Guild icon
The Associated Worlds
Offtopic / random
Irrelevant whatever.
Avatar
Overmind 01/27/2019 9:47 PM
Not everyone on board was necessarily from an advanced civilization.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/27/2019 9:49 PM
wichita, kansas (edited)
21:49
Oh lord
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 1:56 AM
"...But Will There Be Problems? But no matter how much we try to explain the meta-battle for which libertarianism was actually designed, and how important winning your right to control your own body is for the long-term ethics and success of all mankind {See <0823>} — inevitably, the nonlibertarian will fall back on his government school training to ask a question like, “Well, freedom to use our own bodies as we each choose sounds great, but what if … well … Fred is lazy?” “… Or Fred over-eats? … Or Fred is prideful? … Or Fred doesn’t like Armenians? … Or Fred doesn’t want to kill Gadaffi? … Or Fred would rather buy cheap imports? … Or Fred doesn’t want to contribute to my charity? … Or … “What then, Mr. Smarty Pants Libertarian, with your “All Men Should Own Their Own Bodies”!!? How do you solve that problem!? Don’t we need rulers (to enslave us) then?” {See <1055>}"
01:56
Man, I love Dennis Pratt
01:56
Just rediscovered his stuff
Avatar
Xveers 01/28/2019 3:55 AM
My only honest question is, what happens if Fred comes and Molotov cocktail's my house in the middle of the night? The rest of what Fred does doesn't concern or affect my enjoyment of my life (unless I'm some kind of nosy busybody, in which case I should be told to get bent).
Avatar
Enderminion 01/28/2019 7:44 AM
sue for damages, sue for injuries, sue for trespassing, sue for attempted murder
07:44
and if he doesn't show, hire bounty hunters, dead or alive
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 7:50 AM
Adam Smith outlined three essential functions of government: National defense Justice And the public goods required to maintain a free market like transportation infrastructure and education
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 10:41 AM
Found that one I mentioned https://eldraeverse.com/2017/01/07/with-justice-for-all/
Alistair Young
…With Justice For All
SYSTEMIC INTEGRATED TECHNOLOGIES TICKET-TRACKING: CASE 921632 From: Supervisor of Police, Behibehin Rock Mail Subject: HELP US NOW YOUR SYSTEM LOCKED EVERYONE UP AND WE CANT FIX IT WHAT THE —…
Thumbnail
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 11:28 AM
Point of order: that’s not what public goods are. ‘S a technical term, meaning goods that are both non-rivalrous (providing them for one person doesn’t mean there is less for everyone else) and non-excludable (you provide them for one person, you can’t not provide them for everyone else). That’s a much smaller list than one might think.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:29 AM
I think what they’re really getting at is ‘what about inelastic demand, like utilities etc?’
11:30
For one, I’d say that inelastic demand just means incipient monopolies have more competition and there is more drive to do so
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:30 AM
Oh God my school reeks of burning popcorn.
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 11:31 AM
Yeah, but in the interests of clarity, we need to use the right terms right, belike. On the other: well, I’m pretty certain I’ve linked before to assorted texts on how law, etc. can be privately provided, so I won’t recapitulate myself.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:31 AM
Also, while we can’t build a dozen power lines or water pipes into homes we can also do it differently
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:31 AM
And I forgot to bring a dust mask 😷.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:31 AM
Say via rectennas or personal reservoirs
11:31
@Tassadar that’s nothing my school reeks of gas
11:32
As in gasoline
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:32 AM
Jeez. Curious, why?
11:32
Is there a leek?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:32 AM
The school staff drives gas golf carts everywhere
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:32 AM
leak
11:32
The hell?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:32 AM
It’s not a fire I’m worried about it’s getting neurological damage
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:33 AM
Indoors?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:33 AM
Not indoors but under a roof
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:33 AM
Oh good.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:33 AM
They use some EVs but also a lot of ice golf carts
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:33 AM
Indoors would be a risk of CO poisoning.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:34 AM
Ha
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 11:34 AM
As a side note: a thing to always bear in mind is that literally every argument you hear in justification of government is a post-hoc rationalization, because they’re all running on a paradigm inherited from Sargon of Akkad and his brute squad. No-one’s actually sat down with a clean sheet of paper and said, okay, so what do we need here. This doesn’t necessarily make them invalid, and yet.
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:35 AM
Who is Sargon of Akkad?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:35 AM
I’m well aware, but the ARW and French, Russian, Spanish revolutions etc provided a chance for a good break with that
11:35
@Tassadar ancient ruler of Akkadia (edited)
11:36
Like ‘2000BC’ ancient
Avatar
Tassadar 01/28/2019 11:37 AM
Merchant of Venice paper due a week from today.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 11:37 AM
The Catalonian model and the Free Territory etc were attempts at ‘anarchy...’ but not a voluntary anarchy (edited)
11:38
Collectivization and redistribution was enforced by militias at gunpoint
11:38
Some anarchy all right
11:41
Rojava or more accurately the Democratic Federation Northern Syria isn’t as explicitly socialist as most people claim
11:48
In regards to Eclipse Phase Titan: I wonder how an anarchist political party isn’t a contradiction
11:48
They’re engaging with the very structure of power itself and using it, so how is that anarchist
Avatar
o11o1 01/28/2019 11:56 AM
working to abolish rule set by other parties
11:56
its a bit like asking why the Communist part in the us still votes on things
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 11:59 AM
There's three states in India that voted to adopt communist economies, two of which later voted to switch back.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 12:05 PM
Fair I guess
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 5:06 PM
Given the anti-billionaire-fest going on in politics these days, here's an opportunity for fanfic involving the First Distributed Exclavine Republic sailing one of its habs into cislunar orbit, with a passel of sovereign liability management consultants at one end, the vulture capitalists at the other, and lots of space for lease in the middle. 'Cause sometimes opportunity knocks, and sometimes it just rant-whines on Twitter.
17:08
Economic piracy is their business model, after all. Sail into orbit, waving 3.592% tax rates and with banking privacy laws clenched in their teeth. Yarrrr, mateys, we be laissez-faire.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 5:24 PM
Most people would be confused
17:25
And then predictably the average blood pressure of progressives rises dramatically
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 5:26 PM
if I'm not raising everyone's blood pressure, I'm doing it wrong.
17:28
Well, okay, that's not strictly true. More accurately, if I start caring about whose blood pressure I might be raising, then I'm doing it wrong.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 01/28/2019 5:28 PM
Causing fools to self-terminate through aneurysm is a moral good. Change My Mind.
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 01/28/2019 5:29 PM
🎵 "If there was somewhere else to go, You know I'd be the first to leave..." 🎵 (edited)
Avatar
Ian Bruene 01/28/2019 5:29 PM
I think they consider people being able to leave to be worse
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 5:34 PM
@Ian Bruene you have a responsibility to other human beings because you and they were born in the same geographic region
17:34
this makes sense
17:34
also, we shouldn't let people starve because they were born in the wrong place and capitalism's an exploitative lottery. /s (edited)
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 01/28/2019 5:35 PM
you dropped this: /s
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 5:35 PM
oh yep
17:35
Also something something offshore wealth, inherited wealth, neo-feudalism!!!
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 01/28/2019 5:37 PM
Poe's Law is a harsh mistress
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 5:37 PM
(just ignore that 40% of current billionaires were self-made, 'mkay?)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/28/2019 6:12 PM
really? I've seen numbers closer to 10%
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 6:24 PM
The Forbes list claims 67%
18:24
I can't find any quick stats
18:24
But it would make sense since Forbes don't count intergenerational families holding wealth between each other (edited)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/28/2019 6:26 PM
Hm. I wonder if different measures of starting wealth influence things too? Like if one is counting strictly billionares, so someone doesn't count as inheriting it if they started with 100million and increased it to over a billion, but other data sets say it doesn't count as 'self made' unless you started with under 100 thousand?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 6:30 PM
Small loan of a million dollars.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 6:35 PM
Cosigning several loans of tens of millions of dollars.
18:35
Transferring properties worth about $413 million in current USD.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 6:37 PM
s m a l l o a n
18:37
(/s)
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 6:38 PM
Well, a million is about right for a McDonalds franchise.
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 6:42 PM
So, on a completely different note, anyone know where I might be able to lay my hands on English translations of the Strugatskys' "Noon Universe" novels?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 6:56 PM
I know an english translation of Roadside Picnic
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 7:55 PM
So you know, Ken Burnside once said that the problem behind a lot of libertarianism is that the proponents think they can find a solution that doesn't leave some group or person or another desperately unhappy
19:55
At first, my pluralistic half balked at this, but the more time passes the more I actually agree with this premise
19:56
Except that a lot of the people who would be desperately unhappy with a libertopia are the types whose feelings most of us disregard. Like those of slavers etc.
19:57
Not all of them, but a lot.
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 7:57 PM
Going off to eat right now, but as a quick note, my response to that is essentially that if someone's happiness depends on their ability to force people to do shit for them, then they are more than happy to bite my plump consensualist ass.
👏 2
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 8:04 PM
If you can figure out how to pull off a society where everyone has access to all the basic necessities of life without some people being forced to give up something let me know.
20:06
As is, there's too many people and too little arable land available. It would take significant advances in mini-facturing and/or space travel and terraforming to change that in a way even close to ethical.
