magicalmanhattanproject - Tumblr blog

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YOU CANNOT SELF-FLAGELLATE YOUR WAY INTO EXCELLENCE

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If you’re in DC, stop by the GWU University Yard and show them some love. The encamped students are remaining under threat of suspension

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a post-doc was doing a guest seminar at my institute and at the beginning of his presentation he was explaining why he chose birds for his evolutionary analysis - so he said "well first of all, because birds are the best and most interesting animals and it's fun to study them" and a few professors in the room gave him a very serious nod

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I remember a couple of years back when the argument du jour was over whether people at risk of radicalisation or cult recruitment 'deserve' the effort of understanding and outreach, and the entire time people were having knock down drag out fights to determine the one true and correct take I didn't see a single person point out that deradicalisation is a sphere of research and activism that already exists. like you can get involved if you want to. or, if you don't think it deserves your energy, you can disengage in the knowledge that other people have it covered.

we have this dysfunctional cultural notion that the only way to tackle any given issue is for everyone to agree on a single course of action and carry it out simultaneously. our concept of collectivity is so broken that we forget it's not just individualism with a multiplier.

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Kind of hilarious to me how poorly the title "Mob Psycho 100" localized to English-speaking areas. To someone whose first language is English, it scans as:

Mob (Yakuza, Mafia)

Psycho (violent person with "crazy" behaviors)

Thus: a particularly violent member of organized crime.

But in Japanese it scans as:

Mob (background characters in crowd scenes in manga or anime)

Psycho (short for psychic)

Thus: a psychic who looks/acts like someone you'd never pick out of a crowd scene in a comic.

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Dracula: Hm, that human mother is being super annoying about her dead kid at the gate. How do I fix that? Wolves? I’ll say wolves.

Dracula: What’s that? My good friend Jonathan Harker wants to leave ahead of schedule? Think I’ll do some wolves about that.

Dracula: Damn, seems that old Dutchman has blocked off one (1) single window with garlic blossoms and now this one (1) specific girl in all of England is barred from me. Maybe I should use my title and/or some invented pretense to cajole the girl’s mother into letting me in. Or maybe I could just move on to a different victim out of the nigh endless blood buffet I specifically moved here to enjoy, none of whom have a small legion of blood donors and vampire-proofing scholars on their side.

Dracula:

Dracula, about to slam dunk a wolf through the window: Or,

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they used to make smackable technology. you used to be able to hit your tv when it didn't work good.

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really enjoying this series

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When people get a little too gung-ho about-

wait. cancel post. gung-ho cannot be English. where did that phrase come from? China?

ok, yes. gōnghé, which is…an abbreviation for “industrial cooperative”? Like it was just a term for a worker-run organization? A specific U.S. marine stationed in China interpreted it as a motivational slogan about teamwork, and as a commander he got his whole battalion using it, and other U.S. marines found those guys so exhausting that it migrated into English slang with the meaning “overly enthusiastic”.

That’s…wild. What was I talking about?

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this is assuming its on art you normally wouldn't jump to reblog. i myself only rb stuff i really really like so .

The 'rude/demanding' tone would be stuff along the lines of "if you like but don't reblog I'll [threat]" which i see surprisingly often, both serious and more silly

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A surprisingly helpful bit of social maneuvering I've figured out from trial and error: Throughout your life, you are going to need things from people. Often, it's going to be on a deadline. And when that deadline passes, you generally want to know what's going on. So, you need to ask them.

There are two kinds of people, broadly, in this situation. The Shameless will tell you what the holdup is, with absolutely no regard for if the reason is "good enough". This is actually very helpful, because you get the real reason immediately, and can start working on a solution.

The Ashamed is trickier. People who are Ashamed are people who were often told they were giving excuses when they were trying to explain, and they'll often avoid you until they solve the problem on their own. This causes them and you a lot of stress, and often takes a lot longer to solve.

Long term, the strategy for dealing with people who are Ashamed is to provide a supportive environment where they're comfortable sharing any problems they're having with getting things done. But, there's a way to at least partially short-circuit that:

Provide an explanation for them.

One example might be "Hey Susan, I noticed that I don't have your report yet. Are you busy with other projects?" The readymade explanation signals that you're willing to accept an explanation, which is the big anxiety point.

Sometimes, you still won't get an honest answer- especially if the honest answer isn't "good enough" by the standards of the person who traumatized them. But, I've found that it often at least gets you a lie that lets you give them some slack or work around the problem.

Let's say that Susan has actually completely forgotten that she needed to do the report. She's horrified at herself, and completely unwilling to admit the real problem. But, she can now safely reply with "Sorry Jennifer, I've been swamped, and it got lost in the mix. I can have it to you in two days. Does that work?"

From there, so long as Susan gave an estimate for when she can actually do it, she and Jennifer can hash out a solution.

It's not a perfect solution, but it works astonishingly well for how small of a change it is.

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people are always mourning twink death but they don’t celebrate bear birth. why don’t you think about fat hairy gay men for a bit maybe you’ll feel better

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What if there was ANOTHER update aquatic!!!

I had some ideas in a dream and wanted to share them #minecraft

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when the whole house got the autism

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tango noises are keyboard smashes and skizz noises are crash bandicoot audio