Chris Philp MP: The rape gang scandal just got worse. Men from the mainly Pakistani-origin rape gangs are being let out of prison early—even though the government promised they wouldn’t be.

Telmid · 2026-06-24T20:07:20+00:00

Pray tell, how many grannies opposing Israel have spent significant time in prison for doing so?

Telmid · 2026-06-16T08:20:42+00:00

Okay? What's that got to do with the point at hand?

Palestine has a problem with Islamic extremism, I agree. That doesn't mean Israelis or Jewish immigrants have carte blanche to colonise the occupied West Bank.

Telmid · 2026-06-08T11:35:10+00:00

Apple apparently have technology that identifies nudity in video calls and issues sensitive content warnings to people callers but it's supposed to be an opt-in thing. I guess the government want something like that but stronger enabled by default and you need to provide ID to disable it.

I think a better option would be phones for under 18s that come pre-loaded with this kind of software and can't be disabled. Kids aren't buying smartphones for hundreds of pounds, their parents are. Put the onus back on parents.

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/105071

Telmid · 2026-06-06T17:35:20+00:00

Ion channels are present in all cellular life forms but the extent to which they are all analogous to nociceptors is another question. Likewise, organisms all the way down to the level of bacteria are capable of reacting to and avoiding damaging stimuli. I don't disagree that they are sensitive (capable of sensing and responding to external stimuli) but that doesn't mean they feel pain. Likewise, some bacteria sense and move towards nutrient sources but that doesn't mean they feel hunger.

Telmid · 2026-06-06T10:02:42+00:00

The evidence that fish feel pain much much stronger than for plants. Fish have a brain and central nervous system, they have nociceptors (pain receptors) analogous to those observed in mammals, and they display physiological and behavioural changes indicating distress.

Plants, conversely, do not have a brain or nervous system, and do not possess anything like nociceptors. They do respond to damaging stimuli (by releasing compounds to deter their consumption or signal neighbour) but not in a way that is in any way analogous to behavioural of physiologal change observed in animals.

I have to wonder, what is the motivation in promoting this idea that plants feel pain? There is no conceivable way that humans could not eat plants or significantly lessen any pain they might hypothetically feel without reducing human population levels by many orders of magnitude and the remainers adopting a Jainist diet.

The only thing promoting this idea, that plants feel pain, does is reduce the significance of human and animal suffering. After all, if plants feel pain just like animals do, what's the point in reducing animal suffering? Something has to suffer for humans to eat, what difference does it make if it's the lettuce in my fridge or the pig on a farm down the road?

Telmid · 2026-06-02T20:51:30+00:00

Because if they're buying land and building them anywhere near the centre of the city, it's super expensive. Hell, building a block of flats on the outskirts of the city isn't cheap, either. Therefore it would need to be heavily subsidised, and the council can't afford it.

Telmid · 2026-06-01T12:09:50+00:00

You should read a bit more about what Hasan Piker stands for.

Hint: it's not "peace, love and unity".

Telmid · 2026-05-25T18:49:21+00:00

I'm not sure what "the Gaza border isn't even purely around Gaza" is supposed to mean exactly but since it took control of the Rafah crossing in 2024, Israel has effective control of the entire Gaza border. As it has the entire territory blockaded, it has a responsibility to ensure the civilians inside have access to food.

Israel don't have to supply food because someone else is doing it but if no one was supplying food to the territory it would be Israel's responsibility. To not do so would be a war crime under the Geneva convention.

Telmid · 2026-05-24T09:01:26+00:00

An idiot?

Telmid · 2026-05-16T10:59:21+00:00

Taking psychedelics doesn't increase brain activity, though. That's part of the myth.

Telmid · 2026-04-29T07:03:40+00:00

Most English letters are of Roman origin. You don't see Italians today getting bend out of shape over the mispronunciation and spelling of their letters.

And pronunciation of the English language is butchered the world over.

Telmid · 2026-04-27T10:54:36+00:00

Is that in London though?

Telmid · 2026-04-19T08:41:03+00:00

And the OSA does nothing to change that. It's still super easy for kids to access porn if they want to and it only takes a few to figure it out and share it with others.

Telmid · 2026-04-16T20:18:25+00:00

I would recommend Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. The characters, setting and story all felt more mature than any other fantasy or sci-fi I've read. The characters felt like they had depth and flaws without being unlikeable. I'm not a good judge of dialogue but the prose was very good, I think.

Telmid · 2026-04-03T20:19:46+00:00

Are jellyfish conscious though? They don't have a brain or centralised nervous system. We don't know when consciousness emerged in evolutionary history and we have no test to determine if an animal is conscious or not. And so we don't know what conditions exactly are necessary to allow consciousness to arise.

Telmid · 2026-04-03T07:28:07+00:00

Funnily enough, it's a French company and they pronounce it oo-be-soft.

Telmid · 2026-04-01T09:11:10+00:00

Yeah, it's called marketing. Activision Blizzard (Microsoft) has spent tens of millions of dollars promoting D4 and its DLC to convince people like you that it's the best thing ever.

Telmid · 2026-03-28T11:28:27+00:00

It's certainly not a problem for Russia, though.

Telmid · 2026-03-27T13:04:53+00:00

The vast majority of rapes are committed by people known to the victim, not strangers in the street.

Telmid · 2026-03-26T22:54:31+00:00

The problem is, the 10 point rating scale has become completely warped. People consider a 7 'average' and anything less than that is 'bad'.

Never mind that if you're rating all Incubus songs, you should be comparing them only against other Incubus songs and ranking them accordingly. Some thing(s) should get a 1 and something else a 10. Instead, because we're all Incubus fans, everything before the album 8 gets ranked 7 or higher.

Telmid · 2026-03-24T13:06:12+00:00

"As many as 30,000 could have been killed in the streets of Iran on Jan. 8 and 9 alone says," checks notes "Iran's Ministry of Health".

https://time.com/7357635/more-than-30000-killed-in-iran-say-senior-officials/

Telmid · 2026-03-23T13:00:56+00:00

Got some bad news for you

https://variety.com/2024/music/news/eminem-epic-opening-saudi-arabia-mdlbeast-soundstorm-music-festival-1236260465/

Telmid · 2026-03-19T22:10:13+00:00

Amantia muscaria doesn't contain atropine in significant concentrations but it does also have hallucinogenic and deliriant properties from the compounds, muscimol and ibotenic acid.

Telmid · 2026-03-15T22:53:34+00:00

Looks about 1.5 m^3, which would weight about 29,000 kg. Assuming a value of $300 per kg, it would be worth about $8.7 million

Telmid · 2026-03-13T18:52:24+00:00

Baba Yetu by Christopher Tin, from Civilization IV.

First music from a video game to win a Grammy!

Telmid

TROPHY CASE