luks's recent activity

  1. Comment on Help me ditch Chrome's password manager! in ~tech

    luks
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    I am by no means highly knowledgeable on the topic, but I've been using Bitwarden for a number of years and it would tick all your boxes. I use Firefox, setup is limited to creating an account and...

    I am by no means highly knowledgeable on the topic, but I've been using Bitwarden for a number of years and it would tick all your boxes. I use Firefox, setup is limited to creating an account and then installing the Bitwarden extension. It also works on mobile, either with the extension or an app that lets you fill in passwords for all apps too.

    8 votes
  2. Comment on Tiny undervalued hardware companions in ~tech

    luks
    Link Parent
    Maybe not directly helpful for Dell computers, but I retrofitted my ThinkPad X230 with a USB-C connector a few years back from...

    Maybe not directly helpful for Dell computers, but I retrofitted my ThinkPad X230 with a USB-C connector a few years back from https://www.tindie.com/products/mikepdiy/lenovo-charging-port-type-c-pd-x220-x230/

    It should easily be possible to build something similar for a Dell (if the connectors aren't the same anyway already). Combined with a tiny GaN charging brick, it's great :)

    3 votes
  3. Comment on How do you store ”loose” tech hardware? in ~tech

    luks
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    I have one box with larger cables coiled with onewrap velcro. And then for all the micro USB, mini USB, etc. I standardized to USB-C double-ended cables and have tiny adapters for the rest. They...

    I have one box with larger cables coiled with onewrap velcro. And then for all the micro USB, mini USB, etc. I standardized to USB-C double-ended cables and have tiny adapters for the rest. They live in a little wooden box. I really only ever need 2-3 USB cables at a time, so that works fine for me.

  4. Comment on What is the horrible phrase my wife learned from her grandpa? in ~humanities.languages

    luks
    Link Parent
    Not sure if it's only dialect or normal German, as I've heard my parents say it often, but "Schietwetter" (German for shit weather, ˈʃiːtvɛtɐ) could sound similar to the first part. Not sure about...

    Not sure if it's only dialect or normal German, as I've heard my parents say it often, but "Schietwetter" (German for shit weather, ˈʃiːtvɛtɐ) could sound similar to the first part. Not sure about the second though. There's also a ton of other words you could make with Schiet...

    6 votes
  5. Comment on Jury finds Jennifer Crumbley, the Michigan school shooter’s mother, guilty of manslaughter in ~news

    luks
    Link Parent
    What? You think arressting a child for a crime they haven't even committed yet is a good solution? If children, then why not adults? And, how would you determine who is at risk? Because of the...

    What? You think arressting a child for a crime they haven't even committed yet is a good solution? If children, then why not adults? And, how would you determine who is at risk? Because of the behaviors of the parents?

    10 votes
  6. Comment on Can anyone recommend a printer/scanner combo that works with Linux with no additional drivers? in ~tech

    luks
    Link
    I have a Brother L2750DW (black and white laser and double-sided scanning) Printing works out-of-the-box after connecting the printer to my wifi and for scanning I wanted something that didn't...

    I have a Brother L2750DW (black and white laser and double-sided scanning) Printing works out-of-the-box after connecting the printer to my wifi and for scanning I wanted something that didn't depend on my computer being on. I scan to FTP and have a small USB Stick connected to my router where the files are saved. I then have a script on my computer that runs every minute to check if there are any new files.

    2 votes
  7. Comment on Oh my days! 3.5yr old got his big boy bed. in ~talk

    luks
    Link Parent
    What may work is to child-proof his room so far.that he can turn on and off the light by himself and has some quiet/non-destructive toys he can play with (nothing he can color the walls with!)...

    What may work is to child-proof his room so far.that he can turn on and off the light by himself and has some quiet/non-destructive toys he can play with (nothing he can color the walls with!) Then he can play quietly until the clock says it's ok to wake everyone else.

