THOMPSON, blog. Marvel at the mental contortions of our self-imagined betters.

Ephemera

Friday Ephemera (729)

July 12, 2024 202 Comments

It’s all about a heightened awareness of the road. || Welding helmet of note. || Massage, drumming, and fire, together at last. || Skillz. || Not skillz. || I have concerns. || Assisting the encore, or lady not left hanging. || Surprisingly calm, considering. || Some clutter, toilet needs attention, £80,000. || I’m told it can get competitive. || Parenting. || Night vision. || New Doctor Who monster detected. || Scenes of duck up-picking. || And in pub-purchasing news. || The progressive retail experience, parts 566, 567, and 568. || Airbending attempted. || At last, the statistics of simultaneous blinking. || A little kicking required, methinks. || Incoming. || Incoming 2. || Lost flock of sheep found. || He had four hamsters in his pants, not gerbils, as stated. || And finally, fear not, he has jugs and jugs of it.

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Reading time: 1 min

Written by: David

Basking

Their Teats Were Swollen With Human Kindness

July 7, 2024 227 Comments

And that’s a good thing. Because it’s time to remind patrons that this rickety barge is kept afloat by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to help it remain buoyant a while longer, and remain ad-free, there are three buttons below the fold with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted. If what happens here is of value, this is a chance to show it.

If one-click haste is called for, there’s a QR code in the sidebar, at which you point your phone, and my PayPal.Me page can be found here. As requested, I’ve added SubscribeStar and Ko-Fi accounts, via which love may also be monetised, whether as one-off donations or monthly subscriptions.

Additionally, any Amazon UK shopping done via this link, or via the button in the sidebar, results in a small fee for your host at no extra cost to you. Feel free to buy things wildly and in bulk.

For newcomers wishing to know more about what’s been going on here for the last seventeen years, in over 3,000 posts and 200,000 comments, the reheated series is a pretty good place to start – in particular, the end-of-year summaries, which convey the fullest flavour of what it is we do. A sort of blog concentrate. If you like what you find there… well, there’s lots more of that.

Do take a moment to poke through the discussion threads too. The posts are intended as starting points, not full stops, and the comments are where much of the good stuff is waiting to be found. And do please join in.

As always, thanks for the support, the comments, and the company.

By all means consider this an open thread.

Oh yes. The buttons:

Reading time: 1 min

Written by: David

Ephemera

Friday Ephemera (728)

July 5, 2024 116 Comments

Strange goings-on at number 40. || New fashion frontier. || They make more noise than I expected. || An archive of Amazing Stories, 1926-2005. || Third keeper of the TARDIS. || Cheeeldren of the night. || Now do the ceiling. || Incoming. || Not eggs. || How to announce your lack of worth. || “World famous dinosaur poop museum and gift shop.” And yes, they do have fossilised T. rex faeces. || A dog, a cat, and a mouse. || Think good thoughts. || Glamorous assistant. || Beermats and bonding. || Generate polyhedra. || The progressive retail experience, parts 561, 562, 563, 564, and 565. || Reefer buzz. || Suboptimal situation. || A Thomas Sowell playlist. || Today’s word is steep. || A brief history of urology, from 3,200 BC to the present day. || And a small but bothersome detail.

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Reading time: 1 min

Written by: David

Reheated

Reheated (95)

July 3, 2024 58 Comments

For newcomers, some items from the archives. Again, with a theme of sorts.

You Will Pretend It Has Great Value.

At Montreal’s Concordia University, even light is being “decolonised.”

Apparently, “all physicists and other scientists” should divert time and effort from their actual work, the important stuff, the thing that pays the bills, in order to become familiar with indigenous “bodies of knowledge.” Presumably, on grounds that one simply can’t do physics or astronomy without a detailed knowledge of magical talking beavers and rival chiefs stealing the Moon.

The assembled scholars boast that they are “not seeking to improve scientific ‘truth’” and that the purpose of their intellectual toil is “not to find new or better explanations of light.” As if such gifts were theirs to give, or a remotely plausible outcome. Instead, they are vexed by the “social power relations” of scientific enquiry, its objectivity and usefulness, and the fact that the quantifiable and demonstrable tends to trump mythology and the adorable ramblings of one’s Very Indigenous Grandpa.

In Space No-One Can Hear You Scream.

“Decolonising” the search for extra-terrestrial life. Or, the managed decline of Scientific American.

