Mojo Nixon has passed away at 66, while on the Outlaw Country Cruise.
posted to MetaFilter by neilbert at 7:52 PM on February 7, 2024 (78 comments)

These fierce, tiny marsupials drop dead after lengthy sex fests – and sometimes become cannibals. "Antechinuses are perhaps best known for exhibiting semelparity, or “suicidal reproduction”. This is death after reproducing in a single breeding period. The phenomenon is known in a range of plants, invertebrates and vertebrates, but it is rare in mammals. Each year, all antechinus males drop dead at the end of a one to three week breeding season, poisoned by their own raging hormones. This is because the stress hormone cortisol rises during the breeding period. At the same time, surging testosterone from the super-sized testes in males causes a failure in the biological mechanism that mops up the cortisol. The flood of unbound cortisol results in systemic organ failure and the inevitable, gruesome death of every male. Mercifully, death occurs only after the males have unloaded their precious cargo of sperm, mating with as many promiscuous females as possible in marathon, energy-sapping sessions lasting up to 14 hours. The pregnant females are then responsible for ensuring the survival of the species."
posted to MetaFilter by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 1:31 AM on February 10, 2024 (11 comments)

"LIGO" - Director's Cut [1h46m] is a documentary about the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory [film website] and the painstaking path taken toward realizing and releasing their first major observation. It's a lot of smart people talking about doing complex science in an accessible way. If you like this kind of think, you'll probably like this.
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 1:05 PM on February 9, 2024 (8 comments)

Linkfest on recycling or recyclability research and approaches: Pulpatronics makes RFID tags out of scorch marks on paper. Turbine blade maker Vestas may have figured out how to recycle the epoxy in epoxy-carbon-fiber. California museum Exploratorium uses and re-uses machinery from the Bay Area's history, which become part of the exhibits. A polymer analagous to porphyrin is good at collecting gold and platinum from acid-cleaned circuit boards. A plastics-back-to-polymers technique with a new factory opening ?soon?.
posted to MetaFilter by clew at 2:36 PM on February 9, 2024 (15 comments)

We’ve all seen the classic cartoon juggling farce; the character wiggles their arms up and down while the balls fly in a circular pattern in front of their face, yadda yadda yadda. Most jugglers you ask will groan every time they see this. [...] Now what’s really special about juggling when compared to other inaccurately animated activities is that animation as a medium enables artists to create really creative and unique depictions of juggling that would otherwise be impossible in real life. A poorly animated drum set will still sound like a drum set, and a poorly animated piano will still sound like a piano, but quote-unquote “poorly” animated juggling can lead to some really beautiful patterns that have no real life analogue. [...] As I started diving deeper and deeper into this world of animated juggling I became amazed at the huge variety of ways in which juggling can be visually conveyed and obsessed with finding every single example that I possibly could. [...] I have learned a lot from this project, and in this video I wanted to share some of my findings as well as some notable examples that either really impressed me or even pushed my understanding of what counts as animation.

Juggling YouTuber Jasper Juggles asks (and exhaustively answers) "What's the deal with juggling in animation?" [transcript], featuring hundreds of mesmerizing examples from television, film, cartoons, video games, claymation, zoetropes, and many, many more.
posted to MetaFilter by Rhaomi at 4:10 PM on February 9, 2024 (8 comments)

"It is almost impossible to believe that these paintings have been overlooked. The qualifying statements people often make about their so-called domesticity and how Morisot did the best she could within a limited sphere, even when meant as a defence of the work, are entirely unconvincing: what is ‘the domestic’ but the core of life, of eros, and of work?"
posted to MetaFilter by cupcakeninja at 4:17 AM on February 9, 2024 (16 comments)

A video about adorable LA hipsters building a teardrop trailer
posted to MetaFilter by Sebmojo at 1:15 PM on February 7, 2024 (15 comments)