    5 votes
  8. Comment on How would you teach math differently to young kids if budget was not a concern? in ~talk

    luks
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    I had great success as a kid at an accredited Montessori (but public) school. Typically, we were taught new lessons in groups of 2-4 and were also always taught how to self-check our answers. As...

    I had great success as a kid at an accredited Montessori (but public) school. Typically, we were taught new lessons in groups of 2-4 and were also always taught how to self-check our answers. As an adult looking at the curriculum, it appears pretty brilliant - because you're working in the physical realm, big problems are still easy to solve, which motivates small children and a lot of concepts such as fractions, binomial equation and cubes and cube roots are introduced at about kindergarten to first grade the first time in passing.

    I've had a very solid grasp of mathematics and the importance of units and operators that I saw in nearly all of my fellow classmates and didn't see in most of the "normal" kids when I re-joined the normal public school system. It also had the added benefit of lettings kids work as far ahead and as quickly or slowly as needed. Also, we sometimes "regressed" and practiced something familiar or taught the younger kids, which helped with solidifying the concepts and connecting information.

    My favorite was long division and the stamp game :) and I ended up being about 4 grades ahead by 6th grade.

    This is a nice video showing some of the early materials:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIFQjONnn1g&t=381

    https://hollismontessori.org/blog/2018/3/19/montessori-basics-how-math-progresses-through-the-levels

    14 votes
  9. Comment on US Obstetrics and Gynecology certification examinations are being held in person in Texas in ~health

    luks
    Link Parent
    I think they're trying to say it's not banned absolutely and thus teaching or being tested on the material can't be illegal as it could be necessary to know.

    I think they're trying to say it's not banned absolutely and thus teaching or being tested on the material can't be illegal as it could be necessary to know.

    3 votes
  10. Comment on Gordon Lightfoot - Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald (1976) in ~music

    luks
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    It's a much less known shipwreck song by Lightfoot, but I find the Ballad of the Yarmouth Castle to also be an extremely haunting and beautiful song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N16szs0jXrc

    It's a much less known shipwreck song by Lightfoot, but I find the Ballad of the Yarmouth Castle to also be an extremely haunting and beautiful song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N16szs0jXrc

    7 votes
  11. Comment on How do you divide a room completely and maintain high visibility? in ~life.home_improvement

    luks
    (edited )
    Link
    Maybe some open shelves like the kallax ones from Ikea with plexiglass on one side? I don't have a good idea for the door, but for the shelves you could then remove some of the panels and add...

    Maybe some open shelves like the kallax ones from Ikea with plexiglass on one side? I don't have a good idea for the door, but for the shelves you could then remove some of the panels and add carpet/scratching post/etc. to make it a little cat playground.

    Something like https://ikeahackers.net/2011/01/cat-activity-centersleep-center.html or https://ikeahackers.net/2014/07/kallax-cat-scratching-furniture.html but the large units. And then just have an overhang at the top or extend the Plexiglas to the ceiling.

    This is the best image of what I had in mind: http://imgur.com/gallery/f582R You could also just add a board to some of the shelves that extend out a bit farther to allow the cats to jump between levels which would lessen the need to drill holes in the big boards.

    3 votes
  12. Comment on Trans identity and the gender binary in ~lgbt

    luks
    Link Parent
    I agree that it's difficult to divide people into two neat little boxes of "has dysphoria" and "doesn't have dysphoria". In fact, I think it's a much better idea for everyone to think about each...

    I agree that it's difficult to divide people into two neat little boxes of "has dysphoria" and "doesn't have dysphoria". In fact, I think it's a much better idea for everyone to think about each step in the medical process individually.

    I've seen a lot of both: obviously dysphoric people who keep telling themselves that everything is normal and there is no way they could actually be trans, but also (primarily young) people whose sole reason to transition seem to be GNC tendencies but who feel entirely comfortable with their bodies. I think the former group tends to get there eventually, but the latter worries me. Especially those that extrapolate from a label to 'must do all the steps even if it feels wrong'. You see quite a few questions about microdosing T or how to avoid basically all of the consequences of T.

