. No string of emojis, no matter how long, will have meaning - until people are using them to communicate.

"👁️⌛🌡️🛀🏼🌛" could mean fucking anything, much in the same way the string of words "I ate lunch last week" could mean fucking anything. The reason the latter has meaning is because it's embedded within a system of human activity wherein it communicates the proposition [I ate lunch last week], but given a different system of human activity it could just as well communicate the proposition [the weather's nice today]. Until emojis are incorporated into a system of human activity to communicate propositions, no string of emojis will mean anything ever.

Let's make it very simple! (and I do mean simple, we're not going for 'well technically' here)

Hieroglyphs are a script and that script is used to write three different stages of the Egyptian language: Old, Middle, and Late Egyptian.

Hieroglyphs are referred to as 'logoconsonantal' which are 'logograms with consonant sounds attached to them' or 'pictures that reference spoken sounds'.

This is very similar to how we understand the Latin alphabet in so much as the letters have sounds attached to them and putting those letters with sounds together forms words.

The Egyptians formed words in their language using the Hieroglyphic script by putting together signs with the sounds needed to form the word. The word 'cat' in Egyptian is 'mjw' (pronounced onomatopoeically as mew) and is formed of 4 signs: 𓅓𓇋𓅱𓃠

The owl sign sounds as 'm', the reed leaf sounds as 'j', the quail chick sounds as 'w', and the cat is there as a determinative or 'marker' to make sure you're not reading it as any other word that is spelled 'mjw' (like 'metal instrument' (has an instrument determinative) or 'grief' (has a wailing woman determinative)).

Just as A, B, and C have set sounds, Hieroglyphs have set sounds, and that's how they spell words. It's really that simple. It's exactly how we do it, just with pictures representing sounds rather than letters.

(Would hieroglyphs only mark words that have homonyms?)

A determinative functions as a categorisation tool. It is there to tell the reader, most of whom couldn’t read, what type of word they were dealing with. Every word in Egypt bar things like particles, articles, and prepositions etc have determinatives. They do not just mark homonyms. Birds get marked with birds determinatives (sometimes the actual bird if there’s a hieroglyph for it) but a bat🦇 also falls into the bird category for determinatives because it is a flying creature. Crocodile 🐊 uses a determinative of a crocodile but so does the word aggressive 🐊 and so does the word king 🐊 because aggressive is borrowing from the crocodile’s nature and a crocodile is one of the symbols of kingship in Ancient Egypt.

IP symbols are closer but that still feels like trying to cram a concept in where it shouldn’t be. Determinatives show the category and meaning of a word and while IP symbols show that the word has been claimed by a corporation, it is usually obvious from surrounding context what word is being used.

Emojis don’t just belong to one language like the determinative does in Old/Middle/Late Egyptian. They serve almost every language on this planet and have cross cultural differences. Saying “okay👌” in the anglosphere is fine but using that in Brazil or some parts of the Middle East will get you in trouble because 👌 is considered extremely rude.

The way I explain it to my patients is that our neurons don’t regenerate. They make connections with each other and that’s it. If you don’t use your brain, they make fewer connections and, if one of them dies, you’re gonna miss it, because that was the only one that knew how to do X. Now, if each one of them has many, many connections, you won’t notice the difference when one of them dies. The others pick up the slack.

As of 2024, 45% of dementia risk factors are modifiable. Relevant to this conversation, 5% for less education and 5% for social isolation.

We absolutely are going to see the reflection of this, but it’s gonna take decades and it’ll be too late. So, for the love of your brain, pretend that it’s a muscle and make it work. People complain about “when am I ever gonna use this maths formula in my life?” You’re not. You’re teaching your brain to think logically. Those sinapses will be there for when you need to figure out your week’s schedule. English classes taught me how to interpret data and how to convey it in this text so it’s clear and you understand what I’m saying, not because I needed to justify why the curtain is blue.