SCOTUSblog: Supreme Court to decide whether insurrection provision keeps Trump off ballot

The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on Thursday in what is shaping up to be the biggest election case since its ruling nearly 25 years ago in Bush v. Gore. At issue is whether former President Donald Trump, who is once again the front runner for the Republican nomination for president, can be excluded from the ballot because of his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attacks on the U.S. Capitol. Although the question comes to the court in a case from Colorado, the impact of the court’s ruling could be much more far-reaching. Maine’s secretary of state ruled in December that Trump should be taken off the primary ballot there, and challenges to Trump’s eligibility are currently pending in 11 other states. Trump warns that the efforts to keep him off the ballot “threaten to disenfranchise tens of millions of Americans” and “promise to unleash chaos and bedlam if other state courts and state officials follow Colorado’s lead.” But the voters challenging Trump’s eligibility counter that “we already saw the ‘bedlam’ Trump unleashed when he was on the ballot and lost.”

Wikipedia: Trump v. Anderson and the 2024 presidential eligibility of Donald Trump - Politico: Who is Norma Anderson? The 91-year-old lawmaker who could have Trump disqualified - 6 key questions in Supreme Court fight over Trump’s ballot eligibility - ResetEra's annotated list of the many amicus briefs - Tune in to official live audio of oral arguments in about an hour (starting at 10 a.m. Eastern)
posted to MetaFilter by Rhaomi at 5:52 AM on February 8, 2024 (235 comments)

The Password Game
posted to MetaFilter by fleacircus at 9:43 PM on June 27, 2023 (39 comments)

Infinite Craft - from the creator of the Password Game (previously), a browser-based colossal productivity killer where you simply combine two words, over and over, to make... any/everything?! (Via RPS)
posted to MetaFilter by protorp at 11:05 AM on February 7, 2024 (216 comments)

For about three weeks, folks living in Corvallis, OR have had their sleep disrupted by a sound of mysterious origin. Retired software engineer K Lars Lohn engaged in some clever acoustic detective work to pinpoint the source.
posted to MetaFilter by mpark at 10:15 PM on January 29, 2024 (69 comments)

Clara Belle Williams was born in Plum, TX in October 1885 [!]. She attended undergrad in Prairie View TX, graduating in 1908. After a marriage, three sons, and a widowing, she enrolled at University Of Chicato and finally at New Mexico College of Agriculture in 1928. Clara Belle Williams was [what is now known as] New Mexico State University's first black graduate [nmsu.edu link, primary text link], graduating in 1937 with a degree in English at the age of 51. She was the Las Cruces School System's first black school teacher, and she forged a path into a community that had very little black population during a time long before it was expected. Here is an interview with Clara Belle Williams and her family from 1980 [1h31m. VHS transfer, long but amazing]
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 4:06 PM on February 6, 2024 (5 comments)

Many games and tools exist in the mysterious valley that lies between tabletop roleplaying in groups and writing fiction. Solo RPGs can be considered a creative writing practice or a generator for creative writing. Solo gaming surged during the pandemic, along with a surge in the creation of solo RPGs. (What do you know? Solo boardgaming surged, too.) There are whole kit-n-kaboodle games, as one might find on MeFi Projects and elsewhere, and then there are tools that serve as emulators for the GM/DM/referee. In the depths of the valley, or at the height of the mountain range, between boardgames and solo RPGs are to be found tabletop RPG boardgames.
posted to MetaFilter by cupcakeninja at 5:44 AM on February 7, 2024 (24 comments)

I'm really not quite sure who Rosie Bennet is, but somehow she ended up sitting in Brian May's kitchen talking about all kinds of things. From fame to his astrophysics degree to AI and even a bit of music! It's a lovely gentle-voiced conversation that is one of the best musician interviews I've encountered lately! Brian May on AI, Mental Health, Fame, Plagiarism and the Internet - FRET NOT EP.2 [1h5m]
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 2:13 PM on February 5, 2024 (7 comments)

