unpretty

In the two-page handout, Agar instructs firearms analysts on how to circumvent judges’ restrictions on unscientific testimony. He even suggests dialogue for prosecutors and analysts to recite if challenged. Most controversially, Agar advises analysts to tell judges that any effort to restrict their testimony to claims backed by scientific research is tantamount to asking them to commit perjury.

zenosanalytic

#original#lmfao is there ANY 'pattern matching' forensics that isn't bullshit (via @unpretty)

NOPE XD

I’d really encourage everyone to read this article, Balko’s been working this beat for nearly 20 years now and he not only really knows his stuff but is also a concise and punchy writer, but there’s one sentence I think EVERYONE should see, whether they read it or not. To Wit:

One review found FBI analysts had made statements unsupported by science in 95 percent of the cases in which they testified.

95% OF PAST FBI FORENSIC TESTIMONY WAS BASELESS! How many innocent people imprisoned, how many lives wrecked, how many family destroyed, by that gigantic steaming pile of false testimony? If US pols cared about justice they’d be calling for, at least!, every case which FBI testimony played a role in being reviews to make sure it wasn’t unverifiable or simply made up.

rubyvroom

I Cut the 'Big Five' Tech Giants From My Life. It Was Hell

Week 6: Blocking them all

Kashmir Hill

https://gizmodo.com/i-cut-the-big-five-tech-giants-from-my-life-it-was-hel-1831304194

Writer tries to use the internet without relying on Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, or Apple. Writer struggles. A lot. Not because she can’t stop googling things, but because Google is integrated with everything, and anything it isn’t is hooked into is partnered with at least one of the other four. 

For an example, she details the long process of figuring out how to send a large file without relying on the Google iCloud or Amazon Web Services:

My Gmail alternatives—ProtonMail and Riseup—tell me the file is too large; they tap out at 25 MB. Google Drive and Dropbox aren’t options, Dropbox because it’s hosted by Amazon’s AWS and relies on Google for sign-in. Other file-sharing sites also rely on the tech giants for web hosting services.

…O’Brien directs me first to Send.Firefox.com, an encrypted file-sharing service operated by Mozilla. But… it uses the Google Cloud, so it won’t load. O’Brien then sends me to Share.Riseup.net, a file-sharing service from the same radical tech collective that is hosting my personal email, but it only works for files up to 50 MB.

O’Brien’s last suggestion is Onionshare, a tool for sharing files privately via the “dark web,” i.e. the part of the web that’s not crawled by Google and requires the Tor browser to get to. I know this one actually. My friend Micah Lee, a technologist for the Intercept, made it. Unfortunately, when I go to Onionshare.org to download it, the website won’t load. 

“Hah, yes,” emails Micah when I ask about it. “Right now it’s hosted by AWS.”

The troubling implications of tech monopolies on our private data are discussed, as well as potential solutions that don’t sound very appealing at all:

An uncomfortable idea I keep coming up against this week is that, if we want to get away from monopolies and surveillance economies, we might need to rethink the assumption that everything on the internet should be free.

So when I try to create a fourth folder in ProtonMail to organize my email and it tells me that I need to upgrade from a free to a premium account to do so, I decide to fork over 48 euros (about $50) for the year. In return, I get a 5 GB email account that doesn’t have its contents scanned and monetized.

However, I’m well aware that not everyone has $50 dollars to spare for something that they can easily get for “free,” so if that’s the way things go, the rich will have privacy online and the poor (and most vulnerable) will have their data exploited.

weatherman667

Snail mailing a CD-R has a higher throughput than dial-up.

Not joking or being sarcastic, as snail-mail file sharing still has lots of advantages.

thrown-away-opinions

Detransitioner: ‘I’m suing the doctors who removed my healthy breasts’

https://archive.ph/btnyx

The headline on this one doesn’t actually do the story justice. Quick Rundown goes like this:

>Girl has severe anxiety and unresolved issues from some stuff that happened in childhood >Decides to dress more androgynously because her Dad gave her some bad advice >years later, she minors in Gender Studies at college >decides she’s a non-binary she/they >also she’s been formally diagnosed with anxiety disorder, social anxiety, PTSD, major depressive disorder and ADHD at this point >Pandemic happens and mental health gets worse >figures it must be gender issue >gets referred to a major Gender Clinic in Oregon >two zoom calls over a 3 month period and they agree it’s definitely gender issues and not her already established mental health problems >one more month later and she gets a full double mastectomy because every doctor and expert in her support network decided that her boobs were the cause of all her mental issues >complications follow and every doctor who did support her suddenly doesn’t fucking care >also the double mastectomy did not actually help at all and made her feel worse >took months more of seeking actual help for her mental health to realize all of that was a bad idea and that she was being manipulated into it instead of being guided towards addressing her actual problems. >now she’s suing the various therapists and experts who fast tracked her towards a pointless surgery