Make your brain know how to do different things. Logic games, puzzles, taking care of a garden even if small, planning a church’s event or birthday, learn a new instrument, learn a few words in another language, look at a calendar every day, do some manual labor if possible. Do not, I repeat, do not let your brain get rid of sinapses by letting AI do everything. Your brain uses 20% of your body’s energy — do you really think it’s going to maintain connexions that aren’t in use?

Most cases of Alzheimer’s are sporadic, meaning no family history. Family history of a first-degree relative with Alzheimer’s starting before they were 80yo increases your risk in 2-3x on average.

At simplest: because it isn't shaped like an S. Also, not only is there a better, more descriptive name for it; "S-bend" fails to describe the full range of corsetry made on the style and it's a post-period term.

I wrote a whole article here about this, but happy to explain in brief :)

First off, what distinguishes this "new" (emerging 1897-99) style of corset from the "old" Victorian corsets?

Izod corset 1887 vs. Izod ad c. 1905. Do you see the pronounced front curvature (out at bust, in at waist, out at belly) in the older one, and how that's been forced straight at right?

By any reasonable logic, the older corsets are the curvy ones. The distinguishing feature of the new corsets is that straight front, and it was called that in-period (droit devant).

There's no S in these corsets.

It's not a period term, and at best it refers to the sinuous shapes of the clothing on TOP of the corset. And yet, when we actually look at it, "S" is really just evocative of that Art Nouveau shapeliness of long flowing lines, and not an actual S. This 1900-1908ish style is MUCH better described as "Art Nouveau," trumpet skirt, pigeon-breast etc rather than a letter. I've found that my students remember it much better that way, too.

La Mode Artistique, 1905 / 1910s photo from VintageDancer.

This style of corsetry also long outlasts that particular style--see the 1910s image at right. Those women are definitely wearing straight-front corsets, but they've lost the sinuous lines of the 1900s; they're headed into the WWI fashion era. 1920s-50s corsets ("girdles") are also made on the same lines with the straight front.

It's absolutely a pet peeve; nobody's hurting anyone by saying "S-bend." But as a historian, I find the term useless: it's illogical as well as incongruous with period materials in a way that obscures the actual words that were used. Straight-front is more descriptive and more accurate.

rolin truly said this and believed it to be true, and that should be enough for everyone to know what kind of person he is:

they had claudia refer to her life as not only bleak, but specifically bleak and black. a character who was never ashamed of her blackness. they had her say that she hates louis more than her rapist, abuser, and the people that orchestrated her lynching and burned her lover alive. they completely destroyed her character and killed two birds with one stone, butchering who claudia always was/how she saw louis and lestat, and throwing in more insults and hate at louis while mostly ignoring lestat.

and making it so that claudia is suffering endlessly, even in death, felt like another purposeful story choice. not to make claudia's character even more heartbreaking, either. it was pointless no matter how you look at it. this just felt like yet another way to torture a black character, and a black character that has been repeatedly exploited all season for everyone else's feelings. furthermore, summoning claudia had no effect on louis and lestat at all, as they were immediately over it by the next scene.

none of the heavy storybeats can have any emotional impact because both us and the characters are never given time to absorb them. they're just checking boxes with these heavy moments and moving onto the next scene. and all of this is, again, so we can absolve lestat of his wrongdoings and ensure no blame falls on him. his trauma is the only important thing in the show and the only thing worth discussing/unpacking. it's just antiblack, misogynistic writing again and again every week and rehashing it feels pointless but i can't help myself.

aside from the blatant racism and misogynoir, i also get the impression that these writers are just trying to get their quoteable, hashtag-able, gif-worthy scenes each episode. who needs a cohesive plot when you can have lestat say "serving cunt has its consequences" or give the viewers an iconic shot of their favorite ship that feels entirely unearned—one of my examples of this being the fact that devils minion feels like they just put together a bunch of shots that they thought people would love, without actually telling a story with these two characters. everything we learn of their history and relationship is given to us through exposition. and because assad is such a fantastic actor, he's making these scraps into something interesting.

