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ShangXian
The more I discover about Newgrounds, the more I see different worlds, flavours and hues.

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ShangXian's News

Posted by ShangXian - 3 days ago


The interesting discussion of the thread Online Safety Updates and a very unsettling comment that you can agree with though, made me want to discuss about neurotechnology and the emergence of neurorights and mental privacy. It's a thread that I am still reading and keeping an eye since I like reading all opinions shared there, they are all interesting and I agree with the majority of them concerning privacy rights and how governments don't give a damn about kids or the safety of their citizens (see the many data breaches that occurred over the years), they just care about their own power and the next election for the most part. Not to mention many of them are run by old people who know jack shit about internet, new technology and younger generations, and it's also funny how they want to teach internet safety when they are the first to use and overuse shit like FB, Meta etc. where they post their personal info.... I warn you this will be another of mine looooong blogs, so take your time to read it all if you truly wish to read a bit about it.


Neurotechnologies


Anyway let's dive into this fascinating but extremely unsettling world of neurotechnologies and neurorights. What is a neurotechnology? Well, it's any method or electronic device which interfaces with the nervous system to monitor or modulate neural activity. Common design goals for neurotechnologies include using neural activity readings to control external devices such as neuroprosthetics, altering neural activity via neuromodulation to repair or normalize function affected by neurological disorders, or augmenting cognitive abilities(1).


I leave here this interesting video about them, you can watch other videos of this channel to discover more about them from a scientific point of view:



Examples of neurotechnologies:


Deep brain stimulation, photostimulation based on optogenetics and photopharmacology, transcranial magnetic stimulation, transcranial electric stimulation and brain–computer interfaces, such as cochlear implants and retinal implants. 


This field has been around for nearly half a century but has only reached maturity in the last twenty years. Decoding basic procedures and interactions within the brain's neuronal activity is essential to integrate machines with the nervous system.

I admit this is a fascinating world that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spheres and integrating an electronic device with the nervous system enables monitoring and modulating neural activity as well as managing implemented machines by mental activity. Advances in these efforts are associated with developing models based on knowledge about natural processes in bio-systems that monitor and/or modulate neural activity. One promising direction evolves through studying the mother-fetus neurocognitive model(2):


https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-75329-9_24


According to this model, the innate natural mechanism ensures the embryonic nervous system's correct (balanced) development(3). Because the mother-fetus interaction enables the child's nervous system to evolve with adequate biological sentience, similar environmental conditions can treat the injured nervous system. This means that the physiological processes of this natural neurostimulation during gestation underlie any noninvasive artificial neuromodulation technique and this knowledge paves the way for designing and precise tuning noninvasive brain stimulation devices in treating different nervous system diseases within the scope of modulating neural activity(4).


There are also more specialized sectors of neurotechnology that introduced concepts such as neuron-like electrodes, hybrid biotic–abiotic electrodes, planar complementary metal-oxide semiconductor systems, injectable bioconjugate nanomaterials, implantable optoelectronic microchips (I admit these sounds like names coming out straight a sci-fi series XD).


The very positive aspects of these technologies are that they can help control depression, over-activation, sleep deprivation, and many other conditions. Therapeutically they can also help improve stroke patients' motor coordination, improve brain function, reduce epileptic episodes, improve patients with degenerative motor diseases (Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, ALS), and can even help alleviate phantom pain perception. These are things I highly support for neurotechnologies or NT because when technologies is used to help others and improve the lives of those who had difficult conditions I am for it all the way, I can also understand and don't oppose its use as mere entertainment such as to control video games via brain activation.


BUT


But since those technologies are manufactured and distributed as consumer-grade devices that can be bought and used by laypersons on an everyday basis with barely or even no supervision, numerous threats arise. The use and processing of personal data of such devices raises several concerns and entails a multitude of open questions on possible moral and psychological implications, safety hazards, and data security. However not all NT work superficially some need to be surgically implanted on or within the brain and this raises deep concerns about mental privacy, neurorights, invasiveness, risks, complications, side-effects, and degree of commitment to the product required by invasive and non-invasive NT. These are all things which are still not very clear to the public. Types of NT include:


  • Deep brain stimulation
  • Transcrancial ultrasound stimulation (TUS)
  • Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)
  • Transcranial direct current stimulation (TDCS)
  • Electroencephalography (EEG)
  • Electrocorticography (ECoG), it relies on similar principles of EEG but it's more invasive since it's implanted on the brain's surface unlike EEG which placed around the head and scalp
  • Magnetoencephalography (MEG)
  • Neurotechnological implants
  • Neuropsychopharmacology (i.e. sertraline, methylphenidate, and zolpidem)


The real and main concern about and around them is the object they work on: the brain. Interventions and manipulations on the brain harbour immense disruptive potential insofar as they influence the autonomous actions and self-perception of the individual. And this brings us to the concept of neurorights.


Neurorights


They are neurological rights that is to say a set of rights to freedom from abuses of neurotechnology, both for humans and for any transhumans as may eventually exist. Examples of neurorights: right not to have one's thoughts detected by others' mindreading against one's will, the right not to have one's personality altered against one's will, and others, the right not to have to work against one's will due to mental hacking by a potential employer, the right not to have to do something against one's will.


I leave here the website of the nonprofit organization that works to protect the human rights of people from the potential misuse or abuse of neurotechnology: The Neurorights Foundation.


I totally agree with Rafael Yuste, a Spanish–American neurobiologist and one of the initiators of the BRAIN Initiative announced in 2013, who wants a new international treaty on neurorights and a new international agency to make sure countries comply with it similar to what is now the International Atomic Energy Agency, which monitors the use of nuclear energy. With the speed at which these technologies go and the goal some companies held by billionaires such as Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg who are working on brain-computer interfaces that could pick up thoughts directly from your neurons and translate them into words in real time, new strong and highly strict laws and regulations must be made and enacted in order to protect what I consider one of the most important and vital rights of all: privacy and more specifically mental privacy.


What Musk and Zuckerberg are doing could one day allow you to control your phone, computer or any other futuristic tool with just your thoughts, here the announcement by Meta: https://tech.facebook.com/reality-labs/2020/3/imagining-a-new-interface-hands-free-communication-without-saying-a-word/


We are working on a system that will let people type with their brains. Specifically, we have a goal of creating a silent speech system capable of typing 100 words per minute straight from your brain – that’s five times faster than you can type on a smartphone today. This isn’t about decoding your random thoughts. Think of it like this: You take many photos and choose to share only some of them. Similarly, you have many thoughts and choose to share only some of them. This is about decoding those words you’ve already decided to share by sending them to the speech center of your brain. It’s a way to communicate with the speed and flexibility of your voice and the privacy of text. We want to do this with non-invasive, wearable sensors that can be manufactured at scale.
We also have a project directed at allowing people to hear with their skin. We are building the hardware and software necessary to deliver language through the skin.


I admit reading this passage (the piece I quoted was made in 2017) made me have goosebumps both positively (science and technology always intrigue me) and negatively (my love for privacy and myself as person makes me be quite aggressive and misoneist towards these stuff)


The short-term goal is to help patients with paralysis, by decoding their brain signals and allowing them to “speak” their thoughts without ever having to move a muscle. That could be a real public good, significantly improving quality of life for millions of people. And I agree with this and support it, BUT once again we know things will become available to the general public eventually and this raises concerns because Facebook’s long-term goal is to reach a much, much wider audience: The aim, it says, is to give all of us the ability to control digital devices from keyboards to augmented reality glasses using the power of thought alone. To do that, the company will need access to our brain data. Which, of course, raises some ethical concerns. The human participants in their study, three volunteers with epilepsy, already had electrodes surgically implanted on the surface of their brains as part of preparation for neurosurgery to treat their seizures. They listened to straightforward questions (like “How is your room currently?”) and spoke their answers out loud. The algorithm, just by reading their brain activity, decoded the answers with accuracy rates as high as 61 percent.

That’s pretty impressive, but so far the algorithm can only recognize words from a small vocabulary (like “cold,” “hot,” and “fine”). The scientists are aiming to grow its lexicon over time.


Elon Musk’s company Neuralink is developing flexible “threads” that can be implanted into a brain and could one day allow you to control your smartphone or computer with just your thoughts. Musk said he hopes to start testing in humans soon. Considering that even in China something like this has already been happening since 2019 since its government is mining data directly from workers’ brains on an industrial scale to detect changes in emotional states in employees on the production line.


For example the production lines at Hangzhou Zhongheng Electric where the workers wear caps to monitor their brainwaves, data that management then uses to adjust the pace of production and redesign workflows, according to the company. The company said it could increase the overall efficiency of the workers by manipulating the frequency and length of break times to reduce mental stress.


Police worldwide have been exploring “brain-fingerprinting” technology, which analyzes automatic responses that occur in our brains when we encounter stimuli we recognize. The claim is that this could enable police to interrogate a suspect’s brain; his brain responses would be more negative for faces or phrases he doesn’t recognize than for faces or phrases he does recognize. The tech is scientifically questionable, yet India’s police have used it since 2003, Singapore’s police bought it in 2013, and the Florida State Police signed a contract to use it in 2014 (5).


Already, there are AI-powered brain decoders that can translate into text the unspoken thoughts swirling through our minds, without the need for surgery although this tech is not yet on the market. In the meantime, you can buy lots of devices off Amazon right now that would record your brain data (like the Muse headband, which uses EEG sensors to read patterns of activity in your brain, then cues you on how to improve your meditation). Since these aren’t marketed as medical devices, they’re not subject to federal regulations; companies can collect and sell your data :)


I want also leave this study about brain-fingerprinting: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/344526903_Brain_Fingerprinting_A_Warning_Against_Early_Implementation


Neurotechnologies and AI-supported devices can touch many aspects of lives such as sexual orientation. We know that there are multiple areas of the brain which have been found to display differences based on sexual orientation. Several of these can be found in the hypothalamus, including the sexually dimorphic nucleus of the preoptic area (SDN-POA) present in several mammalian species. Researchers have shown that the SDN-POA aides in sex-dimorphic mating behavior in some mammals, which is representative of human sexual orientation(6). The human equivalent to the SDN-POA is the interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus, which is also sexually dimorphic and has demonstrated dissimilar sizes between sexualities(7). There are also other POA-like brain structures in the human brain which differ between sexual orientations, such as the suprachiasmatic nucleus and the anterior hypothalamus. Using meta-analysis of neuroimaging, researchers have concluded that these areas are linked to sexual preferences in humans, which would explain why they may differ based on sexual orientation(8).


