Apepollo11

@Apepollo11@lemmy.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are the Roman numerals based on what your hand look like when you count?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Back to the Future’s “Darth Vader from the planet Vulcan” begs to differ. 🖖

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is a two-party system considered democratic?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s exactly why so many countries around the world roll their eyes when America bangs on so much about democracy.

  It’s a marketing thing. Look around the world. Find any country with the word “Democratic” in the name, and odds are you’ll find a poor excuse for a democracy.

  The actual democracies in the world don’t feel compelled to keep repeating the fact.

  The reality is that America is only really a democracy in the loosest sense of the world. All you need to do is look at how often the wealthiest candidate wins to see that it’s true. Or how often the person with the most votes loses. Or how unregulated lobbying actually is. Or the insane amount of power the President actually has. The power doesn’t lie with the people - it lies with the super-rich.

  Sorry if that came off as really negative! America has a lot of good stuff going for it, but its implementation of democracy is not one.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  If you’re thinking yoga retreats etc, I’d consider building an Earthship or two first. They’re totally eco-friendly, almost hobbit-like buildings. They fit the vibe and would give you a base of operations for future plans.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When people in constitutional monarchies pledge loyalty to the monarch, is it actually for real, or just symbolic / a pro-forma thing?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Interesting addition here, we don’t even have an official national anthem. There isn’t even an “official” version of the lyrics for the song we use as the de-facto national anthem.

  We just all kind of collectively agreed upon the first verse, and mentally update it whenever a monarch dies and a new gender is required.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is it OK for a baby's head to be rolled all the way back on its neck?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I wouldn’t worry about it then. Babies are a lot floppier than you’d expect - it won’t be doing any harm :)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is it OK for a baby's head to be rolled all the way back on its neck?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Maybe the baby’s just a bobble head.

  Unless the baby looked malnourished or uncared for, I wouldn’t worry. Babies are far more resilient, bendy and adaptable than we give them credit for.

  Also, unless there’s a developmental issue, a seven month old would easily be able to hold their head unassisted. Is it possible the baby was just trying to look at things?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨HELP! How do I help educate my son about his body when I know nothing about boys??⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  This.

  Porn is as representative of real sex as action scenes are of real fights.

  It’s a stylised and codified version of things that specifically is designed to appeal to our lizard brains.

  Also, get used to saying the word ‘sex’ around him. It’s weird at first, but the best way to make it clear that it’s all a normal part of growing up, is by acting like it’s a normal part of growing up.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is thinly-veiled political whinging really a question just because you used a question mark?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m not entirely sure I read your comment correctly, but it sounds like you’ve never heard the word “whinging” before.

  For the avoidance of doubt, it’s a real word. It rhymes with “hinging”.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Seconded. As soon as you hit 40, every other visit to the doctor involves talking about something going wrong below the waist.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why there is no photos of earth from space?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I pop this on the telly for my kids when they have nightmares. It’s interesting enough to distract them, yet gentle enough to lull them to sleep again.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Some examples of video games with an UI layout ripped off of another game?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  It seems pretty fundamental, but fighting games have had pretty much the same basic UI layout since Street Fighter II. Before then there was a degree of variability as to how the different elements were laid out. Since SFII, it’s always been Timer in the middle and Health bars on either side of that.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Recreate old chess pieces⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I didn’t know imagetostl took glbs! I honestly wouldn’t even have expected it!

  I’ll definitely be using that then. Blender is great, but I’m tied to my machine - I’d much rather use online tools when I can.

  Thanks for that :)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Recreate old chess pieces⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  If you have at least one of each piece remaining, then yep - it’s easy!

  The technology you’re after is called photogrammetry, and there are two inexpensive ways that I use often (there are more, but these are the two I rely on)

  1. KIRI Engine - I have a subscription, but I think there is a free tier. You take about twenty photos of the object from different angles, upload for processing, and you get a 3D model back that you can print.

  2. TRELLIS - take a single photograph and upload to here:

  huggingface.co/spaces/JeffreyXiang/TRELLIS

  You will receive a 3D model back that you can import into Blender, run a mesh operation to merge by distance (to create a watertight model), export as STL and then print.

  KIRI Engine requires more work upfront, with all the photos, but is the best at recreating existing things accurately.

  TRELLIS requires more work at the end, because it doesn’t automatically create printable models, and it isn’t a finished product yet, but it is the closest thing to actual witchcraft I’ve experienced.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  People are still people, and money is just there to facilitate transactions required for the stuff you need.

  Part of the problem is that a bunch of not-rights have decided that instead the point of money is to accrue it like some kind of high score.

  If you are so rich that you no longer experience the normal problems associated with being a person, such as bad hair days, then you’ve probably become a weirdo yourself.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Ok,

  I’d have paid off my student loans and mortgage already, as that’s the first thing I’d do as soon as I received the money.

  I guess a typical Friday would involve me waking up at noon, pottering about in my pyjamas for a few hours, then working on whatever project I have on the go. I’m one of those people who has an obsession-of-the-month, and I can’t imagine that would change.

  I’d have more time to spend with my kids and partner than I do, which I imagine would be nice.

  On the whole, I don’t think it’d be wildly different to how I live now - only that without the pressure that I have to work so many hours a day, I’d have more time to spend with my family.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why was Hitler so mean and hateful toward one group or another? I find it hard to believe he woke up one day and said you and you suck but these people over here are good. Taking it so far as killing?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Approaching this cynically, all right-wing politicians blame groups as others as being the cause of their country’s societal ills. That’s just how it works.