For better or worse, the web doesn’t work like that anymore. No one clicks a webpage hoping to learn which cat can haz cheeseburger. Weirdos, maybe. Sickos. No, we get our content from a For You Page now— algorithmically selected videos and images made by our favorite creators, produced explicitly for our preferred platform. Which platform doesn’t matter much. So long as it’s one of the big five. Creators churn out content for all of them. It’s a technical marvel, that internet. Something so mindblowingly impressive that if you showed it to someone even thirty years ago, their face would melt the fuck off. So why does it feel like something’s missing? Why are we all so collectively unhappy with the state of the web? from Where have all the websites gone?
posted to MetaFilter by chavenet at 1:42 AM on February 5, 2024 (82 comments)

What are you writing - a CV? A resignation letter? Reports? A spell? Academic papers? Job applications? A thesis? Letters to lovers? A book? A ransom note? Some code? A shopping list? Some interactive fiction? Erotic fiction? A journal or diary entry? Poetry (by Jessica Smith)? MetaFilter posts? And with what - a favorite pen? A pencil? The keyboard? Software? A stencil? A tablet? A paintbrush? A quill? Something else? Or talk about anything and everything in your life and your world as this is your free thread.
posted to MetaFilter by Wordshore at 2:15 AM on February 5, 2024 (182 comments)

I've realised I love fiction where a labyrinth or other extremely complicated and large structure is an integral part of the story. Think the House in Piranesi, the castle of Gormenghast, or the ship in Rendezvous with Rama. What other books might I enjoy?
posted to Ask MetaFilter by underclocked at 3:28 AM on February 4, 2024 (42 comments)

Since the start of the pandemic, the Zinn Education Project has been hosting free monthly Teach the Black Freedom Struggle classes. Scroll down for upcoming classes, and even further down for 49 past classes. They started with The Rebellious Life of Rosa Parks in March 2020. Full transcripts started with Lessons from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in October 2020. Sign language interpretation was added with Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A Hip-Hop History in October 2021. The latest class is The Condemnation of Blackness: Lies We’re Told About Crime from last month. Tomorrow's class is Interracial Organizing Stories from The Sum of Us.
posted to MetaFilter by clawsoon at 3:53 AM on February 4, 2024 (1 comment)

Everyone’s a sellout now Vox article describing the challenge for artists, writers, musicians who just want to practice their craft: Sorry, you need to be a highly-promoted brand first.
posted to MetaFilter by Ayn Marx at 11:04 AM on February 3, 2024 (30 comments)

In 1945, Hugh Le Caine, a physicist at Canada’s National Research Council, began working in his spare time on a single-channel musical instrument he dubbed the Electronic Sackbut. He was intrigued by the fact that the three auditory sensations associated with music—namely, pitch, loudness, and timbre—had counterparts in electronics—namely, frequency, amplitude, and the harmonic spectrum obtained by Fourier analysis. To demonstrate those qualities, Le Caine created a synthesizer that mimicked, among other things, a brass horn known as the sackbut. Listen to it on Hugh Le Caine - Compositions Demonstrations 1946-1974 (full album). Oh, and Vanilla Ice Remembers The Electronic Sackbut
posted to MetaFilter by ShooBoo at 1:56 PM on February 3, 2024 (18 comments)

Do you have trouble keeping the logical fallacies straight? Who better to explain them than Mr. Spock.
YouTuber CHDanhauser has made a series of old-fashioned PSAs of about three to five minutes each, using the ST:TOS:TAS characters to explain fallacies and rhetorical devices. Recent entries include guilt or honor by association, neglect of probability, the "if by whiskey" fallacy, and presentism -- featuring a sentient dolphin from the water planet of Argo.
posted to MetaFilter by Countess Elena at 7:47 AM on February 3, 2024 (17 comments)

