Notices by mekka okereke :verified: (mekkaokereke@hachyderm.io)

@dalias @MichaelPorter @CStamp @shinealittlelove

One thing that is tripping people up is the difference between apologizing for harm vs apologizing for having a disability.

There is an incredible resistance from some people for apologizing for saying such a hurtful word.

On BlueSky someone asked if I would expect a blind person to apologize if they touched me by accident. I pointed out that *touch* is not very harmful. A better analogy is if a blind person stabbed me by accident.

I have cooked dinner with a blind person, who through both of our carelessness, almost cut me with a knife. The blind person apologized. Not for being blind. But because of what they thought was harm.

If they had said, "I'm blind. I shouldn't have to apologize for being blind." that would have been weird.

The resistance to apologizing is strange.

I pointed out that in the trailer for I swear, The main character has a shoving tick where he knocks a beer out of someone's hand. He immediately apologizes. And he doesn't apologize to the whole room. He apologizes directly to the person whose beer fell down.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oeWqQN3snCU&t=78s

So I don't think the concept of "Apologize to the person who received harm, even though the harm was unintentional" is not the sticking point.

I think the sticking point is on people who don't believe that the BAFTAs, BBC, or the man who yelled the slur, should have to apologize at all. Because they don't see the harm as being on the level of shoving someone, or slicing someone with a knife.

🤔I totally misread why people like Hamilton so much, especially this song. I thought they were laughing *at* the King George portrayal.

I didn't know that they were like, "It's funny cause it's true! We want it back!"

Joke's on me I guess.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ukfNXFgUEiU

@FeralRobots @klausfiend @fifilamoura

Some of the most lethal snipers in history have been women. Many of the most lethal special forces snipers, like Nicholas "The Reaper" Irving, say that women are either equal to or better than men as snipers. Special forces sniper school instructors say the same thing.

I'm not linking to any of the videos or quotes, as there's a little gender essentialism going on, and killing people is really not a skill that I think should be celebrated. But men do not have a clear advantage over women in sniping.

I can't think of many more rapid and effective ways to cede soft power in Africa, than by cancelling PEPFAR.🤷🏿♂️

I mean, I'm sure there are better ways, but not by much.

Someone is going to fill that void.

Without the US voluntarily vacating, offers of help would have looked self-serving. No longer.

@vmiheer

Yup.

https://hachyderm.io/@mekkaokereke/113897231424440583

Hey, while we're talking about erasing history:

In 1949 the US military held its first Aeriel Gunnery Competition, later known as "Top Gun."

The best of the best competed in dogfighting and other skills. The team that won, was the 332nd: The Tuskegee airmen.

So they refused to announce a winner. 🤡

Sorry y'all. Maverick is Black.

https://www.acc.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/2783474/history-72-years-in-the-making-1949-first-aerial-gunnery-competition/

@ohmu

Red Tails is a good movie about the Tuskegee Airmen, the racism they faced, and their victories in battle.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3buPNdeMecs

Obligatory:
* All war is bad.
* Civilians get hurt the most. Mostly children.

Make them miss.👍🏿

They might ban teaching about Tuskegee for a day. Or a month. Or a year. Or a decade. But it's coming back.

Lies and obscuring history cannot survive a high information environment.

Yes, in the short term, disinfo is powerful. But long term, spreading info is even more powerful.

https://www.expressnews.com/news/article/tuskegee-airmen-video-air-force-changes-course-20057246.php

@LucyG

Good news: It's not past time for this to be effective.

Better news: You don't need to wait for a boycott, and you don't need to wait for Black people to tell you what to do.

Best news: You're already doing it! 🙂

The fact that you can read these words that I'm writing, means that you're at some level already making a decision about "Who do I want to make richer with my social media activity? Who do I not want to make richer?"

You make a similar decision every time you shop, travel, spend your time, etc. Even if you don't consciously make a decision, a "status quo" decision is made on your behalf.

Americans are rediscovering: In a country that loves money this much, the real election is cast at the cash register. The dollar ballot is the only one that counts.

Billionaires are like gods powered by myth and belief. They only have power if you pray to them. And by pray, I mean pay to them.

People like to believe that MLK Jr's moving speeches warmed the cold hearts of racists, and brought about social change.

But that's not what happened.

The racists stayed racist. The anti-racists stayed anti-racist. But the anti-racists made different decisions on how they were going to spend cash.

Like I've said, you can't fight your own wallet.

Tsk-tsking at Elon, while you drive a Tesla, makes no sense.

I see people in real financial hard times, in need of mutual aid, with disabilities, making an effort to spend differently.♥️👍🏿

While millionaires say, "But I *had* to buy a Cybertruck!" 🤷🏿♂️

You vote every time you buy something or don't buy something.