  Jewish people were just one of the targeted groups, along with LGBT people, disabled people, and communists.

  One universal truth throughout history is that it’s hard to unite people behind a common goal, but it’s easy to unite people against a common enemy.

  Listen to any right wing politicians from around the world - their plans for making things better all start with getting rid of someone (be it a group of people or a governmental department).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I remember that show. It was like Muppet Babies except with crows.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why do AI bros and other staunch AI defenders seem happy about the potential of killing off the creative industries?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  The invention of production lines didn’t mean that nobody appreciated hand-built cars any longer - it just meant a cheaper option was now available to more people.

  The invention of phonographs, records, cd etc, didn’t mean that nobody appreciated live music anymore - it just meant that there was now a more accessible option available.

  Every job in arts and engineering can, has and will be automated to some extent - it doesn’t mean the death of those industries, or a lack of appreciation for the creativity involved.

  I think the real benefit comes from when the creatives use the tools to do the heavy lifting. Every new innovation sees a glut of low-effort money-saving cash-ins. After a while, however, these fall to the wayside as the people who actually have the skills take over again.

  More than ten years ago, I wrote a song for my daughter. I recorded it, animated a little video, and uploaded it to youTube. I’d written several more songs for her, but had never found the time necessary to actually record the songs and create videos for them. Because of AI tools, I’ve finally been able to make significant headway on a couple of songs that I hope to upload within the next fortnight.

  We’re just in a transition period. Like George Lucas’s over-reliance on CG in the prequels - although it looked pretty great at the time but now looks thoroughly artificial.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Has the USA turned into an oligarchy?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Speaking of the nice paint job, it’s a good job you guys made that Eagle thing official. That makes it nice and clear that you’re not at risk of transitioning from democracy to dictatorship.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is there a way to search for specific words on a site?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  For any that don’t already know, this is a universal shortcut, and works across all kinds of different programs.

  CTRL+F = Find

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What do people (as in, IRL) actually think of the [alleged] perpetrator involved in the NYC shooting?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  The only thing I’ve heard general consensus on is how attractive he is.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨In the US, is this actually the moment past the point of no return?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  From an outsider’s perspective, I think a lot of people think you guys sailed past the point of no return back in the 80s.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why do the majority of women still take their partner's last name?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I think the only correct answer will be “there are lots of different reasons”.

  My wife took my last name, even though it’s not a good one and I suggested that we pick a new one.

  Here are a couple of her reasons:

  1. She wanted us to have the same surname.

  2. She was very close friends with my cousins growing up, so the name didn’t seem weird to her.

  3. Tradition - she’d always assumed she would change her name to her husband’s name, so that seemed the most normal thing to do.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How far away are we from someone using AI to create an animated TV show by themselves.⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  We could technically do it now, but you’d need a ton of quality control.

  A basic workflow:

  Use an image generator to generate start (and optionally end) frames of each scene.

  Use a video generator like Runway to create the scene.

  Use something to generate the speech, either a realistic text-to-speech engine or a record the dialog yourself and use AI voice changing software.

  Use a lip synch AI to match the mouth flaps to the audio.

  Generate music using something like Udio

  Job done.

  All these technologies exist and in some capacity are available to use. The only issue at the moment is consistent quality. This is coming on in leaps and bounds, however.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Is there ever a situation where a doctor can legally refuse to render aid to someone?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  At our GP surgery, there are a couple of doctors who won’t consult on birth control matters for religious reasons.

  There’s just a sign at the reception saying that if you need to discuss birth control, please let the receptionist know and they’ll be sure to assign a different doctor.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why don't we just gather up all the ocean's trash and all the nonrecyclables, put them in a rocket, and launch it into the sun?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I love the optimism here, but unless there was a significant potential for profit, none of the people who have the resources to begin collecting ocean plastics could care less.

  The sad truth is that the majority of the world’s resources are owned and controlled by a handful of psychopaths.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Do PhDs HAVE to use Dr?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Only in the US and a select few other countries…

  In other places, ‘Professor’ is a specific academic rank - there’ll only be a few professors in a university.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why did it take so damn long for humanity to "learn" how to draw/paint realistic images?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  chefs kiss

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why did it take so damn long for humanity to "learn" how to draw/paint realistic images?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Materials.

  If you’d have seen the marble sculptures when they were new, you would have described them as anything but realistic. We now know that many, if not most, sculptures were painted in bright garish colours.

  Why paint a delicately crafted sculpture with a dodgy paint job? Party taste, perhaps, but more definitely because that was what was available.

  The paints that we have now are carefully designed, mixed and stored to deliver a wide range of colours of a consistent quality (and even modern companies like GW struggle with that!).

  The further back you go, the fewer pigments there are and the less sophisticated the binders are. It’s no coincidence that the rapid explosion in science and trade of the Renaissance led to the rapid development of paints. Even in those days, an artist didn’t buy paint, they made it - access to new raw ingredients was all that was needed.

  So, why the Renaissance? Because it’s the earliest point in time it could have been possible.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨College students used Meta’s smart glasses to dox people in real time⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I read that book about 30 years ago! I didn’t remember the eye-scanning gargoyle, but for some reason I still remember the phrase “Ultima Ratio Regum” from the nuclear powered gun.