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Patrick Devaney

@patrickdevaney.bsky.social
269 followers 192 following 1.5K posts

UBC CS PhD student - formal verification of hardware and software (also occasionally theory of computation) - hobbyist nature photographer - #CovidIsAirborne - patrickdevaney.net

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Reposted by Patrick Devaney
Aaron Wherry @aaronwherry.bsky.social · 22h
The House of Commons is debating the price of food, which is a bit weird because eliminating the carbon tax was supposed to solve that problem.
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 23h
“Regarding MAID for patients with mental illness, he cited continuing concerns about inadequate access to mental-health services.” THEN PROVIDE ADEQUATE SERVICES! Denying people treatment and using that as a justification to deny MAID is just pointless cruelty.
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rev. howard arson @theophite.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
this literally is not true
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Conor Browne @brownecfm.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
I am rarely affected by discourse on social media, but the current wave of posts asserting that Long Covid is psychosomatic has angered me. To be very clear: if you're asserting that LC isn't a physical disease, you're ignorant of science. End of.
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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
I don’t think everyone realizes how bad things are for US science: For the fiscal year that just ended, the Trump regime withheld $1.4 billion from the National Science Foundation’s research budget, which is about 1/5 of its primary research budget.
nytimes.com
National Science Foundation Diverted $1.4 Billion in Science Funds Mandated by Congress (Gift Article)
The move, affecting about one-fifth of the National Science Foundation’s primary research budget, is the latest sign of how the White House is asserting more control over grants.
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🔬🔭🧭👨‍💻🏞️👾🤖🌡️ @dcrinyyc.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
In a very real way people that are choosing to expand fossil fuel production right now are literally choosing people to die. Not just now either, for hundreds of years to come. Not just people either ecosystems, species. It's stunning to me this is celebrated.
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Theo Moudakis @theomoudakis.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Please enjoy my cartoon in today's Toronto Star
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
static.klipy.com
Count von Count: Eight and Counting
Alt: Count von Count: Eight and Counting
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Katherine Alejandra Cross @quinnae.com · 27/09/2026
You don't have an inalienable right to be an antisocial dipshit because you're doomscrolling all day and it makes you feel terrible. There are no qualifiers to this. You are not released from the obligation to try to be decent just because Elon Musk is lighting the world on fire.
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George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Here's today's column on the astonishing, ongoing mistreatment of people with #ME/CFS. Please spread it far and wide: the only thing which can break the media's wall of indifference is seeing an article about the issue go viral. Thank you. 1/2 www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Abandoned, dismissed and gaslighted: there is no excuse for the way ME sufferers have been betrayed | George Monbiot
Changes in guidance and science seem to have little impact on millions of devastated lives. It’s a social crisis playing out behind closed doors, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot
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LawrieBhoy 🍀 @lawriebhoy.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
You can tell a lot about someone’s character by how they feel about the government providing free school breakfasts for children.
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Sean T. Collins @seantcollins.com · 10/09/2026
3 things about Dem politicians who dabble in transphobia: 1. It's wrong, they're wrong, on a moral basis they're being evil 2. It's stupid, they're stupid, they'll never get any credit from the fascists for it 3. It's proof you're not capable of reading or rising to this, and therefore any, moment
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Patrick Chovanec @prchovanec.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Never forgiving Apple or Google for participating in this bullshit.
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Stef "inclusion is a human right" Christensen @wikisteff.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
This is excellent. Do not make these assumptions about names in your code.
People have exactly one canonical full name.
People have exactly one full name which they go by.
People have, at this point in time, exactly one canonical full name.
People have, at this point in time, one full name which they go by.
People have exactly N names, for any value of N.
People’s names fit within a certain defined amount of space.
People’s names do not change.
People’s names change, but only at a certain enumerated set of events.
People’s names are written in ASCII.
People’s names are written in any single character set.
People’s names are all mapped in Unicode code points.
People’s names are case sensitive.
People’s names are case insensitive.
People’s names sometimes have prefixes or suffixes, but you can safely ignore those.People’s names do not contain numbers.
People’s names are not written in ALL CAPS.
People’s names are not written in all lower case letters.
People’s names have an order to them.  Picking any ordering scheme will automatically result in consistent ordering among all systems, as long as both use the same ordering scheme for the same name.
People’s first names and last names are, by necessity, different.
People have last names, family names, or anything else which is shared by folks recognized as their relatives.
People’s names are globally unique.
People’s names are almost globally unique.
Alright alright but surely people’s names are diverse enough such that no million people share the same name.
My system will never have to deal with names from China.
Or Japan.
Or Korea.
Or Ireland, the United Kingdom, the United States, Spain, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Russia, Sweden, Botswana, South Africa, Trinidad, Haiti, France, or the Klingon Empire, all of which have “weird” naming schemes in common use.Or Ireland, the United Kingdom, the United States, Spain, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Russia, Sweden, Botswana, South Africa, Trinidad, Haiti, France, or the Klingon Empire, all of which have “weird” naming schemes in common use.
That Klingon Empire thing was a joke, right?
Confound your cultural relativism!  People in my society, at least, agree on one commonly accepted standard for names.
There exists an algorithm which transforms names and can be reversed losslessly.  (Yes, yes, you can do it if your algorithm returns the input.  You get a gold star.)
I can safely assume that this dictionary of bad words contains no people’s names in it.
People’s names are assigned at birth.
OK, maybe not at birth, but at least pretty close to birth.
Alright, alright, within a year or so of birth.
Five years?
You’re kidding me, right?
Two different systems containing data about the same person will use the same name for that person.
Two different data entry operators, given a person’s name, will by necessity enter bitwise equivalent strings on any single system, if the system is well-designed.
People whose names break my system are weird outliers.  They should have had solid, acceptable names, like 田中太郎.
People have names.I can safely assume that this dictionary of bad words contains no people’s names in it.
People’s names are assigned at birth.
OK, maybe not at birth, but at least pretty close to birth.
Alright, alright, within a year or so of birth.
Five years?
You’re kidding me, right?
Two different systems containing data about the same person will use the same name for that person.
Two different data entry operators, given a person’s name, will by necessity enter bitwise equivalent strings on any single system, if the system is well-designed.
People whose names break my system are weird outliers.  They should have had solid, acceptable names, like 田中太郎.
People have names.
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Aaron Wherry @aaronwherry.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Of all the weeks in Canadian history, this has definitely been one of them.
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The Onion @theonion.com · 19/08/2026
Democratic Socialism: Myth Vs. Fact theonion.com/democratic-socialism-m…
MYTH: The government will take away your money and give it to the poor.