Avatar
Xveers 01/28/2019 8:18 PM
As an aside, I generally agree with what Ken Burnside has to say
Avatar
Enderminion 01/28/2019 8:46 PM
someone will always be complaining about something
☝ 3
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:01 PM
There are, by and large, three responses to life’s little problems. 1. Figure out a way to solve them with the help of friends, colleagues, and money. 2. Shutting the fuck up and dealing. 3. EPIC THEFT AND SLAVERY SPREE. One of these is moral, two are ethical, and the other one is what most everyone does.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 9:03 PM
Have you ever experienced poverty?
Avatar
Enderminion 01/28/2019 9:04 PM
you forgot 4. Do nothing and keep complaining
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:05 PM
There have been... unpleasant times in my life when I’ve been eating one meal a day to save money and being doorstepped by process servers, if that counts.
21:07
Nonetheless, being thus broke and hungry did not convince me that the world or anyone else in it owed me anything.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:10 PM
I'm the only one who hasn't. The closest to the 'hard life lessons' I've ever gotten was being continually grilled on by academia to do better
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 9:11 PM
It’s not about the world “owing you”, it’s about what people have to do to survive and limiting the strain on society
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:11 PM
And to be fair, it was a wakeup call I needed
21:12
Otherwise I never would have had my eyes open to anything greater and most likely wound up aimlessly coasting (edited)
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/28/2019 9:13 PM
Homelessness costs big cities more than providing housing for them would
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:14 PM
But enough about that. Why does anyone think someone being, say, weaker or more mentally or physically ill makes them more entitled to people's labor?
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:14 PM
Survival is not the highest value one ought to aspire to, and as such certainly isn’t a justification to throw out ethics. If you kill and eat your fellow survivor in a plane crash to survive, you’re still a murderer.
☝ 2
21:14
By the same principle, if you take someone’s goods to survive, you’re still a thief, and if you appropriate the value of their labor, you’re still a slaver.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:15 PM
(mumble mumble rabble bosses appropriate their subordinate's labor so why don't they count? /s) (edited)
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:15 PM
(Er, no, they don’t.)
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:16 PM
I really need to keep using the /s
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:18 PM
Now I will certainly agree that there are lots of things that can be done and at least some of them that should be done to make the world a generally better place - which is why I subscribe to a consensualist UBI theory - but that is a matter of enlightened self-interest, charity, and goodwill.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:18 PM
And yeah, employment is generally a voluntary contract. As stated up above, it is actually important to read it. It's not some EULA you can thumb through because it's boilerplate.
21:19
Plus, well... one probably shouldn't ignore EULAs either, because as questionable as they are they can be quite instructive.
21:20
I have read through a few of them and how they resort to the corp's HQ location for jurisdiction. (edited)
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:20 PM
tl;dr It is praiseworthy to give; it is no sin to receive; but it’s pure-quill fucking evil to take. There ain’t no ethical exceptions you can write yourself.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:24 PM
and at this point it starts getting to why the accusations of 'psychopathy' get thrown around, because a lot of people seemingly can't tell the difference between this and just yelling "TOUGH LUCK COMPADRE" as one rides off to the distance firing guns into the air or some cowboy metaphor. (edited)
Avatar
Enderminion 01/28/2019 9:26 PM
I know a guy who didn't get into the Marines because of that
Avatar
Overmind 01/28/2019 9:26 PM
And greed. I always love being accused of greed by politicians proposing to help themselves to billions of other people’s dollars. If irony could power turbines, I’d own the friggjn’ energy market by now.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/28/2019 9:29 PM
I would suppose it goes double, triple or quadruple if it's the kind of politician who wants to raise the defense budget or give subsidies to their favored voting bloc (edited)
21:31
And if they say 'selfish,' I suppose the irony meter goes off like the Tsar Bomba
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/29/2019 7:15 PM
This seems like a misunderstanding of continuity identity theory https://www.gocomics.com/saturday-morning-breakfast-cereal/2019/01/28?ct=v&cti=1790252
Embedded image
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/29/2019 7:16 PM
His non comic books suggest he knows it fine, so here he's making a joke
Avatar
Zarpaulek 01/29/2019 7:17 PM
That's still her husband, he's just made out of nanobots now.
Avatar
Overmind 01/29/2019 7:20 PM
Seems more like a standard-issue dose of Carbon Atoms Are Special (tm).
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 01/29/2019 7:20 PM
Nah, seems more like she's messing with him and taking a retort too far
Avatar
Overmind 01/29/2019 7:22 PM
Both could also be an option. I mean, as long as one's going in for mysticisms, one might as well collect the whole set.
Avatar
Overmind 01/29/2019 8:24 PM
Having been watching more of The Grand Tour , I put a little more thought into insane supercar design, Empire-style. Conclusion: forget the fission core; too heavy. Basically, the Ridiculoso is a thin shell of magnesium and aerogel wrapped around a superconducting-loop accumulator, powering the overpowered motors driving the thing. And also the sextet of miniature electrothermal rockets on the roof needed to provide downforce when cornering. Or going straight. Or trying not to blow away in a light breeze.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 01/30/2019 2:01 AM
Billionaires are outliers
02:02
You probably won’t learn much from studying their upbringing or habits
Avatar
KAL_9000 01/30/2019 7:42 AM
The post the meme is reacting to is real. Nothing I say could possibly add to this.
Image attachment
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/30/2019 7:43 AM
urgh
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 01/30/2019 7:55 AM
"call CPS"
Avatar
KAL_9000 01/30/2019 7:56 AM
I would suggest vaccination, but, come on, I can't expect these people to be rational...
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 01/30/2019 8:02 AM
I think we can safely assume that they mean anything other than the actual best option. Isolate your child from potential vectors, I guess
Avatar
KAL_9000 01/30/2019 8:03 AM
so... keep him/her away from your community of fellow anti-vaxxers
Avatar
o11o1 01/30/2019 9:01 AM
does the measles vaccination work if you get it like a day before the actual measel's exposure though? I'm pretty sure there's a warmup time where the immune system has to actually process the vaccine
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/30/2019 9:01 AM
I think it's 24-48 hrs?
Avatar
o11o1 01/30/2019 9:02 AM
....so two days. huh
09:02
that's faster than I expected
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/30/2019 9:03 AM
"Measles vaccine, given as MMR, may be effective if given within the first 3 days (72 hours) after exposure to measles."
09:03
so apparently negative 72 hrs o.o
Avatar
o11o1 01/30/2019 9:07 AM
huh. i guess Measles is one of those that tries to hide once it's infected a host, and then builds and builds up until eventually it can't hide anymore.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/30/2019 9:08 AM
I know one of the reasons its so nasty is it has a longish but I think infectious incubation period.
09:08
I presume getting the vaccine during that incubation period sort of cuts it off at the pass
Avatar
o11o1 01/30/2019 9:08 AM
so you don't realize it's an outbreak until it's been there a week
09:08
the vaccine tells the immune system what to look for when it's doing the usual checks
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 01/30/2019 9:09 AM
Pretty much. That's why all outbreaks come with warnings about "if you were in x place you have been exposed"
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:14 PM
Acausal materials science.
16:14
Transmit forces from the future.
Avatar
o11o1 02/01/2019 4:18 PM
even just transmitting from the unexpected past could be handy (edited)
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:22 PM
Conduct heat away from an appliance before it's produced.
16:22
Or conduct it away before it gets to the other end.
16:22
Temporal loop heat batteries.
16:24
The weapons radiators warm up, and the crew groans.
16:24
"Are we going on an adventure today?"
16:25
"Always keep your radiators extended! You might need them tomorrow!"
Avatar
Overmind 02/01/2019 4:26 PM
Y'know, technically, inasmuch as vector-control in general works by nonlocal momentum transfer, ain't no particular reason that said transfer has to be nonlocal only in space.
📌 1
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:27 PM
>man goes flying across the room
Avatar
Overmind 02/01/2019 4:27 PM
Technically, you could combine this with a standard acausal oracle to steal the momentum from shots that would have hit you and use it to move yourself out of the way, such that they never would have connected in the first place.
📌 1
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:27 PM
>well, crap, guess I have to offend someone now
Avatar
Overmind 02/01/2019 4:27 PM
Behold, the I "I Was Never There" shield.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:29 PM
You could make projectile weapons powered by repeatedly punching them in the direction of the target.
16:29
Just store up that momentum for later use.
16:30
"kick the can" takes on a whole new meaning
16:33
New precursor artifact: An immovable object… for now
Avatar
Overmind 02/01/2019 4:33 PM
This also pairs nicely with the ray shielding system using a wormhole with one end in the relative future, which catches lasers that are going to be fired at you in the future and uses them to fire back at the enemy in the past. Conveniently, by observing through the past end when a laser comes out of it, you can detect exactly where the future end needs to be to catch the laser when it's fired.
📌 1
16:34
This, and other "Fuck You, I'm God"-level technologies coming soon to your friendly local merchanter-at-arms...
📌 1
Avatar
Sevoris 02/01/2019 4:34 PM
Causality: screams in a corner
Avatar
gollark 02/01/2019 4:34 PM
Hacking space-time for fun and profit™
16:34
There should probably be a company which does that with some sort of witty name.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:35 PM
Sometime in the distant future, the immovable object will suddenly become a pinball whizzing through space as it's buffeted by all the momenta thrown at it through the millenia of experiments by confused civilizations.