Another area of the brain which demonstrates sexual orientation differentiation is the thalamus, which is a structure involved in sexual arousal and reward. The thalamus of heterosexual individuals was found to be bigger than that of homosexual individuals: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7930173/


The placement of connections in the amygdala have been demonstrated to differ between heterosexual and homosexual individuals. The posterior cingulate cortex, a part of the occipital lobe, the region of the brain that processes visual information, has also been demonstrated to have differences based on sexual orientation. Research has shown that a couple of the areas of connection between the hemispheres of the brain have differences in their size depending on sexual orientation. The front commission was found to be wider in homosexual men than heterosexual men, and the corpus callosum was found to be larger in homosexual men than heterosexual men. Some areas of the brain which researchers looked at but did not find differences in structure between sexualities are the temporal cortex, hippocampus and putamen(10).


With neurotechnologies it might become a reality to detect a homosexual person from a heterosexual one, now image this applied to those lovely gay-friendly countries and places where they are sent to camps (coughs Chechnya coughs). But we also know AIs can be quite flawed and poisoned by biases like it happened in this study. I do appreciate that the researchers claim has in fact been peer-reviewed and is due to be published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and the authors acknowledge the limitations with regard to their sample, but maintain that they "did not build a privacy-invading tool" (here the same study in PDF: https://ai.ethicsworkshop.org/Library/case-face-orientation/wang_kosinski.pdf). This article also points out some of its limitations and potential damages studies like this might harm the LGBTQ+ community due to extreme lack of scientific knowledge from both governments and general public: https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-what-s-really-going-on-with-that-study-saying-ai-can-detect-your-sexual-orientation


Luckily, the brain is lawyering up. Neuroscientists, lawyers, and lawmakers have been teaming up to pass legislation that would protect our mental privacy. In a first for the US, Colorado passed new legislation this week that amends the state’s privacy law to include the privacy of neural data. Now, just as fingerprints and facial images are protected under the Colorado Privacy Act, the whisperings of the brain are, too. Signed into law by Gov. Jared Polis, the bill had impressive bipartisan support, passing by a 34-to-0 vote in the state Senate and 61-to-1 in the House. I commend you, Colorado, bravo!


Here the bill if you are curious: https://leg.colorado.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2024A/bills/2024a_1058_ren.pdf


California is taking a similar approach. The state’s Senate Judiciary Committee passed a bill that brings brain data into the category of “sensitive personal information.” Next, the bill heads to the Appropriations Committee for consideration. Here the link: https://sd13.senate.ca.gov/news/press-release/april-16-2024/senate-committee-overwhelmingly-approves-landmark-neurorights-act


Europe is discussing the topic of neurotechnologies too, here the PDF, enjoy: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2024/757807/EPRS_STU(2024)757807_EN.pdf


But laws must be quick because with companies like Meta and Snapchat exploring neurotechnology, and Apple patenting a future version of AirPods that would scan your brain activity through your ears, we could soon live in a world where companies harvest our neural data just as 23andMe harvests our DNA data. These companies could conceivably build databases with tens of millions of brain scans, which can be used to find out if someone has a disease like epilepsy even when they don’t want that information disclosed and could one day be used to identify individuals against their will. 


Thanks to Neurorights Foundation I've also discovered that several consumer neurotech companies are gathering brain data — and perhaps selling it, according to a major report I link here: https://www.perseus-strategies.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/FINAL-Consumer-Neurotechnology-Report-Neurorights-Foundation-March-2024-3.pdf


Analyzing the privacy policies and user agreements of 30 companies, the report found that a majority could share neural data with third parties.

So if you’re worried about what might happen with your neural data and mental privacy, you need to be worried right now about that, Jared Genser, general counsel at the Neurorights Foundation, said. Because people are buying these devices all around the world.


And now we enter in the creepy, unsettling territory of neurotechnologies that touches one of the most important rights that is emerging in these decades: mental privacy or neural privacy.


Mental privacy and new rights


Remember Rafael Yuste? I mentioned him above in this article. He at his lab, employed a method called optogenetics, he found that he could manipulate the visual perception of mice by using a laser to activate specific neurons in the visual cortex of the brain. When he made certain images artificially appear in their brains, the mice behaved as though the images were real. Yuste discovered he could run them like puppets. I will leave you the article:


https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6747687/pdf/nihms-1049885.pdf


In 2017, Yuste gathered around 30 experts to meet at Columbia’s Morningside campus, where they spent days discussing the ethics of neurotech. As Yuste’s mouse experiments showed, it’s not just mental privacy that’s at stake; there’s also the risk of someone using neurotechnology to manipulate our minds. While some brain-computer interfaces only aim to “read” what’s happening in your brain, others also aim to “write” to the brain that is, to directly change what your neurons are up to.


In this article published at Nature, Yuste and his group introduced new human rights that emerged with the development of neurotechnology, here the article: https://www.nature.com/articles/551159a.pdf


But for the sake of brevity I will list them here too:


  1. Mental privacy (the right to seclude one's brain data so that it's not stored or sold without your consent)
  2. Personal identity (the right to be protected from alterations to one's sense of self and its perception that is not authorized by the person him/her/themselves)
  3. Free will (the right to retain the ultimate control over one's decision making, without unknown manipulation from neurotechnologies)
  4. Fair access to mental augmentation (the right to enjoy equality of access, so that neurotechnology doesn’t only benefit the rich)
  5. Protection from bias (neurotechnology algorithms should be designed in ways that do not perpetuate bias against particular groups)


It's extremely vital to act not only to talk about it and Yuste did what it needs to do. He connected with Jared Genser, an international human rights lawyer who has represented clients like the Nobel Peace Prize laureates Desmond Tutu and Aung San Suu Kyi. Together, Yuste and Genser created the Neurorights Foundation to advocate for the cause.


This led to an immediate victory because in 2021, after Yuste helped craft a constitutional amendment with a close friend who happened to be a Chilean senator, Chile became the first nation to enshrine the right to mental privacy and the right to free will in its national constitution. Mexico, Brazil, and Uruguay are already considering something similar. 


Even the United Nations has started talking about neurotech: Secretary-General António Guterres gave it a shoutout in his 2021 report, “Our Common Agenda,” after meeting with Yuste. Let's see how it will evolve, I wish him all the best!


Now times are still too green especially now with all these shitty governments all around the world, but in future maybe, and I say maybe, a new global treaty might be established. If US federal law were to follow Colorado in recognizing neural data as sensitive health data (I doubt now with the current president and that other guy), that data would fall under the protection of HIPAA, which Yuste said would alleviate much of his concern. Another possibility would be to get all neurotech devices recognized as medical devices so they would have to be approved by the FDA.


I agree when Genser says "It’s about having options", if you give me options and freedom to chose what I want and what not (spoiler: I don't want these technologies in me, on me and around me where by around me I mean my house and my family) then I am more mentally inclined to tolerate them as long as there are strict law that act quickly and limit the misuse power of these technologies. Technology is not bad per se, it's how you use it that makes the difference.


Little gift


And now I want to leave you this useful tool to enhance your privacy online:


https://www.privacytools.io/


See you next time!


References and footnotes:


(1) Cook MJ, O'Brien TJ, Berkovic SF, Murphy M, Morokoff A, Fabinyi G, et al. (June 2013). "Prediction of seizure likelihood with a long-term, implanted seizure advisory system in patients with drug-resistant epilepsy: a first-in-man study". The Lancet. Neurology. 12 (6): 563–71. doi:10.1016/s1474-4422(13)70075-9. PMID 23642342. S2CID 33908839

(2) Val Danilov I (2024). “Child Cognitive Development with the Maternal Heartbeat: A Mother-Fetus Neurocognitive Model and Architecture for Bioengineering Systems.” In International Conference on Digital Age & Technological Advances for Sustainable Development (pp. 216-223). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-75329-9_24

(3) Val Danilov I. (2024). “The Origin of Natural Neurostimulation: A Narrative Review of Noninvasive Brain Stimulation Techniques”. OBM Neurobiology 2024; 8(4): 260; doi:10.21926/obm.neurobiol.2404260

(4) Ibidem

(5) https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/3/17/23638325/neurotechnology-ethics-neurofeedback-brain-stimulation-nita-farahany

(6) Bogaert, Anthony F.; Skorska, Malvina N. (March 2020). "A short review of biological research on the development of sexual orientation". Hormones and Behavior. 119: 104659. doi:10.1016/j.yhbeh.2019.104659. PMID 31911036. S2CID 21005529

(7) Lau, Holning (2018-08-01), "Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Discrimination", BRILL, pp. 1–52, doi:10.1163/9789004345492_002, ISBN 9789004345492, S2CID 240352057

(8) Ibidem

(9) https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7930173/

(10) Frigerio, Alberto; Ballerini, Lucia; Valdés Hernández, Maria (2021-05-06). "Structural, Functional, and Metabolic Brain Differences as a Function of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation: A Systematic Review of the Human Neuroimaging Literature". Archives of Sexual Behavior. 50 (8): 3329–3352. doi:10.1007/s10508-021-02005-9. ISSN 0004-0002. PMC 8604863. PMID 33956296


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Posted by ShangXian - 10 days ago


Hello everyone, here Shang with another artist promotion and this time I would like to promote an artist I met two months ago, I am referring to ChronoNG 


The thing that immediately catches the eye, looking at his works, is the very marked and well-defined outlines of the drawings especially if you take a look at most recent works where the image quality increased a lot compared to the first three drawings.


The artwork that made me fell in love with the style and made me understand the person has a lot of artistic potential is his first drawing:



I discovered this artwork in a forum thread about reviews requests, he asked some critique on poses. I took a look and I immediately liked it, I have yet to review it because I would like to give him some tips about more dynamic poses. A thing that I like a lot about his works is the accuracy with which he mimic the style of the character, for example works like these well show what I mean:







In the last one I particularly like how homogeneous the black colour is on antennae, there are no smears and I like how the right hand is coloured differently with a lighter pressure so that one can appreciate the volumetric shapes between the right hand and the left antenna. I also like the perspective between the two.


His works are mostly black and white but there are coloured works too such as:






I like the grainy effect of the coloured works and nice touch in the background of Charlotte (Original Character) with those alternations between yellow, blue, purple and pink because it gives a nice iridescent effect. His style is very reminiscent of chibi style and if on one hand he knows how to imitate the original style of the character he represents, on the other hand he also knows how to add a personalized touch in his other works such as:




He is a very fun person to hang around too, I admit I like when he comments my stuff even though no one is obliged to always comment my stuff (I had a nasty experience with a person on DA who demanded my friends and me to always comment her stuff whether it was blogs or artworks, and this mentally drained me on the long term), but it's nice to see your works are appreciated.


I think he deserves a much larger following base because of the adorable chibi-style and nice personality he has, so if you want to check him out, go and hit that button!

See you next time, bye!


