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derek

@ derek @infosec.pub

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112
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • Sugar compound from deep-sea bacteria revealed to cause cancer cells to explosively self destruct through pyroptosis

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  • Even if so... If this is as effective and safe as it seems then it will get leaked to the public or reversed engineered and then made public. The original paper's abstract says "this active exopolysaccharide is ubiquitous among the genus Spongiibacter" which means it's accessible.

    The repression of such a boon could not last long. History has proven the human spirit is nothing if not irrepressible. There are plenty of people capable and motivated enough to run what little information we already have all the way to a consistent home manufacturing solution. Its publication and distribution is another game entirely but I'd bet on the public there as well.

    Take a look at the Four Thieves Vinegar Collective for some tangible encouragement. Knowledge is power. Together we can be powerful enough to create what we need to survive. Government buy-in encouraged but optional.

  • shrooms

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  • Well, two, actually.

  • Wearing socks is a social construct

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  • NUH UH.

  • Wearing socks is a social construct

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  • Nuh uh. 😝

  • Wearing socks is a social construct

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  • Both examples are similar to anapodotons. They include an implicit thesis. Don't shoot yourself in the foot because bullets do way more damage than movies let on, your foot will likely never work right again, and even if it does you'll have endured months of easily avoidable pain and suffering. Don't jump off a cliff because you'll likely die and, even if you survive, you'll have to endure a lifetime of debilitation, pain, and suffering, that could have been easily avoided.

    These are also similar to thought-terminating cliches and tangentially related to mondegreens. Anapodotons can be insidious. Fluent speakers unfamiliar with the phrase can tell there's more to it and, since the general meaning can be implied through context, folks avoid the awkwardness of admitting their ignorance (something we should all be more comfortable with - but that's a separate discussion) and miss out on the nuance of some "common wisdom".

    A bit of common wisdom is that "common sense isn't common". These cultural and psychological quirks manifest in our languages are part of the reason why. Not shooting yourself is a great example because for most people this is an obviously stupid thing to do and, yet, hundreds of people accidentally kill themselves via negligent discharge every year and thousands more are maimed. How often do we believe "don't shoot yourself" is sufficient advice when, in reality, proper safety training is required to keep that person alive? How often do those hearing the common wisdom believe they know all they need for that cliche to work its magic?

    There's a lot of value in being aware of these linguistic traps and avoiding them when we think to do so. Like being the child that chooses to stop perpetuating generational trauma and abuse. We can choose better words, better phrases, and stop expecting that other people already know what we take for granted.

  • Fedora-based Minerals

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  • It isn't just one thing. The big money wants to present this unified front to the public like LLMs are a single commodity anyone can use. In reality they're a collection of complex tools that few can use " correctly" and whose utility is highly specialized for niches those few find valuable.

    So you're correct in a way. I'm sure model decoherence isn't helping much either and isn't as visible in those niche applications as it is for the general public.

  • US to withdraw from NATO under Republican bill

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  • Your comment makes no sense and helps no one.

  • Today's Supreme Court Decision on Age Verification Tramples Free Speech and Undermines Privacy

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  • The Tea Party was an astroturf'd campaign cooked up by the Koch brothers to realign conservative ideology with oligarchy under the guise of "originalist" patriotism. A very successful farce.

    Much like the "right to life", "Moral Majority" (which is a useful misnomer for Christian Conservative minority), and the rest of American Conservatism. Effective smoke and mirrors. All of it.

  • US to withdraw from NATO under Republican bill

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  • I keep seeing this sentiment and I don't understand it. Are you speaking purely out of anger and ignorance? The recent No Kings protest was either the third or first largest protest in the history of the U.S.A. and some communities have literally been running ICE gestapo out of their towns.

    The Christian Conservative minority have gridlocked the American government, silently stacked the judicial system in their favor, and partnered with the American oligarchy to bankroll fascists and create the most pervasive, effective, and enduring propaganda machines ever seen (that's already worked its way into Australia and had been finding footholds in Europe).

    The idea that Americans aren't doing anything about this or that there could ever possibly be a single unified movement that magically fixes "the issue" is incoherently reductive and impractical. If I see a comrade struggling for air I don't yell at them to just breathe. I help them remove the pig standing on their neck. What are YOU doing to lend a hand or show lost comrades that there's still hope?

  • Trump White House Considers Dropping Nukes on Iran

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  • What's your point and why do you think it matters in this context?

  • 700 Marines ordered to assist in Los Angeles

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  • YSK about the GI Rights Hotline

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  • All people are born ignorant to their material circumstances and the conditions necessary for them. Disadvantaged folk often have a more difficult path out of that ignorance. Maslow's hierarchy of needs provides some insight into why: one rarely has capacity for deep introspection when they've been deprived of basic needs.