16:36
(amusingly time-compressed, naturally)
Avatar
Overmind 02/01/2019 4:36 PM
So, basically, you can build an immovable object that at an unpredictable future time turns into an irresistable force?
16:37
(Certainly if you line all the momentum up right.) ((Notes this down under Good Pranks for Asshole Precursors.))
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:37 PM
:D
16:38
Perhaps it was a "gift" from someone who thought they'd live until it was set off.
16:39
They must've gotten the time constant off by a couple orders of magnitude of orders of magnitude.
Avatar
o11o1 02/01/2019 4:40 PM
Even just 'pausing' an object and applying forces to it a bunch of times so that all the force goes off at once for one really giant one could be a nifty trick
16:40
I think there's a Rune in breath of the wild that does that
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 4:40 PM
Or maybe it's cyclic, but they lost it after the first time it punched through a wall and into deep space.
16:40
(or "lost" it after the tenth time it pulled that trick)
Avatar
Overmind 02/01/2019 4:42 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qfu1Ux1tX6A
Budd Inverse
Men In Black [1997] Practical joke by the Great Attractor
Avatar
Sevoris 02/01/2019 4:52 PM
I still find Zs non-reaction hillarious.
16:54
If there‘s a better way to show "He‘s seen everything" it is that.
17:00
Z must be what experienced Eldrae Godbotherers and Arceotechnoligists are like.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/01/2019 5:01 PM
"it's a lamp"
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/01/2019 8:35 PM
http://titaniumphysicists.brachiolopemedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Rlyeh.pdf speaking of doing studies on Eldrich abominations, have the paper "Possible Bubbles of Spacetime Curvature in the South Pacific"
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 2:28 PM
You know what pisses me off most about Undertale? It isn't even by far the first indie game to have the whole pacifist shtick Iji did that better, with better writing and more atmosphere, seven years earlier
14:28
also it's free
Avatar
Overmind 02/02/2019 7:49 PM
On the general topic of eldritch abominations, I think the "proper" attitude in the 'verse may be exemplified by Steve? from Minecraft. Namely: open a portal to Hell on Monday, start strip-mining it for resources Tuesday, by the end of the week you're running trains through it to save on distance.
19:49
Image attachment
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:51 PM
What about something like the Blight from Red Markets
Avatar
Overmind 02/02/2019 7:52 PM
"If you meet Yog-Sothoth on the road and don't offer it a partnership in a highly lucrative transport franchise, you're doing it wrong."
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 7:52 PM
"I am the gatekeeper and the gate" "Can I set a toll booth up in front of you?"
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:53 PM
'No matter how far you zoom in it's The Same Discolored Shit Aaaaaagggh'
Avatar
Overmind 02/02/2019 7:54 PM
Not familiar with that one.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:55 PM
Some weird black inky goop that turns people into raving zombies, breaks conservation of energy, and doesn't differentiate no matter how far your microscope zooms in
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 7:56 PM
Sounds more like a field than a proper substance.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:56 PM
The creator basically wrote it as a way to get you to stop thinking about the implications
19:56
It was so impossible to study scientists literally went slightly insane from it
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/02/2019 7:57 PM
It looks like black shit.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:57 PM
'Study sickness,' it was called
Avatar
Overmind 02/02/2019 7:57 PM
INCOMPATIBLE UNIVERSE PARAMETERS DETECTED. REDO FROM START.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/02/2019 7:57 PM
It explicitly states that looking at it under a microscope you see just black shit, no identifiable markers.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:58 PM
But the creator didn't think of mass spectrometers
19:58
So there's that
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 7:58 PM
it just turns the spectrogram black
19:58
:V
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 7:59 PM
UNREAL BLACK THINGS
Avatar
Overmind 02/02/2019 7:59 PM
But, y'know, anything with that many magic qualities is gonna get the shit scienced out of it. Take it apart and keep the useful pieces. If nothing currently available can science it, they'll stick it in the vaults where they keep stuff needing MOAR BETTER SCIENCING.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 7:59 PM
Whatever CASE it is, it's probably "BLACK"
20:00
CASE FULIGINOUS MALAISE
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:01 PM
You cut it apart with a scalpel and it just divides into flakes of more indifferentiable black crap
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 8:01 PM
Can you dilute it? :V
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:02 PM
To be fair in-universe there are immune people and a 'treatment' that turns you into a half-infected person that only turns after they die
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/02/2019 8:02 PM
The writers of Red Markets were probably trying some commentary on capitalism, the internet survived the zombie apocalypse thanks to something like Project Loon, most enclaves in the Loss charge rent to live there (in crypt or driver's licenses), and player characters are assumed to be looters for hire saving up to bribe their way across the border wall into the Recession where the US government retreated.
20:03
Also, the government makes that "treatment" by cutting up the immune.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:04 PM
To be fair Caleb Stokes probably didn't really consider all the angles of attack
20:05
Like, what happens if you get the Blight under a mass spectrometer or smash it up in a particle accelerator
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/02/2019 8:05 PM
There is one Enclave that uses zombies on treadmills to generate electricity.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:05 PM
Trololololol
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 8:05 PM
hm, so that's why Stokes' Law only works under a limited set of conditions
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:07 PM
What's the Blight's molar mass etc
20:08
Literally the first thing I thought of when the Gnat was talking about its inscrutability was 'mass spectrometers'
20:09
Putting it under a mass spectrometer would tell us things
20:09
Even an absence of intelligible results would tell us something
20:09
Anything rrrgh
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 8:11 PM
If it's infinitely granular, its mass to charge ratio will be zero.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:11 PM
EXACTLY
20:11
Get it in the CERN or some kind of atomsmasher
20:13
What happens when you slam some raw Blight into photons going at 0.9999c
20:13
What particles do you get
20:13
fhawrgafdv
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 8:14 PM
photons going at .9999c?
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/02/2019 8:14 PM
Given some of the Aberrants, I'd guess a portal to R'lyeh
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/02/2019 8:14 PM
seems like you already have bigger problems
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/02/2019 8:14 PM
I'd hope he meant protons.
20:14
Or electrons.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/02/2019 8:15 PM
Protons
20:15
Whatever they do at CERN anyway
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:03 AM
I am frustrated. My ex-friend helped me upgrade my desktop a few years ago, including a new motherboard. Apparently in the process he decided to swap out my copy of Windows 10 Home for a cracked version of Windows 10 Pro, instead of getting my key off the motherboard. I have learnt this because I now have a horrible watermark that has appeared with the latest Windows update and went digging for why.
00:04
And apparently I can't even buy a new copy of windows and put it on the machine, because I'd need to buy PRO and that's $500 on the windows store
00:06
Does this mean I need to buy Windows on some sort of installation media, reformate the hard drive, and install everything from scratch? (I'm a chemist damnit, not a comp sci specialist, I'm having trouble finding guides on what to do)
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:35 AM
Unfortunately I've never installed Windows.
00:35
But I could help you replace it with Linux :V
00:35
(though it's probable that Linux isn't what you want)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:36 AM
I may take you up on that for my laptop at some point. I have attempted to install Linux 3 times on 3 different machines over the years, and it's blown up in my face every time
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:36 AM
It's dead simple now, as long as you pick a good distribution.
00:37
Both my laptop and desktop are dual boot, with no issues from Linux.
00:37
(and Windows doesn't get a say because I never boot to it anymore)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:39 AM
old desktop: tried duel booting with Ubuntu, went to local computer club for help, got sexually harassed and told women shouldn't be at uni. Decided only horrible people used Linux and didn't touch it for 5 years. 2 laptops ago: laptop was very old and very out of date. Ex-friend suggested we put Linux on. Ubuntu was too big. So we wrestled ArchLinux onto the thing. Discovered afterwards that it is possible to put an OS on a machine and have, quite literally, only kilobytes of space left over. So I could do approximately nothing with it. I still have that machine because I haven't figured out what to do with it yet. Presumably take to be recycled. 1 laptop ago: laptop died in mysterious circumstances on a plane flight. Different friend tried lots of fixes, including installing Gentoo. It caught fire.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:40 AM
I see you have had the Brussels sprout experience.
00:41
Arch isn't the lightest distro there is—though it's not far off—and it's certainly not the distro anyone should choose to be introduced to Linux.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:42 AM
Yeah, I hated Linux-using people by default for years because it seemed all the ones I met in undergrad were grade A arseholes. Now I know that there are decent people using Linux, but that something about it has it in for me.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:42 AM
Linux a decade ago was much less new user-friendly than it is now.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:42 AM
So one day I am going to get a functional machine using it, just to thumb my nose at it
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:43 AM
I mean, wifi drivers actually work now.
00:43
(sometimes better than the Windows ones >.>)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:44 AM
my current laptop has a tiny amount of memory, to the point the Win 10 distro it came with is chewing up 4/5 of the space and won't install all updates. So that one will be my next 'will you catch fire?' Linux attempt
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:44 AM
If you do decide to go for it, back up your data and ask me on a weekend.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:44 AM
sorry, hard drive
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:44 AM
(if you could even fit important data on its drive in the first place)
00:45
I expect you'd elect to wipe Windows from that one, since it's hardly usable in the first place.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:45 AM
I'm mostly using it to browse the web and as a mobile word processing station. So stuff like taking to gaming nights and it has my character sheets on
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:45 AM
ah, Linux can satisfy those needs easy
00:46
Are you attached to MS Office?
