iSurf Social | Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) @ iSurf Social

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 days ago • friendica

In case you didn't know where the feel of this song comes from, or didn't realize how important drumming is, check it out:

Steely Dan on Bernard Purdie (the Purdie Shuffle)

Donald and Walter talk about Bernard Purdie´s amazing drumming, while Purdie himself explains his unique shuffle!!

^YouTube

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marathon 3 days ago • mastodon (AP)

SD is one of my favourite all time bands. 🙂

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 7 days ago friendica

Many of us hams still use quite a few postage stamps. (We used to use a lot more.) It's not often that USPS produces a stamp series that directly applies to us, but they have one now called Solar Science.

These stamps are gorgeous. A photo doesn't begin to show how good they look because they're printed on a holographic type backing. When you move your head, the images change and animate, and the colors are iridescent and on a jet black background. #hamradio

I order mine directly from USPS. I find it easier than standing in line at the Post Office.

#hamradio

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Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 7 days ago • diaspora

Beautiful!

To get the decorative series here you'd have to queue at the Post Office though, or enter a subscripton with the Post Office services, which charges you some 10% extra for membership - and then you'd get all the new stamps, with values you'll never need.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 7 days ago friendica

Hmm. The German Post Office doesn't let you just order stamps online for mailing to your home? Here in the USA there's no extra charge except you have to pay the postage to ship them to you. It came to about $1.70 for postage to receive several sheets of these. The stamps are shipped between protective stiff cardboard that protects them from damage. I'm going to order more in another day or two.

I was a stamp collector long ago but not anymore. These are so cool, I put a sheet in my fire safe to keep.

Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 7 days ago • diaspora

Hrm.. actually I last tried some 20 years ago. Things may have changed. Additionally, I may have used the subscription only then because.. I don't know.

Looking at https://shop.deutschepost.de/leuchtfeuer-tinsdal-nassklebende-briefmarke-zu-0-60-eur-10er-bogen?tid=SB_0721_PWZ60 I see a nice lighthouse decorative stamp set available, 10 pcs for 6€ plus postage.

Für physische Warenbestellungen wird bei einem Auftragswert bis 20 € eine geringe Versandkostenpauschale von 2,95 € erhoben. Bestellungen über einem Wert von 20 € sind versandkostenfrei

So I was wrong, and had outdated knowledge. Thanks to you and the internet, I revised both. 😀

de

Leuchtfeuer Tinsdal, nassklebende Briefmarke aus der Serie "Leuchttürme" zu 0,60 EUR, 10er-Bogen

^{shop.deutschepost.de}

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abortretryfail 7 days ago • mastodon (AP)

I bought a set of these a month ago. They're beautiful!

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 days ago friendica

Yeah, they're stunning. I never expected something like these from the USPS. Funny thing is these stamps are not featured. You have to dig down to find them. This makes no sense to me.

susannah 7 days ago • mastodon (AP)

those are Such good stamps.

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Olaf 7 days ago • diaspora

In Germany the first hurdle would be finding a post office. Lots have been closed and their services taken over otherwise. "Services"? Don't expect any...

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 7 days ago friendica

Julia Computing Raises $24M in Series A, Former Snowflake CEO Bob Muglia Joins Board

/PRNewswire/ -- Julia Computing, founded by the creators of the Julia high-performance programming language, today announced the completion of a $24M Series A...

^{www.prnewswire.com}

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susannah 7 days ago • mastodon (AP)

I’ve been immersed in R for a decade but I think I need to start learning Julia…

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 days ago friendica

It's certainly worth looking at. I've been programming, studying languages, writing compilers, since 1968.

I love machine language and C. Those are my most native modes. I dislike C++ and various things in so-called object oriented programming. Perl is cool. Python is cool. But the best I've seen yet is Julia. Julia is real power. It taps OOP ideas where they are appropriate and useful, but no more than that. It has a soft and forgiving syntax because of its math-oriented approach. In other words, more than any other language, instead of forcing you into a strict syntax, Julia will figure out what you meant. If you want to write an equation using Greek letters, fine. It will figure it out.

It's also an easy language to install and run. If it's not on your machine, just download it and run it. It has an interactive mode just like Python or BASIC.

But some of the greatest power of Julia is hidden. One of Julia's superpowers is utilization of parallel processing. You don't have to worry about coding to optimize usage of the 4, or 8, or 24, or more cores you have. This is built in to Julia. This is why Julia has been mandated, worldwide, for all future coding of weather models.

For example, in the early days of Covid, biologists wanted to determine the complete list of proteins that the Covid genome could code for. Hah. Ridiculous, right?

Not really. The problem was coded in Julia and tested on conventional machines with 4 or 8 cores. Then the Julia code (just a text file) was sent to Oak Ridge Labs, who had volunteered the Summit Supercomputer for this task. Within a minute the code was running at exaflop speed, across thousands of cores. Within a week, the job was done. This is what Julia was designed for.

I think it's totally cool that number crunching code I write to run an app on a 4 core Raspberry Pi could be emailed to Oak Ridge and self-scale to utilize the full power of Summit without any planning or special design on my part.

This is why Julia is the future of supercomputing problems like weather and econometric modeling. Yet the same system can be used as a desk calculator, on your home machine.

Anyway, it's fun and costs you nothing to try out. Install it and type "julia". Off you go.

The creepy thing about Julia when I first began was that I didn't consult any manuals. I just started typing stuff in interactive mode. It all worked. That was creepy, but now I'm used to it.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 1 week ago friendica

r/Appalachia - West Virginia-Style Mountain Banjo

132 votes and 7 comments so far on Reddit

^reddit

3 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 weeks ago friendica

Hmm. Despite my love and fascination with earthquakes, quakes in this area are always disturbing to me. I've spent quite a lot of time around Lake Tahoe since 1963. There are three faults that pass under Lake Tahoe and while they rarely slip, they are known to be active.

The problem is that a strong quake at Lake Tahoe would be a human disaster. Not only is a tsunami possible on the lake but the shorelines are sharp and would reflect the wave(s) back and forth across the lake. Severe destruction to the buildings and dwellings on the lakeshore is eventually going to happen.

https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/nc73584926/executive

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V. T. Eric Layton 3 weeks ago • diaspora

I've never experienced one nor care to.

lambjams 3 weeks ago • diaspora

Seems like the odds of Yellowstone blowing up would be greater than the odds of a major earthquake around Tahoe. But a search says that's not true... Scientists estimate the risk of a magnitude-7 quake under Lake Tahoe in the next 50 years to be between 3% and 4%, far less than the perennial dangers of forest fires and flood in the region. Whereas... Will the Yellowstone volcano erupt soon? Another caldera-forming eruption is theoretically possible, but it is very unlikely in the next thousand or even 10,000 years. Not exactly apples to apples, but close enough?

