I remember a long time ago noticing, while sorting by new, that posts in some communities had downvotes within seconds of being posted, so yes I think there are bots.

Oh, for sure. It’s not an area that I’m an expert in, but your conversation got me curious because I had heard both things, so I read a few articles. One of the interesting things is that the bit about Hitler’s envoy wasn’t broadly known until 2020 when the Vatican released a whole mess of documents that had been kept hidden previously. So there’s maybe more reason for some people to have one impression based on what they grew up hearing, and others to have a different one based on more recent info, but even with the new info it seems nuanced.

It’s easy to fault anyone who didn’t take a clear stand against Hitler from this vantage point, but it must have been hard to be a world leader facing the possibility that Hitler would be successful and you’d have to deal with his empire. Pius XII supported the allies and it’s obvious he was against Hitler, but he was reluctant to be overtly vocal about it, and he even entertained the envoy, which maybe he saw as hedging his bets (we can’t know exactly what he was thinking). It’s for sure stained his legacy.

It’s less black and white than either of you guys are implying. You’re taking about Pope Pius XII, who was Pope from 1939 to 1958. He’s credited with saving hundreds of thousands of Jews through various means, including support to the resistance, but also by showing some had been converted/baptized, which in itself was controversial. But he also feared the Nazis were going to win the war and that the church would have to exist in a Nazi world. He never clearly spoke out against the holocaust, and though a lot of the things he said, including his sermons, can be taken as condemnation of Jewish persecution, the language was pretty subtle. Also, Hitler had an envoy secretly meeting with Pius from pretty early on, which many say was bad in itself. Still, he also helped the allies with intelligence, to the point where Hitler accused him of espionage and had plans to kidnap him.

My step son memorized a single sentence in Spanish, which he would say with good pronunciation and a lot of confidence: “tengo un gato en pantalones,” which means, “I have a cat in my pants.”

I noticed similarities with The Player of Games (you can see my comments on that one). It’s like none of the main characters have close relationships, even with people they love.

A number of people told my to just skip Phlebas, because it’s the weakest, but I decided to read it anyway. I didn’t hate it by any means, but I did have issues.

By “ravioli bowl,” do you mean it currently has ravioli in it? If so, put it in the microwave for increments of like 30 seconds.

Awesome, thank you.

I started on the culture series at the suggestion of a number of people here, and some suggested I skip the first book as it’s the weakest, but I decided to read it anyway. I didn’t dislike it or the second, but it seems odd how insular the characters are. I’ll probably keep reading the series, I liked them will enough.

Let me know if you really like anything this list points you at. I appreciate your reply

Perfect! That’s exactly what I hoped for when posting this. I hope I help steer you to things you enjoy but might not otherwise have read.

It’s funny, when I was young if I went to the doctor and said my knee or my lower back hurt, they’d take X-rays and try to figure out what’s going on. Now he just says, “Yeah, that’s going to happen…”

It’s not an absolute rule, but it’s true in the vast majority of cases. The coloring is on the X chromosome, and males usually have only one, but some males with have an extra X chromosome (XXY) and those can be calico. It’s rare.

It feels like there’s few pranks these days that don’t end up being cruel. We have enough horrifyingly outrageous things in the news, that if the prank is trying to make us think something horrible happened that didn’t, we sure don’t need that. On the other hand, if it’s trying to make us think that something good happened, but it didn’t, then that’s a really perverse cruelty.

It’s the camera my mom used, too. It was super popular, it seems like every family had one.

Taking pictures was such a different experience in those days, knowing you only had as many pictures as was on the roll (like 20 I think it’s what we bought), and you couldn’t see how they came out until you had them developed.

Omg, a camera with a flash cube - so it would have been able to take 4 flash pictures.

Diarrhea?

No expert, but it seems unlikely. My understanding is that big brands generally use custom fonts, so you’re unlikely to find generic lettering that matches. But maybe you can find something close enough?

I’m case you’re wondering:

Chekhov’s gun (or Chekhov’s rifle; Russian: Чеховское ружьё) is a narrative principle that states that every element in a story must be necessary and irrelevant elements should be removed. For example, if a writer features a gun in a story, there must be a reason for it, such as it being fired some time later in the plot. All elements must eventually come into play at some point in the story. Some authors, such as Hemingway, do not agree with this principle.

I knew what that was going to be before I clicked it. Good job.

Not sure why some people are disagreeing - it for sure fits the definition. I’m not exactly sad about it - Musk is helping to rip apart the country and I have a hard time blaming people who feel that helping to rip apart one of his companies is about all they can do - but committing arson to further an ideology is terrorism.

No, a NASA and DOD contractor. Worked on some neat stuff over the years, including the electrical power system for the space station. I ended up managing the software engineering group, and really liked that - very smart people.

Probably so