    I think my main concern with lumping both groups together is that a lot of the studies on transsexual people, which show huge benefits with hormone therapy and little post-op regret, probably aren't applicable to the non-dysphoric group. With the current ratio of self-identifying transgender/non-binary people to diagnosed transgender people being about 100:1 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4823815/), it worries me a lot that health insurance might not deem transition care as medically necessary in the future if the definitions aren't better delineated in the future.

    1 vote
  13. Comment on Trans identity and the gender binary in ~lgbt

    luks
    Link Parent
    Yeah, when I was thinking about if I really was trans or not and whether I truly needed to medically transition, I based a large part of my decision on my childhood memories as I was a bit...

    Yeah, when I was thinking about if I really was trans or not and whether I truly needed to medically transition, I based a large part of my decision on my childhood memories as I was a bit hesitant to fully trust my current feelings at the time as being a teenager is a volatile time for most people. I had a staggeringly long list of weird memories. Looking back at it now, 14 years later, it's amazing how much of a difference transitioning made. Any tendencies towards depression and depersonalization vanished - I used to read about 2-3 books a day just to escape reality and had massive problems both with self-care as I couldn't face the mirrors in the bathroom, as well as with falling asleep.

    One of the long lists I have is at https://pdfhost.io/v/xlKhxp5Ld_Statistics_and_Studies_of_Transsexuals.pdf The interesting studies start on page 37. For example, in posthumous studies the authors found that the BSTc sizes of trans men and women matched those of their identified genders even though the subjects had never undergone any hormone therapy. This paper also gives an easy-to-read summary of the research into the origins of transsexuality: https://doi.org/10.4158/EP14351.RA

    1 vote
  14. Comment on Trans identity and the gender binary in ~lgbt

    luks
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    It seems most people have already responded to emphasize the biological background behind being trans. To me, this is the only viewpoint that makes sense with both my own lived experiences and...
    • Exemplary

    It seems most people have already responded to emphasize the biological background behind being trans. To me, this is the only viewpoint that makes sense with both my own lived experiences and current scientific knowledge. I'm a research scientist, though, so I have no particular knowledge of queer theory and the "social construct" arguments apart from what I've read online.

    There seem to be two main "types" of trans people currently - some that are transitioning or calling themselves trans as they disagree with gender roles and those that experience dysphoria. From my (very) recent experience in the hospital here, the people getting gender affirming surgeries were all firmly in the latter camp and none of us could understand the former group at all and most don't consider them trans in the same way that we are. In my view, there are two phenomena currently being called the same name, which can make the discussion a bit confusing.

    So, for those trans people with a similar biological basis, I think the brain sex theory makes the most sense. That is, a mental map of the body is created at birth that maps to a particular sex - this can be called your neurological sex or gender identity. Sex consists of multiple different components: chromosomes, primary sex characteristics, hormonal profile, neurological sex, etc. For intersex people, the chromosomes might not match the primary sex characteristics, while for trans people the neurological sex doesn't match the remaining sex markers. By transitioning, it's possible to change the primary and secondary sex characteristics as well as the general phenotype and hormone profile to match the neurological sex, so that trans people are ultimately much closer to the sex they transition to than they are to the one they were at birth.

    As far as I've experienced, neurological sex is immutable and present from birth. As a small child, I attempted to pee standing up, viewed myself as male and held myself to those societal standards such as not crying when hurt or being embarrassed to ride a 'girly' bike. I assumed I would naturally go through male puberty and was bewildered to not be put into the right health class. All this with a marked cognitive dissonance as I rationally knew that others saw me as a girl.

