@deirdresm@hachyderm.io cover
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

deirdresm

@deirdresm@hachyderm.io

Looking for my next thing: macOS, visionOS, iOS, watchOS, or tvOS, preferably in Swift.

ex-🍎 software engineer (employee: Safari team; contractor: Marcom video production). Previously, software engineer at: Be, TiVo, Synclavier.

Cats. Guitars. Basses. Synths. #nobridge

Current gaming focus Honkai: Star Rail

Travel is my drug of choice. (117 countries & counting.) Profile background: Bora Bora, 2014.

Pronouns: She/her, they/them, dude.

Location: Menlo Park. SFO. The World.

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. For a complete list of posts, browse on the original instance.

deirdresm , to random
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

This video (< 4 min) shows the most common first-trimester surgical procedure (D&C aspiration), in real time, with patient covered.

I recommend people watch it just to get a real sense of the (lack of) complexity of the procedure. It is obviously so much less than the pro-life side would have you believe.

For those who've had a pap smear, it's a bit worse, but not as bad as an endometrial biopsy. (I have had all 3.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1g09Y7YRaiU

hrefna , to random
@hrefna@hachyderm.io avatar

There's a chart going around either from or citing that "ranks" LGBTQ "safety grades" by state.

It's an object lesson in why the assumptions behind your data matter significantly and in how not to communicate data.

First red flag: there are no dates anywhere on it.

Second red flag: A large chunk of its data comes from hate crime reporting rates.

What is a hate crime and how often do things get filed as such matters significantly for these things.

This misleads.

deirdresm ,
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

@hrefna Thank you for this. I’ve been seeing it go around FB.

blogdiva , to random
@blogdiva@mastodon.social avatar

REMINDER: corporatism IS fascism. USA's political elites are controlled by unelected corporatist oligarchs for whom politics isn't about party or nation but business. checkout how the DNC wants to price out the little people from their fundraisers. this is literal corporate capture but with political parties because oligarchs only care about the state violence they can capture & profit from.

> How Biden aides are trying to shield the president from protests
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/joe-biden/biden-aides-shield-president-pro-palestinian-protests-rcna141251

deirdresm ,
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

@blogdiva As someone in a county that voted 78% for Biden and had 86% turnout, I’m not sure where to focus my efforts, because local-to-me isn’t a problem. I have a small family with no one in swing or red states.

Best I can do is try to extend my reach by amplifying others and contributing to tight races, particularly those with liberal to progressive candidates.

deirdresm ,
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

@inthehands @blogdiva

Great metric. Because of the potential crisis in secretaries of state, I’ve been focusing on those races, particularly in swing states.

I’ve also been looking at AG races as that affects a ton of people’s lives. A good AG/DA vs. a bad one can be a huge change in local justice, particularly in states with abortion restrictions.

rabia_elizabeth , to bookstodon group
@rabia_elizabeth@mefi.social avatar

Help me, Fediverse!

Around 2018, I read a popular (and excellent) book about cognition and many other things. It highlighted the insidious effects of GPS on the navigational capacity of the human brain.

It posited that human ability to navigate is so critical to our cognition that our gradual loss of that ability thanks to "helpful" technology could have untold effects.

Does this sound familiar to any of you bookworms?

@bookstodon

deirdresm ,
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

@rabia_elizabeth @bookstodon

The Glass Cage, perhaps?

https://www.nicholascarr.com/?page_id=18

mekkaokereke , to random
@mekkaokereke@hachyderm.io avatar

Again for people (racists), complaining about falling birth rates:

The birth rate for women over 40 is not falling. The birth rate for women over 30 is not falling.

What's happening, is girls 15 to 17 are having fewer babies. Kids are having fewer kids.

Also, this is an interesting way of saying that "Teen pregnancy is down, due to sex education and contraception."

