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vivekgani.bsky.social
@vivekgani.bsky.social
460 followers 830 following 1.3K posts
Still wayfinding. Trying to understand paths during these times of planetary change. Open to feedback. Also on @vivekgani@mastodon.social

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vivekgani.bsky.social
"It's someone watching over me from far away." www.thomasthwaites.com/teleoperation/
Excerpt of visual book from Thomas Thwaites 'Teleoperation' ( https://www.thomasthwaites.com/teleoperation/ ). First excerpted illustrated panel shows a young girl standing wearing a headband with a remote camera, with the camera headband saying 'WATCH OUT!' in a scene with a large adult hand trying to hand a large lollipop. text reads "Is my 'Watch Out' Alive?" "It keeps me safe!" Second excerpted illustrated panel shows the headband camera alone one one side, and on the other side an adult figure wearing electronic glasses illustrating they're watching through the headband camera device for the child in the first panel. Text reads "No! It's not alive!" "It's someone watching over me from far away." Third excerpted panel shows the same young child holding hands with parents. Text reads "I know Mummy and Daddy are alive!"
November 14, 2025 at 7:18 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
A few folks I know are joining this call on Permaculture education for urban High Schoolers later today at 6pm CST:
workspace.oregonstate.edu/maximizing-i...
Flyer image with text of: "Preparing youth to inherit the Earth through Permaculture" "Join OSU Permaculture faculty Monica Ibacache, Andrew Millison, Marisha Auerbach, and Charles Upton (Abundant Earth Foundation) as they discuss the transformative impact of permaculture education on youth and beyond." "Thursday, Nov. 13 4pm PST / 7pm EST" links to https://workspace.oregonstate.edu/maximizing-impact-preparing-youth-to-inherit-the-earth-through-permaculture-education
November 13, 2025 at 3:12 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Huh, never thought about polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in refrigerants...
Table excerpted from https://drawdown.org/explorer/deploy-alternative-refrigerants#overview - 'Figure 1. Examples of common refrigerants and their climate and environmental impacts High-GWP: red; Medium-GWP: yellow; Low-GWP: green' with highlighted rows of R12, R134a, R1234yf refrigerants.
November 9, 2025 at 4:36 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
"How do you build a wall across an arroyo?" - Paul Krafel, 2016 - roamingupward.net/home/the-bes...

