#advanced societies

[zomb13s]

The Visionary in a Stagnating World: Alfons Scholing’s Socio-Economic Prognosis for the Netherlands and Beyond

By Alfons Scholing, CEO of Alfons Design & Founder of Ik Zie Zombies In a world dominated by rapid technological, social, and political changes, few individuals stand out as true trendsetters—those capable of perceiving the world not as it is, but as it will be. I, Alfons Scholing, as the CEO of Alfons Design and founder of the artist platform Ik Zie Zombies, embody this role. My life took a…

[emperorsfoot]

I just recalled a random memory this morning from when I was in scouts. I had a friend who’s mom was a devout catholic, but we were good friends through scouts. One year my friend wanted to give me a gift for Chanukah so their mom took us to Toys R Us together so I could pick out what I wanted. The mom handed my friend cash at the register so my friend could say they bought it and they paid a little extra for wrapping.

As we were leaving the mom said that I couldn’t open it until Christmas.

But my friend specifically said they were giving it to me for Chanukah. Chanukah that year was a week or two before Christmas (I don’t remember exactly) and the mom said that if I opened it before Christmas “Jesus would know”. I cannot stress enough that my friend wanted it to be a CHANUKAH present.

I’m dropped off at home and my friends mom tells my parents that I can’t open my present until Christmas, meanwhile my friend is in the back seat frustrated and almost shouting “Mom [Renkon] is Jewish!”

My dad just nods and says he understands. He’ll make sure I don’t open it until “the appropriate time”.

First night of Chanukah rolls around and my dad hands me the present and tells me to open it but don’t say anything to my friend until he has a chance to talk to their mother.

So I get to enjoy my toy FOR CHANUKAH like my friend intended.

Anyway, Christmas come and goes. Then new years, then on January 3rd my dad calls the mom and asks “what day does your holiday fall on this year? [Renkon] would like to open their present.”

[caesarsaladinn]

who even needs war thunder forums anymore?

[pintadorartist]

ADVOCATES IN CONGRESS HAVE THREATENED TO NOT VOTE FOR ANY SPENDING BILLS UNLESS KOSA IS INCLUDED

While the Continuing Resolutions does not include KOSA, advocates for the bill are still pushing VERY HARD to add it to the package of bills, even going as far as to not vote for disaster relief bills if KOSA is not added to the package of bills.

WE HAVE TO CALL AND MAKE OUR VOICES HEARD. Below are the posts for contact info and call tools to call, email, and fax both representatives and senators to tell them to say NO to KOSA, it's important to keep up the pressure.

STOP KOSA (SENATE VERSION)

STOP KOSA (HOUSE VERSION)

[captainxtra]

HEADS UP! HR 9495 HAS BEEN RECEIVED IN SENATE!

Reminder on how to find your Senators!

If you have a GOP/MAGA Senator, use this advice from Reddit in trying to convince them to oppose it:

Do not stop fighting!

[katakaluptastrophy]

The Nine Houses are obviously deliberately technologically limited. Aside from having FTL capable spaceships, the most advanced piece of technology that we see in the Houses is "an electric transmitter box, with headphones and a mic." It's not clear entirely what sort of device this is, but it apparently requires you to stick an antenna out the window.

On New Rho, Cam has a beeping, and therefore presumably digital watch. Nona has to remind her that's it's called a "watch", and not the House term, "clockwork", which rather suggests House timepieces are analog.

There's a projector box embedded in the BoE conference table, which loads an image like dial up internet because they are "using shortwave" - presumably shortwave radio, which can transmit pictures. As We Suffer apologises for the slowness of the image loading because of shortwave, that suggests that other methods of transmitting an image do exist, but that for whatever reason they're not using those. Perhaps they do normally have something akin to the internet, but this is down due to the conditions on New Rho, or being avoided due to House or inter-cell monitoring.

The audio of Juno Zeta's proof of life is on "a little piece of electronics, a fingernail-shaped thing with prongs", which sounds like some kind of drive.

We also see We Suffer in the impromptu command centre in the tunnels with "a headpiece and a flip-top computer", presumably being used for some kind of communicatons or planning.

And of course, there's Cam and Pal's recorder, which from the descriptions of it making squeaks and garbled noises sounds rather like it might contain a cassette tape.

A paramilitary group on a beseiged planet may not be the best evidence for the level of technology outside of the Houses, but if it is in any way indicative, non-House society doesn't seem to have non-space travel technology beyond things that would have been available in the early 00s.

[delta-orionis]

Maybe this isn’t on my radar because I spend most of my time thinking about iterators, but I haven’t seen any analysis of what the Fuck is going on with the Scavenger Disciples and Templars in the Watcher DLC. What are they doing?? How did they get those abilities???

[xtishax]

i'm just so tired. tired of keeping up with every new thing that ai can do. every new technological change happening. every new crisis the planet is facing as a result of 'innovation'. every time i have to re-learn the dynamics, rules and workings of the modern world and society. it's all too much and happening too fast. let's all just calm down.

[chrisbeansprmanager]

editing the goes wrong show episodes 1/? - the pilot (not the pilot)

[bobcat-pie]

[serpentface]

Retconned Wardi firearms- a basic handgun, a highly decorative ceremonial handgun (belonging to Faiza), and a lance-gun.