    The US Military (among others) purposefully recruit more heavily in economically depressed areas. This has been true for decades. These two facts are correlated. Couple this with American Exceptionalist propaganda which created the myth and social elevation of the American Soldier as the ultimate freedom fighter / patriot and maybe you can sympathize with those who enlist.

    My point is not that individuals should be excused from being taken to task for their actions. Nor is it that all those who enlist are duped into it. It's this: people are rarely lost causes, are often unguided, and live unexamined lives. So when confronting anyone: their personal context matters. When I'm struggling to find empathy I look to Daryl Davis. When we encounter ignorance, hate, and bigotry, we are right to oppose it. Always. How we do so should be conditioned, and possibly tempered, by the fact that we ourselves are ignorant to the context of the neighbors assigned to oppress us.

    Do not dismiss out of hand the power of speaking to reason and empathy in the face of violence and hate. Take them to task with the intention of educating a lost comrade. We must defend ourselves when the need arises but, prior to that Rubicon, we ought to acknowledge that were it not for circumstances outside our control so too could we have remained ignorant and been persuaded toward hate.

    There is no more stalwart an ally than one who has been given the tools to free themselves from chains they were sold as armor.

  • HELP! How do I help educate my son about his body when I know nothing about boys?

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  • I'd like to tack on that this point can be used to highlight why this is so. It's a deep concept that can be explained simply and produces a lasting positive impact.

    Everyone has fantasies. Sometimes we want them to be realized. Most often: we don't. Many people carry internal shame because of their fantasies and some of those people have difficulty with intimacy because of it.

    Good sex with other people requires our investment in their comfort and pleasure. This can be emotionally complex and fulfilling to navigate. Masturbation is free of those complications but we often make up the difference via fantasy. This is normal and there's no need to confuse one space for the other. Masturbation and sex may fulfill similar basic needs on the surface but, in practice, they are very different exercises. It's normal for one's preferences to be different for each and for those preferences to shift over time.

    Don't worry about "normal". Focus on having a healthy, honest, and emotionally aware sex life instead.

  • This is how the censorship works in DeepSeek

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  • A collection of 150+ self-hosted alternatives to popular software

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  • Near as I understand it: years ago some dumb engineering decisions were made, acknowledged, and corrected. Is there some recent scandal I'm out of the loop on?

  • Email with own domain service but local?

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  • Sure! That's an SMTP Relay. A lot of folks jumped on the poopoo wagon. It's common wisdom in IT that you don't do your own email. There are good reasons for that, and you should know why that sentiment exists, however; if you're interested in running your own email: try it! Just don't put all of your eggs in one basket. Keep your third party service until you're quite sure you want to move it all in-house (after due diligence is satisfied and you've successfully completed at least a few months of testing and smtp reputation warming).

    Email isn't complex. It's tough to get right at scale, a pain in the ass if it breaks, and not running afoul of spam filtering can be a challenge. It rarely makes sense for even a small business to roll their own email solution. For an individual approaching this investigatively it can make sense so long as you're (a.) interested in learning about it, (b.) find the benefits outweigh the risks, and (c.) that the result is worth the ongoing investment (time and labor to set up, secure, update, maintain, etc).

    What'll get you in trouble regardless is being dependent on that in-house email but not making your solution robust enough to always fill its role. Say you host at home and your house burns down. How inconvenient is it that your self-hosted services burned with it? Can you recover quickly enough, while dealing with tragedy, that the loss of common utility doesn't make navigating your new reality much more difficult?

    That's why it rarely makes sense for businesses. Email has become an essential gateway to other tooling and processes. It facilitates an incredible amount of our professional interactions. How many of your bills and bank statements and other important communication are delivered primarily by email? An unreliable email service is intolerable.

    If you're going to do it make sure you're doing it right, respecting your future self's reliance on what present-you builds, and taking it slow while you learn (and document!) how all the pieces fit together. If you can check all of those boxes with a smile then good luck and godspeed says I.

  • Checking in

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  • Checking in

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  • Stolen shamelessly from someone else who posted it further up the thread.

  • ‘Fatal mistake’: Democrats blame DOJ as Trump escapes accountability for Jan. 6

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  • You've fundamentally misunderstood this. Upholding Constitutional law cannot undermine the democratic process which it establishes.

    If I win a game by breaking its rules I am de-facto disqualified from that victory. Yes, all law is written by people, can be unmade by people, and is only in effect so long as we collectively agree to enforce it, however; if the law is not unmade and if we collectively sigh in apathy at its violation then we are no longer playing the game the rules have defined.

    This is the immense danger of the current Constitutional crisis. If there is no enforcement of the rules set forth in a government's founding document then it can no longer be recognized as the body which that document defines.