Manwray

One of the most memorable scenes in Les Miserables is where Jean Valjean briefly visualizes the full cosmic horror of French society crushing him with inhuman intent.

He pictures in detail every priest and gendarme, every bureaucrat, all the million moving pieces of the machine crushing him.

The more I think about it, the more I believe History of Alternative Medicine is the most important class I teach. I approach it from the angle that ideologies of alternative medicine reveal just as much, if not more, about the ideologies underlying mainstream medicine.🧵

I tend to describe what they do, what they're designed to do, is generate "answer-shaped objects".

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

ICE just arrested Brad Lander, the NYC Comptroller and one of the leading candidates for Mayor, without grounds.

He was conducting routine immigration court work, escorting individuals from hearings.

He asked ICE for their warrant - well within his legal rights.

This is political intimidation.

Weingarten: Their attacks on public education are relentless and why? Because they fear knowledge. Why do they fear teachers? They fear us because we teach critical thinking… their brand of greed, power, and privilege cannot survive in a democracy of diverse educated citizens

what people seem to believe is that there is a large number of criminal, layabout immigrants who can be easily found and deported. they support doing so snd are dismayed by the deportation of otherwise law abiding people. the problem is that the criminal group is imaginary!

A bad President, for instance, has the power to do what? What can he not do? If he wanted to revolutionize this government, he could easily do it with this ponderous power; it would be an auxiliary power. He could cry “havoc, and let slip the dogs of war,”29 and say to the conspirators: “I am with you. If you succeed, all is well. If you fail, I will interpose the shield of my pardon, and you are safe. If your property is taken away from you by Congress, I will pardon and restore your property. Go on and revolutionize the government; I will stand by you.” The bad man will say or might say this. I am not sure but we have got a man now who comes very near saying it. Let us have done with this pardoning power. We have had enough of this. Pardoning! How inexpressibly base have been the uses made by this power—this beneficent power. It has been that with which a treacherous President has trafficked. He has made it the means of securing adherents to himself instead of securing allegiance to the government.

very fun to read frederick douglass accurately describe the problem with the pardon power in 1867

LBJ's words here aren't especially radical, but that he delivered them in front of the Georgia state legislature in 1964 is fairly badass

To add:
Some folks w invisible disabilities are inherently unwell/ in pain (like some fibro pain)
Some folks w invisible disabilities are inherently fine, but how we live life around them *makes* their lives difficult (like some neurodiversity)

But both ppl are conditioned to hide the difficulty

Sun Ra at a keyboard with a cape with a mass of electric squiggles in a cloud emanating from his head

Sun Ra came to this planet from the cosmos to be born in Alabama today. Celebrating the intergalactic music traveler through time & space on his birthday.

Screenshot from linked article reads: Indeed, in all of the debates about science funding, one point seems to be lost: The reason that the federal government funds science is not just to provide scientists or government bureaucrats with jobs, nor is it an act of charity towards universities and academic hospitals. We fund science because it is in our national interest to do so! Whether it's DARPA creating the original Internet, or an NSF grant funding the origins of Google, or the NIH funding work that led to a miracle cure for a type of leukemia, or NSF funding work that ended up making PCR usable, or Defense research that led to the GPS system that made it possible to have real-time maps on our phones, we all benefit from putting public money towards scientific R&D.

This from @stuartbuck.bsky.social ought to be obvious, but is no longer so in the age DOGE. open.substack.com/pub/goodscie...

"WE'VE ARRANGED A society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science technology. And this combustible mixture of ignorance and power, sooner or later, is going to blow up in our faces. Who is running the science and technology in a democracy if the people don't know anything about it?" "Science is more than a body of knowledge, it's a way of thinking. A way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility. If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then we're up for grabs for the next charlatan, political or religious, who comes ambling along."

I think a lot about what Carl Sagan said in one of his final interviews.

I mean is there a better example of how entitled and out of touch a majority of our elected officials and “elites” are?

Primary and remove them all. They know not who they serve or what their job is.

