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    1. Bishop The Musician

      <Insert intro explaining the lack of an intro.> raindrop on the tongue of the parched, de- flated beach ball in the hands of the young, lit cig 'tween the fingers of a nun, one sin's never gonna... <Insert intro explaining the lack of an intro.>
      raindrop

      on the tongue

      of the parched, de-

      flated beach ball

      in the hands of the young, lit

      cig 'tween the fingers

      of a nun,

      one sin's never gonna be enough

      fuck the prose

      words will never be enough.

      the writing's on the walls

      but you can't read it

      you aren't here

      i need a sign you

      can't ignore or a call

      you're bound to hear

      .

      the words just aren't enough

      on their own

      to pull my heart strings

      i can't find peace

      without my blood

      on guitar strings.

      .

      the words are going cold

      the poetry has not a heartbeat.

      i need to take the stage

      and pray to god that they can't see me.

      8 votes
    2. NBA Postseason Discussion

      ~sports has been a bit empty lately. With the end of the NBA regular season I thought we could open this up to discussion of how the season went for your team, notable moments, what you didn't...

      ~sports has been a bit empty lately. With the end of the NBA regular season I thought we could open this up to discussion of how the season went for your team, notable moments, what you didn't expect etc...

      I'll start off, as an Orlando Magic fan I'm so incredibly psyched we finally made the playoffs, it's been too damn long. Speaking of the playoffs, how wild is it that Lebron's streak of finals appearances ends with him completely missing the playoffs? Is there even any point in the playoffs this season because the Golden State Monstars could just steamroll everyone in their way.

      6 votes
    3. What have you been listening to this week?

      What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as...

      What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

      Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

      You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

      http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

      Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

      19 votes
    4. Can you access university libraries in your country w/o an affiliation to the university?

      In Turkey, where I live, almost all universities restrict access to staff and students (only their own students if not a graduate student); the only exception I can find is the Koç University...

      In Turkey, where I live, almost all universities restrict access to staff and students (only their own students if not a graduate student); the only exception I can find is the Koç University where paid membership is open to public. I've researched in the past and found that major universities around the world---i.e. Italy, France, UK, US; selection factor being the languages I can read---seem to allow the public to access in one way or another (article, in Turkish, with results). But I wonder how accurate my reading is with the reality, and thus I'm asking this question.

      So, as a plain citizen w/o any current affiliation to any educational institutions, can you access university libraries where you live? Does it matter if you have certain diplomas or affiliations? How easy it is?

      10 votes
    5. Soul Goth

      Howdy folks. Some of you will be pleased to find that this is a ~music post of mine not about emo rap, hahaha. Across the past six months I've found myself infatuated with a new sound I can't...

      Howdy folks.

      Some of you will be pleased to find that this is a ~music post of mine not about emo rap, hahaha.

      Across the past six months I've found myself infatuated with a new sound I can't quite put the finger on. These songs have something in common, in spirit. And that's what I'm after.

      Here's a little playlist I've assembled under the title of Soul Goth. If you have any other recommendations, give me everything you got.

      Or if I'm describing something what already exists; let me know.

      Yalla.


      "God's Gonna Cut You Down" x Johnny Cash

      "Pray I Won't Wake Up" x Honky Tonk Hustlas

      "No Sugar In My Coffee" x Caught A Ghost

      "In A Week" x Hozier

      "In Hell I'll Be In Good Company" x The Dead South

      "Loud And Heavy" x Cody Jinks

      "The Devil Wears a Suit and Tie" x Colter Wall

      "When Jesus Comes" x Uncle Sinner

      "The Devil Had a Hold of Me" x Gillian Welch

      "Fingers To The Bone" x Brown Bird

      "The Piano Has Been Drinking" x Tom Waits

      "Graves" x Whiskey Shivers

      "Burn The Witch" x Shawn James

      3 votes
    6. Tildistas, do you read or have you read any webcomics?

      as an offshoot of this topic, i'm interested to see if any of you folks read/were previously big into webcomics. the last time we apparently had this question was about ten months ago and...

      as an offshoot of this topic, i'm interested to see if any of you folks read/were previously big into webcomics. the last time we apparently had this question was about ten months ago and obviously the site's grown quite a bit since then, so i'm sure there will be plenty of new answers.

      20 votes
    7. Option to temporarily hide read posts

      It would be nice to have an optional feature that filters out posts that a) you have read and b) don't have any new unread comments. When a post gets new comments it should reappear. That way we...

      It would be nice to have an optional feature that filters out posts that a) you have read and b) don't have any new unread comments. When a post gets new comments it should reappear. That way we could see more unread content on the page, but still keep long running topics going. Have it not affect search, so people can still find posts for reference.

      11 votes
    8. At what point will technology be sufficient for exact local time everywhere?