I've been thinking I'd rather live in New Zealand than here in Australia, but NZ is a much riskier place in terms of seismicity. The museum in Auckland has an exhibit showing how some day the entire Auckland area could explode - but hopefully, they'll have a better reading on warnings before that happens. That didn't help the tourists who went to White Island - tour operators ignored increasing warning signs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Whakaari_/_White_Island_eruption

volcanic eruption in New Zealand

^{Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)}

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lambjams 2 weeks ago • diaspora

Wow - what timing - I see there was a 6.0 just SE, which may have been felt up your way.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 weeks ago friendica

With only a couple of exceptions, since childhood, I've always lived in seismically active areas. The first quake I remember came when I was five years old. I quite enjoy earthquakes, which led me to study them. I don't enjoy the damage and injury they can cause.

I've been deep into the study of Yellowstone since 1964, when I first went there. For a while, in the 80s and 90s, I was a member of GOSA and was really into it. My background in geophysics was useful.

Comparing Yellowstone, which is a caldera supervolcano with a period of around 600,000 years to the seismic faults under Lake Tahoe with periods of around 1,000 years doesn't make sense to me.

All along the California Sierras, where I spent summers, and used to own a house in Incline Village, is very active seismically. (Ignoring Long Valley). The Sierras are growing at a high rate of speed because the Pacific Plate is jamming California into the North American Plate with a lot of force. Mt. Whitney, at 14,000 feet, is being pushed upwards, and this kind of orogeny will result in frequent quakes.

My... show more

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lambjams 2 weeks ago • diaspora

My perception is of the coast being more active, but I guess it's a matter of degrees. I was in Sacramento during the Loma Prieta quake, which was the largest most recently, but relatively small when you look at evidence on the earthquake trail at Point Reyes, or down on the peninsula there are spots where you can see there was more movement from some earlier quakes. I am thinking the area around the Lost Coast has the most uplift. But I'm not up on those details.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 weeks ago friendica

Yeah, California is a mess of faults and very active seismically and volcanically. The volcanic and some of the seismic is on time scales that are long compared to a human lifespan, so they don't seem that big of a deal, but they are. Explore California and you'll see plenty of faulting and fresh volcanic activity. (Fresh meaning 10k years.) There's lots of fresh naked basalt if you know where to look.

California is subjected to two major forces. One is the conveyor belt of the Pacific ramming California into the North American Plate. This is the force that created California in the first place and is now pushing the Sierras upward. Mt. Whitney, at 14,000 feet, results from this activity.

California's geology is confusing and mysterious at first glance. If you drive west from the Sierras to the coast (Lake Tahoe to San Francisco, for example) you will drive through three completely different geologies that change abruptly, one to the next. What? Why? This was long a mystery. California is composed of three separate land masses that used to be three Pacific islands... show more

lambjams 2 weeks ago • diaspora

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) Yeah - living in the Bay Area, you can't help absorbing some tectonic and fault-line information, though most of it is Bay Area-centric. I'm currently in Sydney, AUS. My casual observation was that the coastal sandstone cliffs around here were pushed up as this plate moved eastward. But I recently read that the entire area was a rift zone like in Africa, and is more of a jumble of pieces that settled into place between AUS and NZ. Then there's the relatively recent notion that Zealandia was a continent - which is pretty fascinating.

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 weeks ago friendica

It is fascinating. California is a great place to study geology because you've got almost everything easily accessible. In the 1980s and 90s, my almost weekly long-distance drives out of LA heading north or east would take me past basalt that was less than 10k years old and other basalt outcroppings that were 1.3 billion years old. California has compression, stretching, folding (Vasquez Rocks, Red Rock Canyon), volcanic activity with Long Valley, Devil's Postpile, Lava Beds National Monument, minerals, mines from uranium to borax. Mt Whitney is the highest point in the lower 48. From Whitney you can look down on the second lowest point in the world, Badwater. The structure underneath Los Angeles is fascinating and challenging to seismologists. Up around SF is where the San Andreas heads out into the ocean, which creates more interesting landforms. California is a geologist's paradise. (Or nightmare, depending on your interpretation. Lol.)

I've always wanted to visit the geyser fields at Rarotonga (sp?) in New Zealand.

lambjams 2 weeks ago • diaspora

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) I think you're referring to Rotorua (the town). There is also a Rarotonga - island in the Cook Islands. I've been trying to learn the names and relative locations of various Pacific Island groups.
My wife and I stayed in Rotorua 3-4 days. It is somewhat similar to the walk in front of Yellowstone Lodge, but fewer features. The loop in Yellowstone has some deep pools of varying temperatures and geysers. In Rotorua, there are some pools and blurpy mud pots, but no clear, deep pools; the pools are murky; more sediment. We did not see a geyser - I think there is one nearby, but it was a separate tourist attraction charging admission. In the town proper, many of the obvious geothermal features are in the town park (free), and some spas (with a fee). Also it's on a lake, and there's a trail around the lake with some areas of steaming vents and signage - I think back in the 1800s one of the spots was used by people to soak until some t... show more

New photo by James Lamb

^{photos.app.goo.gl}

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 weeks ago friendica

That's right, Rotorua. Hah. The largest geyser in recorded history existed there. It didn't exist long because it was so large it blew itself apart. I can't remember its name.

lambjams 1 week ago • diaspora

Just watched an interesting video about a volcano in NZ - the protected land surrounding it nearly a perfect circle visible from altitude.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Tonight's musical treat:

The Wilson Sisters - The Battle of Evermore - 11/6/1993 - Shoreline Amphitheatre

Recorded 11/6/1993 - Shoreline Amphitheatre (Mountain View, CA)Visit Wolfgang's https://www.wolfgangs.com/music/ to stream concerts from thousands of legenda...

^{Classic Rock on MV (YouTube)}

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Peter Lindelauf 2 months ago • diaspora

Needed that. Thanks. Ann's a great singer but I'm a Nancy fan.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

You're welcome. It made me feel good so I thought I'd share.

Yeah, Ann has a voice anyone would kill for. The fact that she can tackle Robert Plant's work is proof of that. Or a song like Crazy on You. I wonder how many mid-range speakers and tweeters she's destroyed. Hah.

But yeah, I'm in love with Nancy. I think everyone is. I could spend every day listening to her explain how to make toast. Oh, and she can play pretty good, too. Hah. Now that I play guitar, we actually would have something in common. Her modesty is almost painful. In interviews, people will ask her to play this or that passage from a song. "Well, I'm not the one that plays that passage but I'll have a go." And she knocks it out perfectly.

I'm seriously considering picking up the mandolin, and it's because of her and this song. I've always liked the sound of it. My great-uncle played it pretty well and I got hooked on the sound when I was little, but never got motivated to learn it. Well, I have an Ibanez on my "to-buy" list on Amazon right now. I just to pull the trigger.