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Posted by ShangXian - 2 weeks ago


Hello everyone! I hope you had an amazing Pixel Day, I definitely had a lot of fun making and posting those pixel art pieces I made for the collabs I participated and the fanart for the Pixel Day itself, I still need to post one last pixel artwork I made for the Wanted collab and maybe another piece since that day inspired me to make another artwork. But enough talking about me, I want to start this series about promoting artists I find across this website and this time I want to promote a very talented yet underrated and pretty much under the radar artist I discovered thanks to Buup's journal:


Enchiladas9473


He is the artist in question, he joined the site on July, 2024 but posted his first artwork on January 24th, 2025 so his artistic career started only today and I got immediately struck by the personal style with which he designed Pico and friends. This is the artwork I am talking about:



I plan to properly review his work, just know now that I love how bright colours are and the thickness of the lineart which gives compactness to the colour enclosed within it, enhancing it even more. The second element that made me fall in love with this artwork is the personal style he put on each of them. Characters retain their unique traits that make easy to distinguish them, but at the same time the way hair are drawn, the hairstyle itself and some unique gadget they wear make them stand out very nicely among other depictions of the trio.


Considering the talent he has I image other future cool artworks and I hope to see more of his works.


This is why I would like to promote him and hope more people start following him, he deserves support and if you like his style why not hitting that "follow" button? ;)


I wish you all a great and serene day! Bye and see you next time!


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Posted by ShangXian - 3 weeks ago


Ok, this is first time I decided to write about something related to politics but what's happening in these days is really making me want to get off my chest the frustration and disgust I feel not only for the new US president's decisions but also implications and impacts his actions have on us Europeans. This blog is meant as both a way to sublime all negative emotions I am bottling up during these days and to give an outsider perspective on US people who might stumble across this blog. I know that a good chunk of US population think only about their inner garden and don't think about consequences of their actions (voting for Trump, and despite I may respect your decision I still think that a better Republican could have been chosen instead of a criminal like him), I would still like to show a perspective from the outside, from someone who is not US. So I do apologize in advance if this post will be long, full of pessimism and negativity, but I really need to get this off my chest.


The blog will have both personal opinions and reported facts, it's a mix because my feelings are a mix and I need to sublime in a more ordered way.


The average US citizen thinks about benefits in their own country and it's not a bad thing per se but it's important to know that a country like US can have a huge impact and influence since we sadly live in a US-ruled world when it comes to "Western" sphere, and the world doesn't revolve around them. We are interconnected and the action of an influencing country impacts the world, and the first thing that will be definitely impacted will be the environment and climate.


You already know that President Trump signed an executive order Monday directing the United States to again withdraw from the landmark Paris climate agreement, dealing a blow to worldwide efforts to combat global warming and once again distancing the U.S. from its closest allies. The pact is aimed at limiting long-term global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels or, failing that, keeping temperatures at least well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. also signed a letter to the United Nations indicating his intention to withdraw from the 2015 agreement, which allows nations to provide targets to cut their own emissions of greenhouse gases from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas. Those targets are supposed to become more stringent over time, with countries facing a February 2025 deadline for new individual plans.


I think it's quite clear how the impacts of the climate crisis are worsening. The terrible wildfires in Los Angeles are the clear reminder that US people, like everyone else, are affected by worsening climate change and the will to withdraw from Paris climate agreement and the will to go back to oil, and drills will only worsen this tragic situation. Right now the world is now long-term 1.3°C above mid-1800s temperatures. Although in the scientific literature there is overwhelming scientific consensus that global surface temperatures have increased in recent decades and that the trend is caused by human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases, neither Trump nor any of the department heads he has appointed believe that global warming is human-related.


iu_1340872_20153888.png

20201211 Billion dollar events related to climate change - U.S. -en.svg by RCraig09, 12 December 2020 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license


This graph of number billion-dollar climate-related events in the United States, and annual costs of those events, based on NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information. You can clearly see the growing numbers of weather and climate-related events costing at least a billion dollars which exceed the 1980–2019 inflation-adjusted average of 6.6 such events(1). Following Trump's first election large amounts of climate information from the EPA website was altered or removed. There was widespread concern among environmentalists and scientists and a coalition of scientific and academic groups began to make copies of the EPA web pages before they were deleted. According to the Environmental Data & Governance Initiative which tracks changes to government websites under the Trump administration, over 200 web pages providing climate information were omitted during Trump's first year in office. Other pages were altered to remove mentions of climate and climate change(2). This is unacceptable and concerning to say the least and now that he has Musk and other big tech companies COEs on his side, science and correct information will suffer deep blows in showing how the world will only accelerate its worsening.


And remember what he said during the 2020 California wildfires on September 13th, 2020:


It'll start getting cooler. You just watch. ... I don't think science knows, actually.


And speaking on the scientific front, another one was hit by Trump's decisions: US withdrawal from the World Health Organization.

here the official statement: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/withdrawing-the-united-states-from-the-worldhealth-organization/

The United States is by far the WHO's biggest financial backer, contributing around 18% of its overall funding. WHO's most recent two-year budget, for 2024-2025, was $6.8 billion.

The U.S. departure will likely put at risk programs across the organization, according to several experts both inside and outside the WHO, notably those tackling tuberculosis, the world’s biggest infectious disease killer, as well as HIV/AIDS and other health emergencies. Under U.S. law, leaving the WHO requires a one-year notice period, and the payment of any outstanding fees.


Aaaaannnd this decision has already convincing an Italian politician, the Northern League party politician, Claudio Borghi to suggest the same for Italy: withdrawing from WHO. This is the Italian article:

https://www.huffingtonpost.it/politica/2025/01/21/news/claudio_borghi_oms-18231318/


I will translate some points:


"The Lega MP comments on the news with a post on X. On the same social network he had listed a series of criticisms of the organization: the very high costs, the ties with Bill Gates, the uselessness. Claudio Borghi is rooting for Donald Trump and his decision to sign an executive order that will allow the United States to leave the World Health Organization. The Lega Nord member hopes that the president's choice will lead the way, dragging Italy towards the same fate. "We must do it right away," he writes on X, in a message accompanied by the news of the US-WHO divorce.


In another more verbose tweet, dating back to last year, Borghi had explained the reasons why he criticizes the work of the Organization, with a ten-point list, obtaining over 2 and a half million views. "The WHO is useless," we read at the beginning of the list, "It made sense in 1948 when information on epidemics arrived by telegraph. Now we are in an infodemic. During Covid, the WHO did not provide a single piece of useful information. If it is not useful for that, then evidently its real function is another now."


Most of you don't know but this political party is a combination of political federalism, fiscal federalism, regionalism and defense of northern Italian traditions whose historical goal is to transform Italy into a federated state, letting Padania keep more tax revenues collected there under a regime of fiscal federalism, and it's racists against Southern Italy. This shitty party has also anti-vax positions....


I really hope this fascist government ignores this but I am still very worried. Yes, I called the government of the country I currently live in fascist and not as insult but as a fact because the main party that rules this country, Brothers of Italy (Fratelli d'Italia), traces its origins in National Alliance (Alleanza Nazionale) a national conservative political party in Italy that was the successor of the Italian Social Movement (MSI), a neo-fascist party founded in 1946 by former followers of Benito Mussolini. The party had moderated its policies over its last decades and claimed finally to have distanced itself from its former ideology, a move known as post-fascismo, during a convention in Fiuggi by dissolving into the new party in 1995. Honestly looking at their actions and evolution within Brothers of Italy I still see elements of neo-fascism, so fuck you from the bottom of my heart! I have to be honest thought that this party is not direct predecessor. FdI was established by former AN members, who had been part of the PdL (The People of Freedom or Il Popolo delle Libertà) in 2008–2012, and is the current bearer of AN's symbol under the authorization of the National Alliance Foundation.


And speaking of influences done by US to Italy now that Musk and Trump have full power, I can't help but mention the deal with Starlink. Italian government has already made a deal with Musk and his Starlink satellites. Meloni said Italy may ( aka Italy will use it) employ Elon Musk's Starlink service to provide encrypted satellite communications to link its military contingents around the world because there is "no public alternative." Italy is in talks with Starlink, part of Musk's SpaceX aerospace business, to use its 6,700 satellite constellation in a reported five-year, €1.5 billion ($1.55 billion) deal. How lovely that this fascist government doesn't seem to find funds for healthcare, research, environment and youth people but magically can waste them in this shit that I find highly dangerous for our national security. And this deal was done in combination with another fact that touched Italy directly: Sala case. The Italian journalist was released soon after Elon Musk met with an Iranian ambassador:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/15/world/middleeast/musk-italy-iran-prisoner-exchange.html

So basically Italy sold out its national security to free a journalist, and despite I am happy she could came back, I don't like at all that a greater good (national security) was sacrificed to free a single individual when you could pay high sums of money to free her without putting at risk the country's national security. And I am not the only one who is deeply concerned about this.


So basically Italy is currently in advanced negotiations with Musk's SpaceX company deal to provide encrypted telecommunications services via its Starlink satellite internet provider. Namrata Goswami, an independent space policy scholar, thinks this type of deal will become "the new normal" because Starlink provides fast and reliable satellite internet and secure telecommunications with true global reach.

"So what governments look for, especially in terms of, say, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, communication, those communications are supposedly more encrypted and secure based on what SpaceX is offering," she told.


Yet Elon Musk's courting of Meloni could see him extend his already considerable influence in the sector of what are known as low Earth orbit satellites, which orbit Earth at an altitude of 2,000 km or less. Satellites in that orbit are very useful for telecommunications and internet provision. Much of its internet provision is for businesses and consumers. However, some national governments also use Starlink for their own communications and for military applications. The US Department of Defense avails of a specific service called Starshield, designed for some government and military agencies. Ukraine has also made extensive use of the Starlink service during the war with Russia.


However, a deal for SpaceX to provide a major EU government with communications services would be a new departure. It could also bring Italy into conflict with the EU's own space strategy. The European Commission signed the contract to establish IRIS², a plan to place 260 of its own satellites in both low and medium Earth orbit by 2030. The idea is that those satellites will provide EU member states with secure telecommunications. There are no EU rules prohibiting EU governments from using certain satellite or internet services, including Starlink. The spokesperson for the European Commission made it clear that Italy could proceed with Starlink if it so wished but it emphasized the country's strong role in the establishment of IRIS². "On a purported agreement between Italy and Starlink, the Commission does not comment as a matter of principle on discussions of this kind," the spokesperson said. Italy is a sovereign state taking sovereign decisions. Incidentally, Italy is poised to be hosting one of the three IRIS² control centres."


As for Musk and concerns over how his doing deals with governments such as Italy could impact global geopolitical security, Namrata Goswami says that his growing involvement in politics points to a clear risk. She sees a potential issue in the possibility of him having the power to limit a government or military's use of Starlink, if he disagrees with them politically.

