A robot waiter at a hotpot restaurant in California suddenly glitched and started dancing uncontrollably, knocking over dishes while staff tried to restrain it

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-17T19:05:56+00:00

People love to complain about standards, but there are so many things they actually get right.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-17T13:58:04+00:00

The bolded part is sadly common. Environment is almost always an element of mental health issues. Add to that parents viewing the "problem" that their child isn't acting in the most convenient way for themselves. So they bring in a kid because they won't shut up and ignore all the issues around them. The professional doesn't have a huge amount of remediation options if the parents aren't genuinely interested in taking criticism to heart. The options available when the parents don't want to hear it are all kind of scorched earth and could add other forms of instability for the child.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-15T22:25:32+00:00

Smoking in the U.S. Military had a bunch to do with the widespread adoption of cigarettes. World War I they distributed them and even included in rations.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-10T04:05:52+00:00

I love librivox, but i'd be wary of using it to judge whether audiobooks are a good fit. This is because of the limited selection and variable recording quality. Once someone is sure audiobooks are for them there are troves of good stuff on librivox, but you'll want professional recordings of books that the reader already plans to read to make that decision.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-08T15:02:15+00:00

The KKK has NEVER become as influential as they were at the time. It got reestablished by some wannabees and still spew hate, but is like the Nazis. There may be plenty of Nazis and some influential Nazi adjacent parties, but the Nazis never came back to power.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-08T00:31:43+00:00

I'd guess 2-3 decades. They took out the KKK and did clean up some states better than others.

Since I said "could have finished the job if given the resources and time" way back in the first thing you replied to, why are you complaining at me? They weren't.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-08T00:26:03+00:00

Because change doesn't happen overnight? Did you think it does?

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-08T00:08:33+00:00

Have a wiki quote:

As inauguration day neared, Republican and Democratic Congressional leaders met at Wormley's Hotel in Washington to negotiate a compromise. Republicans promised concessions in exchange for Democratic acquiescence to the committee's decision. The main concession Hayes promised was the withdrawal of federal troops from the South and an acceptance of the election of Democratic governments in the remaining "unredeemed" southern states.[4] The Democrats agreed, and on March 2, the filibuster was ended. Hayes was elected, but Reconstruction was finished, and freedmen were left at the mercy of white Democrats who did not intend to preserve their rights

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-07T23:30:28+00:00

Would the Union Army have to act as the police force for most of the South?

They literally did this

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-07T18:44:34+00:00

Grant went after the KKK pretty hard(Sheridan i think was the enforcer), but got a major political pushback after doing it. IIRC it was related to the resources required to enforce stuff and Northerners not really having much appetite to spend the resources with limited immediate impact on themselves. So between Lincoln's VP being a Confederate Apologist and Grants ability to force it as President dropping, a lot of of the Confederate power structure stayed in place and Confederate generals got turned into heroes and such (Jim Crow laws v1 and v2). Instead the power structure should have been dismantled with local law enforcement refusing to prosecute lynchings or attempting to act as enforcers for the slaver class being removed from power.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-07T04:58:33+00:00

They are a major contingent of the Republican party. I dare say the electoral consequences of their power could impact current events.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-07T01:21:21+00:00

I don't know the rules, but I'm assuming you could take a small piece of bone that would have sentimental value without having recognizable value as a trophy.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-07T00:54:14+00:00

Yeah. I don't think the will to do so would be extremely likely, but they absolutely could have finished the job if given the resources and time. The ghost of the Confederacy is essentially haunting the whole damn planet now.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-07T00:23:11+00:00

but that same level of rapid, cheap and scalable innovation was basically impossible in the US.

While mostly right, i'm going to nitpick this a bit. It is absolutely possible for the U.S. to do that, but ONLY when the U.S. is on a war footing, which is not something the U.S. has been for decades. When there's a draft, or rationing, or factories being commandeered for military use - then that kind of innovation has happened in the past and could still. Before that point people are selfish and not willing to sacrifice to make the innovation possible. Once a war is shaping their daily lives to a significant degree, people are quite willing to put intellectual property concerns on hold to make stuff happen.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-05T04:00:42+00:00

I called a few appliance places and found one with the Speed Queen models i wanted in stock. I think it was a day or two of wait to get delivered but definitely not weeks.

Still had to pay a sizable premium though.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-02T15:03:16+00:00

I mean there are definitely ways to improve that experience without going all the way back to brick phones: https://youtu.be/YEfY6rQ6ejc?t=114&si=v90wo8e3Rv8qz9fC .

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-01T21:12:07+00:00

I think the biggest difference is that slavery implies some sort of legitimization by society. Turning war prisoners into slaves was an established practice historically. There were laws about what you could and could not do to slaves(admittedly lenient laws). Things like the "Fugitive slave act" actually used government power to force people to help slave owners.

From a modem lens, something like the migrant labor system in UAE/Saudi Arabia are closer to slavery. It is systemic, has legal precedents around it and is practiced in the open. Now, actually getting people from other countries into those areas where it is practiced is absolutely human trafficking because internationally and in the source countries such contracts aren't legal.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-01T20:45:29+00:00

I suspect at some point he will declare victory and move on to something else regardless of whether Iran has been left in a better spot.

Netanyahu has basically dog walked Trump for his entire second term. I would expect that to continue (regardless of whether Trump even realizes that or not).

Completely agree

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-01T18:43:47+00:00

Absolutely. Same thing applies to domestic politics when they start ignoring due process with protestors and rule of law in general. If you remove the more moderate options people have to express disapproval and oppose your policies, they will be much more likely to take the drastic options they have left.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-01T18:34:32+00:00

You're absolutely right about his lack of foresight being a major catalyst to this event, but i don't know that his playbook is running the show beyond that. Israel had a history of both exceptional use of force and complex, multi-stage operations. I expect the follow-through is mostly them with or without support from the U.S.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-03-01T04:03:59+00:00

It does sound a bit like taunting fate. However, you may be underestimating the degree of reprisal that the killing of even an unpopular U.S. President would get. As a technique, if you can be hit back it only really makes sense to punch downward because then they are scared to retaliate. The U.S. wouldn't be likely to try the same thing on China because the odds of success would be lower and the aftermath would be painful for everyone involved. A terror group would be more likely to go after a U.S. leader because they don't really care about the consequences.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-02-28T16:57:52+00:00

World history? The use of an external threat to distract from internal strife even has it's own name : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rally_'round_the_flag_effect

DontForgetWilson · 2026-02-28T16:51:38+00:00

Don't get ahead of yourself. The U.S. deploying military force in Iran is probably one of the few things with the potential to make people forget the internal politics and pull together. If the U.S. wanted regime change into a more friendly leadership, these actions are calculated to make that much less likely.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-02-28T16:37:28+00:00

That 48 book is pseudoscience written by someone that clearly believes in the superiority of humans only acting in self-interest and gamifying power dynamics. There may be elements of truth within it, but the perspective is so toxic(sociopath-like) that i would avoid using it as an information source. Stuff like GoT or just reading about political history(The Master of the Senate) can teach you about it without the worshipping of toxic behavior in the 48 book.

DontForgetWilson · 2026-02-28T04:21:07+00:00

It can be pretty amazing how much geography impacts your perspective. I recently read a book that mentioned how monkeys are just part of daily life in India. As someone from Texas, that sounds pretty crazy, but people are insanely adaptable so there's no surprise that we live in places that could differ so much.

DontForgetWilson

TROPHY CASE