How to Bear Your Loneliness: Grounding Wisdom from the Great Buddhist Teacher Pema Chödrön
“We are cheating ourselves when we run away from the ambiguity of loneliness.”
A man accused of raping Brittany Higgins in Parliament House was the subject of multiple sexual assault and harassment allegations, with other women reporting their own complaints after the political staffer’s claim.
The reports which were previously kept under wraps by a court were on Friday made public along with Bruce Lehrmann’s attempts to prevent his criminal trial going ahead.
Documents show other Bruce Lehrmann sexual assault allegations
DuckDuckGo Releases Its Own ChatGPT-Powered Search Engine, DuckAssist Gizmodo: “DuckDuckGo launched a beta version of an AI search tool powered by ChatGPT Wednesday called DuckAssist.
The addition to the company’s privacy-focused search engine uses ChatGPT’s language parsing capability to generate answers scraped from Wikipedia and related sources like the Encyclopedia Britannica. The tool is free and available on the DuckDuckGo web browsing apps for phones and computers as well as the company’s browser extension starting today. “DuckAssist is a new type of Instant Answer in our search results, just like News, Maps, Weather, and many others we already have,” said Gabriel Weinberg, CEO of DuckDuckGo, in a blog post.
“We designed DuckAssist to be fully integrated into DuckDuckGo Private Search, mirroring the look and feel of our traditional search results, so while the AI-generated content is new, we hope using DuckAssist feels second nature. Unlike Microsoft’s bungled AI projects with Bing (RIP Sydney),
DuckAssist isn’t a chatbot. Instead, DuckAssist will suggest an automatic answer when it recognizes a search term it can answer. It’s not being forced on anyone. When an AI-powered response is available, you’ll see a magic wand icon with an “ask me” button in your search results. The company says DuckAssist is still in beta, so it may not pop up that often yet…”
Surveillance in the Danish welfare state (Wired)
It’s tempting to take sides on literary marriages. But with so much pain, abuse, and mental ill health, often both partners are victims for better or worse »
‘Cold Reality’ No Business Reviewing a Work of Fiction
I don’t think I have reviewed a novel since 2004, when I took on Cynthia Ozick’s Heir to the Glimmering World for the Houston Chronicle. I occasionally read novels, usually older ones, and have since I was a kid. I’m always happy to recommend good ones, whether on the blog, via email or in conversation. William Maxwell, Henry Green and Italo Svevo are recent examples. I’m confused by my reluctance to review fiction, though it may have to do with my uncertainty over how much plot to paraphrase. Too much, and it’s boring and delays critical evaluation. Too little, and you’re not doing justice to the narrative.