"There has to be some security that they cannot just cut off a particular service just because they do not like a particular nation's policies," she says. "That's my concern, because he's so powerful that he might want to influence his own company's decision of who they support and who they don't."


https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/01/italian-interest-in-starlink-strikes-at-the-heart-of-european-space-solidarity/


Opposition parties, primarily the Democratic Party (PD), have voiced significant apprehension about the deal, arguing that entrusting Italy’s sensitive government and military communications to a foreign private entity like SpaceX raises serious concerns about national security and sovereignty. One PD senator has described this move as an “unacceptable sell-out of national sovereignty”, highlighting the danger of relying on a company owned by Musk, who is known for his controversial political stances and close ties to Right-wing figures internationally. The fear is that sensitive data could potentially be at risk if not strictly managed under Italian or European control. Critics of the deal argue that Italy should foster its own technological capabilities or support the European Union’s satellite programs like Iris, set to launch in 2029, rather than outsourcing to a US-based company.


There’s also concern over the economic implications of the deal. Critics within the PD suggest that this partnership might sideline local and European companies, thereby affecting job opportunities within Italy’s telecom sector. The opposition has pointed out that Starlink’s services directly compete with local telecom operators, potentially leading to market monopolisation by SpaceX. This could have long-term negative effects on Italy’s telecommunications industry, reducing the incentive for local innovation and investment:


We have already seen how Twitter went after Musk bought it, and it seems he wants to own TikTok too (now I start to think why it was unbanned in US after Trump became president....but it's just a personal opinion, nothing more). Never let single, ultra rich billionaire take care of political stuff and stuff in general, it never ends well....


Don't forget that this junkie has shown support for the far-right, disgusting, shitty, revolting part AfD.

He wrote that the nationalist party was "the last spark of hope for the country," which he claimed was teetering on the brink of "economic and cultural collapse," and that only the AfD could revive the German economy and prevent a loss of identity through a "controlled immigration policy."


Since you support this party, you should know it posted one-way plane tickets through the letterbox of immigrants, right? I bet not, considering your abyssal ignorance on how EU works (and the world in general). Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) is under investigation by the police after people living in the southwestern city of Karlsruhe found the flyers in the mail. They feature an AfD logo, a QR code linking to the website of the party’s local chapter and the purported destination of a “safe country of origin”, with a tagline below that reads: “Only remigration can still save Germany.” (read remigration as deportation since it's a pathetic euphemistic term to soften the semantic burden "deportation" has).


And this is the shitty fake ticket they sent to these people:


iu_1340871_20153888.webp

from: https://de.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/01/14/afd-abschiebetickets-bundestagswahl


When yesterday I watched this on television I felt physically and emotionally hurt by seeing this disgusting piece of crap and I thought how this can also damage the psyche of some of these people who struggles to integrate and interact with German social web. Image to be an immigrant who fled the country to change your life for the better, you studied hard to master the language to an intermediate level (to become a German citizen, one of requirements is reaching level B1 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages), you also studied to pass the naturalisation test, you lived for at least 5 years, just to find in your letterbox this racist shit, how would you feel? If you know more about German citizenship, here the article: https://www.germany-visa.org/german-citizenship/


But Musk added:


"To those who condemn the AfD as extremist, I say: Don't let the label attached to it put you off," Musk wrote. "The portrayal of the AfD as right-wing extremist is clearly false, considering that Alice Weidel, the party's leader, has a same-sex partner from Sri Lanka! Does that sound like Hitler to you? Please!"


LMAO, this last sentence is similar to the same bs I hear from homophobic and racist people to justify their discriminatory views under a sugarcoated sentence" I have lots of [INSERT MINORITY GROUP/SEXUAL ORIENTATION HERE]...."


German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has expressed concern over Elon Musk's support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, weeks before the nation's snap election next month. Scholz, in an interview with Stern magazine said while he was not fazed by the US tech billionaire's attacks on him and other German politicians, Musk's endorsement of the far-right party was much more worrying. Despite I didn't appreciate Musk attacked and insulted Scholz and the other German politicians (if you try to do the same with Musk on Twitter, let's see how long your account will survive, yes I call it Twitter and not that unholy X, get over it, after all your president has already signed an executive order on Monday requiring the federal government to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the "Gulf of America" on official maps so why can't I keep calling Twitter as Twitter), I share Scholz's same worries.


Because of Musk's constant meddling on European affairs the French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot has called on the European Commission to take tougher action against US billionaire Elon Musk. According to him, the European Commission should use its current legislation much more strictly.

Either the European Commission applies with the greatest firmness the laws that exist to protect our unique space or it does not and in that case it should think about giving the capacity to do so back to the member states of the European Union, to France,” he said. I totally support Barrot's stance. I am honestly sick of his constant meddling in European political affairs and now that he is part of the Trumpian establishment, I consider it politically and morally unacceptable and a violation of national sovereignty by the United States. If the European Union did the same to the United States I want to see how they would react...seriously as European I say who the fuck do you think you are to decide to heavily influence the politics of foreign countries?


Some time ago, French President Emmanuel Macron hinted at Musk's interference in European politics. During his speech to French ambassadors, Macron did not directly mention Musk's name but said at the time that nobody could have imagined 10 years ago that the owner of one of the largest social networks in the world would support a new international reactionary movement and directly interfere in elections, particularly in Germany. Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Har Støre also expressed concern about Musk's interference in politics.


If Musk is attacking (or trying to attack) Germany from a political point of view by supporting (and maybe even funding it secretly) far-right party AfD, on the other hand Trump wants to attack Germany on the economic side. The German Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck emphasized that after Trump returns to the US presidency, Germany will be the main target of new trade tariffs due to its trade surplus with the United States. The politician noted that possible restrictions against the entire EU would hit the German economy first. At the same time, Habeck emphasized that the EU is ready to fight back, but Germany must act together with its European partners to strengthen its position.


"You can be pretty sure that the tariffs that he might want to impose will be targeted in such a way that they will particularly hit the German economy... No matter what the next German government wants to do, it must do it in a European way," Habeck said. I totally agree with him. Considering that Italy has ties with Germany too when it comes to car industry, this will hit Italy as well.


It's also funny how Trump issued a mass pardon of approximately 1,500 January 6 rioters, but did you know that on January 21, 2025 Trump granted Ross Ulbricht a full and unconditional pardon? Who is Ross Ulbricht? He is the creator and founder of darknet market website Silk Road the infamous online black market and the first modern darknet market known for its illegal drug marketplace, among other illegal and legal product listings.


As Trump put it in a Truth Social post: "in honor of [his mother Lyn Ulbricht], and the Libertarian Movement, which supported me so strongly, it was my pleasure to have just signed a full and unconditional pardon of her son, Ross." He said "the scum that worked to convict him were some of the same lunatics who were involved in the modern-day weaponization of government against me." (damn, I can hear Trump's voice when citing his words...)


A nice example of love for justice and double standards: if you are a Mexican drug cartel you are a terrorist organization, if you create a darknet market to sell and buy illegal stuff like drugs you get pardoned, it doesn't matter if you sold drug, just like drug cartels, if you support someone like Trump so much you get rewarded. A fine example of moral integrity for a country who wants to think to be the land of freedom, well at least Trump kept his promise I will give him that....


Trump is also known to spew false statements in public remarks, this is a graph showing false or misleading claims(3) made by Donald Trump (we truly live in a post-truth society):


iu_1340873_20153888.webp

2017- Donald Trump veracity - composite graph.png by RCraig09, 23 February 2020 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license


Some of Trump's falsehoods were inconsequential, such as his repeated claim of the "biggest inaugural crowd ever"(4). Others had more far-reaching effects, such as his promotion of antimalarial drugs as an unproven treatment for COVID-19, causing a U.S. shortage of these drugs and panic-buying in Africa and South Asia(5).


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------


I personally think that this is all an attack on the liberal democracies of Europe, and the Italian government is used as a Trojan horse to weaken EU. Meloni has the same Trump's forma mentis so it's not surprising the apparent privileged position Italy has towards US, but she didn't understood that Trump is only using her for his personal gain (you fascist dumbfuck!). So this election will affect you US people who didn't want any of this whether you voted Democrat or Republican (if you didn't want someone like Trump) but it will also affect those who passionately wanted it, since one like Trump gives zero fucks to them. But it will affect the world too, Europe being the first unless she really starts to act unitedly as a political European Union. As European I am deeply worried but at the same time I think Trump might be beneficial for us IF and ONLY IF we stay united, sanction figures like Musk and create laws that protect our autonomy as political entity and economy.


If you reached the end of this very long blog, I thank you. I don't think I will write other politcal-themed blogs unless I really want to get something off my chest like in this case or for historical purposes. Thank you for reading, stay safe and to all US citizens who share same worries as mine, be ready to fight for your right, embrace yourselves because winter is coming. See you next time.


References and footnotes


(1) Smith, Adam B.; NOAA National Centers For Environmental Information (December 2020). "Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters: Overview / 2020 in Progress". NCDC.NOAA. National Centers for Environmental Information (NCDC, part of NOAA). doi:10.25921/stkw-7w73

(2) "EPA chief Scott Pruitt personally monitored removal of climate info from website". CBS News. February 2, 2018. Archived

(3) Kessler, Glenn; Kelly, Meg; Rizzo, Salvador; Lee, Michelle Ye Hee (January 20, 2021). "In four years, President Trump made 30,573 false or misleading claims". The Washington Post

(4) Finnegan, Michael (September 25, 2016). "Scope of Trump's falsehoods unprecedented for a modern presidential candidate". Los Angeles Times.

(5) Rowland, Christopher (March 23, 2020). "As Trump touts an unproven coronavirus treatment, supplies evaporate for patients who need those drugs". The Washington Post.


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4

Posted by ShangXian - 1 month ago


Дорогой русский язык,


Мы давно не разговаривали! Как ты? Надеюсь, все хорошо.

В эти недели я продолжаю изучать азы русской грамматики. Я изучала родительный и винительный падежи множественного числа, но в последнее время я также изучаю глаголы движения. Надеюсь продолжать в том же духе, теперь увидимся в следующий раз.


С наилучшими пожеланиями


Твоя подруга!


Ok this was just a mere exercise with Russian writing and an excuse to practice with what I learnt and I keep learning in this period. And last time we left off with verbs of motion. Verbs of motions are one of the toughest part of Russian language along with plural genitive, that I mentioned in my fictional letter to Russian language, for those not used to such level of specificity that I personally love. In Russia you can't and don't simply "go"!


iu_1334178_20153888.webp

meme taken from: https://www.reddit.com/r/russian/comments/rk9boe/russian_verbs_of_motion/


I almost memorized all the verbs I've shown in the previous diary, conjugation is not a problem. Under this aspect Russian language has an easy way to conjugate verbs compared to Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian, not to mention that infernal hell that is Romance language conjugation system....