      It’s a thought I’ve had mulling around for a while now. I’m wondering will a point ever come when we return to completely accurate local time; each village, town and city operating on a local time...

      It’s a thought I’ve had mulling around for a while now. I’m wondering will a point ever come when we return to completely accurate local time; each village, town and city operating on a local time synced with the sunrise/sunset—noon truly means the solar noon—with technology as the interface.

      Is it possible? would we even want it, would it matter? Do we have to wait for brain chips to make a time conversion seamless?

      11 votes
    9. This Week in Election Night, 2020 (Week 5)

      week five begins with another page worth of links, a big presidential announcement, and the long creep of this cycle that will make us all go fucking crazy by the end of it. the [LONGFORM] tag...

      week five begins with another page worth of links, a big presidential announcement, and the long creep of this cycle that will make us all go fucking crazy by the end of it. the [LONGFORM] tag continues, but i don't think there's any longform this week either, so c'est la vie.

      the usual note: common sense should be able to generally dictate what does and does not get posted in this thread. if it's big news or feels like big news, probably make it its own post instead of lobbing it in here. like the other weekly threads, this one is going to try to focus on things that are still discussion worthy, but wouldn't necessarily make good/unique/non-repetitive discussion starters as their own posts.

      Week 1 threadWeek 2 threadWeek 3 threadWeek 4 thread


      News

      General Stuff

      • from FiveThirtyEight: What The Potential 2020 Candidates Are Doing And Saying, Vol. 15. if you're curious what candidates have been up to, FiveThirtyEight has you covered with this week's roundup.

      • from FiveThirtyEight: Who Might Make The Democratic Debate Stage?. this is probably the most important question now that the field is basically set: how many people will qualify for the debate stage? the DNC has said the cap is 20 candidates, and we have at least 21 running with potentially more on the way. a lot of them meet at least one criterion for being included. the DNC seems to have prepared extensively for that possibility, so it's not like they're on the backfoot here, but i suspect the politicking surrounding this for some of the smaller candidates is going to be pretty wacky.

      • from The Atlantic: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Race: A Cheat Sheet, like CBS News's roundup, this extensive piece covers every candidate currently declared, why they're running, and what they're running on. pretty good resource for those of you needing to cite something.

      • from The Atlantic: The Strategic Move That Gave Bernie Sanders a Fundraising Edge. despite its title, this article mostly focuses on fundraising and how it's been either lackluster for democrats or not been, depending on who you ask and under what criteria, and whether or not that even matters in the grand scheme of things. it's an interesting discussion.

      Joe Biden

      we begin with two words: HE'S RUNNING. The Atlantic first reported this in a piece on the 19th called Joe Biden Is Running for President, and he was expected to announce yesterday but curiously, something (Biden's team was warned about announcing 2020 bid on same day as forum focused on women of color) seems to have interfered with that master plan that joe biden should have known about, so he announced this morning instead.

      here is his announcement video:

      The core values of this nation… our standing in the world… our very democracy...everything that has made America -- America --is at stake. That’s why today I’m announcing my candidacy for President of the United States.

      and nobody was really surprised. anyways, onto articles covering his announcement. take your pick of source:


      moving on to analysis:

      Bernie Sanders

      • from Buzzfeed News: Bernie Sanders Isn’t Fighting The Wars Of 2016, His Campaign Says — The Democratic Establishment Is. in case you haven't noticed, we're still religitating the bullshit that characterized the 2016 primary because nobody can drop it. nowhere is this more clear than with the sanders campaign, who feel like they're still having to defend themselves from the same lines of attack they did back then. whether or not this is accurate is probably debatable, but it's pretty obvious that this isn't going to just go away, so expect it to continue to be a fracture point this year.

      • from The Guardian: Sanders dares Democrats to stop him – but is he the man to beat Trump?. in a similar vein, the sanders campaign seems to be contending with the prospect of the democratic party trying to meddle in the primary and anoit a non-sanders winner, as they were accused of doing in 2016. this is going to also likely remain a fracture point, because the democratic party no doubt feels it has reasons to step in here--but also, it would absolutely be inviting trouble if sanders is the leading candidate when everything is said and done at the convention and they step in, given 2016.

      • from Vox: Republican strategist Karl Rove says Bernie Sanders could beat Donald Trump in 2020. whether realpolitik or genuine concern (and in contrast to rick wilson in the above piece), karl rove seems to think that sanders is the exact sort of candidate who would beat donald in 2020.

      Beto O'Rourke

      In a statement about her and Malitz’s departure to BuzzFeed News, Bond said it was “time for us to move on to other challenges.”
      “Launching a presidential campaign without a big staff or even a campaign manager was no easy feat and it took everyone pitching in,” she said. “We’re proud to have been part of the team of deeply dedicated staff and volunteers who nearly pulled off a historic upset in the 2018 Texas Senate race and broke records launching Beto’s campaign for the presidency.”

