Israeli gunfire on Thursday killed an 11-year-old girl whose family had returned to a designated safe zone, according to a relative, adding to more than 400 deaths reported since a ceasefire was reached to halt fighting in Gaza nearly three months ago.
Many Greenlanders are expressing their anger and frustration over U.S. President Donald Trump's recent musings that the United States needs to acquire their island. But not all residents are reacting with outrage, with some downplaying the comments made by the Trump administration.
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Recent thefts raise a question about the effectiveness of removing front licence plates.
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The 99-year-old Vimy branch in Halifax has been struggling financially since it lost its lottery licence last year after its former vice-president pocketed more than $25,000 from Chase the Ace draws.
Frustrations are mounting in a remote First Nation in northern Ontario amid plans to evacuate residents due to a lack of clean water. Now, Kashechewan is asking Ottawa for military help to get people out of the community, which had been relying on bottled water and snowmelt after the treatment plant failed.
Thousands of students with disabilities across the province are experiencing a “break in services” because of a lack of resources. There were nearly 1,500 students in 2021. By 2025, it had climbed to more than 3,400 students.
I stalled out last year on the drawing practice, because I tidied up my sketchbook and pencils, and it was so frustrating not to be able to find them that I abandoned the project. But I was in OfficeWorks the other day, and bought myself a $5 pack of 12 sketching pencils and a $2 tiny shitty sketchbook.
Two days ago, I attempted to draw something from my screen, and was too sore/tired/grumpy, and gave up after about three lines. Today, I realised that the worst part of drawing is working out where to start. So! I have a simplified goal. Attempt to draw my hand at least once a week. Today's effort was about 5 minutes worth, I got the thumb, some of the palm, and two of the fingers before running out of oomph. I've worked out that I'd rather do a stack of detail in one place than try and sketch the whole shape before getting started. And it wasn't fun, but it wasn't awful.
Jan. 8th, 2026 09:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
polyamships_mod posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
fandomcalendarMelissa Heikkilä, "LeCun: 'Intelligence really is about learning'", Financial Times 1/2/2026:
(The AI pioneer on stepping down from Meta, the limits of large language models — and the launch of his new start-up)
LeCun’s lightbulb moment came as a student at the École Supérieure d’Ingénieurs en Électrotechnique et Électronique in Paris in the 1980s, when he read a book about a debate on nature versus nurture between the linguist Noam Chomsky and Jean Piaget, a psychologist. Chomsky argued that humans have an inbuilt capacity for language, while Piaget said there is some structure but most of it is learnt.
“I’m not gonna make friends saying this . . . ” he tells me, “but I was reading this and I thought everything that Chomsky . . . was saying could not possibly be true, [because] we learn everything. Intelligence really is about learning.”
AI research — or neural networks, as the technology was then called, which loosely mimic how the brain functions — was practically a dead field and considered taboo by the scientific community, after early iterations of the technology failed to impress. But LeCun sought out other researchers studying neural networks and found intellectual “soulmates” in the likes of Geoffrey Hinton, then a faculty member at Carnegie Mellon.
[You can't read the whole article without a subscription, which I recommend despite its price.]
For a sketch of Yann LeCun's opinions about current directions in AI research, see "AMI not AGI?", 8/2/2025.
And 1980's Yann seems to have fallen into the common error of seeing Noam as a proponent of epistemological nativism rather than rationalism, though Noam has often been misleading on this issue, including apparently in the debate with Piaget. See e.g.
"The Forever War", 2/20/2022
"Straw men and Bee Science", 6/4/2011
"JP versus FHC+CHF versus PU versus HCF", 8/25/2005
"Chomsky testifies in Kansas", 5/6/2005
The book that LeCun refers to is Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, Ed., Language and Learning: The Debate Between Jean Piaget and Noam Chomsky — or presumably the French version Theories Du Language, Theories de L'apprentissage.
Some homeowners and Realtors are accusing a private equity firm that owns mobile home parks in Ontario of using questionable and illegal tactics to raise lot rents beyond what many can afford. As a result, they say, homes that have traditionally been seen as affordable are becoming nearly impossible to sell.
The U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration issued new recommendations on Monday that will eventually allow women and people assigned female at birth easier access to at-home self-testing kits for the human papilloma virus (HPV), which is sexually-transmitted and can cause cervical cancer.
smallfandomfest fic!! It was a ~really good writing day. Few and far between these days.cbc_topnews_feed
Rachel Reid, the Canadian author behind the Game Changer book series that inspired the show, has previously confirmed on Reddit that Shane is "probably autistic" — though she didn't set out to write him as such. However, she said she doubted he'd "ever realize it himself."
This year, the great Canadian book debate is looking for one book to build bridges. The panellists and the books they choose to champion will be revealed on Jan. 22.
Ryan Chilibeck tells the National about the moment he witnessed a pod of orcas rub their bellies on rocks off B.C.'s Sunshine Coast.
Did you notice the new design? I’m still figuring things out behind the scenes. Things have Changed, which always throws me for a loop. For one think it wants me to deactivate (how?) my license (what license?) and then reactivate it again (how?). Clearly a job for Mollie.
However I’m quite sure you can still post about books here. I hope. Actually I’m quite sure you’ll post about books here on whatever was the last post. A group of free thinkers, that’s you.
So post about good books. I’ll get the hang of this shortly.
cbc_topnews_feed - Child killed in north Gaza by Israeli fire, family says, as post-ceasefire deaths mountcbc_topnews_feed - Some Greenlanders express outrage over Trump's threats. But not all are concernedmaevedarcy - maevedarcy's hollanov fic recs #1 (Fannish 50 #2)cbc_topnews_feed - Did removal of N.B.’s front licence plates make solving crimes harder?cbc_topnews_feed - Members of 99-year-old Halifax legion want answers as branch set to closecbc_topnews_feed - Remote First Nation in Ontario 'in a dire situation' over unclean water, wants military to help getcbc_topnews_feed - Thousands of Quebec children with disabilities kept out of school due to lack of resourcesfred_mouse - Drawing practicemaevedarcy - [MULTIFANDOM] PolyamShippingDay - January 2026polyamships_mod in fandomcalendar - [MULTIFANDOM] PolyamShippingDay - January 2026languagelog_feed - Chomsky and the origins of AI researchcbc_topnews_feed - Ontario mobile homeowners struggling to sell properties accuse park owner of using tactics that breacbc_topnews_feed - Why aren't at-home HPV tests readily available in Canada?spikedluv - The Day in Spikedluv (Wednesday, Jan 7)autobotscoutriella in purimgifts - 48 HOURS left of Purimgifts Signups!jazzy_dave - A Passing Thoughtcbc_topnews_feed - Heated Rivalry's Shane is autistic. If you didn't notice, that's the pointcbc_topnews_feed - The Canada Reads 2026 longlist is herecbc_topnews_feed - #TheMoment a pod of orcas got their belly rubsargh_ink_feed - This is a Good Book Thursday: Upgrade Daychiming