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:46 AM
Yeah. But I want to fix the Windows problems on my desktop first before I try, because I want a machine I can use to look up videos on the next when I crack open the box of this one
00:46
I use Excel a lot. Word a small amount. The rest can go jump.
00:47
So I'll need to find a decent spreadsheet program.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:47 AM
Have you tried Open- or LibreOffice before?
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:47 AM
OpenOffice, over a decade ago, nearly failed a physics unit because it couldn't open macros
00:47
but I presume LibreOffice has improved on that
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:47 AM
(LibreOffice is the one you should go looking for—OpenOffice is in "end of lifetime")
00:48
I can't vouch for that feature personally, but it's not problematic for my use.
00:49
You might want to export your documents to .doc instead of .docx (and change default save options) to ensure compatibility in preparation for switching over.
00:49
(most of the time .docx is fine, but it's the times it's not that you care about)
00:49
Or you could just start using it now.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:49 AM
I have a Spreadsheet of Doom I use as a test case. If it opens in a non-Office program, that program is fine for my needs.
00:50
And I'll probably need to investigate for this computer anyway, unless I want to purchase Office; mine is 2007 and apparently not receiving security updates any more 😦
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:52 AM
"security updates" for a word processor?
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:52 AM
Given just how MANY attacks sideload off Office files? Hell yes.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:53 AM
If you're using Office 2007, you can almost certainly achieve feature parity with LibreOffice with no problems.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/03/2019 12:53 AM
that's good to know 😃
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/03/2019 12:54 AM
As for attacks sideloading on Office files: I think that just Doesn't Work on Linux.
00:56
Things are intrinsically more secure with the way Linux's permissions work, and besides that Linux workstation users are too small a group for anyone to seriously attack.
Avatar
gollark 02/03/2019 3:41 AM
Linux permissions are, honestly, not much use in desktop environments, since if an attack on a program gets it to run arbitrary code as your user, it can still access your files and stuff. All it can't do is poke at the system files (owned by root).
Avatar
o11o1 02/03/2019 10:16 AM
LibreOffice also runs on windows just fine. That's what I use for both personal and work.
10:17
Though, there have been several times when I can't safely edit the docuements my manager is producing because things like graphs made out of raw boxes and lines can de-format to unreadability.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/03/2019 10:26 AM
Embedded image
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/03/2019 2:37 PM
The thing is
14:37
There's nothing about the Jovian Junta that's particularly egregious
14:37
It's just that they're pretty much the culmination of everything that was wrong with Old Earth packaged into one salad of shit (edited)
Avatar
NHO 02/04/2019 1:35 PM
https://twitter.com/AMAZlNGNATURE/status/1092464585569902599
Author icon
Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE)
You'll never be as cool as this alpaca wearing sunglasses. 😎 https://t.co/Y13E6V1tM6
Retweets
6307
Likes
22341
Thumbnail
Footer icon Twitter
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/04/2019 1:36 PM
😄
Avatar
o11o1 02/05/2019 1:56 PM
nice
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/05/2019 2:12 PM
Image attachment
14:12
Of course when libertarians start trying to play to win I bet you anything this same person cries foul about how they’re underhanded criminals and dangerous psychos etc etc ad nauseam (edited)
14:17
Is there any surprise that both of these lovely choice quotes were provided by the same person?
Image attachment
14:18
(This thread was in reference to modern journalism by the by.)
14:20
And I bet you anything that Raymond (the poster’s handle) will start kicking and screaming about how other people’s tactics are wrong when the knives come out and he winds up on the hit lists
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/05/2019 3:52 PM
Embedded image
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/05/2019 5:59 PM
Better diversify outside of Patreon https://twitter.com/NormanRafferty/status/1092922006348144641
Author icon
Norman Rafferty (@NormanRafferty)
You'd think the golden eggs would be enough to keep them from demanding goose meat, too. #FYGM https://t.co/ARnYqQ8xxE
Footer icon Twitter
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/05/2019 6:36 PM
Image attachment
👌 1
🔫 1
Avatar
Overmind 02/05/2019 6:43 PM
Feh. My non-writing career is in sysadmin/network/software-fu, and I automate the shit out of my smart home in comfort and safety because I'm competent to do my fucking job.
18:45
That's twenty years without a security incident. Mister Can't-Do-This-Safely can bite my shiny metal server's ass.
18:47
SMH.
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 02/05/2019 6:49 PM
Any chance you could list the off the shelf components (hw and sw) you have used and possibly audited?
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/05/2019 6:50 PM
I'm in the weird boat that I like the idea of the smart home, but I hate voice activated stuff and don't have a thermostat and can't figure out anything to automate.
Avatar
Overmind 02/05/2019 6:55 PM
It's varied over time, but the quick version is Windows Server (latest, patched), Linux on an antsle (Host OS is Centos, but my antlets run Debian stable), Cisco routers and switches, UniFi wireless hardware, Raspberry Pi, Arduino / ESP8266 microcontrollers, and a Node-RED automation server for the core, using AWS Lambda and Glacier via an Nginx proxy for some back-end stuff and Alexa integration (mostly Echo Dots, one Show, one Plus), with a Mosquitto MQTT server, etcd, mongodb, huginn, and OpenVPN running at the back end.
18:59
(In off-the-shelf smart home products, I have some Ring cameras and sensors, Yale smart locks, and Philips Hue for lighting control. Which all sit on their own VLAN with two-way filtered and monitored access to both Internet and intranet resources. Well, okay, not the smart locks, but they're controlled directly by the automation server.)
19:04
(Most of the rest is hand-built, because I like stuff that does what I want the way that I want it done, and building stuff is fun.)
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 02/05/2019 9:25 PM
My automation ambitions pretty much top out at recreating the original "Ambient Orb" using cheap off the shelf hw. Calm computing is underrated (edited)
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/05/2019 9:44 PM
What happens when you instance a really old backup
Image attachment
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/06/2019 1:12 AM
...Iafa is male? Huh
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/06/2019 5:53 AM
I’m not sure what sexes Oafans even have
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/06/2019 1:14 PM
Same, I just could’ve sworn they’d used feminine pronouns with him at some point
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/07/2019 3:56 PM
Image attachment
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/07/2019 4:22 PM
Chekov's gun
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/07/2019 5:18 PM
Anything resembling aerial battleships in the IN?
Avatar
Overmind 02/08/2019 1:43 AM
No, because they'd be giant flying targets with no appreciable advantages over ortillery.
Avatar
xandeross 02/08/2019 1:47 AM
Anything resembling aerial battleships in the hands of private lunatics?
Avatar
Overmind 02/08/2019 1:49 AM
@xandeross Giant party zeppelins?
Avatar
Sevoris 02/08/2019 1:49 AM
With laser cannon.
Avatar
xandeross 02/08/2019 1:50 AM
Rather missing the 'battle' part of battleship, I would think. Unless Imperial parties get even crazier than I have been lead to believe.
Avatar
Sevoris 02/08/2019 1:50 AM
If you don‘t do skeet shooting with a 200 Megawatt blue-green laser, somebody will think you‘re doing it wrong.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/08/2019 1:50 AM
Someone would watch Avengers and try building a helicarrier
01:51
May not do much other than party on it after, but Rule of Cool
Avatar
Overmind 02/08/2019 1:51 AM
You want resemblance, that's as far as you're going to get for resemblance. Big. Fat. Target.
01:51
With an appalling tendency (heh, see Avengers) to fall right out of the sky .
01:55
There are civilian zeppelins some of which are big enough to qualify; there are the odd never-landing superwings used by people like the Emergency Management Authority to cruise around in the upper atmosphere; there are even aerospace cruisers that fighters can sortie from in low, atmo-skimming orbit. But that's it. Huge military hoverthings are fixin' to die and take everyone nearby with 'em.
Avatar
xandeross 02/08/2019 1:56 AM
If I had a von Neumann machine and a few spare centuries to kill, I would build a fleet of aerial battleships and then try to recreate the Battle of Jutland/Midway/Other Famous Naval Battle with them. I'm sure that, out of all the trillions of sophonts in the Associated Worlds, there is at least one person with a von Neumann, a few spare centuries, and my sense of aesthetics.
Avatar
Overmind 02/08/2019 1:58 AM
(Actually, having just rewatched Avengers last week, I vividly remember the sudden panic and tilting of the ship when they lost one engine. Even through the screen, the suit, and the noise of battle, I could hear Tony Stark rolling his eyes at that.)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/08/2019 7:19 AM
Mythbusters: We're going to try vaporising a car! Mythbusters: ...we may have also vaporised a steel plate, a solid concrete block, and our entire backstop.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/08/2019 10:59 AM
Image attachment
Avatar
gollark 02/08/2019 11:04 AM
Image attachment
Avatar
Overmind 02/08/2019 11:06 AM
Works equally well with "human cognition". As it should, for obvious reasons.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/08/2019 11:06 AM
"Bill decided to warm up for the landing with some trash talk, and called Tylo out for not clearing Vall out of its orbit." (edited)
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/08/2019 11:16 AM
Image attachment
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/08/2019 12:15 PM
IN Legionnaire "Oh, look, a tank, (throws grenade at tank) YEET!" (edited)
Avatar
Tassadar 02/08/2019 9:26 PM
What would Eldrae think of https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-47154287?