But what makes them more difficult to acquire is the way of thinking. Verbs of motions force you to think differently and expand your mind, quite literally in the semantic field since you have to use te right verb of movement to move, lol. And the ones I am studying are just the unprefixed verbs of motion, because there are prefixed verbs of motion which acquire a different meaning.


I have noticed two core elements that make verbs of motions challenging (but also fascinating from an anthropological point of view):


1) different way of seeing, thinking and reasoning behind them (this might have some anthropological roots that I have yet to discover, my research in the academic abstracts and papers still struggles to find an answer)


2) the way they are taught


In the first case we discover that there a languages that specify very much aspects of life, in this case the movement. Both in English and even worse in Italian there are few verbs to show movement. English has mainly "to go" that engulfs what Russian wants to convey with ИДТИ-ХОДИТЬ, ЛЕТЕТЬ-ЛЕТАТЬ, ПЛЫТЬ-ПЛАВАТЬ etc. Italian only has "andare/venire" that convey in a very generic way these semantic nuances.


In the second case the traditional way of conceptualizing and teaching UVoMs (unprefixed verbs of motion) is based on the rather ambiguous category "directionality" (cf. Isačenko, 1960). This traditional approach is deeply rooted in the tenets of European structural linguistics, which a priori considers any grammatical category as a privative opposition. Searching for universal semantic invariants associated with specific morphemes, structuralist linguistics abstracts from contextual factors and fails to provide an easily applicable guide to choosing the correct UVoM. And when you have to teach Russian as second language (L2) this becomes a problem.


We know that the relationship between “linguistic theories” and the way second/foreign language (L2) instruc-tors conceptualize and teach linguistic patterns under the guise of “pedagogical grammar” and “teaching methodology” is a subject of ongoing discussion and questioning. I've attended an entire course last year about Italian as second language and all theories linked to L2 teaching so I feel this ongoing discussion. All influential L2 teaching paradigms (seethe the Direct Method (cf. Besse, 2010, 9-11; Marchand, 1913;1914;1927) and the Neurolinguistics Approach (cf. Germain, 2018) just to cite a few) have been inspired by advances in theoretical and applied linguistics.


On the other hand, L2 pedagogy has always been guided by the grammar-as-a-tool-not-a-goal principle. The search for simple and intuitive tools to teach and process a second language makes L2 pedagogy very cautious regarding linguistic knowledge. I totally agree with the French pedagogue Louis Marchand when he used the metaphor of lever when teaching L2, I quote his sentence:


Like a lever we use to lift a weight should not be heavier than the weight itself, the grammar used as a tool helping L2 learners to cope with difficulties of the target language, should not be more difficult for learners and teachers than the material it helps acquire.”(cited in Puren, 1998, 52).


And it's interesting how this metaphor, manifesting the grammar-as-a-tool-not-a-goal claim, echoes the problem-solving principle known as Occam's razor, which recommends searching for the simplest possible explanations. I personally think that to evaluate whether a given teaching approach is the same awkward-to-use lever referred to by Marchand in 1920 one must take into account these elements:


  • empirical research on comparative testing of teaching methods
  • epistemological analysis of the linguistic knowledge underlying L2 pedagogical grammar 
  • teaching methods


Considering that teachers tend to see teaching strategies they are familiar with as the only possible and correct way of presenting linguistic information to learners, it's quite clear that the current way to teach Russian verbs of motion is inefficient and only complicates things.


In the case of Russian verbs of motion (VoMs) and specifically unprefixed verbs of motion(UVoMs), the traditional way of teaching them is based on on the opposition between unidirectional vs. nondirectional (or multidirectional) motions. Linguistics such as Bernitskaїa, 2017-2019, Paškina, 2007 and Gepner in 2016 have criticized the traditional directionality-based conception of UVoMs, actualizing long-standing controversy surrounding the category of directionality in linguistics.


Russian language has a further layer of difficulty because apart from the four universal characteristics of motion–moving object, goal/location of motion, the path followed, and manner of motion –some (but not all) Russian verbs encoding motion are sensitive to the lexico-grammatical subcategory as part of the general category of verbal aspect.


This subcategory applies to a small group of imperfective verbs that have two distinct imperfective variations, each associated with one of two kinds of basic stems; think about ИДТИ-like and ХОДИТЬ-like stems. The issue is further complicated because the Russian language requires differentiation between motion on foot and by means of transportation (internally screaming). Even though there is no generic verb of motion in Russian, ИДТИ/ХОДИТЬ can be generalized for motion that does not take place on foot if it occurs within a locality or it is a fixed-route traffic and here, ИДТИ is used much more often in a metaphorical sense. I suggest to read works from Nesset, 2010; Raxtina, 2004; Nesset & Janda, 2022; Veličko, 2018, 611, and Nesset & Janda, 2022 to better grasp this.


All these complications lead to the fact that contextual meanings of different UVoMs are deter-mined by a complex combination of grammatical, pragmatic, and situational variables difficult to encapsulate in a one single “rule”. The concept направленностьдвижения (directionality of motion) has earned a reputation for being dominant in linguistics, but there is no universal consensus on the semantics of UVoMs like Paškina in 2007 noticed while analyzing and identifying 11 terminological pairs employed in Russian linguistics for this purpose. Paškina concluded that they are not very helpful in explaining them.


There is another problem to keep in mind: the definition of направленность. We don't have a single definition, for example  the Russian L2 pedagogical grammar Книга о грамматике defines it as spatial characteristic of motion. Some linguistics such as Forsyth, 1970 and Bernitskaїa, 2019 use the concept of пунктназначения/целенаправленность (destination), but again there is no universal consensus. Both Paškina (2007) and Bernitskaїa(2019) demon-strate that the directionality-based conception of UVoMs reduces the variety of factors influencing the natural human perception of motion to a single directionality without taking into account several others, such as space, time, and moving object's vs. observer's points of view.


Even the meaning of unidirectionality has not a clear definition but many researchers argue that unidirectional verbs encode the motion proceeding “in/from a single direction toward a goal”. As for nondirectional ХОДИТЬ-like verbs, their meaning is not easy to define either, so it's not an easy task^^'


Considering that most of what I said here is heavily based on this important study that I discovered these past days, I highly suggest you to give it a read to have a full grasp of what I said and think about the limits of the traditional approach that even my grammar book seems to use: https://dislaw.at/ds/article/view/106/104


Just know that the alternative approaches, such as Semantic Labeling (Bondarenko, 2023) seem to be able to make up for the shortcomings of the traditional approach and offer a more intuitive methodology for teaching UVoMs. They are situation based, item-focused, and experience-driven approaches and they converge with the principles of cognitive linguistics.


As last thing before closing this journal is that two Russia-born linguistics–Sergej (Serge) Karcevskij (1884-1955) and Alexandr Isačenko (1910-1978) –have credits for the concept of privative (asymmetrical) binary opposition (my Linguistics course memory is flooding here XD) which inextricably links to the idea of directionality.


I hope one day to find possible anthropological roots of why Slavic languages heavily rely on verbs of motions to describe space because I would like to talk about, in the meantime I salute you guys, see you next time!


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7

Posted by ShangXian - December 30th, 2024


I know I may sound boring by posting another blog about myself but seeing other people posting their art summaries made me want to do the same as way to reflect a bit on my art, and it's been ages since I last did one (I was still on DA when it happened). First I want to give credits to the artist who made this template, their name is glitchednotghosts and here the link to the template which is free to use:


https://glitchednotghosts.tumblr.com/post/705016877363216384/transparent-art-summary-template-free-to-use


I really liked this geometric shape and the sloped look each slot has; it gives them a very dynamic feel and I like it.


Here I put the works I loved the most during 2024:


iu_1326159_20153888.webp


I know the Valentine's Day card was drawn at the end of January but I consider it a piece for February. In my FA account it was posted on Valentine's day. It's very rare I say this but looking at this art summary I can say I am "proud" of what I did and what I accomplished in terms of techniques and variety of subjects. Once again I didn't manage to draw a piece for each month because as you can see three months are vacant due to intense study for exams. But I also noticed a pattern starting from July: a more intense artistic productivity, experimental pieces in terms of techniques (lineless subjects or out-of-comfort-zone subjects such as robots) and improved colouring technique.


I can finally say I like my art, after many years of relative tolerance for my works, I am now happy at looking my works. Of course I keep practicing, having fun and experiment so my eyes evolves with time and what I consider cool now it might not be that cool in future since I will acquire new skills. And speaking of skills I want to point out flaws I still need to work on:


  • perspective
  • colour theory
  • geometric shapes
  • robots and mechanical parts


For robots, perspective and geometric shapes in general using 2 point perspective is helping me to train my visual memory and wrist coordination. I am still in an embryonic phase but I am gradually seeing some changes in the way I perceive shapes. As for colour theory I will check some art threads (I'm looking at your posts, Skoops) to see if I can find useful resources and I think I will considering that if my art improved a lot was thanks to this website. Another flaw I've encountered when painting colours with "Bristles-3 Large Smooth" and "Bristle-4 Glaze" brushes in Krita is that I tend to give a soft pressure when stroking surfaces, giving a more dull look to the chromatic composition while I should aim at a more vivid one to make colours stand and stay harmoniously. I do this with traditional pieces but there I am learning to be more patient and add layer over layer to make the colour look more vibrant and make it stand on its own.


Why didn't I include backgrounds in my flaws? Because I am starting to love them, the only flaw I can pick up from them is the texture of environment elements (i.e. rocks, grass, wood, etc.). I also want to push further with dynamism in poses.


You can find each work here:


January



February



March-April-May


Nothing


June



July



August



September



October



November



December



I didn't include other artworks I would have liked to put so I will list them here by category:


runners-up fanarts:









runners-up OCs:







runners-up personal works:




I don't know what 2025 has in store for me, I just hope it will be dope like 2024. I don't care if I will make fewer or more posts, what matters is that I have fun and learn from my mistakes, critiques, and learn from others. For this year I won't be posting any more draws despite I am creating a new one for the Tankmas experience I had during this month, and I am starting to make sketches for the 6 fanart challenge.


Ok this is the last blog post for this year, let's see in the next one and again serene New Year everyone!


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11

Posted by ShangXian - December 27th, 2024


Hello Newgrounds and its people, I hope you are spending serene holidays these days. I know I have already written a recap on my profile and you can read it here: 1st Year on Newgrounds: recap


but here I would like to review this 2024 as whole so both here and outside NG because I would like to reflect on this year that is about to end in few days.