Saw a lot of people misinterpret this as “healthy 30 year old agreed to mastectomy and now she’s angry, but that really glosses over the numerous doctors, therapists, specialists, and other authority figures that saw this girl with a list of obvious mental health issues and told her that it was totally her vague gender-y feelings that she needed to address through pointless surgery. 

Yeah, she was an adult. She was also under severe mental duress thanks to pre-existing mental illness made far worse by the 2020 pandemic, which we knew then and now clearly know caused a massive, colossal mental health crisis that drastically worsened the condition of countless people. On top of that, she was conditioned to believe that her problems were firmly oriented around her gender identity, so she went to a gender clinic, where everyone working there is firmly of the belief that all gender problems can be solved with more pills and surgery.

Trying to frame this as purely an informed consent issue is ignoring how aggressive and pervasive this shit is. If there’s even the smallest suggestion of gender identity issues, there is a whole parade of doctors and therapists ready to force the idea that “gender affirming care” is the cure all to someone’s problems. 

toradora-is-overrated

Fact is, this is the new cash cow for big pharma. Take people with issues already or kids or kids with issues already. Get them hooked on a life long amount of surgery and or medication or both. Profit. 

Also reminds me it isn’t just kids and young adults dealing with this. It’s the mentally vulnerable too. This is disgusting and as much as I DON’T want the fed to have more power, 100% pass laws to prevent this, or make it so we start taking away credentials from doctors of all kinds that fast track this crap. Also as it happens. The “Bastions” of social healthcare. Sweden and Denmark, both stopped gender affirming care after a few years because they realized it made things worse more often than not. Sadly certain types don’t actually care. Help the smallest group of people even at the detriment of the many. So long as 1 actual trans person lives it’s fine if a thousand non trans or cis people kill themselves right?

rametarin

Not even limited to Big Pharma. It’s also big ideological.

Keep reading

retardworld

WEF Declares People Have No Right To Own Their Own Cars: 'You Can Walk or Share' - News Punch

Governments must "price people out of the market"

https://newspunch.com/wef-declares-people-have-no-right-to-own-their-own-cars-you-can-walk-or-share/

Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum has declared that people have no right to own their own car and can instead “walk or share.” According to the WEF, far too many people own their own vehicles and this situation must be corrected by pricing them out of the market.

Thousands of private jets fly into Davos each year for the WEF’s annual summit, but according to Klaus Schwab ordinary people should not own their own car.

In a paper published by the WEF, the Davos elites claim that communal sharing of cars must become part of a “circular approach” in order to reduce global demands for precious metals and fossil fuels.

The global elites in Geneva, Switzerland, are now instructing their Young Global Leaders embedded in governments around the world that far too many people own private vehicles and they must be priced out of the market with massive gas price hikes.

Citing the fact that “the average car or van in England is driven just 4% of the time,” the WEF claims this means people in developed countries including the United States should not have the right to own their own car. People should sell their car and walk or share because “Car sharing platforms such as Getaround and BlueSG have already seized that opportunity to offer vehicles where you pay per hour used.”

And it’s not just cars.

Keep reading

superdriver321

Normalize shooting members of the WEF in the face.

marquisdesadesalad

WEP members should be treated the same way Federal inmates treat child rapists. No exceptions. You absolutely know what you’re imposing on the world.

commiecancer

The members WEF have zero right to breathe oxygen and waste it by speaking. Time to start a worldwide killing fields of the elitists, whoever they are, think they are or live.

rametarin

Yeah I felt this was going to happen.

Don’t trust anyone that whoops up public transportation as the singular source of transportation and that has no respect for personal automotive devices or personal autonomy of vehicles. Ever. They will not be happy until you’re limited to using trolleys, busses or trains and have no choice but to use their paths or go nowhere at all.

throwitonthepile

public transportation is cheaper, better for the environment, faster, and more convenient!

it’s also an extremely easy way to keep a city’s worth of people unable to leave and creates a de facto captive population!

With a new design, lithium-sulfur batteries could reach their full potential.