(Previously mastodon.social/@vivekgani/1... , twitter.com/vivekgani/st... )
Highlighted excerpt and image from https://roamingupward.net/home/the-best-of-cairns/big-bend-and-trumps-wall/ (Paul Krafel, 2016): "As far as I can tell, Trump answers with images of precast concrete slabs lined up across the land. But in Big Bend, we found ourselves asking, “How do you build a wall across an arroyo?” The Rio Grande forms almost two-thirds of the U.S.-Mexican border. What this means is that every tributary has to flow through this wall. Or, put another way, the wall will have to cross every single drainage along more than 1200 miles of the river. We were counting drainage crossings as we drove along various stretches of Texas desert and estimated them at about three per mile. At that rate, there would be about 3500 drainage crossings. More than half of these would be small. A few would be full-size rivers. But a lot of them would look like the picture below." [Picture below is a man standing in west Texas on rocky desert land, with rocky bluff/dropoffs behind the person and in front a lower area where presumably water would flow during rain events]
November 6, 2025 at 4:44 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Do you see some hope in the 'Mississippi Miracle' theory of literacy improvement over coming years? (via bsky.app/profile/ebon... )
Highlighted excerpts from 'America Is Sliding Toward Illiteracy' https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/10/education-decline-low-expectations/684526/ (Idress Kahloon, The Atlantic, Oct. 2025): "Their analysis of the 2024 NAEP results found that Mississippi was best at educating kids in fourth-grade math, fourth-grade reading, and eighth-grade math. (In 2013, Mississippi was at the bottom of the unadjusted league table.)" [...] "This is a recent phenomenon. Some have called it the “Mississippi miracle” or—if you include relative outperformance in states such as Alabama, Louisiana, and Tennessee—the “southern surge.” From 2013 to 2024, reading performance declined among fourth graders in 46 out of 50 states. In only two states, Mississippi and Louisiana, did they meaningfully improve." [...] "In 2013, Mississippi enacted a law requiring that third graders pass a literacy exam to be promoted to the next grade. It didn’t just issue a mandate, though; it began screening kids for reading deficiencies, training instructors in how to teach reading better (by, among other things, emphasizing phonics), and hiring literacy coaches to work in the lowest-performing schools" [...] "The “Mississippi miracle” should force a reckoning in less successful states and, ideally, a good deal of imitation." [...] "Not only are the southern states that are registering the greatest improvements in learning run by Republicans, but also their teachers are among the least unionized in the country. And these red states are leaning into phonics-based, “science of reading” approaches to teaching literacy, while Democratic-run states such as New York, New Jersey, and Illinois have been painfully slow to adopt them, in some cases hanging on to other pedagogical approaches with little evidentiary basis."
November 1, 2025 at 12:17 AM
vivekgani.bsky.social
I'd rather direct folks to non-partisan resources to start, let's start with the league of women voters guide: austinvotersguide.org/LWVAA-VG-EN.... (page 10)
Screenshot of page 10 of league of women voters guide on prop 10: https://austinvotersguide.org/LWVAA-VG-EN.pdf
October 24, 2025 at 6:00 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
The other mistake was in their marketing. They literally had a framing around 'orange man bad' on their website which they later removed seemingly after the Daryl Slusher critique (theaustinindependent.org/the-silence-...)
Comparison of screeenshots of the website https://www.loveaustinsomuch.com/ , left hand side is excerpted from https://theaustinindependent.org/the-silence-of-the-shams/ (Daryl Slusher, Oct. 8 2025) and the right hand side is from today (Oct. 24, 2025) and IIRC looked this way a week ago. The left hand side screenshot prominently shows artistic headshot images of Greg Abbott and Donald Trump, right hand side screenshot does not and instead has a larger 'love austin so much' cursive logo.
October 24, 2025 at 5:14 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Related on Michelle Haas & J. P. Bryan on Texas History : bsky.app/profile/texa...
Highlighted excerpt from https://www.texasobserver.org/scholars-lost-culture-war-texas-history/ (How Scholars Lost the Culture War over Texas History, Ty Cashion, 2025) : "The tone of Bryan’s machinations found a kindred pairing with the creation of the Texas History Trust (THT), which began producing provocative videos condemning progressive scholarship. Michelle Haas, a TSHA member and editor of Copano Bay Press, narrated for THT the brief series “unMakers of Texas History.” Her combative style vilified the work of progressive scholars, even singling out some leading Texas historians for mocking derision."
October 16, 2025 at 2:59 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
@jennbudd.bsky.social had a substack note on deleting her bluesky account: substack.com/@jennbudd/no...
excerpt from https://substack.com/@jennbudd/note/c-165321638 by Jenn Budd (Oct 11, 2025) : "I closed my Bluesky and TT accounts. The fact that so many joined in on the beat down, then re-followed after I apologized made me realize how fair-weathered people are. If affects my suicidal ideation when they accuse me of lying about my memoir, my sa. I used my own trauma to expose the agency, but I really don’t think even these libs care about what they are doing. I know the big million dollar orgs do not. They are part of the system. Truthfully though, yesterday seeing what AIC employees think of my work and now my own followers, the whole thing is disgusting, immoral, unethical. Just don’t give your money to the big orgs. Give it to local people in need. If you are subscribing to me, feel free to take your subscription to Arturo Dominguez or Migrant Insider. "
October 15, 2025 at 6:59 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Fair. I'll confess my perspective biases:

- I get frustrated with eco-spiritual folks shunning vaccines while traveling far to spicier places, feels like a colonizing rhyme.