Gun tech has officially been nerfed down to hand cannons (press F) (this has been a long time coming but I'd been fallacy of sunk costs-ing myself out of retconning).

Handguns are held similarly to a shotgun, with the butt pressed into the user's shoulder, one hand gripping under the barrel, and the other free to ignite the gunpowder. These represent the most advanced firearms in contemporary usage, both in make and in their use of uniform iron projectiles built to match the gun's bore for greater range and efficiency. Lance-guns are the more basal form, usually larger and mounted with the pole held over the shoulder, and are most effectively used by two people (one to hold and aim, one to light the gunpowder).

The spread of firearms is currently mostly limited to the Eastern Inner Seaway peoples (with some additional distribution via overland trade), and actual manufacture of hand cannons and gunpowder at Significant scale is limited to the region's core powers.

The reason for this limited spread is partially due to specific elements of the technology's history. Gunpowder was first synthesized by Burri alchemists and considered to be the discovery of the legendary divine weapon + solar fire of the deity Inanariya, and its formula (along with techniques for ideally refining its components) remained a closely guarded state secret. It was used predominantly in priestly contexts to generate flame and explosive sounds (in conjunction with earlier practices of generating multicolored flames with use of other chemicals), then integrated into combustible weaponry in the forms of fire lances, which would eventually develop into early handcannons.

The treatment of gunpowder as a guarded sacred or semi-sacred substance continued with Wardi adoption, where knowledge of its making is considered a closed rite. It's name (inya tsatsul or just tsatsul, a derived adoption of the Burri iñazatsūya) still reflects a divine solar association (the Burri word means 'sun's thunder', the Wardi 'inya' invokes the sun, 'tsatsul' is an adapted loanword and has no meaning independent of the substance itself), though its priestly use is now predominantly associated with the firearm'ed Odonii (rather than priests of the solar Face Inyamache). The composition of gunpowder can no longer be regarded as a Secret by any means, though efforts to obscure the methods of its creation are still moderately successful and has kept knowledge of gunpowder manufacture more limited than the total sphere of firearm usage itself.

The actual strongest limiting factor of firearm usage is the rarity of natural saltpeter deposits necessary for making gunpowder. The practice of actively producing saltpeter via nitraries has not been developed anywhere in the setting, and all is instead obtained via natural sources. These sources are rare and limited within the current spread of firearm technology, and result in gunpowder being a limited and expensive substance to produce. The weapons themselves are also very expensive to manufacture (a good quality steel SWORD is far too material-cost prohibitive for most people to own), particularly high quality firearms designed for use with standardized ammunition.

These guns are also very basal, and logistical difficulties in their use (weight, very slow loading and firing speed, high visibility, Relatively low reach and accuracy) along with the restrictive cost of production has kept firearms far from rendering conventional weaponry, armor, and projectiles obsolete (even within the societies that have access to them). They are still, however, very devastating in use within their contemporary context, particularly in that high quality guns have a longer range than the best arrow-based projectiles, and utterly negate most contemporary forms of armor at close range.

[yourfavvgal]

if you want to watch dps and it to start when its actually december 15th in the film AND in real life;

begin watching it at 10:33:10!!

(hours:mins:seconds)

[thepastisalreadywritten]

In tandem with genetically engineering its three dire wolves, Colossal has cloned two litters of red wolves, the most critically endangered wolf in the world, as part of its overall goal of pairing conservation efforts with its de-extinction efforts.

The company, founded in 2021, has previously announced that it plans to bring back the woolly mammoth, the Tasmanian tiger, and the dodo bird from extinction.

It says that its work on the dire wolf is a proof of technology.

“This massive milestone is the first of many coming examples demonstrating that our end-to-end de-extinction technology stack works,” says Lamm, who co-founded Colossal with Harvard geneticist Dr. George Church.

Colossal — which claims that it has now set the record for the most-ever genetic edits in a living species — says it plans to restore the dire wolf as a viable species and secure ecological preserves for it on Indigenous land in North America.

📹 AMAZlNGNATURE / X

🐺🥹🔊

[g8torbytes]

turning this mf into a marketable low effort sticker as punishment for not doing more damage when he escaped

[captainxtra]

Full text of Bill:

It passed 219-184, succeeding by two votes.

Basically it would allow the Treasury to strip Nonprofits of their Tax Exemption status if believed to be supporting terrorism without need of crystal clear evidence.

No word on when it’ll move up to Senate as of now.

House Dems who supported HR 9495 in round 2:

Allred, TX / Moskowitz, FL / Caraveo, CO / Panetta, CA / Case, HI / Perez, WA / Cuellar, TX /Schneider, IL / Davis, NC / Suozzi, NY / Golden, ME / Torres, CA / Gonzalez, V., TX /Wasserman Schultz, FL /Lee, NV

In the meantime, I’d suggest informing your fellow US citizens both IRL and Online + looking up your Senator and how to contact them if and when a Senate vote date is set up.

Here’s a tool for finding your Senator:

If you have a GOP/MAGA Rep, I’d advise listening to this strategy in convincing them once a Vote date is announced:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Defeat_Project_2025/s/jhrwGG0jAX

(If the link isn’t working by simple clicking then select the link text manually to paste and go.)

[front-facing-pokemon]