Batteries are everywhere in daily life, from cell phones and smart watches to the increasing number of electric vehicles. Most of these devices use well-known batteries">lithium-ion battery technology. And while lithium-ion batteries have come a long way since they were first introduced, they have some familiar drawbacks as well, such as short lifetimes, overheating and supply chain challenges for certain raw materials.

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory are researching solutions to these issues by testing new materials in battery construction. One such material is sulfur. Sulfur is extremely abundant and cost effective and can hold more energy than traditional ion-based batteries.

In a new study, researchers advanced sulfur-based battery research by creating a layer within the battery that adds energy storage capacity while nearly eliminating a traditional problem with sulfur batteries that caused corrosion.

Read more.

nomosshere

MSNBC: Releasing January 6 Capitol Footage Is 'Dangerous'

MSNBC hack Nicole Wallace and former Democrat Rep. Elaine Luria explain the pitfalls of McCarthy's

https://href.li/?https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/benbartee/2023/01/15/msnbc-releasing-january-6-capitol-footage-is-dangerous-n1661938

Dangerous to the democrat narrative.

theconstitutionisgayculture

If MSNBC is against it there's a great chance that it's going to be good for America.

An Update on the Open Game License (OGL)

Although we are not yet able to release the OGL at this time, we would like to update you on how things are developing, and the goals we have in mind fo...

https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1423-an-update-on-the-open-game-license-ogl

(Check the link for the post itself! Here’s a screenshot of the same content available in the page, though)

Wizards of the Coast has finally made an official statement about the new OGL, and as expected, it’s an attempt to douse the fire with sweet corpo speak. So, here’s some key points about it, so we don’t forget what actually happened.

Also, here’s some segments I want to highlight, just to show how thoroughly filled with horseshit they are:

And third, we wanted to ensure that the OGL is for the content creator, the homebrewer, the aspiring designer, our players, and the community—not major corporations to use for their own commercial and promotional purpose.

This one is probably a jab at Paizo, but they certainly didn’t care about all the third parties affected by this. The “aspiring designer”, the “homebrewer”, the “content creator” are all people who probably have a foot in the industry and are working with smaller TTRPG companies, or third parties. Most third parties have a very limited number of employees (or quite literally consist of just one person), and hire freelancers as needed. These were quite literally the most hurt by this new OGL. Let’s not forget they were content trying to put an end to that.

It also will not include the license back provision that some people were afraid was a means for us to steal work. That thought never crossed our minds. Under any new OGL, you will own the content you create. We won’t. Any language we put down will be crystal clear and unequivocal on that point. The license back language was intended to protect us and our partners from creators who incorrectly allege that we steal their work simply because of coincidental similarities.

They made a section in the OGL that allowed them to steal content. Of course, they are claiming that is not true now, as it would give them a bad image. And yet, they have the nerve to claim they are just defending themselves when they release copied content.

Finally, we’d appreciate the chance to make this right. We love D&D’s devoted players and the creators who take them on so many incredible adventures. We won’t let you down.

This is obviously that sweet corpo speak that ties everything together. They never wanted to make this right: Again, the leaked full OGL was never a draft. They were ready to fuck the entire community over (and still are, most probably) over a greedy cash grab. Do noT forget, and do not relent now: The fight is not over.

We don’t need a “compromise” over the new OGL. I wouldn’t care if they applied this new OGL exclusively to OneDnD, but there is still a lot of people who have built a living operating under 5e’s OGL, and they should NOT be taking that from people. 

(As always, reblog for awareness!)

southerngentry

Biden Center at UPenn Received $54.6M from Anonymous Chinese Donations

At least $54M was donated by Chinese individuals or entities between 2014-2019 to the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.

Wendell Husebø

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/01/10/biden-center-upenn-received-54-6m-anonymous-chinese-donations/

Was Joe Biden engaging in acts of espionage at his office in the Biden Center at UPenn?  Why did he unlawfully have classified documents in his office at the Biden Center?  Unlike President Trump allegedly holding classified docs at his residence, whom had full declassification  authority.  Joe Biden did not have declassification authority, therefore, his indiscretion is indeed, a federal crime whether intentional or negligence.

the-davest-of-uncles

It’s okay; the law doesn’t apply to Democrats. Just ask ‘em.

nomosshere

Biden aides find second batch of classified documents at new location

On Monday, the White House acknowledged a "small number" of classified documents had been found in an office Biden used.

https://href.li/?https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/biden-aides-find-second-batch-classified-documents-new-location-rcna65371

More Biden classified documents found in yet another location. Where you ask? Fuck off peasant! His handlers are still working on the cover story.

celestial-naiad

I'm losing my mind over this because I just imagine Sleepy Joe absent mindedly leaving documents scattered through out all the places he frequents like little collectibles for us to find in an rpg.

beardedmrbean

Can we just look at the date on this for the first batch.

