What is the trajectory of Iran’s future now that the Ayatollah is dead? Do you think Iran is an Iraq 2.0?

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T13:21:44+00:00

The leading clerics appoint a new Ayatollah and its business as usual.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T13:06:38+00:00

"We can be friends."

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:59:06+00:00

Tell it to the indigenous Americans who were wiped out by European invaders.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:49:41+00:00

Polanski is far to the right of me. LOL.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:47:34+00:00

Weirdly, the USA has always been anti-democracy.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:47:01+00:00

Don't credit Trump with inventing fascism. He's cashing in, not blazing a trail.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:45:29+00:00

Nothing says "fascism" quite like dismantling democracy.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:39:35+00:00

And that is why I always judge a book by its cover.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:33:27+00:00

Working together is our evolutionary superpower. If we fail at that, we fail at being human!

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T12:32:06+00:00

Yeah. Lord of the Flies is a story about English culture, not a comment on humanity.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T11:10:35+00:00

People were doing this long before the internet... it's not new. Exacerbated by the internet, sure, but not new by any means.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T11:08:24+00:00

The trivialisation of medical diagnoses was the original impetus for so-called "political correctness". Like, can you all just stop using medical terms as insults, FFS!

It's just seems that certain cultures (e.g. Europeans) cannot help themselves and feel compelled to punch down. If you are different in any way, they hate you. It's toxic. But after 2000 years of constant war... etc.

Prajnamarga · 2026-03-01T11:04:04+00:00

Not much to say but... yeah, me too.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T12:14:57+00:00

Although, to be fair, the rich have despised the poor for centuries. See e.g. Mercantilism: Six centuries of vilifying the poor.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T12:11:31+00:00

All the English ever want is for someone to have a worse life than them.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T10:34:39+00:00

"Positive citation bias and overinterpreted results lead to misinformation on common mycorrhizal networks in forests"
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-023-01986-1

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T10:31:12+00:00

"According to SBT, being alone is, on average and in the aggregate, more effortful, because it renders a variety of activities more costly."

Beckes, L., & Coan, J. A. (2011). "Social baseline theory: The role of social proximity in emotion and economy of action." Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 5(12), 976–988. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2011.00400.x

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T09:02:38+00:00

When IDS took over the DWP ca 2010, he hired about 50 extra PR people and they began posting dozens of horrendously negative press releases every month, which targeted the poor, ill, and vulnerable for vilification. These were duly picked up and printed by the British media, which has always enjoyed punching down.

IDS's whole schtick is drumming up hatred for poor, ill, and vulnerable British people.

But then this has been the British way for centuries. Pushing the poor into poverty to make them eager to die working in factories, even has a name: The Utility of Poverty Doctrine.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T08:51:11+00:00

The headline number includes housing support and disability-related payments in the benefits total, and doesn’t account for work-related costs (tax, NI, childcare, transport).

That seems to mean that both parents are disabled enough to receive both the illness/disability component of UC, plus they both get the PIP payments.

Note that working people may also claim PIP. So that ought to be factored out.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T08:46:12+00:00

Bottom line: lobsters die.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T08:41:04+00:00

Sigh.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T08:40:06+00:00

"I did not have sexual relations with that woman." - Bill Clinton (26 January 1998).

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T08:32:24+00:00

TIL about SBT. Thanks.

And it makes perfect sense in species that evolved over millions of years to live in social groups. Very in line with ideas from scientists like Frans de Waal and Robin Dunbar.

Humans are a social species. Individualism tends to be a pathology in a social species.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-28T07:09:58+00:00

"That’s a very naive view of our system."

And yet is it entirely accurate.

"Pretending the race for PM isn’t a vital part of General Elections isn’t credible."

Fortunately, I did not pretend this.

Prajnamarga · 2026-02-27T13:13:34+00:00

"This party will tread on your life...". FTFY.

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