      • from the Huffington Post: Beto O’Rourke’s Non-Media Strategy. on a more strategy-driven note for beto, his campaign has interestingly been one of the only thus far to not have a nationally televised town hall. this seems to be intentional. as the article notes:

      O’Rourke ... sa[id] he preferred interacting with voters “eyeball to eyeball” rather than by doing TV, as evidenced by his dozens of events where he regularly takes questions from the audience and reporters alike. But he acknowledged “at some point, I may have to give in” to doing cable television.

      it's a bold strategy for certain, but i do suspect that he's going to have to at some point get his voice out nationally. he's been slightly slipping in recent polls, mostly to candidates like buttigieg, and it suggests that he's lost a bit of his lustre with democratic voters.

      Elizabeth Warren

      Pete Buttigieg

      • from Buzzfeed News: Pete Buttigieg’s Presidential Run Has Many LGBT Democrats Eager For Their Obama Moment. buzzfeed has a piece on the significance of pete buttigieg to LGBT americans and how he's been able to leverage that to tap into a donor network that's usually pretty splintered. it's unclear to me that he's going to be able to parlay that untapped base into success, though, and more recent polling seems to have buttigieg sorta stalling out around 10% with the logjam of other sorta-kinda-frontrunner candidates.

      • from CBS News: Pete Buttigieg on the presidency as a "moral office". this is mostly a personality piece on buttigieg and both his history in afghanistan and his electoral history, and how that has influenced his current candidacy and what he views as priorities. it's kinda straightforward and the title sorta speaks for itself, so there's not actually that much to be said for it.

      Kamala Harris

      Harris said she would mandate universal background checks on anyone selling more than five guns a year, ending a loophole that allows private gun sellers to bypass background checks on 1 in 5 gun sales nationwide, bar people classified as fugitives from buying guns. She would also, her campaign said, close a loophole in federal law that allows perpetrators of domestic violence to keep their guns if they are not married to their partner.

      • from POLITICO: Kamala Harris says she supports adding third gender option to federal IDs. she also supports the fairly small idea of adding a third gender option to federal IDs. i guess you gotta have some tiny policies in there too with the big ones for maximum efficiency. it is possible this raises questions about her history of LGBT policy, though, which is probably not something that she wants to litigate because it's not the best.

      Everybody else


      Opinion/Ideology-driven

      For voters, Booker's Wall Street ties and his T-Bone stories are part of the same problem: Authenticity. Can you be a liberal Democratic willing to take on billionaires, entrenched corporations and the deregulation unleashed by the Trump Administration after years of cozying up to Wall Street and pharmaceutical donors? Can you address the racial divides in America — not just what's in people's hearts, but the problems of differential education, mass incarceration and inequality of opportunity — if you can't bring yourself to call Trump a racist? And can you be trusted to tell the truth of why you've arrived at your liberal politics if you made up a T-Bone to explain to white people a cartoon version of black intergenerational trauma?


      anyways, feel free to as always contribute other interesting articles you stumble across, or comment on some of the ones up there.

      11 votes
    10. I have a basic and possibly uninformed question about the event horizon of a black hole

      It is my understanding that if you are looking at an object falling into a black hole from a remote viewpoint, then the object will appear to take “forever” to complete the fall into the black...

      It is my understanding that if you are looking at an object falling into a black hole from a remote viewpoint, then the object will appear to take “forever” to complete the fall into the black hole. The object is effectively frozen in time at the black hole’s event horizon, from the remote viewer’s POV.

      Is this the correct interpretation so far? If so, let’s remember that.

      It is also my understanding that a black hole can increase in mass as it captures new objects. The mass does increase from an external viewpoint. Is this accurate?

      If I understand known science on the above points, then the paradox I see here is that while the visual information is frozen in time from the external POV, the mass of the black hole does increase from the external POV. So is this where the Holographic Principle comes in? Or is there another explanation here, or am I off-base entirely?

      Or is it just that the accretion disk gains mass and black holes never increase in mass from an external POV, after they are initially formed?

      Is this known?

      Please either attempt to answer my tortured question, or point me to material that might lead me ask a better question.

      Thanks!

      13 votes
    11. What is your top 1 song?

      For me it is Holy Wars by Megadeth. The entire album really, but this song just blows everything away. It will never be surpassed. Tornado of Souls is right up there, but i have to choose just one...

      For me it is Holy Wars by Megadeth.

      The entire album really, but this song just blows everything away. It will never be surpassed.

      Tornado of Souls is right up there, but i have to choose just one so...

      24 votes