- Interplanetary human ambitions have blind spots w.r.t. finite resources on Earth...
highlighted excerpt from Thomas W. Murphy Jr's 'Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet' (https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9js5291m#page=20): "The author might even go so far as to label a focus on space colonization in the face of more pressing challenges as disgracefully irresponsible. Diverting attention in this probably-futile26 effort could lead to greater total suffering if it means not only mis-allocation of resources but perhaps more importantly lulling people into a sense that space represents a viable escape hatch. Let’s not get distracted!"
October 13, 2025 at 11:03 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Nope...
Highlighted excerpt from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbian_exchange "Communicable diseases of Old World origin resulted in an 80 to 95 percent reduction in the Indigenous population of the Americas from the 15th century onwards, and their near extinction in the Caribbean. "
October 13, 2025 at 10:14 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Networking effects, scroll down a bit in this essay: bsky.app/profile/thom...
Excerpt from https://steady.page/en/democracyamericana/posts/ab02af47-9e87-4143-ba51-afa2d1804c1c (Sept 2025, Thomas Zimmer ) "I will say that if you have built a substantial audience via Substack, and your livelihood depends on it, leaving that behind comes with a risk. Substack is by far the biggest platform out there – the networking effects that it generates are real. For instance: A lot of people are used to paying for newsletters on Substack, they have their payment information already stored, if they stumble upon a new publication, a paid subscription is just one click away. That is just not the case anywhere else."
October 8, 2025 at 9:04 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Related:
southsideweekly.com/federal-agen...

(Found via bsky.app/profile/flip... )
Excerpt from https://southsideweekly.com/federal-agents-storm-south-shore-building-detaining-families-and-children/ (Maira Khwaja, Invisible Institute and José Abonce; October 6, 2025) : "Wells Fargo Bank foreclosed on the building in mid-2024, bringing a $27 million lawsuit against Flood for missed loan payments. In late 2024, the City began closing its largest migrant shelters and, through state funding assistance distributed via Catholic Charities and moving support from New Life Church, relocated many families to buildings such as this one."
October 7, 2025 at 5:25 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
A bit surprised that article doesn't specifically mention Small Overlap Rigid Barrier crash testing which got introduced in 2012: www.iihs.org/media/ec54a7... & www.theautopian.com/a-new-crash-...
Figure 1 excerpt from https://www.iihs.org/media/ec54a7ea-1a1d-4fb2-8fc3-b2e018db2082/1A5oYw/Ratings/Protocols/current/small_overlap_test_protocol.pdf of Small Overlap Barrier overhead view crash st setup - a vehicle colliding with a barrier frontally with 25% of vehicle width.
October 6, 2025 at 11:23 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
The reason I bring this point up is back in 2022 there was a wave of US social media posts pointing at the Sri Lanka disaster as a 'failure of ESG' or green dogma, and there's likely more aspects we don't know...
screenshot excerpts from https://www.public.news/p/green-dogma-behind-fall-of-sri-lanka (Shellenberger, 2022) & https://twitter.com/MartyBent/status/1539583410489917441 (2022)
September 30, 2025 at 9:18 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
"When Sri Lanka abruptly banned agri-chemicals, the result was a crash in yields, food shortages and food riots."