I've just noticed DC released a deluxe version of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen, with annotations by Leslie S. Klinger. How do these annotations compare with those by Doug Atkinson, which have been available online since 1995?
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Rash at 10:31 AM on January 31, 2024

In a previous question I mentioned needing to talk to my elderly parents about longterm planning and user basalganglia said it was "probably a whole 'nother question in itself". So this is that whole 'nother question. What questions should I be asking my aging parents about their next steps? Assume I know absolutely nothing about aging, retirement, long-term care, and so on.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by robot cat at 10:41 AM on February 1, 2024 (21 comments)

I have a really hard time focusing while the internet is available. There are any number of tools to block specific sites, but what I really want to do is block almost all the sites most of the time, allowing just a few that I need to use.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by lgyre at 3:09 PM on February 2, 2024 (4 comments)

Often when I travel I like to go to a place to do a specific thing like attend a music festival or something. I have been thinking it would be fun to go somewhere to take crafting lessons.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by jacquilynne at 6:48 PM on February 2, 2024 (18 comments)

'Take Five' arranged for solo guitar by Lucas Brar.
posted to MetaFilter by MetaFilter World Peace at 8:26 AM on February 2, 2024 (26 comments)

A bardcore take on Kate Bush's legendary track, here is "Running Up That Hill" in Early Middle English (credits to the many collaborators for that track in the yt description).
posted to MetaFilter by FatherDagon at 11:25 AM on February 2, 2024 (7 comments)

and Also by the Time I Was Thirty-Five I was supposed to renew my car registration today. I haven’t opened the Web site. I thought that I would’ve for sure given a ted talk in my thirties on “How to Unleash the Infinite Writer’s Brain.” I haven’t even given a tedx. Damn, I really wasted the morning and the afternoon and the last ten years.
posted to MetaFilter by folklore724 at 11:34 AM on February 2, 2024 (32 comments)

It is rare to find a house that has everything. A house that wills itself into Postmodernism yet remains unable to let go of the kookiest moments of the prior zeitgeist, the Bruce Goffs and Earthships, the commune houses built from car windshields, the seventies moments of psychedelic hippie fracture. It is everything. It has everything. It is theme park, it is High Tech. It is Renaissance (in the San Antonio Riverwalk sense of the word.) It is medieval. It is maybe the greatest pastiche to sucker itself to the side of a mountain, perilously overlooking a large body of water.

Look at it. Just look.

McMansion Hell (previ-ously on MeFi) explores the arcane architecture of 354 County Road 211 in Bremen, Alabama -- a gaudy (or Guadían?) wonder known locally as the Castle at Smith Lake.
posted to MetaFilter by Rhaomi at 12:11 PM on February 2, 2024 (67 comments)

Wreckage of Ellipses by Anna Della Subin is a long essay on the Sumerian-language poet Enheduana, the world's oldest named author, and a review of Enheduana: The Complete Poems of the World's First Author, a new translation by Sophus Helle. He was a guest on the podcast Poetry Off the Shelf, where he talked about Enheduana with Helena de Groot, and read some of his translations. A website accompanying the book provides background information and scholarly translations of Enheduana: Temple Hymns, a separate Hymn to Inana, and The Exaltation of Inana. The last poem was the jumping off point for the essay Poet of Impermanence, about what Enheduana can mean to modern readers. And here is the Exaltation of Inana in his literary translation.
posted to MetaFilter by Kattullus at 12:46 PM on February 1, 2024 (12 comments)

As they become a legacy act, doing a lengthy residency in Las Vegas, and are becoming ever more deprecated across younger generations triggered mainly by their Apple Album Distribution debacle, U2 fans Bill See [Divine Weeks frontman] and Melody Muraca [early U2 Fanzine founder] have sat down to record the Into The Heart Of U2 Podcast [YouTube playlist link]. Album by album, tour by tour, with a lot of research and background information that I didn't know before... This might be the way for you to process your U2 fandom or your U2 mourning. Apple Podcasts Link.
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 3:42 PM on February 1, 2024 (80 comments)