In 1991 25% of 15 year olds gave birth before they turned 21. That's bad. Now it's 6%. That's better.

https://npr.org/2023/01/08/1147737247/teen-pregnancy-rates-have-declined-significantly

deirdresm ,
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

@deathkitten @Npars01 @mekkaokereke @Jennifer

I was over 30, never married (back then), and couldn't find someone to do sterilization until I'd had a second abortion. Because it was life threatening, my doc would do the tubal, but insurance wouldn't approve it.

So…never got one.

deirdresm , to random
@deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

This is the single best explanation (long!) I've read about why LLMs are a con. Great piece from @baldur.

https://softwarecrisis.dev/letters/llmentalist/

The intelligence illusion seems to be based on the same mechanism as that of a psychic’s con, often called cold reading. It looks like an accidental automation of the same basic tactic. By using validation statements, such as sentences that use the Forer effect, the chatbot and the psychic both give the impression of be- ing able to make extremely specific answers, but those answers are in fact statistically generic. The psychic uses these statements to give the impression of being able to read minds and hear the secrets of the dead. The chatbot gives the impression of an intelligence that is specifi- cally engaging with you and your work, but that impression is nothing more than a statistical trick.
ALT
  • Reply
    • + Npars01
    deirdresm , to random
    @deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

    Bullet point 1 is the funniest thing I’ve ever read about #ADHD. Also true.

    things my therapist told me about adhd that I didn't know before Disclaimer: I have verified very little of this. I'm also paraphrasing a lot. My therapist specialises in ADHD and treats nothing else, so I trust her, but feel free to provide rebuttals if you find evidence to the contrary, or sources if you know of them. 1. People without ADHD apparently only have a "few" interests, like for example are just into politics and rugby, as opposed to the rest of us who are into politics, rugby, needlepointing, jet skiing, bread baking, Formula 1 racing, ska, tubas, and Sailor Moon until we pick up learning Thai next week and discover modular synths. tbh I found this quite shocking. I cannot even imagine what that is like. No wonder they have so much time to do their laundry.
    ALT
  • Reply
    • + claudius
    randahl , (edited ) to random
    @randahl@mastodon.social avatar

    Which way of writing dollar amounts is more readable to you?

    deirdresm ,
    @deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

    @randahl I prefer “$5 USD” format, which keeps the common use of symbol then amount, but adds global context.

    ElleGray , to random
    @ElleGray@mstdn.social avatar

    shout out to all of us who learned to turn book pages stealthily and silently during reading-out-loud times because it was taking too long and not being able to read ahead was driving us crazy

    deirdresm ,
    @deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

    @ElleGray Extra shout out for those of us who got scoldy notes in report cards for “Reads other books in class.”

    GottaLaff , to random
    @GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

    May he go broke trying...

    Via MeidasTouch:

    Donald fired off a late night post in which he said he is "interviewing various law firms" to represent him in his appeal of the verdict, leaving many to wonder if Alina 's time on the case is over.

    deirdresm ,
    @deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

    @GottaLaff It would be unusual to have the same lawyer manage the appeal.

    GottaLaff , to random
    @GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

    Lol.

    Fact check: True.

    Via Acyn:

    McGovern slams and GOP: This guy’s been indicted more times than he’s been elected.

    deirdresm ,
    @deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

    @GottaLaff @solownh 91 is the best number, 13 x 7.

    GottaLaff , to random
    @GottaLaff@mastodon.social avatar

    E Jean's lawyers are simply awesome.

    👀 Via Klasfeld:

    News

    #EJeanCarroll's lead attorney threatened SANCTIONS against Trump lawyer Alina #Habba over her "utterly baseless" claim that a federal judge had an undisclosed conflict of interest. #legal #Trump

    Habba's conflict claim is based entirely on a single-anon source story in NY Post.

    Carroll's lawyer ques how the tabloid came to publish it & if the supposed partner at Paul Weiss — the firm where she and the judge both worked— "even exists."

    deirdresm ,
    @deirdresm@hachyderm.io avatar

    @GottaLaff @harryooman Hugs from me and Lily (kitty hugs are best hugs).

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