David
LightNews LightNews
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
David
@dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
180 followers 790 following 300 posts
"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known" - Sharon Begley
Posts Replies Media Videos
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
"We live in a world where there is more and more information, and less and less meaning.... What every society looks for in continuing to pro- duce, and to overproduce, is to restore the real that escapes it."
November 2, 2025 at 10:52 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
was lowkey rooting for Lei Tingjie but the finals will be lit! 😁
Results for Women's Chess World Cup with Humpy Koneru defeating Lei Tingjie by 5-3
July 24, 2025 at 4:32 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
A flow cytometry chart showing 12 different cytometry readings with several areas in the chart highlighted for possible duplications
July 16, 2025 at 5:17 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Part of me thinks this is a much larger manifestation of the human tendency to focus on short term gains while foregoing long term benefits.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperbo...

(just found out this is the actual name of the phenomenon.. sweet)
“One of the biggest prices we pay lies in our tendency to focus on short-term gains at the expense of long-term stability. ” Excerpt From In This Economy? Kyla Scanlon
July 12, 2025 at 4:35 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
What would happen if we just don't consume or only consume what is necessary? There is no need to buy that new trendy bag, or that new fancy cardigan. There's no need to go to the new fancy shopping mall that sells things for twice the price of the guy down the alley.
“We live in a consumption-on-demand world, with our lives designed around the presumption that we can and should be constantly consuming—fast fashion, shopping malls, and advertising being the main revenue models of many of our big tech and retail companies. Everything can be bought quickly—and discarded quickly, too.” Excerpt From In This Economy? Kyla Scanlon
July 12, 2025 at 4:26 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Just realized the scroll bar on my phone makes use of the checker shadow illusion. Pretty cool.
Five-six white with a dark grey column to the right. A grey scroll bar overlays this. A white background. A grey scroll bar is located to the right Nine-tenths white background with a tiny dark grey column to the right. A grey scroll bar sits between both the white and grey background.
July 12, 2025 at 1:55 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
The converse of this would be the general public overestimating how much people in one sub-field of a larger field know about other sub-fields of that same larger field.
a comic from xkcd with two individuals. Person A says "Silicate chemistry is second nature to us geochemists, so it's easy to forget that the average person probably only knows the formulas for olivine and one or two feldspars." Person B replies "and quartz, of course" then Person A replies "Of course". The foot text reads "Even when they're trying to compensate for it, experts in anything wildly overestimate the average person's familiarity with their field."
June 29, 2025 at 3:47 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Not sure how useful this model is but assuming it is, we will currently be in stage 7, lose-lose situation.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedri...
The nine stages of conflict resolution: Stage 1 - Tension, Stage 2 - Debate, Stage 3 - Actions instead of words, Stage 4 - Coalitions, Stage 5 - Loss of face, Stage 6 - Threat strategies, Stage 7 - Limited destruction, Stage 8 - Total annihilation, Stage 9 - Together into the abyss Stages 1-3 are win-win Stages 4-6 are win-lose Stages 7-9 are lose-lose
June 22, 2025 at 5:55 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
mf! How does this guy even think? That they'll suddenly become peaceful after warning that this will lead to war?
Post from Trump "We have completed our very successful attack on the three Nuclear sites in Iran, including Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan. All planes are now outside of Iran air space. A full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow. All planes are safely on their way home. Congratulations to our great American Warriors. There is not another military in the World that could have done this. NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE! Thank you for your attention to this matter."
June 22, 2025 at 12:07 AM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
This makes sense. If we imagine a hill with a prize at the top, the high self-efficacy student will believe that they can climb that hill to get the prize and so they'll have less of a mental barrier to overcome,
“Previous studies showed that individuals with high self-efficacy showed more effort, engagement, and persistence and had fewer adverse emotional reactions than those who had low self-efficacy when they encountered difficulties in the process of academic goals attainment” Excerpt From Goal Frustration in Academic Achievement Settings Mingming Zhou
June 11, 2025 at 12:23 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Why aren't we all doing this?