FACT: You are the poor.
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Erica Windisch @ewindisch.ontological.observer · 16/08/2026
DRM is bad and should be illegal. Companies have told us for decades now that you're "buying" content but actually creating a lease, instead.
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Patrick Cosmos @veryimportant.lawyer · 04/08/2026
"it looks like you're using an adblocker to visit our site." yep! ha ha! it rocks!
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Adam Rawnsley @arawnsley.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
Today, August 4, 2026, is the setting of Ray Bradbury’s short story “There Will Come Soft Rains” about a fully automated house continuing on after the family who lived there and the world around it died in a nuclear blast.
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Jan Adriaenssens @verbeeld.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
Brutal photo caption from The Guardian: “Gianni Infantino carefully explains to Donald Trump that he is not part of the Spanish national team.”
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
This arrived in the mail today - excited to read it! @grimalkina.bsky.social
“The Psychology of Software Teams” book by Cat Hicks, on a brown wood table.
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Shiv Ramdas Mens Rice Activist @nameshiv.bsky.social · 12/07/2026
counterpoint: the dead should make it harder for me to speak ill of them
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Avi Lewis @avilewis.ca · 30/06/2026
They’re going to call you a socialist regardless. So be a socialist.
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emily fraser 🌿🐌✨ @emilyesfraser.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
Climate scientists will recognize this playbook. Controversialize science that isn’t controversial by platforming a small group of “skeptics” who generally have little to no expertise in the subject, in order to delay necessary action at the price of countless lives.
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FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting) @fairmediawatch.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
National corporate media have created a controversy—”is Long Covid a real medical disease?”—which never existed in any serious form among the experts who research Covid. fair.org/home/media-w...
fair.org
Media Won’t Stop Psychologizing Long Covid
Media outlets that trumpet their journalistic integrity have used their prestige to launder an unproven, anti-science conspiracy theory about Long Covid.
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Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 21/06/2026
My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and— I said look. Look with your eyes! Oh now you’ve gone and touched it. The paint is peeling. My beautiful paint! I’ll have to call my pool guy back. Vandal! Antifa! I said look And despair Nothing but the algae remains.
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evacide @evacide.bsky.social · 16/06/2026
One more time for the people in the back: I will always hate your real names proposal. I will always hate your backdooring crypto proposal. I will always hate your hack back proposal. These ideas are bad and you cannot dress them up in any way that will change that.
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Dave Vetter @davidrvetter.bsky.social · 12/06/2026
Now that's an obituary headline.
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Ryan Heuser @ryanheuser.com · 06/06/2026
7
EMERGENCY BRAKE
Fredric Jameson, reflecting on the contemporary moment, comments that
we may pause to observe the way in which so much of left politics today — unlike Marx's own passionate commitment to a streamlined technological future - seems to have adopted as its slogan Benjamin's odd idea that revolution means pulling the emergency brake on the runaway train of History, as though an admittedly runaway capitalism itself had the monopoly on change and futurity.!
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Doug McNeall @dougmcneall.bsky.social · 04/06/2026
Can I just give a shout out to the @ethz.ch researchers who initialised an AI weather model with a cat picture. 👏🐱
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Jesse @requiemarm.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
it’s crazy that they still do this event every year while this post exists
Classic internet hippo tweet: “Just got back from the centrist rally. Amazing turnout. Thousands of people holding hands and chanting “Better things aren’t possible”
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The Beaverton @thebeaverton.com · 28/05/2026
Carney to replace Steven Guilbeault’s seat with burning tailings pond
thebeaverton.com
Carney to replace Steven Guilbeault’s seat with burning tailings pond
OTTAWA - Prime Minister Mark Carney has absorbed the resignation from Parliament by climate activist Steven Guilbeault, immediately announcing that his seat would be replaced with a tar sands tailings...
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Thaddeus is a girl's name 🏳️‍⚧️ @thaddeus.zone · 22/05/2026
hey everyone wanna see what a manufactured hate campaign is shaped like???
google trends analysis on the search topic "transgender" in the u.s., over the past five years 