'I'm suing my parents for giving birth to me'
This Indian man says it's wrong to bring children into the world and burden them with expectations.
Thumbnail
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/08/2019 9:30 PM
I mean, there are cruel and heartless ways people are saying 'go kill yourself' that are abuse and should not be tolerated, but it seriously looks like he has some form of depressive state ("I'm not actively suicidal I just don't want to exist" is one of the defining symptoms) and perhaps investigating ways of peaceful ending is optimal for him.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/08/2019 9:32 PM
This “anti-natalism” philosophy sounds like the logical conclusion of Buddhism/Hinduism to me
21:32
Life is suffering, seek non-existence
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/08/2019 9:45 PM
@Zarpaulek That's why they call it anti-life
21:46
Like that man friedrich, it just strikes me as a deep loathing of existence and experience (edited)
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 02/08/2019 9:55 PM
Feels like some Jainism in there as well.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/08/2019 10:06 PM
I thought Buddhism’s moral code had some decent ideas, but the end goal being non-existence rather than immortality rather turned me off.
22:07
And besides, Taoism’s focus on this life fits my monist view. Not to mention more fun. (edited)
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/10/2019 1:22 AM
Personal pet peeve: people using the term 'black swan event' to refer to unexpected events, when they are talking to anyone who might be from the southern hemisphere
01:22
Swans are supposed to be black. A black swan is PERFECTLY NORMAL AND EXPECTED
01:23
And it leads to a tonne of confusion and wtfery and having to constantly mentally correct, all because some north american economicist popularised a completely inaccurate term.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 2:58 PM
Conclusion: Everything that happens in Australia is so unexpected and abnormal that black swans seem normal in comparison.
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:15 PM
Since I vaguely remember some talk about vaccination in here a while back, I share the following post I made elsewhere: "So, this is just your reminder post that: Everyone should, certainly, vaccinate their children, given all the evidence in favor and lack of evidence against; but It should by no means at all be made compulsory. One would not think that citizens of the nation responsible for the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, that pioneered forcible sterilization of the unfit long before the Nazis made it unfashionable, that at one time had serious enthusiasm for lobotomizing unruly children - and unruly women - etc., etc. ought to need reminders of where tripping merrily down the road of forcible medical treatment leads, but evidently they do. But, I hear you cry, that's different! Today we know better! Doctors and other authorities assure us that this is the best thing to do! It's for the common good, and the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one! Sweeties, darlings, that's exactly what they said every other time. "
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:17 PM
@Overmind Something something herd immunity what about the kids that can't vaccinate
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:18 PM
"When you picture the future, picture Donald Trump dressed as Nurse Ratched administering Haldol to his political enemies, forever."
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:18 PM
They should at least ban unvaccinated people from, say, schools.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:19 PM
something something public health? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:20 PM
Amazing what you can justify in the name of public health.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:20 PM
Yeah but what about the kids that can't vaccinate
16:20
For actual legitimate reasons rather than 'DEATH IS A PREFERABLE ALTERNATIVE TO AUTISM'
16:20
if the herd immunity is broken then they're screwed
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 4:21 PM
The other thing about herd immunity is that the more hosts a virus has to replicate in the more chances it has to mutate into a form the vaccine won't stop.
16:22
It might be advisable to homeschool immunocompromised kids, but they can't live in a bubble forever.
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:22 PM
I mean, if we want to go all public health, just imagine what we could do to, say, the HIV infection rate if we rounded up all the HIV+ folk into little camps, where they could learn to concentrate. Hell, if we extended that principle to everyone in a high-risk group - say, all the gays, all the IV drug users, and anyone Officially Deemed "promiscuous" by a committee of the people you'd least like to be in charge of making that determination.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:22 PM
@Overmind word
16:22
When you have government power, everything starts to look like a (looking for poetically appropriate counterpart to-)nail after while (edited)
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:22 PM
Amazingly enough, there is often space between "do nothing" and "go massively overboard".
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 4:22 PM
Wouldn't work for HIV anyways, the latency is too long
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:22 PM
Just quarantine, innit? For the greater good of the greater number. Public health, and all that.
16:23
@gollark Amazingly enough, the more you cut away at a principle, the easier it is to throw out the rest. (edited)
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:24 PM
What @gollark said
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:24 PM
The practical issue is, of course, that the Committee of Public Health almost never will be run by exactly the people you like because it's inevitably going to be appointed and organized by someone terrible (edited)
16:25
The nature of political power itself makes its wielders optimize for the power only. (edited)
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:25 PM
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/black-or-white
Your logical fallacy is black or white
You presented two alternative states as the only possibilities, when in fact more possibilities exist.
Thumbnail
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:25 PM
It's an inescapable part of all government
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 4:25 PM
On the plus side, we're seeing a lot of people in Washington state reconsidering their stance on vaccination.
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:26 PM
Which is why it's a good idea to have very strong Schelling fences against deciding that $SMALL_INFRINGEMENT is okay, because it'll be used to justify $MEDIUM_INFRINGEMENT, and then before you know it, you're sitting there applauding Buck v. Bell .
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:27 PM
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/slippery-slope
Your logical fallacy is slippery slope
You said that if we allow A to happen, then Z will eventually happen too, therefore A should not happen.
Thumbnail
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:27 PM
This isn't something magically exclusive to the US Government, all politicians become 'corrupt' and 'evil' through the extremely Darwinian selection of who can keep most of the important centers of power eating from their hand
16:27
If any of you haven't watched CGP Grey's Rules for Rulers, now would be a great time
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:27 PM
See CGP Grey: Rules for Rulers
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:27 PM
Unfortunately, the slippery slope thing does actually happen, a lot.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:27 PM
jinx
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:27 PM
"You're fine with us wiretapping a few people, right? So surely it's fine to spy on all internet use constantly?"
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:28 PM
It's important to think things through before taking action, so that you don't start a slippery slope
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:28 PM
Which politicians avoid like the plague.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:28 PM
good point
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
@KAL_9000 I'm going to have to ban that site, aren't I? YOUR logical fallacy is assuming that slippery slope is an applicable fallacy in light of reams of historical evidence that we've slid down that same slope many times before. At this point, you're nancing about on a clifftop with your eyes closed, declaring "The map says there can't be any cliffs here, woohoo!"
👌 2
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
Beware the fallacy fallacy
16:29
(yes that is literally A Thing)
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
Fallacy fallacy fallacy!
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
fallacy fallacy
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
...good point
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
FALLACY x 10₁₅ (edited)
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
@Unknown i ninja'd again whoops
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:29 PM
Fallacy³
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:30 PM
I'm not dancing about, but I'm saying that in this one case, compulsory vaccination is a good thing. It will save countless lives and doesn't hurt anyone, unlike compulsory sterilization
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/10/2019 4:30 PM
Is the luddite fallacy a thing?
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:31 PM
Wait, ten subscript fifteen?
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:31 PM
Yeah, and I'm saying that's exactly what the people standing at the top of all those other slippery slopes were saying, too.
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/10/2019 4:31 PM
or is it dying off from jobs being destroyed more than new ones?
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:31 PM
Which is why we think about our actions before we continue along the slope!
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:31 PM
Which the people in charge avoid doing!
16:32
Or a lot of the time deliberately push everyone down.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:32 PM
...oh, yeah. Forgot that we're dealing with politicians.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 4:32 PM
The problem with compulsory vaccination is that there are some rare people who can't take vaccines due to allergies (flu shots are cultured in eggs for instance) or compromised immune systems.
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:32 PM
Compulsory vaccinations if you safely can, then.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 4:32 PM
And government doesn't do exceptions well
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:32 PM
So we test for that before we vaccinate
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:34 PM
It is even more indisputably a good, life-saving thing to institutionalize homicidal maniacs. The argument gets thinner when it comes to paranoid schizophrenics, but hey, we've already lowered the barrier a bit. Repeat a few times... ...and now you've got the historical situation where families could get children locked up in asylums for "disorderliness" or "excessive flirting".
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:34 PM
Alternatively, you make the vaccinations mandatory on the other end.
16:34
Business owners, schools, et cetera may require that you have your immunology up to standard before entering their establishment.
16:35
Under the same premise that they can forbid fistfighting.
16:36
If you can't, that's kinda fine—you can do almost anything online anyway. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:36 PM
Can, but usually don't, since attitudes haven't caught up yet.
16:36
"You're not really working if you don't sit in an office 8 hours a day, with 2 hours of meetings." (edited)
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:37 PM
(Incidentally, that slippery-slope fallacy page? The example they picked is ironic as hell, inasmuch as since we legalized same-sex marriage the advocates for polygamy, incestuous marriage, etc., etc. have actually got louder and gained ground. I mean, I for one am fine with that particular slippery slope and being able to marry any consenting and competent legal person, but nonetheless.)
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:38 PM
I'm of the opinion that marriage just shouldn't be a government-recognized legal thing and instead just some sort of person-person agreement, which deals with all the mess nicely.
👍 5
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:40 PM
If you're not comfortable with getting vaccinated, or outright can't, there's always protective gear so that you can carry a mobile quarantine zone with you. :V
16:41
It seems like those little face masks are fashionable now anyway.