Just so that it's abundantly clear that there is zero possibility that he was anything other than a private citizen when the office was leased, meaning he had taken those documents at some point prior to January 20, 2017 and had them in his possession for a minimum of 1 year before they wound up in his office that was leased in February of 2018.

Documents that even when he was vice president he did not have the authority do declassify.

So how long till barry pops in and says he declassified those and gave them to joey and just forgot to mention it to anyone?

deadletterpoets

Seriously, did nobody read Hill's Outsiders run? All that Cass/Shiva work he put in and it's being forgotten and retconned for Batgirls? And SHIVA DID NOT RAISE CASSANDRA! God I hate this series, but whatever

A Major Bat-Family Antagonist is Finally on the Road to Redemption

Lady Shiva's interactions with the Batgirls may suggest she secretly wants to redeem herself to be with her daughter.

https://href.li/?https://www.cbr.com/lady-shiva-redemption-batgirls-dc/

judgeanon

Oooooh I don’t like that. I don’t like that. Even the headline is giving me psychic damage. “Major Bat-Family Antagonist”? When, in ONE arc of Detective Comics? And redemption? That’s not what Shiva needs. That’s not what she’s ever needed.

Anyway, yeah, it’s very upsetting that folks are genuinely writing stuff like this:

When this happened just a bit over two years ago:

And mind you, it’s not just Batgirls that’s glossing over it. Urban Legends’ new Birds of Prey story did it too. It’s a real kick in the nuts, not just because they’re completely overlooking all the excellent progress Hill did, but also that they’re throwing it away for nothing. They’re not making an actual Cass/Shiva story out of it, they’re just tearing down the foundations to put new, worse foundations and then leave the house unbuilt. That’s the part that really pisses me off.

rametarin

>They’re not making an actual Cass/Shiva story out of it, they’re just tearing down the foundations to put new, worse foundations and then leave the house unbuilt

Described, in a nutshell, what’s wrong with a lot of supposed ‘creatives’ these days, and what and how they’re trying to ‘improve’ franchises, stories and characters. Just, demolishing the good stuff and paving over it to pretend it doesn’t exist, then replacing it and acting like it’s a revolutionary action.

throwitonthepile

it’s actually really impressive how hollywood went to find fanfic writers for new and interesting plots, but every one they hired wrote bad fanfiction.

“Out Of Control”: Dozens of Telehealth Startups Sent Sensitive Health Information to Big Tech Companies – The Markup

An investigation by The Markup and STAT found 49 out of 50 telehealth websites sharing health data via Big Tech’s tracking tools

https://href.li/?https://themarkup.org/privacy/2022/12/13/out-of-control-dozens-of-telehealth-startups-sent-sensitive-health-information-to-big-tech-companies

In October and November, STAT and The Markup signed up for accounts and completed onboarding forms on 50 telehealth sites using a fictional identity with dummy email and social media accounts. To determine what data was being shared by the telehealth sites as we completed their forms, we examined the network traffic between trackers using Chrome DevTools, a tool built into Google’s Chrome browser.

On WorkIt’s site, for example, we found that a piece of code Meta calls a pixel sent our responses about self-harm, drug and alcohol use, and our personal information—including first name, email address, and phone number—to Facebook.

reasonsforhope

20,000 Pounds of Trash Removed From Pacific Garbage Patch: ‘Holy mother of god. It worked!’

The man who won't rest until the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is cleaned up has successfully tested his system for doing so.

Andy Corbley

https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/20000-pounds-of-trash-removed-from-pacific-garbage-patch/

““The Great Pacific Garbage Patch can now be cleaned,” announced Dutch entrepreneur Boyan Slat, the wonderkid inventor who’s spent a decade inventing systems for waterborne litter collection.

Recent tests on his Ocean Cleanup rig called System 002, invented to tackle the 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic pollution, were a success, leading Slat to predict that most of the oceanic garbage patches could be removed by 2040.

Intersections of ocean currents have created the massive floating islands of plastic trash—five slow-moving whirlpools that pull litter from thousands of miles away into a single radius.