flat line from may 1, 2021 to feb 1, 2023, when it rockets straight up to near 100 then bounces up & down to date, staying between 50 & 100 the whole time google trends analysis on the search topic "transgender" in the u.k., over the last 5 years

flat line from may 1, 2021 to feb 1, 2023, when it rockets straight up to near 35-40, quickly tends up to 50 and bounces around there for the remainder except for a massive spike to 100 in april 2025
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Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 22/05/2026
A history of the top marginal tax rates on the wealthiest Americans: 1940: 81% 1950: 84% 1960: 91% 1970: 72% 1980: 70% 1990: 28% 2000: 40% 2010: 35% For 50 years, corporate backed politicians in Congress have slashed taxes to line the pockets of their wealthy donors.
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Elana Levin @levin.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
Proposed Burrito Tax: For every 1 door dash opinion you post you must bring meals to a disabled person who can’t get food safely themselves.
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Julia Métraux @juliametraux.bsky.social · 08/05/2026
This Canvas hacking situation shows problems with monopolies/duopolies, in this essay I'll..
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 04/05/2026
The Assistant to the Regional Manager of the Rings
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Timothy @landbeforetim.myatproto.social · 01/05/2026
Bring back the ancient knowledge
Things you read on a blog might make you angry. They might upset you. Stop visiting that blog. Don't waste your time posting comments. Move on and find a new blog. There are so many fun blogs on the Internet. You'll easily find a better one.
There is always another fun new blog to read online.
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 30/04/2026
Does the stock market count as a prediction market? 🤔
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 30/04/2026
Urging Bluesky to bring more nuance to AI in general.
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David Moscrop @davidmoscrop.com · 28/04/2026
Good evening: this is your semi-regular reminder that you can’t preserve or strengthen democracy without democratizing the economy and giving workers a greater share of wealth and control in the workplace.
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 10/04/2026
Passed my RPE (my department's equivalent of PhD qualifiers) this morning! 🥳 Now I just have to do the PhD...
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Ankit Panda @nktpnd.bsky.social · 08/04/2026
*taps the sign*
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Hank Green @hankgreen.bsky.social · 28/03/2026
“Vice President JD Vance thinks aliens are visiting earth and that they are Demons” is the most “I wish Carl Sagan were alive” moment I’ve had in a while.
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Patrick Devaney @patrickdevaney.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
While I was holding office hours today, a group of (unmasked) people a couple tables over were talking about how it seems like everyone is sick right now and flu season is every 2 months 🤔
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Gavin Schmidt @climateofgavin.bsky.social · 22/03/2026
The best time to have invested in renewables, walkable cities and transit to avoid the oil crisis shock was twenty years ago. The second best time is today.
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Ebony Elizabeth Thomas @ebonyteach.blacksky.app · 22/03/2026
I really, really need academic organizations to think more critically about travel (conferences, talks, and meetings) during the Trump administration. Sadly, most are not.
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