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177
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • Why would you deliberately use a resource that is going to lie, just not predicably?

    I can give a real-life answer to that. I was working on an assignment where keyword searching journal databases was not really helping because the while the primary keywords have specific meanings in the context I was intending, the words themselves have different meanings and uses. So I had to weed through a ton of articles in order to get just a few useful ones. Asking ChatGPT to give me 10 peer-reviewed journal articles about X and Y topic would return maybe three or four real articles, but it took me a lot less time to identify the three real ones from a set of 10 compared to locating three on-topic articles from, say, 100 results.

    The above was using the public version of ChatGPT. Partway through the semester, my school got ChatGPT Edu. Interestingly, the Edu version, given the same prompt, did not return fake articles, but it included somewhat related, but not-relevant ones. In either case (public or Edu), I still had to check all 10 results, but it was still less time consuming than trying to search on my own.

  • I tried out a bunch, including Babbel, Busuu, Language Transfer, Mango, and Memrise. I didn't like them for one reason or another. I finally landed on Lingodeer. It's similar to Duolingo, but it is a paid app. (You can try level 1 of any language for free.)

    The regular subscription price is definitely not worth it. It's okay (not great, but not awful) when they do their sales. But I felt okay about paying human workers.

    This kind of learning is a great start, but will only get you so far. If your local library has access to Kanopy, look for the Great Courses series on Spanish. I thought that was an excellent series after a little bit of Duolingo.

  • Saul (Sha'ul) is a Jewish/Hebrew name. Paulos is a Greek name. Even until now, bilingual people who are of a minority culture (compared to where they're living) often have two names, one in their their native (family) language and one in the local majority language, one official, the other unofficial.

    This was not limited to Paul, even in that immediate timeline. Levi (Jewish name) was also called Levi (Greek name). There's no reason to believe Paul "changed" his name sheet his conversion. He continued to go by Saul after he became a Christian. He went by his Jewish name among Jewish people, then his Greek name when he travelled across Rome and interacted with Greek-speakers.

  • I only got a nickel and quarter with King Charles on the last weekend, among a literal handful of change.

    There are a lot of years of QEII coins out there, though. She's going to still be in circulation for a many years, yet.

  • May encourage you to get your immunity levels checked, especially if you were born around 1970-mid-90s, as we likely only had one shot instead of two. I asked my doctor to check out of an abundance of caution, and now I have upcoming appointments to get the MMR vaccine again. It's free (covered by OHIP) to get the bloodwork and to get the shots.

    Also, tangentially related, please allow me to encourage blood and plasma donation. Measles treatments include plasma products. Most of the unvaccinated are children who don't have a say in the matter. We can't help them get vaccines, but we can help with ensuring supply of medicine if they get sick (and their dumbass parents get scared enough to bring them to a hospital).

  • The person complaining thinks the proprietor is scamming people, and (apparently) ChatGPT, by falsely advertising what products are available.

    Idiot: You lied about your product! MapGuy: Where did you see that (on my website)? Idiot: ChatGPT screenshot

  • This is basically how we ended up with the burqa. A woman's body is evil because it makes men unable to control their sexual urges, therefore women must be banned. Now, in Afghanistan, a woman's voice must not even be heard.

    How long until the USA reaches that point?

  • We barely rejected the right wing nuts, and they could easily take the next election. While relief is warranted, we should not be smug or complacent about it, either. Lies more faster than the truth, it's still an uphill battle for morality and decency.

  • Yes, this has absolutely been a thought for me. I am not removing accounts, etc. from my phone pre-emptively, but I will uninstall things like Lemmy and remove specific email accounts if we have to land. (I use multiple emails for different reasons, so it won't be terribly suspicious.)

  • Everyone reacts differently to different things. I know someone who's side effects were worse each Covid shot he got. He still got them, because he was taking care of an elderly family member, but he had to started planning to be bedridden himself. He's not antivax, but stopped getting boosters when the family member died because he didn't want to be laid up for a week at a time.

  • Just booked a flight to south of the US. Even the most direct flight had a layover. I could have saved hundreds of dollars if that layover was in the US. I opted to pay hundreds of dollars more to have the layover in Mexico.

    It was partways about Elbows Up, but it was also I'd rather not get arrested and/or detained and/or deported possibly to an El Salvadorian prison. Avoiding the the non-zero chance of that is worth $500.

  • *Doug Ford. Rob Ford was his younger brother who was the mayor of Toronto, and who has since died.

    I'm not convinced Doug would want the job, maybe in the future. Right now he's got a majority in Ontario and can do whatever he wants within provincial preview. He can, and I believe he will, cooperate with Carney and caucus to do what's best for Canada and Ontario in the face of Trump, because that will also be what's best for him, too. Fair's fair, he did a not-bad job during Covid and had a rare moment of cooperating with federal and municipal governments, and it truly made him look like good leader for a while. (He became his normal self after emergency measures were lifted and started blaming everyone else again.)

    If he became federal leader now, he couldn't do anything but blow hot air for a while. It's a bigger stage, but lesser power, and it doesn't really do anything to benefit him. Doug is after dollars, but I think he does not like the maple maga and has no interest in dealing with them. Cut them out of the CPC base, they're not likely to win again anytime soon. Or he could just stay premier and have a lot of actual power.

  • When Liberals rob everyday people to give to the rich, they do it while smiling at you. When Conservatives rob everyday people to give to the tich, they do it while simultaneously robbing you of rights and yelling slurs at you.

    So yes, Liberals are better. It doesn't mean they're the best, or even good, but they are certainly less bad.

  • Bloodletting is therapeutic... for some very specific conditions. For example, hemochromatosis, where the body has too much iron, and there has been some preliminary study that blood donations are a way to reduce the amount of PFAS in blood.

    But everyone has PFAS in their blood; not every male has (beyond normal) phimosis.

  • I had one interviewer specially say she was committed to getting back to each candidate, no matter the outcome. I expressed genuine appreciation for that, saying that most places just ghost people.

    She ghosted me.

  • Star Trek Social Club @startrek.website

    Still Plenty of Strange New Worlds for Star Trek to Explore: Interview with Bob Picardo