After some pre-emptive disapproval of the “colonial” violation of hypothetical microbes, whose autonomy and wellbeing would apparently be desecrated by human curiosity, we’re told that “making SETI more diverse” – i.e., giving influence and authority, and a salary, to people with no relevant skills – is a matter of great importance. “There’s really no downside,” says Ms Charbonneau.

The upside, however – i.e., the premise of the whole 2,300-word article – is, to say the least, a tad vague. Apparently, hiring Iroquois or Pawnee people, or Australian Aboriginals, or whoever is deemed sufficiently brown and therefore magical, would result in “the expansion of our pool of what civilisations might look like.” “It just makes sense,” says she.

Readers unschooled in intersectional woo may be puzzled as to why those chosen as suitably indigenous and put-upon would have much to add to the doing of modern astronomy and space exploration. A pivotal role in any success seems unlikely. Readers may also wonder why those who can construct orbital telescopes and land robots on distant planets should defer in matters of science to those who can’t.

Those Aboriginal Telescopes.

On tongue-bathing the primitive.

It’s hard to miss the pretension around this “ancient wisdom,” the patronising dishonesty, and the implication that the rest of us are expected to pretend too. But the definition of astronomy – a branch of science that uses mathematics, physics and chemistry to study and explain celestial objects – is being stretched in order to flatter primitive mythology with zero scientific content beyond a very rudimentary calendar.

I’m not sure what’s achieved by gushing over the fact that what we now know as the constellation of Orion was referred to as a canoe by an arrested Stone Age foraging culture. A culture that, despite tens of thousands of years of purported “astronomy,” had bugger all to show for it. While Galileo Galilei was calculating the heights of lunar mountains and discovering the moons of Jupiter, our Aboriginal “astronomers” had little to say on the subject.

And while Angelo Secchi was pioneering astronomical spectroscopy – and proving that the blinding disc in the midday sky must be the same kind of object as those twinkling specks seen at night, only much, much closer – and pondering what follows from that realisation – our Aboriginal “astronomers” were still banging on about sky emus.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

Reading time: 3 min

Written by: David

Academia Free-For-All

Between The Thighs

July 1, 2024 136 Comments

Speaking, as we were, of Clown Quarter academics and their relentless intellectual thrusting, I bring you this:

A PhD researcher is “investigating pole dancers’ digital media practices,” with funding from the taxpayer, the Telegraph can reveal.

“Digital media practices” sounds so much more scholarly than, say, tarts who use OnlyFans. Oh, and Instagram. Naturally, this is being done “through an intersectional feminist framework.” One that “centres lived experience.” So lofty stuff, and rigorous to boot.

The researcher behind this colossal undertaking informs us,

“As someone who frequently practices pole dancing for recreational purposes and also has some experience of online sex work…

Quiet at the back. Don’t make me flick the lights on and off.

…I am committed to respecting the origins of pole dancing as a practice that was created by strippers, and supporting all sex workers, who face significant inequalities within the UK (and beyond).”

As I said, all terribly high-minded. Political, even.

Should any doubt remain,

A spokesman from the University of Lancaster said: “As a leading research-intensive university, we stand by the value of the contribution of arts and humanities to society.”

And as we’ve seen, many times, the Clown Quarter is driven purely by academic enquiry, a ceaseless thirst for knowledge.

Update:

In the comments, Twin Cities Teegan asks, not unreasonably,

Was there a hypothesis to test? Don’t research papers typically have a direction or theory that they are testing? That the information being gathered presumably will be used to create datasets which will then in turn be used to make conclusions about… something?

Alas, such details, should they exist, are now hidden from view. We are, however, assured,

The project recognises the labour often involved in creating / engaging with pole content and is therefore designed to provide accessible ways for pole dancers to participate that require minimal amounts of time and additional uncompensated labour from participants.

At risk of being presumptuous, it occurs to me that this theme of minimised intellectual labour may apply more generally. A suspicion not shaken by our scholar’s claims of “challenging patriarchal systems” by sharing nude photos on Instagram. Or by her public ruminations on such topics as “The Gendered Politics of Body Hair,” a feat of rote regurgitation and colossal self-involvement, in which we learn of the crushing oppressions of leg-waxing and eyebrow maintenance.

Readers who wish to probe further into the bush can find our scholar’s inexpert twerking here.

Reading time: 2 min

Written by: David