the showrunners are no longer pretending to be subtle with their sloppy writing, poor pacing, and hatred towards louis and claudia. they're just writing the racism right into the script and think that, because a black character says it, they're free from all criticism. and a majority of their nonblack fans are jumping to defend them by saying that claudia's rage is justified and if you claim otherwise (even if you're not saying that) then you can't accept black characters being cruel and/or evil. which isn't true at all.

claudia's rage is entirely justified, her berating the two people that were supposed to love her and put her first but instead used both her life and death for their own gain is not the issue here. she could've been as cruel as she wanted—but having her say a slew of horribly racist things to louis and direct most of her ire towards him as opposed to lestat or the both of them equally was nothing more than these antiblack writers once again degrading louis for their own enjoyment because they hate his character and know they can get away with dragging him through the mud. especially if they hide behind another black character.

even the decapitation at the end felt like a quick moment of shock to the viewer that turned comical immediately after. the abysmal pacing of this show makes it so that loustat being beheaded has no actual weight because we know they're fine and we're given no opportunity to sit with this moment. there are no stakes and there was no real buildup to it. nor to armand and daniel coming up with this plan and suddenly working together the way they are. in fact after the dust settled, id say the scene was borderline cartoonishly evil.

At simplest: because it isn't shaped like an S. Also, not only is there a better, more descriptive name for it; "S-bend" fails to describe the full range of corsetry made on the style and it's a post-period term.

I wrote a whole article here about this, but happy to explain in brief :)

First off, what distinguishes this "new" (emerging 1897-99) style of corset from the "old" Victorian corsets?

Izod corset 1887 vs. Izod ad c. 1905. Do you see the pronounced front curvature (out at bust, in at waist, out at belly) in the older one, and how that's been forced straight at right?

By any reasonable logic, the older corsets are the curvy ones. The distinguishing feature of the new corsets is that straight front, and it was called that in-period (droit devant).

There's no S in these corsets.

It's not a period term, and at best it refers to the sinuous shapes of the clothing on TOP of the corset. And yet, when we actually look at it, "S" is really just evocative of that Art Nouveau shapeliness of long flowing lines, and not an actual S. This 1900-1908ish style is MUCH better described as "Art Nouveau," trumpet skirt, pigeon-breast etc rather than a letter. I've found that my students remember it much better that way, too.

La Mode Artistique, 1905 / 1910s photo from VintageDancer.

This style of corsetry also long outlasts that particular style--see the 1910s image at right. Those women are definitely wearing straight-front corsets, but they've lost the sinuous lines of the 1900s; they're headed into the WWI fashion era. 1920s-50s corsets ("girdles") are also made on the same lines with the straight front.

It's absolutely a pet peeve; nobody's hurting anyone by saying "S-bend." But as a historian, I find the term useless: it's illogical as well as incongruous with period materials in a way that obscures the actual words that were used. Straight-front is more descriptive and more accurate.

There are 760,000 Australians on the National Disability Insurance Scheme, the system that - if they feel like it and your personalised plan says you get to have it - provides funding for everything from personal hygiene care to support workers to therapies to assistive technology. It's already very hard for disabled people to get on the NDIS, regardless of your disability. It's near impossible to access most support and equipment without being on the NDIS. And the government has announced that they want that number to drop to 600,000 in four years. 160,000 of us cut off the Scheme - and countless more denied access. This will cause deaths. People will die and people will suffer because there is no safety net. The NDIS is the only option for most of us. Even private health insurance doesn't cover most of these things. Nobody will swoop in to save us.

The bill wants to give the (non disabled!) NDIS minister basically unlimited power to cut our funding. They're already planning what they'd do with that power. What rights they'll strip from us. What dignity and freedom they'll remove to make their budget look better.

The bill wants to force people to try every treatment out there before they're allowed to be on the NDIS. Including if the treatment is literally impossible to access. There’s a lot of us living in regional areas or out bush who can't just pop to the capital cities for specialists. This will especially hurt disabled First Nations people in regional and remote communities, who already experience limited access to healthcare. Oh, and it includes chemical restraint, too. The government has directly refused to exclude chemical restraint from the required process, calling it "trialling medication".