The largest one sits between California and Hawaii, and 27-year-old Slat has been designing and testing his systems out there, launching from San Francisco since 2013.

GNN has reported on his original design for the floating device, but his engineering team improved upon it. System 002, nicknamed “Jenny,” successfully netted 9,000 kilograms, or around 20,000 pounds in its first trial.

It’s carbon-neutral, able to capture microplastics as small as 1 millimeter in diameter, and was designed to pose absolutely no threat to wildlife thanks to its wide capture area, slow motion, alerts, and camera monitors that allow operators to spy any overly-curious marine life…

Slat estimates ten Jennies could clean half the garbage patch in five years, and if 10 Jennies were deployed to the five major ocean gyres, then 90% of all floating plastic could be removed by 2040.” -via Good News Network, 10/19/21

disgruntled-foreign-patriarch

Oh that’s awesome!

oligopspispopd-deactivated20221

The Inside Story of Reddit's Redesign

Goodbye, dystopian Craigslist. There's a new Reddit, and it's all grown up.

https://www.wired.com/story/reddit-redesign/

still impressed by all the effort reddit put into making their site worse

loving-n0t-heyting

“It used to be that anyone could go on Reddit and do or say anything. But now it’s finally moving past this immature parochialism to become a site for everyone”

I would like to sue every takefluencer involved in making this now common line of thinking make sense to me for 500k$ each

comicsansstein

It still seems bizarre to me that SRS, a hostile outside community that everyone hated back in 2012, won. The main subreddits are now about as much sj-aligned and ban-happy as the invaders from Something Awful wanted them to be.

throwitonthepile

people used to be able to speak their minds, now they have to be polite and lie

geek-ramblings

John Oliver Just Found A 'F**king Creepy' But Legal Way To Blackmail Lawmakers

The "Last Week Tonight" host suggested he has some really weird dirt about certain members of Congress.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/john-oliver-data-brokers_n_6253db8ae4b066ecde08a5f8

Dude this is so f*cking briliant.  To basically get Congress to realize how f*cked up data privacy laws are. He did data mining, targeted men over 45 that are within 5 miles of the US capital, and put ads out including “do you want to read Ted Cruise fanfiction”. it looks like 100s clicked it including 3 that seemed to be in the capital building while doing so, which then means he has their device info, ip address etc. which he can then mine even more. 

wisteria-wolf

How can you mention the ted cruz ad and not include what the ad they clicked on looks like? Anyways, here it is:

zz9pzza

https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Ted%20Cruz/works

shinelikethunder

“If you’re thinking, ‘How on Earth is any of this legal?’ I totally agree with you. It shouldn’t be,” he said. “And if you happen to be a legislator who is feeling a little nervous right now about whether your information is in this envelope, and if you’re terrified about what I might do with it, you might want to channel that worry into making sure that I can’t do anything.” Then, he cheerfully concluded: “Anyway, sleep well!”

psiotechniqa

hehe

cyan-opinions

Thats the most based that man has ever been

An international research group is building a case for more sustainable concrete by replacing synthetic reinforcement materials with natural fibres and materials from difference waste streams.

The latest Flinders University-led study, with experts from the US and Turkey, demonstrates how geopolymers reinforced with renewable natural fibres and made with industrial by-products and waste-based sands from lead smelting or glass-making can match the strength, durability and drying shrinkage qualities of those containing natural sand, which in turn consumes more raw resources and generates extra emissions in its processing.

Conventional concrete is the most widely used construction material, with 25 billion tonnes used every year. It consumes about 30% of non-renewable natural resources, emitting about 8% of atmospheric greenhouse gases and comprising up to 50% of landfill.

Lead researcher, Flinders University civil and structural engineering researcher Dr Aliakbar Gholampour, says the promising findings have significant potential for the use of natural fibres in the development of structural-grade construction materials, in which binder and aggregate are replaced by industrial by-products and waste-based materials.

Read more.

The City College of New York Grove School of Engineering today released a new report which examined advanced recycling. The report concluded that advanced recycling helps avoid climate impacts, reduces demand for energy resources, and offers key tools for expanding the circular economy. The report was authored by Dr. Marco J. Castaldi, professor of chemical engineering and director of CCNY’s Earth Engineering Center (EEC), and EEC research associate Lauren Creadore.