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:42 PM
I have learnt that in Japan, many people with colds and similar illnesses go about wearing surgical masks, as a courtesy to avoid transmitting them to others. This is a worthy custom, I deem, and one which could perhaps be generalized.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 4:42 PM
😄
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:45 PM
For fictive purposes, incidentally, vaccination is about as compulsory as everything else in the Empire, which is to say, not; but you are legally liable for the costs of any diseases you knowingly or negligently communicate. Which is to say, you don't have to use proper infection control precautions, but you are incentivized to do so - and can pick whichever ones suit you best.
📌 1
Avatar
Enderminion 02/10/2019 4:47 PM
and how is that any different from being mandatory?
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/10/2019 4:48 PM
Keep in mind you could get infected with some weird viruses in the Eldraeverse if you do not keep your vacs up to date. (edited)
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:48 PM
"do this or you'll get fined" vs "you can choose not to do this, but it'd be like putting up an inviting nuisance"
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:48 PM
You can pick any of the eighty vaccinations on the market, wear a face mask or even an environment suit, stay at home any time you feel even slightly sick, etc., etc., or just precommit to having to pay out a bunch of medical costs and comp to people. Choose anything you like.
📌 1
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:49 PM
You can put a gate on your skate park, or you can pay for the medical bills of all the neighborhood hooligans who get hurt on it.
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:49 PM
What you have to do is not (knowingly or negligently) infect people. How you go about that is up to you.
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:50 PM
I presume property owners can deny access to people who haven't taken precautions?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 4:50 PM
This still doesn't address the people who legitimately can't take vaccines, rare as they are
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/10/2019 4:51 PM
Environment suits seem to address them adequately.
Avatar
Tronzoid 02/10/2019 4:52 PM
Who can't take vaccines? this is the Empire!
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:52 PM
It's like pollution regulation there . It says that, for example, you mustn't emit dioxin into the atmohydrosphere. Unlike most of ours, they don't care how you go about that: destroy it, use it for something useful, store it in a giant dioxin-ice blob in deep space, whatever. Just that you do it.
📌 1
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/10/2019 4:52 PM
For purposes of argument I am going to keep this in general terms, insert your prefered signifiers as needed. Scenario: $SHITHEAD goes into $GROUP_OF_INNOCENTS and kills a bunch of people. Then: Option 1: the $POLICE_EQUIVALENT arrive, shootout happens, $SHITHEAD is dead in a pool of his own blood Option 2: $SHITHEAD gets away before anyone arrives. The next day as he is walking down the street $SHITHEAD_2 jumps out with a knife and kills $SHITHEAD as part of a gang initiation. Are these morally identical....... right?
Avatar
gollark 02/10/2019 4:52 PM
Yes, in the cool space future they can fix their unvaccinatibility. (edited)
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 4:53 PM
@0111narwhalz Property owners can deny access to people for any reason they like, or none. So yes.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/10/2019 4:54 PM
So don't be too quick to say that scenarios like "no one will sell me this" are just like "this is banned". Completely different situation, even if the end result is the same.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/10/2019 6:24 PM
In practical terms, if the goal is 'removal of $SHITHEAD then yes, they're equivalent. And sometimes police admit that. During the Sydney gangland war I remember watching the news and seeing a very exasperated police commissioner telling the media "What we're hoping for is a sudden outbreak of common sense in the criminal underworld, but in the mean time our primary goal is prevention of collateral damage. If any of these criminals would like our protection we are happy to provide them with a secure cell." Cue howls of protest that police aren't allowed to say 'look at this point if the crooks are killing each other we do not care nearly as much, just knock it off with hitting bystanders in drivebys'
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 6:27 PM
Wait, is that where Pratchett got his ideas for Ankh-Morpork?
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/10/2019 6:29 PM
I suspect it's a fairly widespread thought amongst police dealing with similar situations, they just don't lose their temper and SAY it
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 6:36 PM
And sadly, "Incidentally, have you heard what Jimmy the Knife said about Nicky the Nose's mother?" is right out.
😆 2
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/10/2019 6:38 PM
A new meme format for all you fine sophonts!
Image attachment
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 8:29 PM
A first contact situation http://stevegallacci.com/archive/edf/2019/02/06
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 8:51 PM
Seems a mite on the paranoid side. Sure, caution, jolly good, but if you go around treating the unknown as "hostile to the extreme", you come off looking rather, well, hostile.
20:58
(Also, Admiralty Intelligence would like to point out that not only can coming too close be considered hostile, but staying too far away would definitely be considered hostile. Honest friendly sophs don't go skulking around your star system at the fringes of detail sensor range, and all that. So basically, you're screwed.)
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 9:01 PM
(I echo the immortal words of one of Yudkowsky's characters, and would say: "Why couldn't we have been alone in the universe?")
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 9:02 PM
Well, in that particular series they're at war with space Nazis who've deployed KEWs.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 9:03 PM
space rabbit nazis
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/10/2019 9:03 PM
And this "issue" is a response to some of the self-insert fanfic the author's seen.
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 9:03 PM
Still, gotta be careful. If you screw up a first contact because you've got an interstellar war going on, you can easily end up with two interstellar wars instead.
21:04
Ah, first "contact" scenarios. Gotcha.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 9:04 PM
It's bad to even be in the same system as totally unknown new sophonts
21:05
If they notice you first they have the element of surprise
21:05
If you notice first your two options are to get closer or get out, neither of which look good for reasons stated above
Avatar
Overmind 02/10/2019 9:05 PM
Best solution to that is hydrofluoric acid body fluids. Applied to either the self-insert or the fic writer, depending on taste.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/10/2019 9:21 PM
does it qualify if it's a character spun out of aspects of me I think would be interesting to have interact with the (non-fanfic, by the way) plot at hand or is that still grounds for having my hands cut off >_> (edited)
21:21
anyway
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/11/2019 8:02 AM
Embedded image
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/11/2019 9:28 PM
https://abc13.com/master-herbalist-on-trial-in-diabetic-boys-death/5130913/
'Master herbalist' on trial in diabetic boy's death
A man who touted himself as a "master herbalist" is on trial after prosecutors say he convinced the family of a diabetic boy to stop giving him insulin, leading to his death.
Thumbnail
21:30
He’s only facing two years in prison?
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/11/2019 9:32 PM
He's sufficiently removed from the actual cause of death, it makes sense
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/11/2019 9:34 PM
Basically convinced the parents to put leaves in their kid’s emergency kit instead of insulin. Might as well have poisoned his food.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/11/2019 10:39 PM
And then convinced the family that insulin was poison and the hospital would deliberately murder their son, that has to be worth something too
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 2:59 AM
Image attachment
03:02
that's fucking awful (edited)
03:02
(not the elon thing, the insulin thing)
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:02 AM
Gotta love alternative medicine
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:02 AM
why am i shitposting at 4am my time?
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:02 AM
killing rhinos and children around the world
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:02 AM
Because I couldn't sleep, that's why!
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:03 AM
I am, because I'm procrastinating a paper
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:03 AM
Press 🇫 to pay respects
03:03
Seriously, tho, elon. Catgirls when?
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:04 AM
As long as we get both genders and they get full sophont rights I'm on board in principal
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:04 AM
both
03:04
LGBTQ+ Community: burn the heretic
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:05 AM
You forgot the rest of the alphabet soup. But what can I say, being bi tends to make you look at it in a binary way, especially when your mother tongue and second best tongue have binary human grammatical gender distinctions
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:06 AM
English and Latin?
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:06 AM
yup
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:06 AM
neuter intensifies
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:07 AM
human was an important part of that phrase
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:07 AM
ah
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:08 AM
even nouns that conjugate like neuters if referring to humans almost always have masculine or feminine gender
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:08 AM
The feasibility of genetically engineered human-feline hybrids in Mars colonization: An investigation
03:08
-Combining two Elon memes into one!
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:10 AM
don't remind me of academic papers right now
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:10 AM
get back to wörk
03:10
IRL's moar important
03:10
:V
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:10 AM
also, you just wrote the intro for @Zarpaulek's setting. And nah, I've got 7 hours before I need to be in class
03:11
and it's one I could skip for sleep if I had to
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:11 AM
oh alright then
03:11
I feel like I'm operating on @Archon time
03:11
4am => 8pm his time
03:11
So he's up :V
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:12 AM
huh, I thought Archon was a Euro
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:12 AM
nah, he's an Aussie
03:12
I have it from reliable sources that the ParaImperium is Furries IN SPACE!
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:13 AM
trans-sophont ones, yeah
03:13
I binged the whole backlog about a year ago
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:14 AM
eikones help you
03:14
Might need to invoke other pantheons, too
03:15
not the particular content, but binging something
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:15 AM
over the span of a week or two
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:16 AM
oh okay that's more reasonable
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:16 AM
and there wasn't that much at the time
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:17 AM
Elon posing with a catgirl prototype
Image attachment
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/12/2019 3:19 AM
He may very well be what every weeb dreams to be
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/12/2019 3:20 AM
Also, having feline hormones as well as homonid ones will give any would-be catgirls serious emotional issues if not resolved. And Elon's giving her a flamethrower...
03:20
Nothing could possibly go wrong
Avatar
Archon 02/12/2019 5:43 AM
... You had to ping me to check what timezone I'm in?