Peter Lindelauf 2 months ago • diaspora

Pull the trigger! I used to have a mandolin but gave it to a friend's grandkid. The mandolin neck is a bit skinny for my fingers. Instead, I have an octave mandolin. Same strings as mandolin just an octave lower and with a longer, wider neck. Ironically, it introduces a new challenge in that your fingers may not be scrunched together anymore but you have to do some long pinky stretches for some scales or chord shapes. I've really had to work on the pinky thing. As well, kind of wish I'd gone with Irish bouzouki (as they call it) instead. Mandolin/octave mandolin have unison pairs of strings -- two of the same strings -- while the Irish bouzouki is like a 12 string guitar with a high and low string for each pair. More jangle to it. All it takes is a little work on the nut or just making a new nut.

Reverb.com is a good place to shop. I had to hunt a while to find a good quality southpaw mandolin for my older son when he got the urge to play. Very impressed by the quality of Eastman mandolins. I got a good deal on a used one in mint condition.

As for the Heart girls, their... show more

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Yeah, it's on the list and I'm certain I WILL pull the trigger. It's calling to me. From now to the end of June I'm extremely busy with ham radio, but then comes the summer.

Kenny Chaffin 2 months ago • diaspora

"As for the Heart girls, their rendition of Stairway to Heaven at Kennedy Center with Page, Plant, and Jones in the audience is one of my favorite musical performances…ever."

YES!!
https://youtu.be/LFxOaDeJmXk

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Yeah, I watched that live. Good grief. I had tears in my eyes. I'm sure Nancy has hung out with Jimmy Page and knows what he was trying to create with Stairway. And she brought that knowledge to the Kennedy Center arrangement. With Obama being a huge fan of Led Zep, I'm sure the production pretty much had an unlimited budget, hold back nothing attitude, so they went all out to create what Jimmy had in mind, only on a scale that Led Zep alone could never achieve.

You want the dynamics of the song to progress from tiny to huge and back to tiny? Challenge accepted.

And, since it can't be Robert Plant himself, who is to sing this thing? Ann Wilson, of course.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

diane

2021-05-17 04:05:33

the Boeing 787 needs to be rebooted every 51 days to stop rounding errors causing it to crash

#microsoft

#microsoft

4 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

OMG. We've been joking about this. It's not a joke. It's actually happening. There have been a bunch of incidents around the USA where gas hoarders set themselves on fire. Just search with a search engine.

Police: Woman Hoarding Fuel Catches On Fire After Crash In Pickens County - WCCB Charlotte's CW

Police say a woman, hoarding several containers of fuel in her trunk, caught on fire after crashing her car in Pickens, South Carolina on Thursday.

^{Samantha Gilstrap (WCCB Charlotte's CW)}

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Bob Lai 2 months ago • diaspora

Rather lucky that the Hollywood standard of car-on-fire-goes-boom isn't actually how it works.

Martin Seeger 2 months ago • diaspora

All the experiences during the pandemic convinced me that human intelligence is at best a rare individual property.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

@Karl Auerbach You remember what was across the hall from Boelter 3420. Well, it's here:

High-bandwidth wireless BCI demonstrated in humans for first time

BrainGate device complements Neuralink's successful test of wireless BCI in monkey.

^{Ars Technica}

@Karl Auerbach

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Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

Acronyms are opaque to dyslexics.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

BCI -- Brain Computer Interface. The acronym goes back to when I was in college, at least.

Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

BIC(R)?

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Karl Auerbach 3 months ago • diaspora

I don't remember any of this stuff.

There was a lot of Boelter that I never saw - like the reactor area.

But I do remember the soils engineering lab in Unit 1 that had the great sign "Dirt Driveways Are Best!"

And the Engineering unit 1 elevator - big enough to hold the entire set and cast (including elephants) from Aida - but slower than a glacier. (And I got stuck in it one day.)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Hmm, I did visit the reactor room, and all three watts that it produced. Haha.

Across the hall from 3420 was the BCI lab (Brain Computer Interface). 50 years later, all that primitive stuff has come a long ways.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

I frequently explored Boelter Hall when I needed to think. I like to walk when I think. I can walk outside or I can walk the halls, of every floor. I'd stroll along and when I saw an open door, I'd look in. If someone was working on something, "Hi. My name's Phil. What are you working on?"

Most were happy to discuss their work and I picked up notes on where I could find experts on whatever topic. If I had an EM question, I knew who to go ask.

Of course, the funny thing is that years later as I learned more and more, I realized that those professors really didn't know as much as they thought they knew -- at least in terms of the kinds of questions I had. But, it was fun anyway.

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Kenny Chaffin 3 months ago • diaspora

It's a brave new world!

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Kenny Chaffin 3 months ago • diaspora

yes, but still, any acronym is confusing if not useless unless defined in the first use as it should have been in the Headline of this article. That's the problem with using acronyms and making assumptions about understanding.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

True. I'm so accustomed to it, I forget. But yeah, Brain Computer Interface. I have a feeling that this obscure acronym will find it's way into common speech over the next few years.

Karl Auerbach 3 months ago • diaspora

My friend John Romkey came up with an April 1 RFC for the Brain Wave Transfer Protocol.

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Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

😁

Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

I still think UCLA stands for "uncle".

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

We used to pronounce the acronym as spelled: uckla.

Karl Auerbach 3 months ago • diaspora

@Tom Grzyb - UCLA stands for "Underground Steam Tunnels" (as well as the rather large bridge right in the middle of the campus that most students don't know about.)

But those in the know don't call it UCLA, we call it "South Campus".

@Tom Grzyb

Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

Strange that UCLA and MIT share some very similar history - with the tunnels and system software and all.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Yeah, UCLA is a very fine school in many fields, but not all. In the 1970s, shocking as it may seem, UCLA was not so great in the field of electrical engineering. My school turned out engineers that couldn't design their way out of a paper bag. They knew theory and basic principles, but had never held a soldering iron or screwdriver. Had never actually built anything. As a result, I did work for the physics labs because they knew that I had been doing electronics since I was a child and the shit I built worked. My childhood best friend also attending UCLA was hired in the medical department for the same reason. There, they wanted to build electronics that extended the capability of quadrupole spectrum analyzers. My work was with Josephson junctions. But at that time, without an existing background like I or my best friend had, the physics and medical departments wouldn't dream of hiring a UCLA engineer. All through the 80s, when I was building companies, I didn't either. I looked for guys from Cal Poly or those with innate skill from a young age.

Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

You've probably heard about the "Media Lab" at MIT. It's rather amusing...

Karl Auerbach 3 months ago • diaspora

@Tom Grzyb - I think I've heard of MIT. Isn't that some college back east? 😉 (My affiliation is closer to Caltech: I was named a Fellow of Law & Technology at Caltech and Loyola/Marymount Law.)

@Tom Grzyb

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Congratulations! I would feel tremendously honored by that.

I've not attended either, but in industry MIT seems to have more weight on a candidate's CV. Personally, I'd rather have Caltech on my resume. This is purely a personal impression that comes from imagining matriculating into the school and looking forward to the first quarter or semester. At MIT, I'd not be terribly concerned. At Caltech, I'd be worried about whether I was up to the task.

Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

Oh, I did not attend MIT, I just happen to know some folks associated with the place - and I live in MA.

2 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

I'll just leave this here.

Tests from 1993 killing reveal another man's DNA other than executed Arkansas inmate

DNA testing from a 1993 killing in Arkansas has revealed genetic material from a male other than the inmate executed for the murder four years ago, two groups said Friday.

^{Associated Press (KATV)}

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Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

that is why it is better to free a thousand criminals than potentially kill one innocent person..

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Exactly.

Clara Listensprechen 2 months ago • diaspora

Exactly.

Muse 2 months ago • diaspora

The death sentence is considered barbaric in a number of countries.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

It is barbaric. There's no question about this if you have any respect for philosophers who are likely much smarter than any of us. Nearly all major philosophers have considered the whole question of crimes and punishments, and have weighed in. As far as I know, all of them come to the same conclusion on the question of the death penalty. This conclusion is intuitively obvious to me. I really cannot understand having any other position. There is only ONE logical position on this, which I'll capture below.

Yes, there absolutely are crimes that deserve the death penalty. There's no question about this. There are crimes that are SO egregious that they deserve nothing less than death.

However, there are severe problems with the death penalty itself. The three most prominent problems are 1) You might be wrong. Witnesses are notoriously mistaken. There are many things that can go wrong that result in you having the WRONG PERSON in the hangman's noose. This is not a risk worth taking because death is irreversible.

2) In a society that pretends to regard murder as wrong, the death penalty creates a huge problem. Why is it not okay for one person to kill another but a committee can? This is nonsense. For one thing, it's impossible to explain this nonsense to children. Either murder is okay or it's not. Committees or other trappings cannot make something that is inherently not okay, okay.

3) In a society that argues that killing is a sin, going ahead and killing, by committee or otherwise, detracts from the ethical standards of the society. Every time someone is killed by a committee, it detracts from the ethics (or morals) of the society. This is inescapable. You can't argue your way our of this. Either killing is wrong or it's not.

So, the great philosophers who have addressed this end up at the same place. It's the only logical place you can go, and it goes like this: Yes, we all agree that some crimes are so egregious that they absolutely deserve the death penalty. But, since we are not perfect, we are not gods, society will be merciful and cautious, and in lieu of the death penalty we will give life imprisonment. We do not want to damage our society by killing anyone, so you get life in prison. We recognize that you deserve the death penalty but we are civilized and give life in prison instead.

Rob Anybody 2 months ago • diaspora

👍 @Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

Muse 2 months ago • diaspora

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) And that is pretty much the argument I gave in High School debate club.

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Excellent. You probably floored half the people in the audience.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Oh, I should add, although it's a bit off-topic, when the great philosophers are in this arena and say what I said above, the next thing they say is that life in prison should ONLY be given in lieu of the death penalty. In all other cases, life in prison is unethical, and there's lots of discussion about that.

Andreas Geisler 2 months ago • friendica

US prison sentences are also barbaric, though.
"We will put you in a situation where you might have to peddle sexual favors for protection, if you're lucky" is also, by any sane standard "cruel and unusual".

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Well, if you've watched an execution by electric chair or gas chamber, it's clear that the "cruel and unusual" thing is completely ignored. Execution by lethal injection can easily be painless. It's easy peasy -- the same way we euthanize horses. Inject a massive overdose of sodium pentothal. You pass out immediately, dead. Painless. Do we do that? Nope. We inject a series of chemicals that ensure the person suffers respiratory arrest, then cardiac arrest, all while conscious, and then death, hopefully.

It's cruelty by design. It's who the U.S.A. is.

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) It is barbaric

Absolutely.. and totally completely agree with all the points u have made.

i did a post a while back that talks about humane ways to kill animals and people.. It was not approving of it but like "if u absolutely gotta do it, then this is the best way" sorta thing. It was kind of a bit of a dark post (not on purpose tho) with a very interesting video by i think the BBC or some place like it... just can't remember if my post is public or not.

If death was the punishment then it wouldn't require injections, chairs and all sorts of other things. In the end it is about vengeance... not "closure" just the dark human emotion of vengeance..and schadenfreude and it is being (in the US and other places) enforced by a government. It is government-approved murder.

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Exactly. The U.S. justice system is about REVENGE because that's what the barbarians that inhabit this country love.

Look man, we're all going to die and be forgotten. You've been dying since the moment you were conceived. What do you accomplish by torturing someone? You detract from your own humanity. You cost yourself your humanity. Nothing else. Your victim is already dead but you get to carry your broken self around for a few more years before you die and are forgotten, just like I will. So, stop with the revenge stuff. It's the childish thinking of a three year-old, not an adult.

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

don't know if this will work or not but it is public (4 months ago) and here is the link thingy.. it was not exactly a popular post 😅😖😿

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

This is the best peanut butter I've eaten since the 1950s. I could eat the whole jar in one sitting. No additives, no sweeteners of any kind (doesn't need it), no removing the peanut oil and replacing it with hydrogenated coconut oil. They don't even remove excess peanut oil so it's very soft and messy. Certified non-GMO and Kosher.

Just grind the peanuts, add 1 percent salt, put it in the jar, done. It's screamin' good. Highly recommended.

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know 3 months ago • diaspora

some places have a machine and let you grind your own.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

That works. I could do it in the food processor, and I just might if I can find a good source of peanuts. In the meantime, Smuckers finally offers this in a jar -- bare nekkid peanut butter.

It's obviously not difficult. You just need buyers who want it, and they now exist.

One reason I'm considering doing it myself is these jars don't last long in this household. "I just bought this. Why is the jar empty???"

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

i love peanut butter and my neighbours dog loves it too.. every time i take him for walks he has the same "Didja bring some?" face on : ) never had (or seen) smuckers b4. This is the one we get.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Yeah, give it a try. I think it's ironic that Smuckers has come full circle in my lifetime. In the early 1950s, there was a peanut butter called Big Top, which was natural peanut butter like the above. Smuckers bought the company and figured out how to cost reduce it by extracting all the valuable peanut oil so it could be sold separately and replacing that oil will whatever, including horrible tropical oils like coconut. And all major brands in the U.S.A. are like that today. Read the ingredients.

They put the peanut butter in a centrifuge and remove all the oil. All that's left is peanut powder. Then they add other oils and sugar to make U.S. style peanut butter.

So now, people have wised up, and Smuckers has come full circle to making what Big Top used to be. Hahahaha.

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

coconut oil is bad? like i get palm oil and stuff is bad but yeah.. If i see smuckers next time at the store we will get some and let "boss" (neighbours dog) be the judge since hes an afficianado lol

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Yes. Coconut oil is bad, bad. You're better off eating beef fat. I have a chart here somewhere...