Photography


Some of you already know by my previous shutter-bug chronicles blogs that I developed a passion for photography. A passion that was born in September 2023 thanks to a dear University friend who offered to take me to Sardinia. This passion grew over the year, my favourite subjects are birds, reptiles, insects, spiders, nature in general. I hope one day to photograph wild endemic mammals too (now I only photographed a nutria), but I know it's more difficult than with birds because they are more elusive. I know that in "my" area there are many small rodents like common voles, Eurasian harvest mice, yellow-necked mice, short-tailed field voles, wooden mice, brown rats, black rats etc. then there are red foxes, common hares, roe deer, boars and ultimately even wolves. I will share here some of the shots I loved the most during this year:


-January


iu_1324431_20153888.webp


This is one of my favourite photos I took of this 'lil "bastard". I called him simply because he was the most difficult subject to photograph because he is so elusive and quick (I love these birds). He is not that different from wild Tamago in Tankmas ADVENTure XD you have to approach very slowly and not let him to see you or else he will fly away. Even blue tits, great tits, hooded crows, Eurasian jays and common redstarts were easier to photograph, lol. This is not the very first photo I took of this species though. The very first was in November 13th, 2023 and fun fact about that first pic: my TV was playing "Un bel di vedremo" while I managed to capture this bird in my camera. The music unironically fit perfectly the situation, lol.


-February


iu_1324433_20153888.webp


I just love how bright and vivid colours are and how they stand out the colours of my vegetable garden. They visit often my garden during winter time and I love feeding them.


-May


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If you look carefully and with a bright screen you can see AR3664. So if you see a purple-violet trail-like hue, congratulations that's an aurora borealis I could see and photograph for the first time of my life. One of the largest sunspot groups in recent history is crossing the Sun right now and I have to thank Link4universe, an amazing Youtuber I follow, if I could not only get notified of this gem but also to witness it where I live and take some pics. I never imaged I could see an aurora. As you know auroras are the result of disturbances in the Earth's magnetosphere caused by the solar wind. Major disturbances result from enhancements in the speed of the solar wind from coronal holes and coronal mass ejections (CMEs). These disturbances alter the trajectories of charged particles in the magnetospheric plasma. These particles, mainly electrons and protons, precipitate into the upper atmosphere (thermosphere/exosphere). The resulting ionization and excitation of atmospheric constituents emit light of varying colour and complexity. The shape I could see was a mix of glow and arc, it was beautiful almost terrifying and sublime to me since I never saw one in real life and where I live they usually are not visible.


Auroras can have many colours from green, red, yellow, blue to ultraviolet and infrared. The one that got photographed in Italy were all reddish purple-violet. The colour red occurs at highest altitudes. Excited atomic oxygen emits at 630 nm; low concentration of atoms and lower sensitivity of eyes at this wavelength make this color visible only under more intense solar activity. The low number of oxygen atoms and their gradually diminishing concentration is responsible for the faint appearance of the top parts of the "curtains". Scarlet, crimson, and carmine are the most often-seen hues of red for the auroras. Auroras can make noise too. Aurora noise, similar to a crackling noise, begins about 70 m above Earth's surface and is caused by charged particles in an inversion layer of the atmosphere formed during a cold night. The charged particles discharge when particles from the Sun hit the inversion layer, creating the noise. Exposure time of this photo 30s.


-June


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These two are my favourite photos not only of June month but of all 2024, especially the juvenile hooded crow. That day (it was June 5th) I went visiting a park of a city near where I live to have opportunity to take some bird pics and other stuff. I know that area is visited by hooded crow, my favourite bird species of the area where I live. Sadly they are pretty shy and it's difficult to take good quality photo but in this area they are quite common and I love listening to their contact calls to locate them and know what they are up. When I was walking I noticed a crow head and I immediately stopped not to disturb him/her but the bird didn't fly away and soon I realized he/she was a juvenile hooded crow. First time of my life I could see one and take several pics of him/her. Parents were perching on a tree near the area the little crow was in. I could listen to one of his/her parent's call, they were probably telling him/her not to go too far from where they could watch him/her. I discretely took several pics and then took a different turn because I didn't want to disturb or stress both the juvenile and parents. Just because I love photography it doesn't mean I have the right to annoy animals if they don't want to be disturbed. Respect is one of lessons true photography one learns. I don't consider myself a true photographer, I have a lot to learn in terms of technique but many times I see some people annoy animals or put themselves at risk just for a photo.


After I returned in the area I didn't see him/her anymore but I could immediately listen to his/her call. It looked like to me that he/she was practicing his/her calling skills because I didn't hear the typical voice they make when they are fed (at this stage they can still beg for food) and I couldn't notice that first notes of the call barely resembled that of a crow but then the following ones sounded more crow-like.


The second photo is this lovely lil fella I met during my walk in the park, an Italian wall lizard (Podarcis siculus). This is also the first reptile photo I post here, yayyyy :D The lizard was very chill while sunbathing (horrible pun I know XD) so I took opportunity to take a pic of him. He didn't feel annoyed or bothered by my presence, but I wanted to take only two pics because I wanted to leave him alone while warming up.


The snout–vent length of P. siculus is 150–250 mm on average. P. siculus is characterized by a green or brown back with a white or green belly. There is variation in length and color diversity due to the many subspecies and populations of P. siculus. The trademark of this species is the characteristic of having many subspecies within its large range. Studies evidence how rapidly P. siculus subspecies can become distinguishable from larger populations given geographic isolation. A 2008 study detailed distinct morphological and behavioral changes in a P. siculus population indicative of "rapid evolution":

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releas.....0417112433.htm

https://web.archive.org/web/2008042.....evolution.html


If you want to know the many subspecies it has here a link:

https://web.archive.org/web/2008061.....acertids2s.htm


It has so many subspecies that Henle and Klaver (1986) described 52 subspecies of P. siculus. Podnar et al (2005) described 6 groupings of P. siculus in the species' native range: Sicula clade (Southwestern Calabria, Sardinia, and Sicily), Monesterace clade (Istrian coast), Catanzaro clade ( central Calabria), Suzac clade (islands in southern and central Dalmatia), Tuscany clade (Western Italy) and finally Campestris-sicula clade (Northern Italy and the Adriatic Islands).

The species can develop different dorsal patterns (campestris, calabresiae, intermediate 1, intermediate 2, reticulated, concolor etc.) and morphs, for example Podarcis siculus klemmeri is a blue morph found exclusively on the small island of Licosa (province of Salerno, Campania). Take a look a this morph:

https://www.zoochat.com/community/m.....emmeri.466971/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:.....89-1d-left.png


Another pic I loved of this month was this:


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Last time I saw these birds I was still in high school. They are by far the most difficult to spot and photograph because how rarely I see them, mostly because the area is already occupied by other birds and they don't like foreign birds. The European goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis) is a small passerine bird in the finch family that is native to Europe, North Africa and western and central Asia. The subspecies of the European goldfinch are divided into two major groups. These intergrade at their boundary, so the groups are not recognized as distinct species despite their readily distinguishable plumage. Subspecies in the carduelis (black-crowned) group occupy the western part of the range and have black crowns; subspecies in the caniceps (grey-headed) group occupy the eastern part of the range and have grey heads. The bird is 12–13 cm long with a wingspan of 21–25 cm and a weight of 14 to 19 g. The sexes are broadly similar, with a red face, black and white head, warm brown upper parts, white underparts with buff flanks and breast patches, and black and yellow wings. The bird's preferred food is small seeds such as those from thistles (the Latin name is from Carduus, a genus of thistles), cornflowers, and teasels, but insects are also taken when feeding young. It also regularly visits bird feeders in winter. In the winter, European goldfinches group together to form flocks of up to 40, occasionally more. Insects, including bugs, moths, beetles and flies, form a smaller part of a goldfinch’s diet, particularly during early spring and in the breeding season. Spiders and larvae are also eaten.


Males have on average, more extensive red on the head, black nasal hairs and lesser coverts that are black or brown black, sometimes narrowly tipped brown. While females are described as having, on average, less extensive red on the head, grey or blackish grey nasal hairs and lesser coverts that are broadly tipped brown although occasionally as narrowly as some males. From: https://two-in-a-bush.blogspot.com/.....hic-study.html


I suggest to give it a read as it's extremely interesting and shows limits of this type of sexing. Juveniles have a plain head and a greyer back but are unmistakable due to the yellow wing stripe. Birds in central Asia (the caniceps group) have a plain grey head behind the red face, lacking the black and white head pattern of European and western Asian birds. The nest is built entirely by the female and is generally completed within a week. The male accompanies the female, but does not contribute. Common nesting spots for goldfinches are usually found tucked in between branches of a bush or tree, particularly fruit trees. Nests are built up to 6 m off the ground, with higher nests occasionally used. Eggs measure around 17 mm by 13 mm and are shades of pale blue-white to grey-violet, spotted with purple-reddish brown markings. The clutch consists of between 4 and 6 eggs, which are incubated for 13 to 15 days by the female alone. At least one brood is raised each year, often two, and sometimes as many as three. Goldfinches do not usually mate for life, but they are seasonally monogamous, and stay together throughout the breeding season, raising their young together before going their separate ways. Pairs form in late winter, and it’s unlikely that the same pair will reunite and raise young together again. European goldfinches are commonly kept and bred in captivity around the world because of their distinctive appearance and pleasant song. I personally highly disagree trapping a wild animal to keep as a pet just because it elicits you an egoistical attachment to positive sensory stimuli (pretty look and pleasant call). Leave them alone. In Great Britain during the 19th century, many thousands of European goldfinches were trapped each year to be sold as cage birds. One of the earliest campaigns of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds was directed against this trade. Wildlife conservation attempts to limit bird trapping and the destruction of the open space habitats of European goldfinches.


Fun fact: if European goldfinches are kept with domestic canaries, they tend to lose their native song and call in favour of their cagemates' songs.


-November


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A beautiful black cat that visited my garden. I love black cats, they are my favourite cats.


-Curious phenomena


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The first pic is easily explainable: it's ballooning. It is a process by which spiders, and some other small invertebrates, move through the air by releasing one or more gossamer threads to catch the wind, causing them to become airborne at the mercy of air currents and electric fields. A 2018 study concluded that electric fields provide enough force to lift spiders in the air, and possibly elicit ballooning behavior:


Electric Fields Elicit Ballooning in Spiders


This is primarily used by spiderlings to disperse; however, larger individuals have been observed doing so as well. The spider climbs to a high point and takes a stance with its abdomen to the sky, releasing fine silk threads from its spinneret until it becomes aloft. Journeys achieved vary from a few metres to hundreds of kilometers. Even atmospheric samples collected from balloons at five kilometers altitude and ships mid-ocean have reported spider landings. Ballooning can be dangerous (due to predators, and due to the unpredictable nature of long-distance ballooning, which may bring individuals to an unfavorable environment). Species such as Erigone atra, Cyclosa turbinata, as well as in spider mites (Tetranychidae) and 31 species of lepidoptera, distributed in 8 suborders, display this behaviour. First time I witnessed this phenomenon. In other areas fields were covered with a blanket of spider web, giving the feeling a delicate snow fell down.