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/12/2019 5:53 AM
@MarcusAurelius It’s non-binary transhuman catgirls in space
05:54
Have you read the introductory novel by any chance? The POV was cloned without genitalia
Avatar
NHO 02/12/2019 10:32 AM
Посмотрите, о чем твитнул(а) @AndroidArts: https://twitter.com/AndroidArts/status/1095340664898781186?s=09
Author icon
Arne (@AndroidArts)
Saw it in a dream... could imagine doing it to a bunch of '70s cars.
Likes
370
Image
Footer icon Twitter
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/12/2019 1:54 PM
Just saw someone give "flexibility and efficiency" as reasons why the modern mega-schools exist
13:54
Uh..... I think you forgot to carry the 1. Like, all of them.
Avatar
Overmind 02/12/2019 1:55 PM
So, two qualities they have never been known to manifest?
13:55
Seems legit.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/12/2019 1:55 PM
(he may have been joking, though there was no "\s")
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/12/2019 4:30 PM
Grumble-mode: The necessity of dancing around the fact that the purpose of a resume is wanting to get money for doing something hopefully not hated. And that the purpose of hiring someone is that the company thinks they can get more money by doing that.
16:35
(also that it is hyper-gauche to come right out and say "I am not sending this to you to tick off the box on my welfare application")
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/12/2019 8:31 PM
Embedded image
20:31
A cursed image from the wilds of the Infratubes
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 02/12/2019 11:00 PM
That is so terrible/ridiculous I'm just going to assume it's trolling
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:02 AM
https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/aq0gfw/chinese_people_do_consider_it_to_be_a_success/
r/badhistory - "Chinese people do consider it to be a Success... t...
378 votes and 142 comments so far on Reddit
Thumbnail
10:02
This is a good debunking/discussion of the idea that Communism ended cycles of famine
Avatar
Overmind 02/13/2019 10:46 AM
Ah, the halycon days of my youth when no-one sane would have thought this needed debunking. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do learn from history are doomed to watch those other idiots repeat it.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:47 AM
Not sure
10:47
Your youth would have been in the Cold War yes?
Avatar
Overmind 02/13/2019 10:48 AM
Closing days of it, yeah.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:48 AM
It may as well be ancient history since I was born in 2000
10:48
I suspect that’s part of the reason.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:49 AM
*1990
Avatar
Overmind 02/13/2019 10:49 AM
1974.
10:49
waves stick.
10:50
demands everyone depart from my lawn.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:50 AM
would wave the lawn repellant stick but there is as least one person who could beat him
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:50 AM
An entire generation has grown up without the shadow of a Socialist megastate
10:50
That has to be taken into account when you see tankies, wow autocorrect (edited)
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:51 AM
I'm weirded out by the people who weren't alive or sufficiently old to understand when 9/11 happened
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:51 AM
I was one year old
10:52
It may as well be any other historical event if it weren’t for the fact I grew up with the never ending wars in the desert it caused
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:52 AM
Your presense wierds me. Please acquire a time machine and rectify that situation.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:52 AM
Sorry
10:53
It kinda comes with the territory of having been at war for nearly twenty years
👌 3
Avatar
Overmind 02/13/2019 10:54 AM
Yeah, I remember it from sitting at my desk at working pinging a datacenter in New York (close, but as it turned out fortunately, not too close) where friends of mine worked. Bad form to call into a disaster area, after all, but ICMP, that I could do.
Avatar
o11o1 02/13/2019 10:55 AM
I was in middle school, they paused class to bring everyone to the room with a tv in it so we could watch
10:56
so we were all looking when the second plane hit
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:56 AM
I can’t imagine that now
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:56 AM
my father and I hooked up a TV after getting a call just in time to see that
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:57 AM
My earliest memories are from c. 2003 and 2004
Avatar
o11o1 02/13/2019 10:57 AM
yeah, just a perfectly normal school day for us, then the english teacher walks in, asks us to all come to the science lab where the tv was and watch the disaster, a plane crashed into a famous skyscraper.
10:58
I didn't really know why the tower was important then, just that I'd seen it show up in simpsons once
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 10:58 AM
Only seen it in photographs
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:58 AM
glad the typical stupidity didn't take hold and everyone try to hide it
Avatar
o11o1 02/13/2019 10:58 AM
then the second plane hit, and what I thought was "That's clearly a declaration of war. But who's attacking?"
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 10:58 AM
I had never heard of them before that day
Avatar
o11o1 02/13/2019 10:59 AM
later that week we all had to do a powerpoint report on the event
10:59
might have been the following week
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 11:02 AM
My earliest memories politically are Bush II, the police state activity due to the war, and hearing about climate change
11:03
Also the 2004 governor election over here
11:05
I remember it being a relief when Obama came to power
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/13/2019 11:14 AM
I was born in 1990.
11:15
My earliest memory is some vague mention of a war someplace, not sure where.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 11:15 AM
Oh yeah my earliest memory is picking up a tree at the science park
11:15
Which has recently been reopened btw
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/13/2019 11:17 AM
I was in middle school when 9/11 happened. I remember the ensuing wave of patriotic fervor, the foundation of the TSA, military recruiters showing up at schools, the Recession...
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 11:17 AM
Don’t forget the Recession
Avatar
Enderminion 02/13/2019 11:23 AM
I was six months old when 9/11 happened
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 11:24 AM
Haha I’m older than enderminion
11:24
(Slightly)
Avatar
Enderminion 02/13/2019 11:27 AM
jokes on you, you're up for the Draft
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/13/2019 12:59 PM
Same here. I learned about from a discovery channel special when I was 5ish
12:59
And I’m a little older than the other two youngins. I saw a whole 3 months of the previous millennium
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 1:39 PM
technically 2000 is part of the 2nd millenium and 20th century
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/13/2019 2:52 PM
By the standards of the common folk, then (edited)
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 02/13/2019 3:09 PM
Good Lord, you are all children! Given some of the levels of cynicism I expected older. Good work, keep it up.
Avatar
gollark 02/13/2019 3:09 PM
It's not hard to be cynical given the terrible stuff which happens and increasing ability to know about it!
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 3:10 PM
I'm a "cynical optimist", more like a layer cake and I don't know what color the layer on the bottom is
Avatar
john dougan(his grace/his grace) 02/13/2019 3:11 PM
One of my earliest and most treasured memories is of an Apollo launch on my pre-school teachers TV.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 3:11 PM
yeah, sophs are going to fuck things up as much as they can, but they have been doing that for the last N kilo-years and look where we are?
Avatar
gollark 02/13/2019 3:12 PM
Except now due to interconnectedness and advanced technology and whatnot it's even easier for one person to break everything.
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 3:12 PM
and easier for people to point it out
15:13
it is not possible to underestimate how much the internet has curbed the ability for one faction to set the narrative and shove everyone else out of the overton window
Avatar
gollark 02/13/2019 3:13 PM
I was talking more about "one person with nukes can just blow up everything" and "a bunch of important people in China can probably wreck the global economy".
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 3:13 PM
that is why we have so much chaos right now. We had it when the papacy lost it's death-grip too
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 3:13 PM
@Ian Bruene if anything it has been increased
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 3:14 PM
desperate graspings for control "They" once had is nothing like an assured march of triumph
15:14
even if they do look the same to the untrained eye
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 4:33 PM
anti-vaccinationism is also in large part because organizations exist that irresponsibly spread information such as 'vaccines are made from aborted babies!!!'
16:35
'vaccines have mercury in them!'
16:35
'measles isn't such a big deal!'
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 4:37 PM
Most annoying part is that when - inevitably - there is some badly formed vaccine no one will listen
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 4:37 PM
there are people genuinely allergic to or unable to use vaccines for reasons
16:37
the worst part is that anti-vaccinationism actually puts them in even more danger through their idiot children exposing them to pathogens
16:39
fuck the AntiVax movement
16:40
unless it's tetanus shots then if you're dumb enough to not want to vaccinate go ahead
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/13/2019 4:40 PM
I"m one of them, or at least was as an infant: had a horrible reaction
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/13/2019 4:40 PM
https://xkcd.com/2111/
xkcd: Opportunity Rover
Image
Thanks for bringing us along.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/13/2019 4:57 PM
Rust in pepperonis opportunoni
Avatar
Xveers 02/13/2019 5:00 PM
o7 little drone
Avatar
gollark 02/13/2019 5:18 PM
We can now rebrand all Mars missions as manned rover rescue missions
Avatar
baidicoot 02/13/2019 5:33 PM
True, but sleep. And do English. @gollark
Avatar
NHO 02/14/2019 12:29 AM
Turns out this position exists to 'compete' with another help desk. Despite doing no work we are out doing them because they do negitive work. Literally only make problems worse. Congraduladumadulations!
00:29
Oh, Tales From Tech Support.
00:30
https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/aqemm4/i_shouldnt_have_to_tell_you_twice/
r/talesfromtechsupport - "I shouldn't have to tell you twice."
34 votes and 11 comments so far on Reddit
00:30
Sometimes, life is so much stranger than a fiction. And worse. Nightmarish
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/14/2019 1:31 AM
this may be the best title of a school assigned reading yet: the story of Evil Kiddo
Avatar
Overmind 02/14/2019 1:33 AM
...Beatrix Kiddo? 😁
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/14/2019 1:33 AM
No, a 3 year old boy from Shanghai named Chengcheng
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/14/2019 12:10 PM
https://twitter.com/4thFromOurStar/status/1095070929527271426 Sinister things are happening out at the Red Planet. Opportunity's not the only one in trouble...