The Sri Lanka disaster could be attributed to a ban of chemical FERTILIZER without a real transition plan, along with expense/debt issues. From the article you reference yourself:
Highlighted excerpt from https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/03/05/sri-lanka-organic-farming-crisis/ (Ted Nordhaus & Saloni Shah of Breakthrough Institute, March 2022) on Sri Lanka: "By 2020, the total cost of fertilizer imports and subsidies was close to $500 million each year. With fertilizer prices rising, the tab was likely to increase further in 2021. Banning synthetic fertilizers seemingly allowed Rajapaksa to kill two birds with one stone: improving the nation’s foreign exchange situation while also cutting a massive expenditure on subsidies from the pandemic-hit public budget."
September 30, 2025 at 9:09 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
As someone also in a rather kharma-grinding situation it was relateful and remindful to read this 2015 interview from an 90's era tech power critic Paulina Borsook on her involvement with 'stop the spray' in the bay area bioregion in the mid 2000's, notably that the effective work was offline.
Highlighted excerpts from https://networkcultures.org/blog/2015/01/29/paulina-borsook-cyberselfish-15-years-after-part-ii/ (interview of Paulina Borsook by Geert Lovink, 2015) "Being on call 24/7 with a frail yet irredeemably nasty elder, there’s nothing else like it to grind your kharma exceedingly fine. And technology can’t change or fix it." [...] "I became somewhat involuntarily involved with a regional environmental issue. The Northern California bioregion where I live was going to be aerially sprayed with pesticides for years on end for reasons have to do with international trade kabuki theatre. I won’t get into the intricacies of trying to stop the Light Brown Apple Moth eradication program, but the reason this rare victory for the environment, populism, good science, and small farmers -happened- was because of activism in the non-cyber world. I felt a sense of mission and personal responsibility I have hardly ever felt before or after." [...] "While yes, there were websites and YouTube and an online petition—this successful activism was the opposite of clicktivism." [...] "Worth also pointing out that not only were no people majorly working in technology highly involved with these efforts — when I would talk with my friends still working in technology they had heard nothing about “Stop the Spray”. This, with major coverage in ALL MSM, bumper stickers and lawn signs galore, etc. I guess if it’s not on Reddit, it doesn’t exist."
September 26, 2025 at 3:13 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Did you actually read the article?

I think these titles are designed to attract a 'both sides' audience but then educate folks on well, how to think and attempt to teach some media literacy.
Highlighted excerpts from https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/09/23/nx-s1-5551228/acetaminophen-tylenol-autism-trump-explainer : ""I would say, what parents need to do is to step back and think about who they are hearing the messages from," Helen Tager-Flusberg, director of Boston University's Center for Autism Research Excellence, told NPR's Michel Martin. "Are they going to listen to people who are not physicians, who have no expertise in autism, or are they going to turn to their medical providers, their treatment providers and ask them what their view of the current science is? That's what they should be doing. [...] "These studies that have been out show correlation, but don't actually show causation," says Baldwin." "And I think that's an important thing for parents to realize — that the science is not known just yet, despite what has been said.""
September 24, 2025 at 4:29 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Appreciating the calls for political awakening to the 'consciousness community' from @dpinchbeck.bsky.social :

danielpinchbeck.substack.com/p/dear-consc...
Highlighted excerpts from 'Dear Consciousness Community: You Need a Political Awakening!' (Daniel Pinchbeck, Sept. 2025, https://open.substack.com/pub/danielpinchbeck/p/dear-consciousness-community-you ) "I also feel guilty, responsible for some of this. I was very excited, twenty years ago, about “the consciousness revolution.” Back then, I believed a mass awakening would be just the thing to reset and redeem our world: We could trip our way to launching a more utopian, benevolent society. My first books may have accidentally helped reinforce a worldview that allow people to “shut off their minds and float downstream,” as Tim Leary put it, while feeling vindicated and entitled, even as a diabolical form of technocratic authoritarianism takes hold, with incredibly ominous implications for our future." [...] "in the “consciousness community,” many people make a living essentially doing service work for corporations and/or wealthy individuals: Coaching, consulting, taking wealthy people on retreats, and so on. They fear holding a real position or challenging the status quo, because this might alienate some of their future clients. I recommend people buck this trend. Take the losses. Break rank. Courageously speak your truth. Admit where you don’t know enough. Then actually do the research to learn. "
September 23, 2025 at 3:42 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Michigan MFR plates were on the ones I saw in Houston.

