Clement Tahershamsi 
@Clementulus@social.cleverlibre.org
Just another statistic.
Joined Nov 2022
@Quatrus @tkinias Yes that is understandable my siblings who have arabic names do not use more common variants or anglacised versions when speaking English, no need in this day and age. However, 12th century Egypt was a very different time. Despite being multi-ethnic and relatively cosmopolitan for that time, I still believe that there would be considerable pressure to conform to the dominant Arabic-Muslim culture, especially if you wished to be financially successfull. Same thing happened in the multi-ethnic Persia after Islamization.
@catm@mastodon.art reminds me of the Redwall series by Brian Jacques. Loved those books as a kid.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
lunation 1204, 2020
taken over the span of two months during a period of intense grief and insomnia. 18 moon phases composited together.
#art #mastoart #photography #compositeimagery #moonphases #southernhemisphere #documentaryphotography #blackandwhite #circleoflife #womeninphoto
@tkinias should qualify that I meant he would have used Ibrahim in his day to day dealings regardless of what his parents would have called him.
@tkinias I would lean towards Ibrahim because of the higher social status of the Arabic language at that time but I am hardly a scholar in this area.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
A cuneiform keyboard, for all your modern communications.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
All of my great-grandparents were born in countries that no longer exist today.
All of them spoke a mother tongue different to mine.
We have no idea what our descendants will be like or what they’ll need.
To help them now, the only safe bet is to help create a fairer, more livable world for everyone.
👉 A world based on universal human rights.
@sim Stephen King says his strategy was to give himself a quota of words to do each day and to write at least that many no matter what. Even if it was absolute rubbish that he would end up throwing out he would still write it. He goes on to say that over time this strategy helped him become able to acheive his quota with all decent material. And of course on days he was feeling it he would go way over the quota.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
#introduction
Before retiring, I was an aerospace engineer (Apollo, Viking Mars lander), software developer, and tech writer. But that was to pay the bills. I think of myself as a writer -- mostly sf, some horror, some mystery, some (yet unpublished) fantasy. Lots of details at www.dvorkin.com
My wife and I also help writers self-publish. You can find out more at www.dldbooks.com
In theory, I should be writing much more now that I'm retired. In practice, that's not happening. I blame the Internet.
American politics
@MichaelPorter Things going down to Florida to die is nothing new. Canadians have been doing it for decades. 
@nyrath Hard to believe that this is not science fiction.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
> While the need to rescue people at sea remains deeply ingrained in the seafarer ethos, as well as an obligation under maritime law, uncertainty over when and where they could disembark rescued persons, and the potential costs of deviations and delays serve as disincentives to merchant vessels to do their duty.
On this point I will say that, disincentives or not, on the two occasions that I have personal knowledge of, the crew acted without hesitation, with impeccable professionalism and humanity. They had the full backing of both their employer and the ship's charterer.
May those miserable politicians who fuel xenophobic discourses and inflict such suffering never find themselves in that predicament.
@lferreiramoita Exciting stuff! This is exactly the type of research I wish I had gotten the chance to do in Uni. Never too late to go back I suppose.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
Cool new Hubble image of an ancient supernova
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
🇳🇱
“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."
REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
"So we can believe the big ones?"
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
"They're not the same at all!"
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"
MY POINT EXACTLY.”
― Terry Pratchett, Hogfather
#TerryPratchett #DiscWorld #Fantasy #magic #magick #Literature #Book Quote #Quotes
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
Ce Hörthron amplifie le son venant d'une direction précise. La personne qui s'assied à l'intérieur perçoit les sons de façon très directionnelle... ce qui est extrêmement déstabilisant.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
> The European Union has abdicated its responsibility to ensure search and rescue in the Mediterranean. No #EU ships actively patrol anywhere near where most boats enter into distress. #Frontex, the EU’s border and coast guard, conducts aerial surveillance in service of interceptions and returns, not rescues. Despite overwhelming evidence of horrific detention and abuse of migrants in #Libya, the EU supports the Libyan forces’ efforts to detect boats and pull people back. EU governments and institutions have largely turned a blind eye to unlawful and dangerous pushbacks of boats to #Turkey by #Greece in the Aegean Sea. Alarm Phone, a hotline for migrants and refugees in distress at sea, consistently reports failure of the Maltese authorities to respond to cases in their vast search and rescue area (#SAR).
https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/09/13/endless-tragedies-mediterranean-sea
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
I've seen some people describe themselves as a "Twitter refugee".
Would it be possible for people to stop using that term please. Refugees flee from persecution, usually also fleeing for their lives. Moving from Twitter to Mastodon is not fleeing from persecution or fleeing for your life.
Using refugee in this context comes across of making light of what it actually means to be a refugee, and can strip away what being a refugee actually in everyday parlance means to if used causally too often.
Clement Tahershamsi
boosted
boosted
A relevant blog post for this Mastodon platform: 'The "palaeontological folklore" of mastodon hair': an essay about the surprising LACK of fossil evidence for brown, shaggy hair in these elephant-like creatures. It turns out that there's no reason to assume mastodons were mammoth-like in appearance, and the brown, hairy mastodons you see everywhere are a #paleoart super-meme.
(Mastodon image by Charles Knight - one of my favourites from him).
http://markwitton-com.blogspot.com/2020/08/the-palaeontological-folklore-of.html
Just another statistic.
Joined Nov 2022