The second photo was taken at the beginning of this month and it was the first I saw a huge flock of pigeons. The funny thing is the symmetry in which they positioned themselves. I have another pic with fewer pigeons but you can see how aligned they were on the roof. This photo shows other pigeons who came later. Pigeons are social creatures and tend to flock together, especially during the winter months. Large flocks provide warmth and safety, as pigeons huddle together to share body heat and conserve energy. They create a "warm bubble" around them to keep them warm and this is fantastic because it shows the versatility of this cool species.


-Christmas Gift


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This is a gift (various meat scraps) I gave to magpies who visit my garden during Christmas day. I love feeding birds of "my" area especially during winter time. I offer nuts, seeds, grains to other birds in order to help them a bit with cold temperatures. A spell of very low temperature in winter can result in high mortality among small passerines and this is why I try to help them a bit. After listening to magpies over and over I can distinguish each individual by their voice and I know the typical call they make when they see food that catches their interest. It's a call aimed at warning other magpies (familiar ones) of potential food and during winter they prefer meat over plant-based foods.


Academic Life


On the university side, 2024 was a year full of satisfactions in terms of exams because I managed to pass most of them. Now only three exams before I end my journey even if it will take some time because Spanish was a waste of time and changing for Russian only occurred in November. What matters is getting the degree with formed skills and this university is giving me such cool skills that will be used for future jobs. Spanish was the only taint of this year because this language isn't for me. I prefer to study a harder language that gives me challenges but I enjoy it rather something similar to my second mother tongue but I can't fully like. Besides this I enjoyed this other university year, courses I enjoyed the most were Comparative Literatures, German Literature III and Germanic Philology. I plan to present a dissertation about Scandinavian literature and aspects of cultural anthropology with German Philology teacher since I would like to explore lesser know aspects. Why Scandinavian literature? Because it shows more aspects of Scandinavian culture and society than Anglo-Saxon literature that was made by warrior class for warrior class, so ignoring the rest of society. Now I am focusing on Russian language because I prefer to have a target-oriented mind on simple goals. Let's see what 2025 will give me.


Personal Life


This year was overall decent for the most part due to academic life and experience on NG. But on a more personal level there were some things that tainted a bit this year and it started from September where an someone started throwing litter and cigarette butts in my garden. This is an individual that my father knows because he is a visitor of the bar my father hangs out. It is not a mentally stable person, he comes from a dysfunctional family, has a brother who screams every time he goes for a walk disturbing both people and animals, and has problems with alcohol. People like that can interpret everyone others do or say as a personal attack, and because my father has this tendency to speak with everyone something must have upset this person. So he started for a month and a half throwing litter in my garden. I hate everyone who pollutes the environment, especially if you throw cigarettes then you are in my naughty list (Christmas pun :P). We filmed every night and finally caught him. My father spoke to him and now things seem sorted out BUT I didn't forget nor forgive. I hate this person with a burning passion for what he did towards my garden who smelled like cigarette even after he stopped, plus you polluted a piece of environment and Nature. Another element that is giving me some worries are some family problems but studying and browsing here on NG has a therapeutic effect on me.


And I take this opportunity to thank Newgrounds and the people I interacted with if my Christmas was one of the most serene Christmas I ever had in ages. Most of them were tranquil at best, but this one had the kind of serenity and creativity I search for during this period. I want to personally thank ChronoNG  if I had the mental energy to keep drawing during Christmas after the previous bad day I had with my family. I know it may be small and even insignificant but his will to see what I was about to draw gave me the strength to draw not one but two artworks that day so from the bottom of my heart thank you!


Another thing that made me happy during Christmas was the surge of new fans who decided to follow me, thank you! I didn't expect such nice Christmas gift here^^ I am deeply honoured to be followed by so many cool artists (even people with a larger following base than me, it never happened on other sites like DA or FA) and this shows how the community can build strong bonds through Art whether it's voice acting, music, art, games or flash movies. You are all fantastic, keep being awesome and may have serene Christmas/winter holidays!


I want to take advantage of this part to promote again the journal made by SheepSLAPS, even if you can't help her, just a spread can help too.


Newgrounds


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2024 on Newgrounds was great in every aspect even though my activity surged during mid July after I finished most third year exams. The first thing that made it great was the huge number of collabs I participated, here the folder about them:



This is not the first time I participate in collabs, my very first was on DeviantART back in 2015 and it was Pokemon-themed collab about flying Pokemon racing together. But after this and other two collabs on DA, I didn't contribute to any future collab. Until I joined NG...and it was the best choice ever because I could push my limits further and experiment new things that helped me to gradually come out my comfort zones. I think my biggest achievement, that I plan to continue pursuing, was creating and painting backgrounds and environments for my subjects. And this will lead me to learn more about them especially when it comes to textures. In my last artwork (it will be my last artwork for this year too):



I've noticed that I still have to work a lot on rocks and their textures. I know the artwork is meant to be simple with a simple graphic but this doesn't change the fact that I aim at more realistic-looking rocks. This applies to grass, forestscapes etc.


Another important noteworthy thing for my artistic skills growth, that happened in this year, was the creation of an art thread:


Shang's art cave [art thread]


This is not an art-dump thread, I don't aim at this and I don't like showcasing my stuff this way, it's superficial and I want to give a more in depth look at how I learn and draw. I already have my gallery with even my personal playlist where people can navigate easily what I make (fanarts, personal works or OCs) since the infinite scrolling can make them lost in a sea of artworks if I reach big numbers (this is the only thing I criticize: why not adding the option to choose between infinite scrolling and pages?). In this thread I try to talk about the learning process about my artistic creation, I try to study myself while studying art so it has a meta-artistic nature this thread. I also like to criticize my own artworks (in future I will do it) and I would like to hear some constructive criticism and feedback but don't feel obliged to comment. If you want that's fine, it don't want that's fine too. With time this thread will expand more and more but I prefer baby-steps so for now you will see boring 2 point perspective exercises. I hope to help others with my thread so it's not entirely egoistical^^'


Another small accomplishment in this year was drawing robot characters:





These are the first three fanarts where robotic characters appear and I am liking the idea of drawing something that is completely out of my comfort zone like robots. I hope to practice more for the next year Robot Day. If we consider the Wanted! - Pixel Art Collab I am participating then the number of works featuring robots increases to four robot characters drawn this year.


The only two things that made me sad were:


-not being able to attend Pico Day meetup (I hope one day to be able to see in person the many amazing people that make this site so awesome) not even the one in Dublin. It would be nice a NG event in continental Europe, I would go immediately if conditions are favourable.


-not being able to draw something for Pico Day because I was busy af with exams


Despite these two things I do really hope 2025 will blast off and on a personal level it already started since I have already sent my entry for the first 2025 collab (Petri Pals Collab) I will participate, you must be scouted to participate though. Thanks to that entry I learnt the importance of symmetry in pixel art when drawing frontal facing subjects and I could experiment with colours too.


Resolutions


Frankly I don't have any except for two:


-real life

Getting HPV vaccine. Yes, I keep forgetting because of university life and other stuff that keep me busy and forgetful.


-NG life

Getting better at pixel art


Final Thoughts


Ok, I have nothing more to add to this extremely long journal and I will thank everyone who will reach the end of this walltext XD

I wish you serene New Year and may all your dreams come true!


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17

Posted by ShangXian - December 20th, 2024


Hello everyone, sorry if I write a second journal the same day I posted another one but while I was browsing the artists news I stumbled across SheepSLAPS's journal and reading what happened broke my heart since I know her works and I enjoy a lot her art which I find highly inspirational to me. He art is fantastic, superb use of lighting, shades, the poses are dynamic and give a sense of strength, colours are very pleasant to look at and overall the level of creativity is neat as heck. Here the journal:


https://sheepslaps.newgrounds.com/news/post/1496891


Sadly I can't directly help because my family and I are living a delicate financial moment in which we have to decide some stuff linked to things we have, but I feel the necessity to help in a different way by spreading her journal. I know she has more fans than me, but this doesn't prevent a very small artist like me to try to attract the interest of those who follow me and might be able to help more incisively. So if you can help, or even spread her journal feel free to visit the link I posted. Thank you for reading and again sorry if I wrote another journal. Have a serene day/evening.


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6

Posted by ShangXian - December 20th, 2024


Hello everyone, I hope you are doing great here and irl. While I was browsing the art forum threads I stumbled across a thread called "Your most *controversial* art? in which people are encouraged to share their most controversial works or talk about their past experiences with their controversial works. One of the comments caught my interest because it showed a clear examples of effects of parasocial interactions that can turn into parasocial relationships.


What are parasocial interactions? They are a kind of psychological relationship experienced by an audience in their mediated encounters with performers in the mass media, particularly on television and on online platforms. Viewers or listeners come to consider media personalities as friends, despite having no or limited interactions with them. With social media this is enhanced because, social media introduces additional opportunities for parasocial relationships to intensify due to the more opportunities for intimate, reciprocal, and frequent interactions between the user and persona.


The term was first described from the perspective of media and communication studies. In 1956, Horton and Wohl explored the different interactions between mass media users and media figures and determined the existence of a parasocial relationship (PSR), where the user acts as though they are involved in a typical social relationship (1).


However do not think that PSI were born with mass media, they trace back in ancient times, when a person would establish a bond with political figures, gods or even spirits:


https://web.archive.org/web/20190307223332/http://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e7dc/325264aed0fedb0205e1242724b8cb7d7200.pdf


Since then, the term has been adopted by psychologists in furthering their studies of the social relationships that emerge between consumers of mass media and the figures they see represented there. Horton and Wohl suggested that for most people, parasocial interactions with personae complement their current social interactions, while also suggesting that there are some individuals who exhibit extreme parasociality, or they substitute parasocial interactions for actual social interactions (2).

However Perse and Rubin, in 1989, contested this idea, finding that parasocial interactions occurred as a natural byproduct of time spent with media figures (3).


