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Leon Bambrick

@secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy

12 followers 0 following 190 posts

Owner/occupier of an ever-hungry brain, feasting on the flesh of thoughts. Bleeding heart. He/him. Strongly support lgbtqia+ community 🌈 and first Australians. [bridged from https://mastodon.cloud/@secretgeek on the fediverse by https://fed.brid.gy/ ]

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Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 5h

Mixing those different ideas together:

What if early
Hominid discovery of tea drinking is the origin of consciousness, the fundamental spark of civilization?

Did we evolve increasing sophistication to enjoy more tea? Or did tea evolve us?

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 5h

Some people say that the rise of the coffee house in France led to the French Revolution — middle and upper middle class talking long hours germinating ideas etc.

A separate and unrelated fringe theory called “the stoned ape hypothesis” (McKenna et al.) says that humans became humans because of […]

Original post on mastodon.cloud

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Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 5h

I learned:

1. That caffeine evolved separately in plants many many times.

2. Why caffeine evolves in plants.

3. That separate cultures developed tea into drinks - entirely independent.

I knew about caffeine as an adenosine inhibitor - but didn’t know that caffeine is so similar to parts of […]

Original post on mastodon.cloud

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Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 5h

My brother sent me this intriguing short video essay about caffeine — I learned interesting things from it:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=p-Dy2pcdBSU&t=434s&pp=2AGyA5ACAdIHCQkbAaO1ajebQw%3D%3D

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 22h

A circle is just an over inflated triangle

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 1d

just got an email that said “it’s cyber security awareness month. Click here to learn more.“ Ha Ha! I’m not falling for that one. Nice try Kevin Mitnick!

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 1d

I just got an email that said “it’s cyber security awareness month. Click here to learn more.“ They’ll have to do better than that, I’m not falling for it.

1 1

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 1d

There’s a drama just released on “Stan” called “The Hack” about the News of the World phone hacking scandal. It really sinks the boot in to the fetid tabloid industry. What it doesn’t mention is that “Stan” who PRODUCED the show is owned by Nine Entertainment Co Holdings. Meanwhile: “News of the […]

Original post on mastodon.cloud

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Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 2d

Does Visual Studio Rot The Mind?

*An essay from a simpler time.*

Charles Petzold's talk is soon to be 20 years old. It's momentarily unavailable from the internet, so I've republished it on my wiki here:

https://wiki.secretgeek.net/does-visual-studio-rot-the-mind

Does Visual Studio Rot The Mind? (wiki.secretGeek.net)

wiki.secretgeek.net

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 2d

"WebSocket closed without opened."

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 3d

The asylum is running the asylum.

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 5d

“English” is named after a region in which modern nation?

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 7d

Surf guitar music was a way for African american blues and latin american rhythms to be appropriated and marketed to a white audience as something wholly new.

Love that sweet reverb though.

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 9d

Just now I over heard one line from a song and thought -

“oh I haven’t heard this… i guess it must be… the Rolling Stones? Doing a very pointed satire of Dylan. Ouch! Those are some very deep cuts!”

A moment later, after one more line of the song, I realised it was The Animals covering Dylan’s […]

Original post on mastodon.cloud

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Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 9d

The Dylan Paradox is this:

Every lyric to every Bob Dylan song is indistinguishable from a biting parody of any lyric from any Bob Dylan song.

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 10d

Note to self.

Rather than "Enshittification" I occasionally prefer the newer, more elegant, gentrified form of the term:

"Enshitrification"

cc @pluralistic

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 10d

It's hard to summarize any of its points without sounding like a "gender essentialist" (but read the book, because Cat is very clear that trans women are women, etc.)

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 10d

I keep thinking about a book I read (twice) a few months back:

"Eve:
How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution"

by Cat Bohannon

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 14d

45 years - John Bonham - bonzo

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 19d

I could listen to opera, a guy like me. Why not a guy like me?

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 21d

Yesterday I received an expensive product with an engraved QR code, which was only readable under ideal conditions. This led to an in depth analysis during which I learnt more than I wanted to about generating and debugging QR codes. The product details involved confidentiality so I can’t really […]

Original post on mastodon.cloud

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Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 21d

I just re-read “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”.

Like Gatsby it’s a short read but, even more-so than Gatsby, an absolute whirlwind tour-de-force in creating an amazing and compelling character. Just wow. Boom! Whoosh! 💥 ‼️

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 22d

The Dutch invented windmill powered sawmills which:

“…greatly reduced the cost of construction of ships and helped make them the leading shipbuilders in northern Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries.”

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vergulde_Draeck

Vergulde Draeck - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 25d

Noel Redding — who quit as bass player for the Jimi Hendrix Experience — complained that playing with Jimi was just “endless interminable jamming in E minor” ….

And hot damn! I’ve never felt so close to Jimi Hendrix in my life!

Leon Bambrick @secretgeek.mastodon.cloud.ap.brid.gy · 28d

What’s one or more *specific* things you were taught at school, that turned out not to be correct?

(For brevity let’s leave all religious instruction out of this)