iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I'm sorry you had to deal with that, but if someone talks about how they're sad and lonely and your response is "you're welcome to share Christmas with us if you take a medical test every morning," volcanic anger seems to me like a very natural response.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

That is objectively extreme behavior. If a sibling asked that if me, I'd politely decline rather than getting "absolutely mad," but perhaps she did and then you were insistent.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Because it's rude and you know it's rude?

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

I think most of the people punching left perceive those on the left as partly responsible for the Democratic backsliding. There is a loud faction of the American left who seems to prefer Republicans to centrist Democrats.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

They're effective because they're large. You don't need to protest every day to protest.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

The Louvre is one of the worst in this regard, since it has such a stringent timed ticketing system and so few entrances and exits. You basically can't stop in briefly. Whereas there have been lots of times when I had a few extra minutes in Trafalgar Square and popped into the National Gallery.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

Don't give him ideas. He just jacked up national park admissions for foreigners to a punitive extent.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is free to New Yorkers (I forget the exact geographic contours) but not out-of-towners. But they implement it as a "suggested donation" for locals—you can get out of it if and only if you're local. It's really gross.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

This is a key point. Art museums are best enjoyed in small, focused bursts. Charging $30 for admission makes people feel like they need to turn it into an all-day death march to get their money's worth.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

It's a sign that he's either an idiot or thinks his voters are idiots. Neither speaks well of him.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

I for one was surprised Trump won and was definitely not right all along.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/03/2026

"They" here is the Iranians, I think.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

Yeah, while I don't think he has any morals or qualms about committing war crimes, there's a high likelihood here that he just thinks this sounds cool.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 11/03/2026

It is the same energy, although I bet one major set of users are people who are just learning English, and to them I say: whatever works.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

It's not actually up to me. I will vote against him in the primary. And if he wins the primary anyway, I will support him, because I'm neither MAGA nor a fool.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

On the contrary, the country's best hope of survival is if the GOP is resoundingly defeated, and the best hope of that is if we have a depression.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

Unless there exist other barriers to entry.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

Hard to believe that's true given the obscenely high room rates that are routine these days.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 28/02/2026

I'm inclined to sign up for one, but if the supply chain risk designation is maintained, I think they'll be out of business in a few months.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 28/02/2026

How do they survive being designated as a supply chain risk? It basically means they can't do business with major corporations in America.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 24/02/2026

By the time I got to the baggage claim, there were about 2-3" of snow that had accumulated on the floor of the baggage claim, near the flaps to the outside, *indoors*.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 24/02/2026

That's a Rhode Island record. In Boston, this didn't match the April Fools' Day blizzard of 1997, let alone 1978. I was flying back from London in 1997. The pilot "pulled some favors" and took off early, landing at 1:50, before they closed the airport at 2:00 (scheduled arrival 2:30).

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 21/02/2026

This is why primaries are important, and also why we need to get rid of first-past-the-post voting. There are very few interest groups on the broader left whose interests would be served by electing Republicans at this point.

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Reposted by D.M. Ridley

Will Stancil @whstancil.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

I find it really incredible that the concept of “vote blue no matter who” is so hard for some to grasp. It doesn’t mean “all Democrats are good.” It means “vote for the Democrat against the Republican.” In their November races, Fetterman, Masto, Platner, Booker, Newsom are the correct choices

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

That's not an especially well defined assertion, though. It doesn't follow that there is nothing one can do to improve accuracy, and in fact we have seen the opposite. It's relevant if a model can provide an answer that recognizes that you need your car to wash it.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

Yeah, that is certainly a good succinct description.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

The overarching point I'm pushing back on is just what sounded like a suggestion that diversity leads to systemic racism. I assume that isn't what you meant anyway, and it doesn't have to do so.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

Yes, although slavery wasn't very central to the economic system of the North and that's why it was jettisoned. But you're right, I was eliding the period where the South treated enslaved people like livestock and bred them locally rather than importing them.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

Well it's not just because it is diverse. It built a whole culture and economic system on the systemic racism at a time when it was deliberately importing the diverse people.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

I take Tillis's point, to his mild credit, as being that Miller's idea of a positive legacy (which you correctly summarize) isn't anyone else's.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

And "the change that is needed" basically requires a couple of election cycles of obliterating Republicans, which presumably Tillis would like to avoid.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

Yeah, maybe it's just a tactical effort to manipulate Trump to do less damage—that seems likely.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

Do you think he genuinely believes this "good czar, bad boyars" nonsense?

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

Yeah, your interpretation makes a lot of sense! I like that (at least as much as one can like a bon mot about an atrocity).

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

Because. Contrary to your suggestions. Land does not belong. In perpetuity. To the descendants. Of whoever happened to live there. In 1492. This would be idiotic even if I had some legal right or practical ability to go live where my ancestors did then.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

You seem to have a lot of grievances on behalf of Native Americans that you have not put together in any kind of coherent way. I suspect we would even agree on a lot, if you did. I don't know why you think that reflects poorly on me.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

(I suppose there are exceptions to that, where a treaty reserved certain lands to Native tribes. But they're still two different things and you seem to be muddling them.)

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

You posted about contract, asked "How many legally binding agreements we have made, systemically ignored, and violently reneged on?", and then posted a map of unceded lands, which by definition are *not* governed by contract. I don't know what we're debating, precisely, because you weren't precise.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

It was extensive, but that's not what your map depicts. I'm afraid you need to be a little more nuanced than "Americans were bad and so should do stuff to make up for it."

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

If anything is going to happen, by definition it's a negotiation. But right now it's just you announcing stuff. If there are particular treaty terms providing something, sure, let's give them legal force, but that has very little to do with your "bare minimum" demands.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

Put differently, the point here is not that we should turn a blind eye to the suffering of native Americans due to their mistreatment over the centuries. The point is that your list of "bare minimum" acts includes some that are repugnant, excessive, or just performative.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

I would not call that atonement, but as I said upthread I have no problem with trying to rectify current material inequities. But the goal should be equality of opportunity for all, not recognizing some permanent property interest based on ancestry.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 13/02/2026

No. It's more efficient and more pleasant.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 13/02/2026

It was a serious question! I have no idea what he's talking about; I wasn't speaking of a situation in which artifacts were stolen by killing their owners.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 13/02/2026

For the most part we aren't even talking about sins my own ancestors committed, and from your bio I'm guessing yours didn't either. What is the basis for atoning? Our nationality?

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 13/02/2026

I'm not going to atone for sins I didn't commit.

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D.M. Ridley @ridleydm.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

Now you're hypothesizing a murder?

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