Don't get me wrong parasocial interactions can have positive consequences such as identity formation and learning through media, but they do have negative consequences:


body image


A study was conducted to examine the relationship between media exposure and adolescents' body image. Specifically, researchers looked at parasocial relationships and the different motivations for self-comparison with a character. This study surveyed 391 7th and 8th grade students and found that media exposure negatively predicted body image. In addition to the direct negative impact, the study indicated that parasocial relationships with favorite characters, motivations to self-compare, and engagement in social comparison with characters amplified the negative effects on kids' body images. Furthermore, the researchers found that making social comparisons with favorite characters distorted actual, or ideal, body image and self-perception. Studies have been done exploring these effects of negative self-perception and body image across both male and female students:


https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320069675_Body_Image_Perceptions_Do_Gender_Differences_Exist


another study examined the parasocial relationships between men and superheroes; the study looked at muscular versus non-muscular superheroes and men who either did or did not develop a one-sided psychological bond with a superhero character. The results from this study indicated a significant impact on body image, particularly when exposed to muscular superhero characters. Research conducted by Ariana F. Young, Shira Gabriel, and Jordan L. Hollar in 2013 showed that men who did not form a parasocial relationship with a muscular superhero had poor self-perception and felt negative about their bodies after exposure to the muscular character. However, if the men had a PSR with the superhero, the negative effects on body satisfaction were eliminated (4).


And don't get me start with beauty filters on social media


unrealistic life expectations


There is research that has been done that highlights the negative role that parasocial relationships play in a person's own self esteem about their personal life. Often times, a person forms a parasocial relationship with a celebrity or influencer because of their personality and the seemingly appealing life that the person lives. Studies show that depression and a decrease in self-esteem can often occur in these relationships due to the person comparing their own life to the potentially unrealistic portrayal of the celebrity's life. This makes me think about the importance of thinking not twice but 1000 times before posting stuff that can affect negatively others if you are an influencer or celebrity...

People ignore that most celebrities and influencers hide the negative aspects of their life from public view.


aggression


A study done by Keren Eyal and Alan M. Rubin examined aggressive and violent television characters and the potential negative impacts they may have on viewers. The study was based on social cognitive theory and looked at trait aggression in viewers and identification and parasocial interaction with aggressive characters. The researchers measured trait aggression in each of the participants and compared that to the level of identification with aggressive characters. The study found that more aggressive viewers were more likely to identify with aggressive characters and further develop parasocial relationships with the aggressive characters (5).


Parasocial interaction has been linked to psychological attachment theory and its consequences have seen the same dramatic effects as real relationship breakups. In considering the relationship between parasocial interaction and attachment styles, Jonathan Cohen found that individuals who were more attached to certain television and media programs tended to be more invested in parasocial relationships. These parasocial interactions use similar psychological thought processes that are often used in real-life personal relationships.


https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0265407504041374?journalCode=spra


It is a very one-sided relationship. But despite the distress that media consumers experienced after a parasocial breakup was quite similar to that of a social relationship, the emotional distress experienced after the parasocial breakup was weaker than that of the real life interpersonal relationship.


Social media is designed to be a new channel through which parasocial interaction/relationship can be formed. Research has shown that interacting with individuals through blogs and social media can influence the perceptions of those individuals. As Internet users become more active on social media platforms, followers often feel more engaged with them, making the parasocial relationships stronger. And this leads to another problem that arises with parasocial interactions: the fake image a person creates around the person they think to have a relationship with.


This is what happened to the person who commented on the thread. People who follow her fabricated a mental image of her and her art as innocent and innocent-looking, they attached her a sticker, a category from which she cannot escape or she will ruin their fake images of her and her art.


Her art is mostly everyone-oriented but this doesn't prevent her from drawing more adult oriented stuff and she has all the right to do so, she explained it well in the forum thread. This is a clear example of negative effects of parasocial interactions, just because a person mainly draws a specific theme or themes, it doesn't mean they are not allowed to go out their usual zone.


And this brings to what made me want to write this journal. Now that you briefly know what parasocial interactions are and their effects (I don't want to dig in depth not to make this blog too long), I want to clarify what I want to do with my art here. The first thing I did was to create personal collections of my own works to make navigation of my artworks more easily accessible to the viewer and follower, and to help myself to keep track of what I do in order not get lost in my creations one I hit big numbers (+200 works i.e.):







As you may have noticed my art tend to be for most part E-rated with innocent-looking characters but I also have pieces that are marked as T or even M because I love exploring darker themes and I like drawing gore stuff sometimes as way to both study blood and how it works on different materials and surfaces, and to sublime negative emotions I may experience due to real life stuff. So to everyone who follows me, especially minors, be prepared that I can post bloody pieces, delicate topics or dark themes along with my more light-hearted and silly content.


This artwork for example was a huge emotional relief because I was experiencing a really annoying event that even made me lose appetite for four days straight:



This piece is also tame compared to what I can draw, but I tend to mark as T blood pieces, weapons used in combat situations, minor violence, light-themed innuendos and trivial language while I mark as M everything that is more extreme. Now I don't think I will post A stuff and by A I mean everything marked as M but ten thousand heavy in terms of themes. I won't post sexual NSFW stuff because it's not my thing and it would be very tame (sorry to disappoint all horny people here ;P, jk), similar to Kunaigirl's adult-oriented works because those times I drew sexual works it always involved tenderness, affection, cuddles, kisses and never vulgar horniness. Only exception to this personal rule of mine are artistic nudes because I consider them works of art since the human body is a natural work of art to admire and appreciate.


So yeah, you have been warned about what you are about to see here, mostly SFW stuff but sometimes I need to explore more dark waters. And remember that you can toggle filters in order to avoid seeing more mature stuff, so if you see something you don't want and you didn't even pay attention to disable said filter, it's all your fault then. I always turn off adult filter when I want to enjoy some fanarts or movies in the Portal. See you next time and have a nice day/evening!


References and footnotes


(1) Horton, D.; Wohl, R. (1956). "Mass communication and para-social interaction: Observation on intimacy at a distance". Psychiatry. 19 (3): 215–229. doi:10.1080/00332747.1956.11023049. PMID 13359569

(2) Ibidem

(3) Perse, Elizabeth; Rubin, Rebecca (1989). "Attribution in social and parasocial relationships". Communication Research. 16 (1): 59–77. doi:10.1177/009365089016001003. S2CID 145109069

(4) Young, Ariana F.; Gabriel, Shira; Hollar, Jordan L. (January 2013). "Batman to the rescue! The protective effects of parasocial relationships with muscular superheroes on men's body image". Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. 49 (1): 173–177. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2012.08.003

(5) Eyal, Keren; Rubin, Alan M. (January 2003). "Viewer Aggression and Homophily, Identification, and Parasocial Relationships With Television Characters". Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. 47 (1): 77–98. doi:10.1207/s15506878jobem4701_5. S2CID 143790982


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5

Posted by ShangXian - December 14th, 2024


In this post I mentioned that I would have started talking about the original Journey to the West that will inspire works such as Saiyuki by Minekura and Dragon Ball series by Toriyama (rest in peace). Journey to the West has strong roots in Chinese folk religion, Chinese mythology, Chinese Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoist and Buddhist folklore, and the pantheon of Taoist immortals and Buddhist bodhisattvas are still reflective of certain Chinese religious attitudes today, while being the inspiration of many modern manhwa, manhua, manga and anime series. The novel is at once a comic adventure story, a humorous satire of Chinese bureaucracy, a source of spiritual insight, and an extended allegory. This won't be a fresh post because it will be mostly based on these posts I wrote years ago and posted in my Tumblr account that is dedicated to Saiyuki (one of my favourite Anime), but at the same time I will add further info I gained over the years and it will be improved in terms of writing after I learned some basics of academic writing even though I don't label my posts as "academic", more like hybrid ones. This also means I will cut in six parts these posts in order to respect the original ones in terms of number. So, without further ado, let's start.


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Let's start by saying that Saiyuki is a Japanese word, specifically it is the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word (西遊記) Xijou Ji and means "Journey to the West". It is the name of one of the great Chinese novels, belonging to the group of the great classical novels. The group usually includes the following works: Ming dynasty novels Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Water Margin, Journey to the West, and The Plum in the Golden Vase; and Qing dynasty novels Dream of the Red Chamber and The Scholars


There have been a number of groupings. Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Journey to the West, Water Margin and The Plum in the Golden Vase were grouped by publishers in the early Qing and promoted as Four Masterworks. Because of its explicit descriptions of sex, The Plum in the Golden Vase was banned for most of its existence. Despite this, Lu Xun, like many if not most scholars and writers, place it among the top Chinese novels (1).


These pillars of Chinese literature have influenced not only the literature, but also other arts such as the theatre, the cinema not just in China, but also in other countries such as Vietnam, Korea, Taiwan and Japan.


The modern 100-chapter form of Journey to the West dates from the 16th century (2). Embellished stories based on Xuanzang's journey to India had circulated through oral storytelling for centuries. They appeared in book form as early as the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279) (3). The Yongle Encyclopedia, completed in 1408, contains excerpts of a version of the story written in colloquial Chinese, and a Korean book from 1423 also includes a fragment of that story (4). The earliest surviving edition of Journey to the West was published in Nanjing in 1592. Two earlier editions were published between 1522 and 1566, but no copies of them survived (5). The authorship of Journey to the West is traditionally ascribed to Wu Cheng'en, but the question is complicated by the fact that much of the novel's material originated from folk tales (6).


I don't want to go too in depth on the work's authorship because it's not the purpose of this blog and it would become very long and maybe too academic for some readers, so let's continue with the story.


The novel has 100 chapters that can be divided into four unequal parts. For the purposes of these posts I will only focus on the second part which talks about the adventures of the Buddhist monk Xuanzang (actually inspired by a monk, Xuanzang/Tang Sanzang (唐三藏) of the Tang dynasty) who must take a dangerous journey from China to India to retrieve important sutras not available in China. As journey companions of this fantastic journey (in every sense) we have the Monkey King Sun Wukong (孫悟空), the pig Zhu Bajie (豬八戒) and the sand demon Zha Wujing (沙悟淨) and the horse Yu Long (玉龍) or Bai Long Ma (白龍馬) who is none other than the third son of the Dragon King of the South Sea and he is specifically a dragon prince.


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from: https://bangqu.com/wVz7gN.html


As I said, the story is inspired by a real character who actually traveled to India to recover some sutras, since the various translations of some Buddhist texts in China said everything and its opposite, and also certain words were not translatable. So Wu Cheng'en was inspired by another text known as Great Tang Records on the Western Regions.


I stop for now, next time I would like to talk more about Great Tang Records on the Western Regions.


References and footnotes


(1) Lu Xun, A Brief History of Chinese Fiction (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1959), pp. 232–234

(2) Chang, Kang-i Sun (2010). "Literature of the early Ming to mid-Ming (1375–1572)". In Chang, Kang-i Sun (ed.). The Cambridge History of Chinese Literature, Volume II: From 1375. Cambridge University Press. pp. 1–62. ISBN 978-0-521-85559-4.

(3) Ibidem

(4) Ibidem

(5) Ibidem

(6) Jenner, William John Francis (1984). "Translator's Afterword". Journey to the West. Vol. 4 (Seventh ed.). Beijing: Foreign Languages Press. pp. 2341–2343

https://bangqu.com/wVz7gN.html


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