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

2 people like this

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

poly is the bad one though isn't it? or is it mono thats the bad one.. or maybe they're both good and it is transfats that are the bad one... ugh..

any dog owners know if celery is bad for dogs? i don't let him eat it just it is easier to get a big scoop of it on the celery and let him lick it off..

EV olive oil is the best, though MCT oil often has coconut oil in it or something

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Yeah, several oils are toss ups. Saturated fat is the baddie. You're better off with beef or chicken fat than coconut oil. Hahaha.

Personally, I use olive for most things, soybean for incidental use, and peanut for deep frying.

Salastil 2 months ago • pleroma (AP)

I'm wondering how much of a pain in the ass it is to make a jar of peanut butter that size from peanuts at home.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 months ago friendica

Making peanut butter isn't hard in a food processor. I make hummus a couple times a week. (I eat a lot of hummus.) They are similar to make. You need a powerful enough food processor that can run continuous on high-power for five or six minutes straight in order to make nut butters. I also make cashew butter, which I use in my hummus instead of tahini.

As to your question, you need about 2X the volume of roasted peanuts. So to end up with 2 cups of peanut butter, you need 4 cups of roasted peanuts.

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

unsalted grass fed butter too : ) though EVOO is obvs more vegan/vegetarian friendly..

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Ĥigh ≡l=vation 3 days ago • diaspora

"Natural" means nothing on food labels. It's not a regulated term so it means nothing .
And no, this is far from the best. Kroger has peanut butter grinders, $2.99 a pound. No oils or added anything. Just grind and go. You have to use the $2,500 grinder that they have, it's the only way.
If your PB has oil in it it's not good.
Smucker's is just another big name business creating waste with products that nobody recycles.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

I never realized what an arrogant organization Amazon is until now. I've searched exhaustively and find no way to give feedback on a malfunction in their web site. I guess they think their shit's perfect. Hahaha. It ain't.

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Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

You can comment on the products but you cannot comment on them.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Exactly. I never realized that until now.

Cєℓєѕтє 2 months ago • diaspora

Amazon is evil. It destroys businesses, it hurts people and it is filled with junk blah stuff from china.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 days ago friendica

So is every store. Virtually all manufacturing has moved to China. This is not Amazon's fault, it's the fault of U.S. corporations, even small ones, who have moved manufacturing to Asia.

The same thing happened to Europe 120 years ago, when manufacturing moved to the U.S.A. Now, the torch has moved to China.

The funny thing is that most USians have no concept of the scales involved here. When Trump made much noise about tariffs against China, it was laughable. You're going to scare the Chinese by putting tariffs on 3 to 4 percent of their output? Hahahaha. Yeah, that's what we comprise. We comprise an amount equivalent to roughly out population with respect to the rest of the world. Our tariffs were a joke to the Chinese and only hurt us.

So, look at history in the 20th century and you'll know what's coming. I'm so old it doesn't matter, but if I were a bit younger, I'd learn to speak Chinese.

know 2 months ago • diaspora

much that has come to exist is overblown on it's own worth and self-importance

Tom Grzyb 2 months ago • diaspora

Huh?

Ĥigh ≡l=vation 3 days ago • diaspora

Only low IQ people use Amazon .

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 2 days ago friendica

Actually, very busy people use Amazon. It's the fastest solution to most acquisition problems. IQ has nothing to do with it.

Cєℓєѕтє 2 days ago • diaspora

Éire ghaelach, english and deutsch (intermediate) is enough for me...chinese is way way way way way way too difficult! Thankfully there are many places that make things locally or operate under ethical practices far away from the suicide nets and slave houses.

Change will not fully happen though until the same people who cry foul of the evils of manufacturing stop shopping from these unethical companies. Irony being people some ppl who with one breath cry out in anguish to the status quo then go talk to their Alexa to get them more stuff....that they don't need.

I'm guilty of it too...we all are.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

This AM and PM, I drove through precip ranging from flurries to blizzard. Temp now 32F. Forecast for Tuesday: 85F. I must be on the Genesis Planet.

2 people like this

Tom Grzyb 3 months ago • diaspora

We had some flurries this evening in the Berkshires also. Not something I wanted to see...

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago • friendica

Do you like the blues?

I said, do you like the blues?

If you do, I've got a little something here you might like. 1989. Buddy Guy and Stevie Ray, live, doing blues improvisation. Serious fun. Like REALLY serious fun. This is the shit right here.

If you don't know who Buddy Guy is, he's the guitarist who was the strongest inspiration to Jimi Hendrix when he was learning. Do you hear me now?

Check it out.

Buddy Guy & Stevie Ray Vaughan (Live at Buddy Guy's Legends Club)

Buddy Guy & Stevie Ray Vaughan performing Champagne and Reefer LIVE at Buddy Guy's Legends Club July 30th, 1989.

^{CJ McKinley (YouTube)}

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Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 4 months ago • diaspora

Thank you. Me like the blues rock.

There's some guitar excess in this one from twenty years earlier, and also a very young Jack Bruce.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Oh, yeah. Back around that same time, my best friend was playing an album at his house and I said, "Who is that? Is that Hendrix?" No. It was Buddy Guy.

Here's Buddy Guy in 1965. You can see here where Jimi got some of his ideas. At this time, Hendrix was playing rhythm guitar for the Isley Brothers. He was a terrific rhythm player but he had bigger ideas, inspired by Buddy Guy.

Soon, he was playing by himself as the frontman, like Buddy Guy. One of his signature tunes was Catfish Blues, dating from around 1940. He played it a lot. If you listen to Catfish Blues, your hair will stand on end because you hear the roots of something else. Gee, this sounds a lot like... um, Voodoo Chile.

Yeah, Voodoo Chile evolved as an improvisation that grew out of Catfish Blues.

Which brings us to Kingfish. Kingfish is, in my opinion, the best there is today. We lost Hendrix, we lost Stevie Ray. Kingfish picked up the ball. I think he's 17 years old here in this video playing a version of Catfish Blues. He's good. He's really good. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQha23zpf5k

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Oops. Forgot to put the Buddy Guy link in up there: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmlsFWN51DU

Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 3 months ago • diaspora

With that amount of history I had to find my "new" discovery Gary Clarke Jr. play Catfish Blues. He did play it. What do you think?

Now let me dive into that new Kingfish rabbit hole.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Yeah, Clark is great, but Kingfish is even better. Kingfish is actually a prodigy, a genius, a freak. His playing is perfect. The only one I can compare him to is SRV.

And Kingfish can play any style. He loves the blues and that's what people want to hear. But, he can shred as well as anyone. He can bring Eddie Van Halen back to life with an Eruption that would blow your mind. This guy is something else -- a natural born prodigy.

When he's performing blues, sometimes he'll throw in some shredding and an Eddie lick just to blow your mind. I've never seen anyone like him.

Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 3 months ago • diaspora

Kingfish, I just heard a live performance now from a Dallas Guitar festival. Excellent Hey Joe version, very much playful and.. eloquent, if that were a word to use for musical expression. I might go with most of the attributes already.

