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daoish.bsky.social
Medieval manuscripts, Daoist (aka Taoist) philosophy, comedy, palindromes, versus recurrentes, &c. Upcoming: in 2025, I'm presenting at ICM-Leeds and ICMS-Kalamazoo , the Intl Conf on Daoist Studies in Romania, & 2 shows at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
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“'Too good,' I nod knowingly as he unveils plans to turn all federal buildings into casinos. 'Top-ten standup of all time,' I wink as I empty my savings account to buy an avocado."

Translating some modern wisdom literature (LOTR bk. 2, ch. 2) into Gəʿəz (suggestions for improvements welcome!): ወብእሲ ፡ ዘይቀጠቅጥ ፡ ግብረ ፡ ከመ ፡ ይክሥት ፡ እፎ ፡ ውእቱ ፡ ዝንቱ ፡ ወፅአ ፡ አሠረ ፡ ልቡና :: wä-bəʾəsi ፡ zä-yəqäṭäqqəṭ : gəbrä : kämä : yəkśət : ʾəffo : wəʾətu : zəntu: wäḍʾa : ʾaśärä : ləbbuna ::

I've been joking for a few weeks that Canada and Mexico should join the EU. Maybe I'm not joking?

'Study Reveals That Greek and Roman Statues Were Not Only Painted and Adorned with Textiles and Jewelry but Also Perfumed' 🏺

1. The DOGE website is garbage. The claimed savings has no relationship to the data provided. And the data that is provided grossly inflates the savings from each canceled contract. So we just launched our own site — the Musk Watch DOGE Tracker — that breaks everything down.

A thing that I think is passing a lot of people by is that Columbia is a place where there is a *lot* of Jewish life, progressive and otherwise, and calling the place "antisemitic" is another way of saying that progressive Jews are the real fascists, which I think is just despicable.

Everybody's upset abt this or that thing Dems did or didn't do at the faux-SOTU. Poor messaging, poor this, bad that. Very few of those things matter much or will be things we'll remember in a couple months. What they do on the CR really does matter. A LOT. That shld be 10x more focus anything else.

getting into the leo frank conspiracy theory is hardcore nazi shit. hardcore. the most hardcore. this woman has no place in public life

The Art Institute of Chicago announced that it has returned the sacred 12th-century statue “Buddha Sheltered by the Serpent Kind Muchalinda” to Nepal, its country of origin.

So we knew this already but DEI is deadass their new woke DEI actively replaces black, women, or literally any kind of minority they’re mad at during any given moment 😭

A team of archivists has recreated the pre-Trump CDC website as a live, easy-to-navigate website that should be indexed by Google. The team is hosting it in Europe. Cool project that is sadly necessary: www.404media.co/archivists-r...

Oh great, yet more reputational whitewashing for one of history’s grossest dudes

For decades, The Economist has been the cheerleader for transatlantic co-operation. Today's editorial ends that. "Europe must prepare to be abandoned or extorted. Not to prepare for that could leave Europe vulnerable to Russia & to an increasingly hostile America. That is the tragedy of Mr Trump."

Had some... well... thoughts on Donald Trump claiming that he's brought free speech back to the US government just hours after promising to imprison and deport protestors. www.techdirt.com/2025/03/05/t...

British PM Starmer hugged Zelenskyy. That’s how bad U.S. foreign policy has gotten—it’s driving the Brits to physical displays of emotion.

A reminder that The Conversation has huge revenues - $14.9M (2023) - and doesn't pay writers, including people who are non-tenured. You shouldn't write for them or share their work as a matter of labor solidarity with those of us who aren't fancy tenured folks. www.patreon.com/posts/better...

We're at the "French University is offering grants to refugee scientists censored by the regime" stage of our country www.404media.co/french-unive...

"several federal judges in the Washington D.C. area had received pizzas sent anonymously to their homes, which is being interpreted by law enforcement as a form of intimidation meant to convey that a target’s address is known." www.reuters.com/world/us/jud...

Isn't it ironic that all those techbros are absolutely in love with the Roman Empire but hate bureaucracy, completely forgetting that what made Roman Empire actually run was... enormous bureaucracy? How do they think the whole empire thing functioned?

One thing that needs to get repeated until it sinks in is that “AI” does not simply function as a tool that people in power are using; it’s even more powerful as a permission structure for the destructive & extractive things they wanted to do in the first place.

Also, money received through the app is witheld from the creator for 75 DAYS. So not only are you as a member being charged extra, the creator has to wait 2.5 months to get it. It's bad for everyone. Sub through the mobile site or desktop!

Want some fragmentary fun? Then join us at the London Palaeography Seminar next Tuesday, 11th March, to hear Dr Fran Alvarez on 'The Importance of being a Host' with new finds from Exeter and Salamanca. 5:30pm Senate House and online. Sign up here: ies.sas.ac.uk/events/impor...

Attn: early career scholars of manuscript and rare book studies Come and work with our collection! www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DMB941/p... #PLOW

I spy with my little eye a visual alignment between the 'dancing statues' frescoes of the newly revealed Dionysian banquet hall in #Pompeii and the Dionysian fresco in the Villa dei Misteri. The maenad/dancer with the cymbals - nearly a perfect match.🏺 📸 Ministero della Cultura; Meisterdrucke

Current and former federal workers: We’re here in D.C. sending out our signal 🚨 Contact us confidentially on Signal at 917-512-0201 or go to propublica.org/tips.

Listen to me read my palindromic poem ZEUS AND OLYMPUS: www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD_U...

I love our piecemeal reproduction of Roman concrete. It's one of the best, most engaging real world examples of epistemology, philosophy of science, and philosophy of technology there is. So damn good.

Looking at some survey data here. Trump/Elon cutting off all cancer cure research is the issue that freaks voters out more than any other, also the one they've heard the least about. Important for voters to hear more about this.

Kenneth Tam’s exhibition “The Medallion at Bridget Donahue” takes up the devastation of those whose lives have been shattered by the plummeting value of the medallion, a permit to operate a taxi that is unique to New York City.

I feel as if we're capable of acknowledging that a one-day boycott is mostly symbolic without becoming contemptuous and dismissive of people finding a little meaning and comfort in such a symbol. The scorn seems petty.

This is a bad take (and disingenuous in it's attempt to ridicule.) The point of a one day buyer's strike is that people will know why it is happening. Sure, a long term boycott of Amazon is a great idea (and I'm doing it.) But there is no way for Bezos to notice the gradual, daily reduction.

Cardinal With 3-Foot Vertical Leap Emerges As Frontrunner In Papal Combine theonion.com/cardina...

We talk about Bezos, or Citi, or Big Tech, but cancer's brand is seriously in the toilet. Everyone hates it. And yet, day one hit from Trump/Musk was to shut down all federal funding for cancer cure research. And it's still mostly shut down. Have you ever known anyone with cancer?

Looking to be Bezos free? Drop Goodreads for StoryGraph today if you haven’t already

Were there really barbarians in Mainz in 406? What was "news" in late antiquity? In case you missed it, my new open access paper that rethinks the founding events of the end of the Roman empire in light of female agency and the understanding of history. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Roses are redde Noble are the manatees To counter the nonsense yn the worlde We must teach artes & humanityes

DOGE By The Numbers theonion.com/doge-by...

Something that’s very clear is that Trump is old and checked out. He wants to play the role of president but has zero interest in doing the job and is happy to outsource the real work to Musk, Vought and a crew of feral zealots.

Instagram Reels has randomly decided to recommend violent videos to people, myself included. We're talking shootings, gore, surgical procedures, people dying. Social media needs legal enforcement. This is not good.