Author icon
Mars (@4thFromOurStar)
My moons are conspiring against me
Likes
932
Footer icon Twitter
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/14/2019 6:48 PM
http://ffn.nodwick.com/?p=1877
02/14/2019
Visit the post for more.
Thumbnail
18:48
Image attachment
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/15/2019 8:45 AM
https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2018/07/canned-monkeys-dont-ship-well-.html
08:46
It really galls me that Nyrath publishes rando blogposts and treats them as if they are ironclad scientific fact like gravity
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 1:42 AM
I'm not into the Far Cry games, but I do like that their newest one, New Dawn, may be set in a post-apocalyptic USA but it isn't monotone. Not just brown or just grey. It's a brightly coloured apocalypse
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 8:29 AM
Brightly colored apocalypses ftw
08:32
I’m tired of everything getting sepia or grayscale recolors as if it were an old movie
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:40 AM
I'm helping a friend who's fiddling with making a post-apocalypse farming game (although at the moment it's drifting more towards a post-apocalypse fishing game) and we've decided that there will be many flowers and plants and colours other than sepia.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 8:41 AM
As though whatever destroyed the world is also going to make everything look drab and depressing somehow. Fury Road was good with avoiding this
08:41
There was blue and green in addition to all the tan brown and orange
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:41 AM
Well. It would have been a LOT more vivid if they used their original outback filming location XD
08:42
But I do understand why they didn't, given I dimly recall "plants don't grow well in the wasteland" was a plot point that doesn't play nice with 'what do you mean the once in two decades rain fell on this desert and it is covered in purple and white flowers?'
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:47 AM
I mean, there are lots of ways to apocalypse which don't actually render the entire world wasteland?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 8:48 AM
Yep
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:48 AM
But a part of me says that the part of me which longs for bright colors is also the part of me which longs for the world to not end.
08:48
And that maybe similar genre effects can be gotten with a colonial game?
08:48
Rather than a post-apocalyptic one.
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 8:49 AM
You’re telling me that the superbug or whatever also killed all the plants and damaged pigments
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:49 AM
... That's what the scientists say, man.
08:49
But yes!
08:49
(Also, in this area: Brightly colored spacers)
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 8:50 AM
I get that it’s usually a visual shorthand for how the characters feel but hey
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:50 AM
I mean yes.
08:50
So I guess what we should say is "What are you going for"
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:51 AM
I actually wonder if a large chunk of the video game dull wasteland aesthetic is due to Mad Max
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:51 AM
Don't think so.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:51 AM
since that film really set a lot of foundations for the genre
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:51 AM
Most post apocalyptic things are pretty dull
08:51
Though often in "Overgrown concrete"
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:52 AM
I'm meaning the original movie
Avatar
Archon 02/16/2019 8:52 AM
Possibily!
08:52
Can't deeply speak to that.
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:52 AM
Especially since the Fallout games use that orangish toned sand which, if I recall correctly, isn't that common in north america?
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 8:53 AM
The original mad max took place in a grassland
08:53
It was the later three movies that took place in a barren desert
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/16/2019 8:53 AM
huh, am I getting the first and second mixed up again?
08:54
I thought it was out in spinifex territory because that's the only place they could get insurance to drive cars in ludicrous ways
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/16/2019 8:55 AM
That Mutant Year Zero video game seems to be set in the middle of a verdant forest
Avatar
Sevoris 02/16/2019 11:02 AM
Generally... like, look at Chernobyl.
11:02
The place is green as f---
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/16/2019 3:17 PM
Also, sidenote, there’s a really simple refutation to any notion that things that happen in minds are immaterial: ”What about brain damage?”
15:18
There are countless recorded instances of physical trauma to computing substrate changing personality, memories, preferences etc.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/16/2019 3:25 PM
Heck, changes to gut fauna have influenced personality
Avatar
0111narwhalz 02/16/2019 3:25 PM
You're not you when you have an irritated bowel?
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/16/2019 3:26 PM
The Anxiety-IBS feedback loop is very well documented
15:27
And the “curebies” seem focused on changing gut microbes for their latest attempts at “curing” autism
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/16/2019 8:03 PM
Image attachment
20:03
Image attachment
20:06
XO to ferryman, quite a career leap.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/17/2019 6:51 PM
Interesting, this has a setting where you're playing the post-Singularity Minds of relativistic colony ships https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/266197/Fate-Space-Toolkit-o-Prototype-Edition?src=hottest
Fate Space Toolkit • Prototype Edition - Evil Hat Productions, L...
Take your Fate game into the great unknown with the Fate Space Toolkit! The Toolkit requires Fate Core to play. Inside y
Thumbnail
Avatar
Xveers 02/17/2019 7:37 PM
ooh, interesting
19:37
was gonna grab it already.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/18/2019 8:47 AM
Oh, and the "Expanse"-like setting in there has rules for governing your ship by democracy or "technocratic anarchy"
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/18/2019 4:34 PM
@Zarpaulek why use ferry man when Greek gives us the perfectly specific and awesome word "Psychopomp"?
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/18/2019 4:39 PM
@MarcusAurelius Dramatic symbolism
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/18/2019 4:42 PM
I just love the word
Avatar
Archon 02/18/2019 9:32 PM
Yeah, Psychopomp seems a better word to me.
Avatar
Zarpaulek 02/18/2019 9:34 PM
I write horror and fantasy, besides sci-fi, that doesn’t really have the same “impact” as ferryman
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/18/2019 9:54 PM
oh yeah, but it's nice word
Avatar
o11o1 02/19/2019 9:09 AM
Intended audience though. People generally hear about the ferryman myths before they get to the technical term Psychopomp
09:09
important if you're in, eg, the young adult genre
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/19/2019 9:55 AM
I BRING YOU SPACE MEMES AND ANIME MEMES!
Image attachment
👌 4
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/19/2019 12:26 PM
Image attachment
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/19/2019 12:38 PM
r/wholesomememes strikes again
Image attachment
Avatar
BizarroLand ♀ 02/19/2019 12:44 PM
@KAL_9000 their souls are weighed down by gravity
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/19/2019 12:46 PM
aw nuts
12:46
now they can't get to heaven
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/19/2019 1:06 PM
so true tho
Image attachment
Avatar
Morgrim Moon 02/19/2019 6:09 PM
https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/02/18/do-neural-nets-dream-of-electric-hobbits/ interesting discussion of dreams vs predictive algorithms
Scott Alexander
Do Neural Nets Dream Of Electric Hobbits?
Last week OpenAI announced its latest breakthrough. GPT-2 is a language model that can write essays to a prompt, answer questions, and summarize longer works. For example (bold prompt is human-writ…
Thumbnail
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 11:26 AM
Image attachment
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 12:21 PM
i would watch this anime tbh
Image attachment
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:10 PM
For you @MarcusAurelius
Image attachment
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:14 PM
Gratias tibi ago. barbaros trans rhenum rutos proclamo
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:31 PM
you'd like https://www.reddit.com/r/SPQRposting
r/spqrposting
Thumbnail
13:31
i got it from there
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:32 PM
Yes
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:32 PM
ita vero you barbarian scum
Avatar
Overmind 02/21/2019 1:33 PM
Do we also get /r/SPQRshitposting ?
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:33 PM
That's what /r/SPQRposting is
13:33
Roman memes
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:34 PM
me barbarum vocasne? Valorse dictu, puer
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:34 PM
Nani?! (edited)
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:35 PM
不會說日本語
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:36 PM
私は週末です
13:36
if google translate fails you, that's "I'm a weeb"
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/21/2019 1:37 PM
subscribed
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:37 PM
Image attachment
Avatar
gollark 02/21/2019 1:37 PM
I should fix my font configuration, all your somelanguageorother just appears as small rectangles with hexadecimal written in them.
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:38 PM
Image attachment
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:38 PM
Ah, socii
Avatar
Ian Bruene 02/21/2019 1:38 PM
Nothing ever made me think about becoming a weeb like watching the people triggered by it
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:38 PM
The social war was great
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:39 PM
vos habet amicus in meus (because fuck conjugation)
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:40 PM
habes me amico
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:41 PM
Image attachment
13:42
Image attachment
13:42
https://www.reddit.com/r/spqrposting/comments/araxjd/how_romulus_met_your_mother/
r/spqrposting - How Romulus met your mother...
54 votes and 1 comment so far on Reddit
Thumbnail
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:42 PM
octavianulum sapientem puellum censeo (edited)
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:44 PM
Finland actually claimed to be Rome's successor
Image attachment
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:45 PM
My best CKII save: playing as Macedonia in Lux Invicta, form the Greek hegemony and rule all three Romes
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:46 PM
veni vidi vici
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:46 PM
The duke of Russia was a fun NPC (edited)
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:47 PM
now time to conquer finland
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:47 PM
I got bored with the save, but it would be doable
Avatar
KAL_9000 02/21/2019 1:49 PM
time to cross the tornio
Avatar
MarcusAurelius 02/21/2019 1:50 PM
Putting down the rebellion in the north was annoying enough, not dealing with it
Exported 58,282 message(s)
View next segment