No way can I call a contest, but that Live at the Surf Lodge would be fantastic to hear from Kingfish. I'll dive in some more, definitely.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Hmm, just got home from work to discover Prince Philip has died. I have two namesakes. My parents agreed on Phillip. My mother because of Prince Philip. My father after his father, Phillip. Now you know.

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lambjams 4 months ago • diaspora

Looking it up... several women's magazines and other sources in the past year were saying the Queen was planning to step down in a year. But now several experts are saying "the Queen has no intention of stepping down". Ah, the British press, and Royal "experts"...

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Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 4 months ago • diaspora

She's stuck. The British public has so much to deal with… stepping down would trigger katharsis fatigue

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Yeah, I'm now worried that Her Majesty will not be with us much longer. Mark my words.

There is overwhelming statistical evidence that, with old people, when a spouse dies, the other dies shortly after. Often very shortly after. There are many documented cases where the time period was just hours. It depends to some extent on how close they were, which none of us can really know.

Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 4 months ago • diaspora

Expecting civil unrest in 3.. 2.. 1..

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Hopefully not.

lambjams 4 months ago • diaspora

There's also a significant number of women who outlive their spouses, but when you start getting into your 90s, you're already past that point. Yes, it seems she still has a role to play in this transition.

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 3 months ago friendica

Yeah, QE2 is a tough girl. She may not be affected by this as most are.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Good morning everybody!

Personal data of 533 million Facebook users leaks online

Personal data from 533 million Facebook accounts has reportedly leaked online for free. Records included phone numbers, Facebook IDs, full names, locations, birthdates, bios, and email addresses.

^{Jay Peters (The Verge)}

4 people like this

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Martin Seeger 4 months ago • diaspora

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) Everyone that has your phone number associated with your Signal account in his contacts knows that you’re using Signal.

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

In theory. Problem is that most people have never heard of Signal. Lmao.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

frater chaos

2021-04-04 23:40:18

9 people like this

Martin Powers 4 months ago • mastodon (AP)

Part 1/2
The Guardian published an article about where all the pseudoscientific, conspiracy, antivaxx memes and disinformation comes from. We all knew the states would be the culprit, but it is down to just 12 US citizens. Yup 12! The Guardian didn't name them and the link The Guardian cited also didn't name them. So I did some digging on the 'disinformation dozen'.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

The latest crap I'm hearing here in West Virginia and reported to me from Idaho is "Now that Covid is getting better, the Democrats are trying to get more mass shootings happening."

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago • friendica

Just a reminder that tomorrow is Google+ Memorial Day. Never forget.

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Doug Senko 4 months ago • diaspora

Those mthrfckers!

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Martin Seeger

2021-03-31 03:47:09

Whistleblower: Ubiquiti Breach “Catastrophic”
On Jan. 11, Ubiquiti Inc. [NYSE:UI] — a major vendor of cloud-enabled Internet of Things (IoT) devices such as routers, network video recorders and security cameras — disclosed that a breach involving a third-party cloud provider had exposed customer account credentials. Now a source who participated in the response to that breach alleges Ubiquiti massively downplayed a “catastrophic” incident to minimize the hit to its stock price, and that the third-party cloud provider claim was a fabrication.

Whistleblower: Ubiquiti Breach “Catastrophic”
On Jan. 11, Ubiquiti Inc. [NYSE:UI] — a major vendor of cloud-enabled Internet of Things (IoT) devices such as routers, network video recorders and security cameras — disclosed that a breach involving a third-party cloud provider had exposed customer…
^{krebsonsecurity.com}

#91 #93

4 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Two undocumented x86 instructions discovered that allow modification of the CPU's microcode.

The instructions are decoded in all modes including user mode. However, the microcode throws an error unless the CPU is in Red Mode.

This should be fun.

https://twitter.com/_markel___/status/1373059797155778562

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Violante de Rojas 4 months ago • diaspora

Sadly, the only thing this means to me is Okay, this is BAD right?

Will this happen to my Windows 10 software?

Or will it happen to folks using Intel stuff?

Not the Math & Science guru, just the History & Art fan....

Rob Anybody 4 months ago • diaspora

Any machine running an Intel CPU would, I expect, be vulnerable, @Violante de Rojas. No mention of AMD CPUs here, so maybe they haven't got this defect.

@Violante de Rojas

Violante de Rojas 4 months ago • diaspora

...that's good to know...we used AMD because price and lack of availability of Intel...

Karl Auerbach 4 months ago • diaspora

What is "Red Mode"? - I see a "red unlock" on the web

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

I'm not an x86 expert. My understanding is it's the highest level of privilege, higher than the mode the Linux kernel runs at. But, I could be mistaken.

Perhaps an expert on x86 architecture will happen by and explain it.

Karl Auerbach 4 months ago • diaspora

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) - I've heard about the super-privileged rings of control on Intel processors. I believe that most modern Intel processors have a system management controller processor that runs separately from the main x86 engine and that has considerable control. I don't know how that relates to the EFI firmware - there seems to be a lot of magic in there. (At a higher level most modern data center machines have a "baseboard management controller" (BMC) that let's one do pretty much everything that one previously required physical access (except for replacing things like power supplies.) For a while Intel, Dell, Supermicro were proposing a way of dynamically assembling components - processors, memory, networking, storage - in data center racks in order to have software defined computers.

@Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Well, I've long had my own theories about modern mainstream CPUs that I'll keep to myself. Discovering these hidden instructions is no surprise and I'll bet there are many more. And, there are even more hidden things that no one will ever find that give access if you just know the trick.

NSA isn't stupid, you know. They have some of the smartest people on the planet working for them 😉

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Some people are unfit to function in a society. Those people are self-selecting themselves into the limelight here.

Quarantine Defying, Qanon Believing, Cop Punching Small Business Owner Says, "I'd Go Again..."

Scott was arrested �in January, and indicted in February…�Yesterday the Department of Justice argued to keep him in jail until his trial.

^{www.dailykos.com}

3 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

So, I took a look at a container of fruit juice that's frequently handed out to the kids in the neighborhood. 100 percent juice it said. So I read the analysis that lists all the vitamins and minerals. 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, and 0. All goose eggs. Puzzling.

4 people like this

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Bob Lai 4 months ago • diaspora

"100% Juice" likely means that the amount of juice added is such, but not that the product itself is 100% juice.

It's like '100% grated parmesan cheese' on a certain green bottle one finds in the grocery store. It contains 'celluose powder' and potassium sorbate, so it can't actually be 100% parmesan cheese. It could be 100% grated ...

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 4 months ago friendica

Hahaha. Genuine lol there. Thank you.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

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Violante de Rojas 5 months ago • diaspora

..am also confused...what the bloody hell does that mean?