If you're australian and worried, the ABC did a good breakdown of the proposed changes.

I know australia stuff doesn't really pop up on the radar on this site, but I want everyone to know what's going on. What we're fighting for here. Your australian disabled friends might be NDIS participants fearing for their life, rights, and freedom. They might not be a participant and afraid these changes mean they never will have access. We deserve better. The government built a system with no backup plan, and now they want hundreds of thousands of disabled people to pay the price for their bad planning.

Glimmer: Oh no that means...

Bow: I'm sorry I misheard you but maybe this guy can help us too?

Adora: I don't think he can

holy shit they did it, they stuck the landing, hell yeah let's go lesbians

-thanks to a telecoms deal Facebook came preloaded on a lot of mobile phones and often time on FB didn’t count towards your minutes so to many in Myanmar Facebook WAS the internet

-nonetheless FB was not optimized for Burmese, Myanmar was not renders on Unicode, and the terms of service were translated extremely late and passed out on paper flyers instead of posted anywhere. FB in Myanmar had little to no oversight and there was only one contractor in Dublin monitoring hate speech in Burmese even when there were LITERAL RIOTS caused by misinformation posted on Burmese FB

-Myanmar was not a priority for FB leadership so after LITERAL RIOTS they only hired one other contractor who seemed to remove posts from peace activists rather than hate speech or posts calling for violence

-due to what seems like internal politicking against the author, the person she tries to hire to be in charge of Myanmar in the right time zonenever gets hired

-FB higher ups were warned in advance of huge misinformation efforts like troll accounts and takeovers of fan accounts for pop stars but did nothing, leading pretty much directly to what the UN calls genocide and crimes against humanity

There is a lot in the book that is independently verifiable if you match up news reporting to events in the book, so I take what can't be matched up (because it happened inside Facebook offices or on private planes, etc) is probably also true.

OpenAI scraped the entire web. All of which had been a labor of love from humans. Wikipedia is the backbone of a lot of LLMs, and that was volunteer human labor. They stole it and now they're selling it back to us.

But in my darkest hours, I believe that it has everything to do with undercutting the free internet, and killing competition. There is a very strong chance that it has to do with potential future market advantage, should the free sites, the labors of love, on the internet die out.

Even very small "free" websites have maintenance costs. Stuff like paying the ISP (internet service provider), maintaining the domain name (which has annual fees), or, if applicable, a website designer. These fees are relatively small, but the process has costs and is tedious. Of course, for the larger labors of love, like Wikipedia, there are tons more overhead costs, hence the annual donation requests.

How do small websites stay afloat? Some of the website owners eat the cost because they are passionate, principled and refuse to participate in the humongous data trading marketplace. These website owners might ask for donations from viewers, which can only be provided if the user actually views the site, and sees the ask.

But many more website owners can't eat those costs, so they participate in the advertising and data analytics marketplace. For these site owners who are hoping to break even, Views are Directly Tied to Their Ability to Subsist. Every view takes a cent (or a fraction of a cent) off of overhead. Even where the website is free, the views are the source of income to allow them to break even.

So when services like Google's AI Overview are designed remove the necessity of the user actually clicking to and viewing the human source, it is actively depriving these sites and creators from the money that is required for them to subsist. And when websites don't break even, they get shut down.

There are only a few places these sites and their info can be found after they disappear from the internet--the first is not easily searchable: the Internet Archive. You have to know about the original URL and turn back time to get to it.

The other is the AI, which ingested these people's labors of love for free into its model, and then deprived them of mere subsistence.

And as we see with large companies emptying out the market of competitors (e.g. Uber to taxis), access to the service originally offered at a loss will get more and more expensive. In markets stripped of competition, there are very few caps on the amount a service can charge.

So yes, AI is burning the library of Alexandria, but I would more say that it is operating a war of attrition. It is starving the library of Alexandria out, librarian by librarian, book by book. And once the shelves are empty, there will be nowhere else to go to for truth but the monster that consumed the world in its greed, and left the rest of us to starve.