U.S. may be reverting to a time when measles deaths were not very rare, experts warn Peter Marks: “Unless we dramatically change course, drastically change course, it's going to be a problem. This is what measles does.”

#Measles deaths in the US have been ultra low for years. But with 3 deaths so far in 2025, it appears the country may be on a different trajectory — unless vaccination promotion is amped up and vaccination uptake increases. www.statnews.com/2025/04/06/m...

First of all, the case is not merely unjust but so obviously unjust that nobody is really disputing it. The administration's lawyers admitted it was an error. Joe Rogan thinks it's horrific.

This is a case that is already breaking through, and we can bring this to the American people.

Ezra Klein has never done anything but blog. That's been his job since he was an undergraduate. He has absolutely no experience doing anything else. Meaning he doesn't have any firsthand knowledge or experience of how anything works. Which makes everything he didn't think of wrong or a conspiracy.

"I don't want a Disney vacation of our history! I don't a whitewashed history, I don't want a homogenized history. Tell me the wretched truth about America, because that speaks to our greatness" -- 20 hours into his speech, Cory Booker is spitting absolute 🔥

Thank you - can’t wait to try them!

If you accept that non-citizens have no right to due process, you are accepting that citizens have no right to due process. All the government has to do is claim that you are not a citizen; without due process you have no chance to prove the contrary.

I've Been Paralyzed Since I Was 3. Here's Why Kindness Toward Disabled People Is More Complicated Than You Think Editors Note: This is a boldly honest look at how people with paralysis have to deal with "overly kind" (well-meaning) offers of help. It's a uniquely

Please take a couple of minutes to read this piece.

It's important.

"We have ignored the perspectives, stories & voices of disabled people for so long that their actual needs, feelings and experiences are hardly acknowledged."

How denial of airborne COVID transmission broke the world The most grievous error of the pandemic response has become clear.

How denial of airborne COVID transmission broke the world canadahealthwatch.ca/2025/03/11/h... @blakemurdoch.bsky.social @healthydebate.bsky.social

Tax billionaires until they need free college

Audio radiance for our radio audience!: Give The Drummer Some with Doug Schulkind Audio & playlist from March 7, 2025

Give the Drummer Some is getting ready to do its part for @wfmu.bsky.social's fundraising marathon. Tune in to the live broadcast (9-noon, et), pledge, and win some amazing prizes! PLEDGE: pledge.wfmu.org/donate/DS LISTEN: wfmu.org/wfmu_drummer... CHAT: wfmu.org/playlists/sh...

Recommended this a friend recently. They texted this morning to tell me that they made their first-ever call to reps using this app. If you've been scared to call, this can help. If you know people who are scared to call, suggest this.

It's never to late to start and we're gonna need all of us.

This is a great idea!

Dr. Collins noted that when he was recruited to the institutes, and through many of the years that followed, “investment in medical research was seen as a high priority and a nonpolitical bipartisan effort — saving countless lives, relieving human suffering and contributing substantially to the U.S. economy.” “N.I.H. is the largest supporter of biomedical research in the world,” he wrote. “It is the main piston of a biomedical discovery engine that is the envy of the globe. Yet it is not a household name. It should be.” He went on: “When you hear about patients surviving stage 4 cancer because of immunotherapy, that was based on N.I.H. research over many decades. When you hear about sickle-cell disease being cured because of CRISPR gene editing, that was built on many years of research supported by N.I.H.”

Francis Collins led the mapping of the human genome, and chose to do big scientific to benefit the public. He is a a former NIH Director.
He just resigned his position in government. His resignation letter:
www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/u...

NEW: Senator Marshall (R-KS) RUNS AWAY, fleeing his own town hall after being asked about DOGE firing Veterans. MAKE HIM GO VIRAL.

18F, a digital services unit inside the General Services Administration, has been completely laid off, according to an email I’ve seen. The email says that 18F was deemed “non-critical” and the decision was made with the “explicit” direction of the administration and GSA leadership.