ꂵꄲ꒤ꋊ꓄ꋬ꒐ꋊ ꃳ꒐ꀘꏂ 𝔸𝕕𝕕𝕚𝕔𝕥≈⁴²⁰≈ 5 months ago • diaspora

Well, because Biden isn't doing anything.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Playing with yourself, Level 100

YouTube: Foggy Mountain Breakdown (FCTV Floyd Central Highlanders)

2 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

This "attorney" is apparently incapable of researching Supreme Court decisions. This was clearly decided 100 years ago. The court said the exact opposite. I've read the decision that he or she hasn't.

The Bill of Rights is overridden by the fact that you DO NOT have the right to endanger your fellow citizens. The court's decision goes on to point out that governors have the power to force mask wearing and arrest those who do not comply, vaccinate their state's population by force if necessary, (arrest, vaccinate, release), and require proof of vaccination to be allowed into public venues like stores and restaurants.

So, this "attorney" has nothing to stand on here, at all.

5 people like this

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ꂵꄲ꒤ꋊ꓄ꋬ꒐ꋊ ꃳ꒐ꀘꏂ 𝔸𝕕𝕕𝕚𝕔𝕥≈⁴²⁰≈ 5 months ago • diaspora

God? God has nothing to do with the Constitution, it was written by men.

Separation of Church and State.

2 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Exactly. The introduction of God into discussions of the Constitution is an immediate bullshit-alert.

The founders of the USA were a lucky confluence of brilliant educated men. Yet there is nothing in the Constitution that had not been done or tried before (just not all together at once) except one thing. The USA is the first government ever established (as far as we know) without any connection or blessing from a religious body or organization. (Some of the founders were worried about this, but we did it anyway.)

The only time you see God mentioned in the writings of the founders is in reference to our rights. You'll see "inherent" and "God-given" in reference to rights to illustrate that the rights in the Bill of Rights and elsewhere are not granted by the government but are inherent in us. The Bill of Rights guarantees those rights. It does not grant them since the founders felt that governments do not have the power to grant those rights. They are inherent or "God-given" depending on who is talking.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Kelly Loeffler Just Lost Her WNBA Team to a Player She Refused to Meet

A massive story just went down in Atlanta, if we take the time to acknowledge it.

^{www.thenation.com}

gil likes this.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

There are a bajillion apps for Android covering every imaginable thing, and often 20 apps that do the same obscure thing. Yet I can't find a trangulation app. We used to write our own 25 years ago. This is used in radio direction finding to locate a transmitter or noise source.

You walk or drive to a location and take a bearing on the noise. The app places a pin on the map where you are and draws a straight line representing the bearing you measured. Then you walk or drive some distance and take another bearing. The app puts another pin and another line.

Where the two lines intersect is the target. Simple. With radio it's a good idea to take several bearing to improve accuracy.

I can't find any app that does this simple thing. I can't even find a decent app that lets you draw arbitrary straight lines on an OSM map.

Sheesh.

2 people like this

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Andreas Geisler 5 months ago • diaspora

Does it need something for directionality? Or would the user need to input where they think the sound is coming from? (if you mean audible noise)

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

As I mentioned above, I just got home from work and discovered several answers. I installed Sigtrax for Android and have experimented with it briefly. It appears to do the job nicely.

You can choose to enter data manually, or use GPS to fix your position and enter the bearing manually, or you can enable the compass and enter bearings visually by sighting across the phone like it was a lensatic compass.

The map display is overlayed on Google Maps so you can invoke high-res sat photos and use buildings or other objects to select a bearing.

By noise, I'm referring to electrical noise. A cracked insulator on a power pole will radiate noise at all frequencies. Using directional antennas you can get a bearing. At UHF frequencies (450 MHz) handheld directional antennas like Yagis are easy to make. These give maximum signal when pointed at the noise source.

At low frequencies, where the wavelength might be hundreds of meters, it's trickier, but there are antennas like the flag antenna that can be used. When hunting noisy power lines, you can start with just a decent AM portable radio. The "loopstick" antenna is directional, but in that case you go for the nulls rather than peaks. With a magnetic antenna like the loopstick, the nulls are much sharper than the peaks. (If you've taken an AM radio apart, you have noticed a ferrite rod with many turns of wire on it. That's called a "loopstick" antenna.)

Since a loopstick antenna is bidirectional, when you find a null you don't know whether your target is in one direction or the opposite. But as soon as you've taken two or more bearings, the correct direction becomes obvious.

This loopstick antenna at low frequencies technique is how LORAN navigation worked, back in the days before GPS. Today, you can use an AM radio and broadcast stations to navigate a sailboat, if you wish. Lol. (Actually, I know I guy who did this decades ago, navigating through fog at night.)

And yes, it would work with sound too if you have a highly directional sound collector.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Yes, for radio (my needs) you use a directional antenna to located the source of the signal (which might be noise). Then you plot a line from your position in the direction of the signal. Then you move to a new location and do it again. Where the two lines intersect is the source of the signal.

You could do the same thing with audible sound, but since the distances are so small, you can just walk towards the source. With radio, the source may be many miles away when you first begin.

My application is locating radio noise sources. A cracked insulator on a power line can arc internally, which generates electrical noise that radiates and interferes with shortwave radio reception.

In my case, the power company does no preventive maintenance that I've ever seen. So I have to track down these faults for them (they should be doing this) and report them.

For one thing, radiating electrical noise and interference is illegal, especially if it interferes with licensed radio services. Secondly, these faults cost the power company money because it's energy that's leak... show more

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Yes, wonderful, thank you. I just got home from work and found several answers. Many of my searches contained the word triangulate, and yet that app never appeared.

From the answers I've received, there are at least two apps that do this but run on Apple only. There are also at least two apps for Android: the one you indicated here and one called Sigtrax.

I installed Sigtrax and it appears to be well done and works smoothly.

Andreas Geisler 5 months ago • diaspora

Very neat, all of it!

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Andreas Geisler 5 months ago • diaspora

Well, not the Power Company, but when is that ever the case?

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Well, German ham radio operators don't have this problem because, unless things have changed since I was last there, all power lines except the long distance "marching giants" are underground. Problem solved.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 5 months ago friendica

Yes, 300,000 dead. Torture perpetrated by puppet dictators trained in the United States of America and placed into power by us. Now there is something to be proud of, eh?

tomgrz

2021-02-24 06:27:53

Sister Dianna Ortiz—US Nun Who Survived Guatemala Torture and Became Human Rights Champion—Dies at 62

Sister Dianna Ortiz—US Nun Who Survived Guatemala Torture and Became Human Rights Champion—Dies at 62
"Dianna walked through the very worst of hell and came out with love... Her legacy is a witness to nonviolence and to love in the face of evil and to redemption. That's her legacy, to teach us that that's possible."
^{www.commondreams.org}

This entry was edited (5 months ago)

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Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

If it seems like I'm not participating or ignoring comments, it's because here on Friendica, I stopped receiving notifications about a week ago. I have no idea what's wrong.

