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Cake day: June 20th, 2023

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  • hotspurtoScience Memes@mander.xyzDisappointed
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    78 days ago

    Yeah this was my reaction a while back when I saw their promos about how they want to de-extinct wooly mammoths and dodos. Like ok neat, but where are the mammoths supposed to slot in, a rapidly warming arctic that will more likely have palm trees than ice by the end of the century?

    I mean I’m being a little obtuse here on purpose—these species choices are obviously guided by marketing potential. No one will pay attention if they resurrect some niche mouse that went extinct a couple years ago, so they’re picking stuff that looms large in pop consciousness.

    But in the end, it’s a private company, and I very much doubt their whole goal is to make money off of conservation societies and zoos to make extinct animals—far more likely it’s to refine and recreate new genetic editing procedures which will then get ported into making purpose-built animals for industry (think the sheep who’s milk has certain valuable enzymes or chemicals built in) or like human biotech (so, like, GATTACA).

    The “founder” gives off strong Palmer Luckey vibes. (This is based on visual aesthetic and his general demeanor vibes only, he could be a saint, I have no idea)






  • I doubt he cares whether you federate or defederate. He’s pointing out that OP is misrepresenting the interactions. If OP posted “I don’t like the opinions that hexbears tend to hold, and I think we should defederate” it wouldn’t be a problem—that’s stating a valid preference, and doesn’t involve defaming an entire community.

    Also, are you aware you can block instances and users? I’ve used that recently with the .world instance and its users, as .ml is federated with them, and while they post somewhat interesting articles, they are completely unpleasant to interact with in good faith—anything they don’t agree with means you’re a Russian propagandist and they threaten you with stupid flags and reports. The mods aren’t so bad, but I just got tired of forgetting what the instance was and finding out it was another person who has no intention discussing anything. My solution was to just… block the instance. They don’t want to interact with diverse opinions, and I don’t want to interact with them, win-win.

    It won’t keep Hexbear users out of your comment sections, but honestly good luck either way in that, as I’m guessing most people have multiple accounts depending on their interests. I was a Hexbear user first ages ago, but got this .ml account when I moved to lemmy proper during one of the many Reddit exodus waves a while back before Hexbear was federated.





  • I’d imagine for the same reasons that people study the past and try and understand how events unfold. People still mention the name Chamberlain when discussing the rise of the third reich for instance.

    When Snowden released his collection of files way back when, he made the argument that the panopticon that was being built wasn’t being used in the worst way at the time of his decision to whistleblow. But his point was that the construction of such tools could not be justified based on their eventual use by a worse form of American govt.

    When the liberal mainstream—and this includes Biden, major media, and most other center/center-left politicians and pundits over the last year and a half—presided over the framing of anti-semitism as the act of being critical of Israeli govt actions and supported that govt in a year long punishment campaign to destroy an ethnic group, they normalized the positions that are now being used to deport green card holders and leverage higher ed into submission. Free speech on this issue was fought over last year, and generally, the anti-free speech side won.

    It doesn’t necessarily mean they’re worse, or even equal in vileness to the current admin, but it is a point worth recognizing. Enshrining Trump, as horrid as he is, as an exception may be comforting, but it removes the broader narrative that brought our present about. If we don’t work to understand this sequence with clear eyed judgment, our resistance to it will likely fail.


  • “Scientist” as a general concept doesn’t have an inherent positive or negative value. Some scientists have invented things that saved lives or expanded our understanding of the universe. Others experimented on prisoners, or developed addicting drugs for big pharma. Personally I’d say scientists are more likely to resemble the first, not the second, but what defines the value is not the profession, but the actions they take as individuals.

    His comment appeared to describe the issues with approval of scientists as a baseline, when the capitalist system they’re trapped within has other incentives and agendas. It’s a point one can certainly disagree with, but it is a coherent argument.





  • Yeah seems totally plausible to me, I got to see elephants in the wild a few years back, and it left me with no doubt that they were extremely intelligent. Looking into their eyes felt like locking eyes with a fellow human, you just felt there was thinking sentient creature in there. And their behavior in certain situations is very relatable, saw a mother route her calves around a too-aggressive camera tourist car, and once she was sure the babies were safe on the other side, she came back and did what I could only believe was a huge “F YOU” trumpet at the offending car to let them know they were out of line, turned around and went back after the kids.