I'm not telling you who or what to vote for. I'm just saying be conscious of who you are voting for with your wallet, and make an informed decision.

Understand what your money is paying for.

Don't be an uninformed voter.

Ah, right.

Because US history doesn't like to teach the truth about civil rights, and because people don't like to read anything, here's what really desegregated Montgomery Alabama buses.

Black people, and people that care about Black people, stopped spending.

For over 380 days.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FE6Yvy--5aw

@ohmu

Very little. It's completely not a priority for me at the moment. I am 100% focused on this last lifting goal.

When I do ramp up the walking, I'll start at around 1 hr / day of active cardio, 5 days a week. If I need to increase, I'll gently increase the work rate (pace, incline, add a flight of stairs, etc) rather than increase walking time too much. And I'll add more passive cardio (like walking 1:1s) during the day.

That plus 1 hr of lifting, will be plenty.

@ohmu

I'm not doing much cardio at the moment for reasons, but these days most of my cardio is walking.

More nerdy stuff about powerlifting that you didn't ask for but I'm going to tell you anyway, because this is my timeline and I write what I want.🤷🏿♂️

Muscle mass is a physical attribute. Strength is a skill.

Some bodybuilders are very muscular, but are slow, can't run fast, and can't jump high. But some bodybuilders are very muscular, but are much faster and jump much higher than normal athletes. Why is that?🤔

Picture a large concrete slab standing on its edge. It takes 10,000 lbs of force to knock the slab over. Picture a gym full of 200 elementary school kids, each of whom can produce a peak force of 100 lbs but for under 1 second. If I tell them all to knock the slab over, they can't do it, even though they should be able to generate 20,000 lbs of force. Force plates might measure the max generated force at 9,000 lbs.

They can't push the block over because they're not coordinated. Ideally all kids would apply their force within 10ms of each other. But they don't know how to do that yet.

Now imagine that the kids all join a step class for Black history month.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KU5g2MwmTEQ&t=55s

On March 1, they try to push the block over again. 1 kid jumps out front and leads the others in a synchronization call. They push the block over easily!

Plyometrics training, and super heavy weight training, don't really make your muscles bigger. They don't "add more kids." They make the muscles you already have, better adapted to the task of *maximal exertion*.

You can't tell from looking at a group of school kids if they know how to coordinate their force to under 10ms. Similarly, you can't tell from looking at a big person, if they can apply their muscle in under 10ms🤯

Mark Henry dunking at 370lbs (not 410 lbs but still)
https://youtube.com/shorts/VDQLUd_OwNI

Bodybuilder dunking and doing a back flip
https://youtube.com/shorts/7y4pOCk0muE

Miles Garrett (270 lb NFL player) dunking
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1Zp15t_Zyns

Dunking a basketball is about vertical jumping ability. From a physics standpoint, it's "How much can you accelerate your bodyweight by the time your toes lose contact with the ground?" Which is a combination of (how much muscle x how coordinated is that muscle) and (how much do you weigh).

(It's also about storing and releasing energy in tendons, but hey).

For me the major topics of a CS education for the general public are:

* Computer Hardware
* Encoding and Decoding
* Logic and Control Structures
* Iterration
* Objects
* Databases
* Ethics and Applications
* User Interfaces and Design
* Computer Networks
* Computer History

This list keeps changing every time I revise my courses which is every year.

Notice that "integrating functions" is an outcome, a specific skill. A nice one that implies you know a lot of math... maybe. But not all math curriculums end there. There is a robust debate in math education about if we obsesses about The Calculus too much, everyone understands that doing some integrals isn't "knowing math."

I think most CS educators understand something similar but there is much less consensus about what it is that we are teaching if not "how to code."

@mekkaokereke I needed to hear this. I need to keep hearing this. Thank you

@KrajciTom @mekkaokereke @pixelnull A simple unit analysis reveals that the unit energy per degree is inversely proportional to the amount of joy created.

Where does it all go then? You're telling me the energy just turns into sound or friction or heat and is lost and that this sum total lost energy is 'chaos', that this is all there is to 'entropy'?

Nay, nay. It has to go somewhere, and the concurrent generation of joy fully explains the energy loss.

@ChemicalEyeGuy

Oops! 😁

@klimpner

🤗 Aww!

Reminder:

If you get exhausted and burn out and give up, you lose. If you stay in, you win. Just by existing, you win!

So taking little breaks for joy is fine! Good actually!

Helping other people find joy, gives you joy too! Joy is conserved! The laws of thermodynamics have nothing to say about joy!