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Carsten Raddatz (劉愷恩) 6 months ago • diaspora

Since I now have a Friendica account as well (but not yet using it), I'm interested in what happened and how to find out. Wouldn't your podmin have an idea?

Adam 6 months ago • friendica

Hey @Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) I'm glad you mentioned it - please do feel free to throw instance-related things my way in the @iSurf Support forum if things like this come up. But, again I'm glad I caught your post.

I'm seeing the same thing - no emails being sent from Friendica and I can see some errors in the logs. I'll see about getting that resolved.

@iSurf Support @Phil Landmeier (ᚠ)

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

Something to consider about the nonsense we are fed here in the USA. McDonalds has restaurants all over the world, including Denmark. Denmark has strict requirements for all employers, which include paying a living wage, vacations, sick leave, 1 year of maternity leave, and a retirement plan. In US dollars, the price of a Big Mac in Denmark is 45 cents more than in the USA.

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Karl Auerbach 6 months ago • diaspora

In-n-Out burger - which produces a better quality product than McDonalds for a significantly lower price - pays much higher wages than McD's and has much better training, and as I hear, much better benefits. (In-n-Out is owned by one person with a religious bent - but one has to look hard to find the religious parts.)

In our own small company we have tried to cover a lot of gaps in normal insurance - but the US gov't has laws and policies that make that hard. For example, we wanted to cover the costs of employees obtaining insurance to cover gaps in things like the ACA. But the IRS bans those sorts of practices!!!

In other words, fixing this in the US is more than just changing the way that companies act - we also have to fix the laws that prevent companies from changing.

Sheila Nagig 6 months ago • diaspora

Speaking for myself, I would gladly pay more for the burger if I knew it meant that the person making it for me could have a decent living wage. As for insurance, don't tie it to the employers, ffs. Here in the Netherlands you buy your own health insurance and if your employer offers you anything, it's a better group rate. However, you being able to afford insurance is not dependent on getting it through your employer. The deductible here is around €380 per year. Anything above that and you're covered. You can pay for a better package with things like dental and vision, physiotherapy and even alternative remedies if you so choose. Most people pay about €150 a month for health insurance without all of the extras. It's a much better system. American opponents of such a system say that in Europe and Canada you have to wait years sometimes on a waiting list for treatment, but that hasn't been my experience at all, and the insurance even covers mental health treatment and this year they're offering to cover smoking cessation too. It works. America could do it, but there are too... show more

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Sheila Nagig 6 months ago • diaspora

Do you know one thing that almost never happens here? Medical bankruptcy. I remember my brother's daughter was born premature and spent months in an incubator. I think the final bill after insurance was $180k or thereabout. That was in America. I tell people here about it and they're aghast. That could never happen here. People don't go around worrying that an illness or an accident could wipe them out financially for the rest of their lives or lead to bankruptcy. They don't put off going to the doctor or try to treat themselves because they're afraid of the financial repercussions of simply going to the doctor.

You know another thing they don't have here? Commercials for pharmaceuticals on television or radio or in print. Here your doctor makes the suggestions and you do not ask for a medication by name.

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lambjams 6 months ago • diaspora

There are American chains here in Australia who have to pay high minimum wage. Some of them have a bad history of cheating employees out of their pay; it seems others don't. I haven't heard of McDonald's underpaying employees, but 7-11 has been in the news more than once. It could be related to how much the national office keeps a watch over franchisees. After working in the US and being mostly unemployed in Australia, I have less appreciation for the high minimum wage than I did. I do think it keeps people out of the workforce. I'm now more in favor of universal basic income, and some sort of system that taxes companies relative to how profits are distributed among workers, management, and investors. The devil's in the details though - because different industries are comprised of different types of employees. Some are highly reliant on an army of low-paid workers (restaurant industry), while others employ nearly all highly-paid intellectual workers. The restaurant industry has a low profit margin while intellectual work has a huge profit margin, so some sort of differential would a... show more

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago • friendica

TIL: I knew that broccoli contains various chemicals that negatively affect cancers and tumors. I didn't know (didn't care) what they were called: glucosinolates and isothiocyanates. The really important thing I learned is that boiling your broccoli is a bad idea because it washes away most of the aforementioned chemicals. Steaming, microwaving, and stir-frying have little effect on these chemicals. Now you know.

8 people like this

Gomez :baner: 6 months ago • mastodon (AP)

can't remember the last time I boiled any vegetable (except maybe potatoes for mashing occasionally) it's steaming or roasting all the way for me.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

Feb 1, 2021, "Republicans Unveil New Stimulus Plan".

What year is this? Democratic majorities in both houses and the presidency. I shouldn't have to see the word Republican for at least two years.

The only unveilings I want to see are criminal indictments against their own.

6 people like this

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

And just like that...

Biden's defense secretary wipes slate clean, dismissing hundreds from Pentagon advisory boards

In the last months of Donald Trump's maladministration, Trump's teams shifted from their prior obsession of rooting out supposed "disloyal" government workers and devoted themselves to burrowing conservatism's most tawdry cronies into whatever parts …

^{www.dailykos.com}

8 people like this

ProtonMail 6 months ago • mastodon (AP)

There is no such thing as a backdoor that only lets the good guys in. Together with Tresorit, @threemaapp and Tutanota, we are calling on EU policy makers to rethink anti-encryption proposals that would introduce backdoors in encryption platforms: https://protonmail.com/blog/joint-statement-eu-encryption/

@Threema

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Flav 6 months ago • pleroma (AP)

Would be nice if you guys had your app in F-Droid like Tutanota does. That would be very useful for people who use degoogled phones.

ProtonMail 6 months ago • mastodon (AP)

Thank you for your suggestion! We're focused on building a new version of the Android app right now, and we will put the ProtonMail app on F-Droid after we release it. Stay tuned for updates.

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

"I put eyes on the cat’s bed and could not be happier with the result"

https://twitter.com/i/status/1353829937233473538

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

This is the most amazing thing I've ever seen. Be sure to watch the video.

World's fastest RC aircraft hits a stunning 548 mph – without a motor

No props, no jets, no rockets – California's Spencer Lisenby just broke the world speed record for remote controlled aircraft, taking an unpowered RC glider transonic at 548 mph (882 km/h) using nothing but the wind.

^newatlas.com

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

With the resurgence of the sea shanty style on the net, I thought I'd post this collection of classic sea shanties.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CuyLbC2TZo

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 6 months ago friendica

Lisa Stranger

2021-01-15 07:07:41

Local GOP officials warn the party they will put Trump allegiance first - Raw Story

Deny them use of any and all GOP corporate logos/trademarks (yes there's a hint of sarcasm there). Make them start their own party.

'We are just getting started': Local GOP officials warn the party they will put Trump allegiance first
On Thursday, The New York Times reported that even as there is finally some movement at the national level for Republicans to distance themselves from outgoing President Donald Trump, there is little such movement at the state and local level — and t…
^{www.rawstory.com}

Phil Landmeier (ᚠ) 7 months ago friendica

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