    As puberty started, I wished for breast cancer and later to accidentally be dosed with steroids and still somehow believed that I would be male when grown up although I had no idea how that could be as I had never heard of transitioning. None of this had anything to do with gender roles, rather it was a natural distress with how my body was changing that was far greater than what is typical for teens. In fact, gender roles weren't really enforced when I was growing up and I steadfastly ignored any attempts to make me more feminine. Once I learned that medically transitioning was possible at 16, it was abundantly clear to me that that would be the correct path for me. Struggling through the therapists and bureaucracy was a nightmare at that age.

    Many trans men, including myself, experience phantom penises and can't reconcile breasts into their own self-Image. Despite having lived with them for nearly 10 years, the second I had a mastectomy it felt normal again. In contrast, women often feel the loss or phantom pains after such an operation.

    If you want any studies or review papers, I can find them for you as I have a very large master list and too much time as I'm currently recovering from surgery.

    19 votes
  15. Comment on How neighbors got NYPD to stop parking on a school sidewalk after forty years in ~life

    luks
    Link Parent
    One benefit of getting rid of street parking, however, would be that there is then enough 'lane space' to build buffered bicycle lanes in their place, which would allow children and seniors to...

    One benefit of getting rid of street parking, however, would be that there is then enough 'lane space' to build buffered bicycle lanes in their place, which would allow children and seniors to also comfortably cycle.

    5 votes
  16. Comment on <deleted topic> in ~science

    luks
    Link Parent
    Looking at the article, it's still being cited in 2022 and 2023. Send those authors an email and ask if they might have a copy they can send you? If that doesn't work, look for any...

    Looking at the article, it's still being cited in 2022 and 2023. Send those authors an email and ask if they might have a copy they can send you?

    If that doesn't work, look for any students/younger people they wrote a lot of papers with (a successor basically) and email them asking if they have copies.

    4 votes
  17. Comment on <deleted topic> in ~talk

    luks
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    Yes, as far as I understood the election options, before deciding it's not something I want to be involved in, one of the better options is to tax all unrealized profits as if they were realized...

    Yes, as far as I understood the election options, before deciding it's not something I want to be involved in, one of the better options is to tax all unrealized profits as if they were realized each year.
    Currently all my money is sitting in savings accounts...

    1 vote
  18. Comment on Is keeping Donald Trump in the 2024 US election beneficial to Democrats? in ~talk

    luks
    Link Parent
    Maybe you've already heard this, but This American Life did a podcast about exactly this a few weeks ago: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/805/the-florida-experiment I wasn't aware that so many...

    Maybe you've already heard this, but This American Life did a podcast about exactly this a few weeks ago: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/805/the-florida-experiment

    I wasn't aware that so many people had moved to Florida specifically because of him - it was pretty disheartening. On the other hand, there was a college prof teaching the 'lesbian continuum', which sounded absolutely insane and deeply Freudian the way she explained it and I'd also question how that is being taught tbh. The only part I had heard a lot about before were the number of trans people desperately moving to any blue states for medical care.

    8 votes
  19. Comment on <deleted topic> in ~life

    luks
    Link Parent
    Just wanted to mention that changing your name before moving probably isn't a great idea. In my state, a name change is public record and the database of civil court cases is searchable online and...

    Just wanted to mention that changing your name before moving probably isn't a great idea. In my state, a name change is public record and the database of civil court cases is searchable online and then all they would need to do is to request the case files to get the new name. Most likely, moving then changing name and maybe even moving again would be safest if they won't seal the records.

    3 votes
  20. Comment on AP psychology effectively banned in Florida over lesson on sexual orientation, gender identity in ~life

    luks
    Link Parent
    Not to mention that transsexualism appears to be a form of neurological intersexism - just as innate and present at birth as any of the other DSD's. Medical intervention then changes most of the...

    Not to mention that transsexualism appears to be a form of neurological intersexism - just as innate and present at birth as any of the other DSD's. Medical intervention then changes most of the rest of a person's sex characteristics, effectively changing sex in any meaningful sense. Thus, it's not immutable.

    5 votes