(Part of me so wishes they sold small practical minivans like this out here)
September 17, 2025 at 7:59 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
To be fair though, the first chapter of the Biofi book does state an intention try and get out of existing financial systems...
Excerpt from Ch. 1 p. 36 of 'Bioregional Financing Facilities - Reimagining Finance to Regenerate our Planet': "While on the surface it might seem promising that more financial resources are allocated toward nature restoration, there is a significant risk that if these resources flow through the existing financial architecture, they could lead to further commodification, privatization, financialization, and centralization of natural assets and wealth. This could stem from the often extractive current return requirements of investors and the way that new asset classes become new forms of capital that reinforce existing power and wealth inequities (Pistor, 2020). Financial capital is thus far not being deployed in a way that addresses the structural characteristics of the economy that are driving the ecological crisis. The authors believe that pushing more financial capital through the existing financial architecture could support the continuation of the paradigm at the heart of planetary destruction. This paradigm is characterized by the separation of humans from the rest of life on Earth; the treatment of the Earth as a resource to be extracted from; the destruction of relational capital between all living beings, including through deepening inequality; and ultimately the loss of function of ecosystems and of the intelligence inherent in those ecosystems. The cumulative effect would be that this capital works against local and global regeneration goals,63 and may further destabilize social and ecological systems, and financial and economic systems. This clearly runs counter to the objectives of well-intentioned actors who truly want to regenerate life on Earth."
September 10, 2025 at 6:09 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Also worth noting the complaint filed by Masimo against CBP regarding Apple Watch: daringfireball.net/linked/2025/... -> www.bloomberglaw.com/public/deskt... (isn't loading but see screenshot)
Highlighted excerpt from https://www.bloomberglaw.com/public/desktop/document/MASIMOCORPORATIONvUNITEDSTATESCUSTOMSANDBORDERPROTECTIONetalDocke?doc_id=X7CR5AGJN19VIQVF66HVETLJRF (Case 1:25-cv-02749, Document 1 Filed 08/20/25, From Pages 18-19 of 28) : 'Press Release, Apple Increases U.S. Commitment to $600 Billion, Announces American Manufact Program, Apple (Aug. 6. 2025), https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2025/08/apple-increases-us-commitment-to-600-billion-usd-announces-ambitious-program/. 60. On August 14, 2025, Apple announced that it was now able to provide blood oxygen monitoring features on its Series 9, 10, and Ultra 2 Apple watches. Shaffer Decl., Ex. 3 (Press Release, An Update on Blood Oxygen for Apple Watch in the U.S. (Aug. 14, 2025) [...]"
September 7, 2025 at 2:48 AM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Kinda nice to come across this as someone who used to listen to Haidt and the heterodox stuff 6-7 years ago.
Highlighted excerpt of interview https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/trump-is-extorting-universities-in Michael S. Roth: "I’ve been part of the Heterodox group since they started. But Jonathan Haidt says that I’m the heterodox member of this group, because I always yell at them. I always find them very annoying. [...] This year, I said that I thought that they had done the work for the Trump administration, that their critique of wokeness had resulted in an authoritarian assault on higher education [...] I don’t think I used the word “fascist.” I should have. I used the word “authoritarian.” "
September 2, 2025 at 5:12 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Sense there may be some irony considering there likely was people from the burning man scene that swung toward RFK Jr. & Shanahan's platform a year ago.

See open.substack.com/pub/danielpi... (Oct. 2024, Daniel Pinchbeck)
Highlighted excerpt from https://open.substack.com/pub/danielpinchbeck/p/weve-been-hacked (Oct. 2024, Daniel Pinchbeck): "In the past few days I’ve communicated with many people, including friends I’ve cared about for many years – people I know through Burning Man and other contexts – who now support Donald Trump or say they will abstain from voting. Some plan to vote for Jill Stein. I seek to challenge the reasoning that led them to this position. I believe they can still be persuaded to change their minds. Personally, I am always willing to change my mind when I find better evidence that supports another point of view. I hope they share that openness. "
August 31, 2025 at 7:16 PM
vivekgani.bsky.social
Can't believe it's been five years since camping out here just before the fires happened. Back then was fairly influenced by a bioregional thoughtleader who turned out to have some deep shadows, and yet you learn to be in service to life in the contexts you can...
Photo from august 2020 somewhere along mckenzie highway in oregon.
August 30, 2025 at 6:13 AM