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Pat

provocative comment on mass graves, war 

Why do they bury war victims in mass graves?

So that in a million years from now when another species has taken over for humans, who by then are long extinct, all those people who were buried a million years ago during the war will have turned into oil and then the new species can pump out that oil and they’ll have something to fight about and start wars over.

The cycle of life.

(Image: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil, by Sanjay Acharya, CC-BY-SA-3.0)

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Pat

Kamala Harris has tested positive for COVID-19.

Who could have seen that coming?

qoto.org/@Pat/1077413148863402

qoto.org/@Pat/1076704476506666

qoto.org/@Pat/1080622174884341

qoto.org/@Pat/1073899541892304

qoto.org/@Pat/1080923981166191

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Pat

Hi all.

Due to the technical issues here on qoto, I've created another account at:
mastodon.social/@PatPat/with_r
and an additional backup at:
mastodon.online/@Pat/with_repl

So you may see me posting from there for now...

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Pat

Happy birthday, Earth.

4,540,000,052 years old today.

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Pat

Retro SciFi of the Week…

Godzilla (1954)

This is the original Japanese version. Shortly after it’s release, a highly censored American version was released in the US and other countries which totally hacked up the film, replacing character- and plot-developing dialogue with bland exposition voiceover.

The American version replaced one of the protagonists with a white guy, cutting in scenes which were produced with lousy sets, poor cinematography and hasty acting which trampled on the carefully crafted pace of the original film. This gave most people an impression that the film was just a B-movie, instead of the well-produced masterpiece which was the original.

If you’ve never seen the original Japanese version, you haven’t seen Godzilla.

(Note: Of course, as with all earlier films, the cinematic techniques of the time were no match to today’s state of the art, so you need to watch it with a different level of suspension of disbelief.)

Here’s a clip from the film that was cut from the American version. (See the rest of this thread for more discussion.)

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Pat


The truth is…

The Russians have developed an armored tricycle because they are running out of older soldiers.

= A statement that is logically or literally true (or partly true), but seems to imply something that isn’t true or is just plain weird. (for rhetoric, logic or propaganda studies… or just for fun)

(Image CC BY 3.0 by Fastboy, Mediawiki Commons.)

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Pat

Retro SciFi of the Week…

Starship Troopers (1997)

This is a satire about how governments use wars to control their populations. The satire is probably lost on many viewers and this propaganda film is probably effective even for those who understand that it’s satirical.

Not much different from what’s coming out of the Star Trek franchise lately.

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Pat

Bad Company (2002)

The description for this film reads, “...a streetwise punk is recruited by a CIA agent to stop an arms deal from going bad.”

Anyone want to guess which one is the CIA agent and which one is the “streetwise punk”?

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Pat

.gov

- - -
- - -
Here’s Nancy Pelosi speaking on the crowded floor of the House of Representatives without wearing an N95 respirator.

She is in the line of succession to the presidency, yet she carelessly takes an unnecessary risk by exposing herself to COVID-19 without wearing a respirator.

Ironically, she was talking about how the US is falling behind other countries in science. Duh!

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Pat

Retro SciFi Film of the week…

Tron (1982)

This was the first major motion picture to extensively use CGI. The film was targeted at the small, niche market of computer users, as well as others who were interested in the new fad.

This dream/fantasy world narrative was influenced by early literature such as The Odyssey and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Tron had considerable influence on subsequent science fiction films such as The Martix, Vanilla Sky (Abre los ojos) and Inception.

(movie poster image owned by Buena Vista Pictures; low res fair use)

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Pat
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Pat

Congratulations to Jessica Chastain and Will Smith for being awarded Best Actress/Actor at the 2022 Academy Awards.

(Images: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil, CC-BY-SA-2.0; commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil, CC-BY-2.0)

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Pat

.gov

The truth is…

Press Secretary Jen Psaki became infected with COVID-19 because she didn’t wear an N95 respirator.

Psaki doesn’t wear a respirator when she gives her press briefings to the White House correspondents.

According to the CDC, none of the White House correspondents who were infected by Psaki are considered close contacts.

(In epidemiology, a “close contact” is anyone who was close enough to an infected person to possibly become infected themselves. It’s used for contact tracing to locate people who may have become infected to help prevent further spread of disease, among other things.)

= A statement that is logically or literally true (or partly true), but seems to imply something that isn’t true or is just plain weird. (for rhetoric, logic or propaganda studies… or just for fun)

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Pat

Retro SciFi Film of the Month...

Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe: Doom of the Dictator (1940)

This is the final episode of the film series in which Ming is defeated (no spoiler – it’s in the title!)

"Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe" was produced in the US shortly after the start of World War II, when the issue of whether the United States should enter the war was a hotly debated topic.

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Pat



---------------
Energy saving tip number 13

Eat plants…

Calorie for calorie, a plant-based diet is much more energy efficient than feeding those plants to animals and then eating the animals. Beef requires about 53 times as much food energy than if you just ate those plant calories directly. (Source: ourworldindata.org/grapher/ene)

Eating “lower on the food chain” will also help to alleviate the global food shortages that are expected due to the war in Ukraine.

(Image: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil, United Soybean Board, CC-BY-2.0)

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Pat

Retro SciFi Movie of the Week...

I, Robot (2004)

This is the only movie so far in the “Retro SciFi Movie of the Week” series that has a black character in it. I had to come all the way up to the 21st century to find it. So this film is not very “retro”, although the original story is from the mid-20th century.

Black people are even more under-represented in science fiction films than they are generally in Hollywood.

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Pat



---------------
Energy saving tip number 8

Choose a zero-energy home…

Zero-energy or ultra-low energy buildings are designed so that, on average, they require little or no energy. It is much easier to design a zero-energy home from the beginning than it is to try to upgrade an existing home.

Using techniques such as earth sheltering, super-insulation, high-efficiency windows, seasonal thermal storage, and other techniques, a building can be designed that requires no additional energy for lighting, heating and cooling. Solar panels can provide the energy required to run appliances and other devices.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_

(Image: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ear, CC-BY-SA-4.0)

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Pat



---------------
Energy saving tip number 10

Invent the next breakthrough in energy…

Changing our behaviors to conserve energy can help with the immediate needs of this particular energy crisis, but a major breakthrough in energy could end oil wars permanently.

Consider working in STEM fields that work to develop new energy sources. If you work for the petro-fuels industry, consider switching careers to new energy. The industry is dying and you don’t want to get stuck with an obsolete resume.

Be aware that the petro industry aggressively works to sabotage the new energy industry, including infiltration of research projects and setting up trojan companies that work to undermine development of new sources of energy by sucking resources from legitimate R&D. For example, companies that say they are developing hydrogen fuels for transportation are very often working on behalf of the oil industry.

But there are many areas of legimate research. Areas of active research and development include...

- Commercial fusion energy
- Low-temperature superconductors
- Improved solar cell efficiency
- Grid energy storage technologies
- Improved electric batteries
- New generation fission reactors that are safer and more sustainable
- Efficient heat engines, waste heat recovery, and other efficiency improvements
- Electric vehicles

(Image: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil, CC-BY-SA-4.0)

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Pat

warning: disturbing comment and picture about Ukraine and Putin 



There’s a new burger made from the bodies of mothers and babies killed in Ukraine.

It’s called the MacBeth burger.

(Image: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fil, CC-BY-SA-3.0)

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Pat

A sneak peek at an upcoming Retro SciFi Film of the Week…

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