The authors examined 13 recently completed life cycle assessments (LCAs) and found that advanced recycling can transform hard-to-recycle plastics into products with a smaller carbon footprint than those made from new resources. The processes also reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions compared to conventional end of life methods, such as landfilling and waste-to-energy. Use of advanced recycling contributed to circularity for plastics in all 13 LCAs.

Specifically, the report found that advanced recycling technologies can:

Produce plastic and chemical products with a reduced global warming potential compared to products made from virgin resources.

Reduce the need for fossil energy resources by up to 97% compared to landfilling.

Reduce CO2 equivalent emissions by more than 100% compared to typical end-of-life processes when accounting for displaced demand for chemical products and energy.

Read more.

association-of-freed-people

Majority of Americans back new stimulus checks to combat inflation

About two-thirds of Americans said the federal government should send out stimulus payments, according to a poll conducted exclusively for N

https://href.li/?https://www.newsweek.com/majority-americans-back-stimulus-checks-inflation-poll-1755636

I think they conduct these polls as a stupidity check. They need to make sure enough people are dumb.

kalashni-cola

NPC: free money

forknightshonor

Basically low education taught people

"Give me other people's money now"

uncle-jingo

About two thirds of Americans diagnosed as clinically stupid, film at eleven.

lost-in-the-funhouse1971

Wtf?! Idiots!

transphobegk

actually the money is theirs. the money they'd get from stimulus is less than what the government stole from them in taxes so i don't see a problem with giving them back some of the money that was coerced from them in the first place. if you're really worried about the federal coffers i'm sure they can make up the difference by not wasting tax payer money on corporate welfare

robin-hood-for-freedom

So why not just stop stealing their money to begin with?

siryouarebeingmocked

It's interesting how these folks never seem to consider that, isn't it?

beardedmrbean

They do, but they also know that's not really something that's going to happen. Two things that are sure in life and all.

the-davest-of-uncles

Mr. Assistant Principal Dumbass, the only people impressed that you protected criminals from cops are other criminals.

And they’re going to come to your school and kill the kids you’re responsible for.

theconstitutionisgayculture

School officials have officially joined journalists, lawyers and politicians as subhuman scum.

emmaubler

Not only did the vice principal let armed teens into his school because “I thought they weren’t safe with the police out there,” the school board actually backed his call, saying he did what he thought was best because they were just let into the lobby.  Let it be known to the parents of the Cleveland Metropolitan School System–your school and system leaders will actively put your child in danger to protect armed teens in stolen cars running towards the building.

https://fox8.com/news/i-team/video-police-confront-kids-with-guns-at-cleveland-school/

And this is the most recent article listed–19 days ago on the local news.  No follow up on this at all, so maybe the parents were all cool with it.

cookingwithroxy

soooo, who’s going to be the one to bring up that this was literally a potential school shooting, and the principal was just fine with that?

gsirvitor

What the article doesn’t mention, is that they don’t actually know if what they found is a sieve, as the Smithsonian seems to suggest, they found zeolite in the sediments of the Corriental reservoir at the Maya city of Tikal.

However, sediments naturally deposit at the bottoms of reservoirs, from weathering and erosion of architecture, Tikal itself is made of limestone, sandstone and volcanic tuff, Maya architects aquired the limestone at Tikal, sandstone at Quiriguá, and volcanic tuff at Copan.

Volcanic tuff is the most interesting in regards to the reservoir at Tikal, why? Because zeolites are formed as a result of the reaction of volcanic ash with waters from basic sources.

And what is Volcanic tuff? Volcanic tuff is a type of rock made of volcanic ash ejected from a vent during a volcanic eruption. It’s like trying to explain to people that the Baghdad batteries weren’t actual batteries, but large containers, hell, only one had a rod in it and another contained residue from rotted parchments.

Not every aberration we discover is due to some lost technology, most of it is coincidence, and since we live in modern times we assume, incorrectly, that ancient peoples would use something we use today in the exact same manner we do.

It’s like seeing a face in a tree trunk, just because you recognize a pattern doesn’t mean it’s true.

The FBI's Transformation, from National Police to Domestic Spy Agency. Part One: "Disruption"

A Florida FBI agent blows the whistle on a Bureau that's stopped worrying about making cases, shifting resources to a vast new mission: dome

https://href.li/?https://taibbi.substack.com/p/the-fbis-transformation-from-national?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1042&post_id=82152100&isFreemail=true&utm_medium=email

An extremely important read from Matt Taibbi.

Please share with people outside this bubble.