It has driven a wedge between Sámi in Russia and those in Nordic countries [Foreign Policy Magazine]

Russia’s war is splitting the indigenous Sami in two [The Economist]
posted to MetaFilter by riruro at 5:53 PM on February 1, 2024 (12 comments)

Every year, on 2 February, Punxsutawney Phil the groundhog comes out of his burrow and if the sun is shining and he sees his shadow before scurrying back into his hole, winter will last six more weeks. But if the day is cloudy, spring will come early. Curiously, Phil is not alone. A couple of other creatures do the same job across the Atlantic – and in all instances, it is a sunny day that will herald an ironic extended winter. from Groundhog Day's European creature parallels - and surprising 3000-year-old origins [BBC]
posted to MetaFilter by chavenet at 1:13 AM on February 2, 2024 (23 comments)

I have an anxiety disorder that presents with a lot of arm and leg tremors. My therapist today asked me if I could touch my toes and I have never been able to touch my toes and he suggested that maybe I could find release from some of the tension I'm carrying in my body if I can find good stretching exercises. He offered no recommendations so I'm coming to you, dear hive mind! Do you know of stretching/flexibility exercises for someone with zero ability to do any of this that might release stored PTSD tension? Videos, classes/programs, reading... I'll take anything!
posted to Ask MetaFilter by hippybear at 4:03 PM on January 31, 2024 (31 comments)

"Yet the value of returning to the fantasy genre in later life cannot be understated. Mystical novels filled with world-building brilliance at once allow us to explore both the trials and tribulations of otherworldly creatures and of very human characters with preternatural destinies. In both cases, nevertheless, magic and mystery boil down to very simple universal truths and lessons. Indeed, it was Lewis Carroll in his beloved Alice in Wonderland who wrote, “Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it”."
posted to MetaFilter by cupcakeninja at 3:33 PM on January 31, 2024 (91 comments)

"I grew up in a highly controlled and religious family where women’s sexuality and freedom to express oneself was highly suppressed. As I matured and recognized how women were objectified, demonized, and dehumanized by my old religion and society I wanted to take these uncomfortable issues and channel them into an artistic dialogue. One of the significant ways I found my voice was through the body. Through this vessel I began by creating a world where feminine nudity and sexuality felt free, unashamed, celebrated, and powerful." [all links in this post NSFW]
posted to MetaFilter by cupcakeninja at 4:18 AM on February 1, 2024 (10 comments)

Tony Finch illustrates the steps needed to construct a four-point egg, and, as a bonus, offers an interactive egg.
posted to MetaFilter by Lirp at 10:51 PM on January 30, 2024 (16 comments)

“Generation Alpha can oftentimes challenge and refuse to accept the status quo, questioning rules and customs that may seem arbitrary or hypocritical” ... “The internet and social media have created a generation that can see anything at any moment, including social injustices and influencers who voice their opinions on anything and everything” ... "This can feel empowering and liberating to a child." [Parents.com / Axios]
posted to MetaFilter by chavenet at 6:39 AM on January 28, 2024 (34 comments)

RIP, David John Skal. The novelist, horror scholar, NPR interviewee, occasional movie writer and guest died at 71.
posted to MetaFilter by doctornemo at 10:40 AM on January 27, 2024 (7 comments)

Equal parts Murder Mystery Party, Escape Room, and Parlour LARP, Jubensha are the Chinese gaming experiences that you've probably never heard of. (NYT)
posted to MetaFilter by forbiddencabinet at 12:01 AM on January 28, 2024 (4 comments)