So a point further down in the article about encouraging cooperation and not competition.

We are social beings, why we chose to focus on competition rather than cooperation is beyond me.

www.weforum.org/stories/2018...
Finland's education system emphasises equity over excellence, providing equal opportunities to all students regardless of their background or abilities.
April 7, 2025 at 10:51 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
On a slightly unrelated note, I tell you, Finland has figured out education.
"Proficiency improved significantly in only two countries, Finland and Denmark" " It remained stable in 14, and declined significantly in 11, with the biggest deterioration in Korea, Lithuania, New Zealand and Poland"
April 7, 2025 at 10:51 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
An interesting point here. Maybe the problem is not the phones but the way information is consumed with less active involvement and more passive participation.
"Most discussion about the societal impacts of digital media focuses on the rise of smartphones and social media. But the change in human capacity for focused thought coincides with something more fundamental: a shift in our relationship with information." "We have moved from finite web pages to infinite, constantly refreshed feeds and a constant barrage of notifications. We no longer spend as much time actively browsing the web and interacting with people we know but instead are presented with a torrent of content. This represents a move from self-directed behaviour to passive consumption and constant context-switching."
April 7, 2025 at 10:37 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Seems like a chicken and egg problem. Did we reduce our reading because of mental fatigue or the other way around?
"So we appear to be looking less at the decline of reading per se, and more at a broader erosion in human capacity for mental focus and application"
April 7, 2025 at 10:37 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Problems with concentration and processing information could just be due to mental fatigue (which may have risen, but I don't know).
Graph showing an increase in individuals who reported "Difficulty thinking or concentrating" and "Trouble learning new things" with a slight uptrend from 1990-2013 followed by a sharp uptrend from 2013-2020 Graph showing that share of adults who struggle to process information is rising.
April 7, 2025 at 10:37 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
This could be due to it being taught less in schools, or people using statistical reasoning less, or people's intrinsic capacity for statistical reasoning declining.
"In one particularly eye-opening statistic, the share of adults who are unable to “use mathematical reasoning when reviewing and evaluating the validity of statements” has climbed to 25 per cent on average in high-income countries, and 35 per cent in the US."
April 7, 2025 at 10:37 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
After the TOS changes
Anakin and Obi Wan meme with Obi Wan screaming "You were the chosen one" and Anakin labelled "Firefox"
February 28, 2025 at 4:25 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
The "is this a butterfly" meme with the guy saying "is this the future?" while pointing at a butterfly tagged "Flashes"
February 25, 2025 at 9:12 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
This goes hard ngl
A still from the 1943 film "Madam Curie" showing a hall with lots of people giving a standing ovation as Madam Curie enters
February 22, 2025 at 4:38 AM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
An excerpt from the article linked to in the quoted post that reads "Weaponized states create a difficult collective action problem for establishment elites who, in theory, would prefer democracy to competitive authoritarianism. The politicians, CEOs, media owners, and university presidents who modify their behavior in the face of authoritarian threats are acting rationally, doing what they deem best for their organizations by protecting shareholders or avoiding debilitating lawsuits, tariffs, or taxes. But such acts of self-preservation have a collective cost. As individual actors retreat to the sidelines or censor themselves, societal opposition weakens. The media environment grows less critical. And pressure on the authoritarian government diminishes."
February 16, 2025 at 9:12 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
Learned some stuff about visual perception, and came across this.
A black and white picture with dots and blotches of black. The black spots make the image of a Dalmatian dog sniffing the ground with a tree in the background
February 6, 2025 at 11:32 PM
dreamingoctopod.bsky.social
First 10% hehe 😁
Congratulatory card from blue sky indicating that dreaming octopus was the 955,563 member thereby making them among the first 10% to use blue sky
September 16, 2024 at 10:42 PM