Way back in 1980, friends and fellow art school students James Gurney (previously) and Thomas Kincade (previously) hopped a freight train together, sketchbooks at the ready. Gurney has also posted audio about the trip, as well as a recent Substack post. The two published a now somewhat rare book on their journey that has not been reprinted [Archive]. As has been mentioned before on the blue, the two also collaborated on the 1983 film Fire & Ice, notable for its rotoscoping and the collaboration of Ralph Bakshi with Frank Frazetta.
posted to MetaFilter by cupcakeninja at 6:24 AM on January 28, 2024 (10 comments)

Presented in three parts -- Sincerely Yours: The Making Of "The Breakfast Club" [IMDb] Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, a lightly-edited [to get past YouTube's robots] examination of the ridiculously iconic 1985 film.
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 3:55 PM on January 27, 2024 (11 comments)

Random computer and mathematical animations by Etienne Jacob of bleuje.com.
posted to MetaFilter by AlSweigart at 5:24 PM on January 27, 2024 (8 comments)

In the US, Gallup data shows that after decades where the sexes were each spread roughly equally across liberal and conservative world views, women aged 18 to 30 are now 30 percentage points more liberal than their male contemporaries. That gap took just six years to open up. Germany also now shows a 30-point gap between increasingly conservative young men and progressive female contemporaries, and in the UK the gap is 25 points. from A new global gender divide is emerging [Financial Times; ungated]
posted to MetaFilter by chavenet at 5:56 PM on January 27, 2024 (137 comments)

It's that time of year again... the time I surface and look around with a sigh and a smile having spent 3 weeks immersed in the Best of 2023 lists from Headphone Commute. As resolutely restrained in its format and delivery (12 unranked lists, albums released in 2023 only, shared sporadically from the 1st January onwards) as it is particular in its choice of genre names, if you can get past the whimsical titles you'll find a treasure-trove of new pathways and inroads to stunning ambient / instrumental / experimental / electronic / modern-classical music.
posted to MetaFilter by protorp at 4:23 AM on January 21, 2024 (13 comments)

Vegemite is a thick, dark brown Australian food spread made from leftover brewers' yeast extract with various vegetable and spice additives. The New York Times says, "First concocted a century ago, the spread is widely adored by Australians — and loathed by almost everyone else" and reveals "The Corner Lot Where All the World’s Vegemite Comes From" (ungated & archive). Oh, and there's a song.
posted to MetaFilter by ShooBoo at 8:30 AM on January 27, 2024 (49 comments)

There is quite a bit at stake in entertaining the possibility of linguistic relativity – it impinges directly on our understanding of the nature of human language. A long-held assumption in Western philosophy, classically formulated in the work of Aristotle, maintains that words are mere labels we apply to existing ideas in order to share those ideas with others. But linguistic relativity makes language an active force in shaping our thoughts. Furthermore, if we permit fundamental variation between languages and their presumably entangled worldviews, we are confronted with difficult questions about the constitution of our common humanity. Could it be that there are unbridgeable gulfs in thinking and perception between groups of people speaking different languages? from Our language, our world
posted to MetaFilter by chavenet at 2:01 AM on January 27, 2024 (16 comments)

Michael Joseph's compelling portraits of America's young travellers
posted to MetaFilter by goo at 9:49 AM on January 26, 2024 (38 comments)

New research suggests that consciousness is a quantum wave that passes through the brain's microtubules. My humanities-steeped brain is having trouble parsing this, but it sounds like there's some work that suggests an outsider theory about how consciousness works, involving quantum superpositioning to find the most efficient energy transfer, has gotten some proof. And the study involves.. tryptophan? Isn't that the thing that makes you sleepy at Thanksgiving? I'm curious what the smart people here on MF think. Is this what the journalists at Popular Mechanics think it is?
posted to MetaFilter by heyitsgogi at 8:31 AM on January 26, 2024 (185 comments)

Alice Parker (Wikipedia), choral composer, arranger, conductor, and teacher, passed away on Christmas Eve 2023 at the age of 98.
posted to MetaFilter by rekrap at 1:50 PM on January 25, 2024 (10 comments)