The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

Art is built on metaphor, which is an underlying connection between multiple meanings.

In semantic space, meanings are points while metaphors are vectors.

Dont say Prometheus

Ok… it was Προμηθεύς.

Since 1995, I’ve always associated Ian McKellan with his iconic role as Richard III.

Which colored my impression of Lord of the Rings a bit.

Or The Game?

If you think they’d be open to it, try Bayes’ theorem. Ask them to give percent likelihoods for the following:

A. The odds that the government (or whoever) is trying to kill everyone, before taking the evidence of excess deaths into account
B. The odds of seeing excess deaths for any possible reason, not just their conspiracy hypothesis
C. The odds of seeing excess deaths if the conspiracy hypothesis were true.

Then logically, the odds of the conspiracy being real given the excess deaths should be A*C/B. If you disagree on the outcome, you must disagree on one or more of the assumptions (probably A—if it’s B, you can find the objective odds by checking historical data).

If you still disagree on the prior assumption (A), you can set aside the excess deaths argument and ask what other evidence led them to form that prior assumption. Then you can repeat the process until you either reach agreement or they’re left with an assumption they have no evidence for.

My Dinner With André

Retailers order more plastic bags when their inventories fall below a certain level. If you reuse a bag, their inventories will last longer and they will order bags less frequently; and manufacturers will reduce production due to the decreased demand.

In the limit, all data is either destroyed or made public—privacy is always temporary.

They’ve got to do something with the cows once they’re too old to milk.

Why are you assuming that the fundamental goal is a stable society, rather than (say) a society that promotes the welfare of its members?

Even if you don’t believe them, they obviously won’t be able to enjoy the vacation unless you avoid the circumstances they’re afraid of—so you might as well humor them.

I assume it’s because it reduces the possibility of other processes outside of the linked containers accessing the files (so security and stability).

I get the smallest phone available and don’t use a case because I don’t like the bulk.

I also figure a smaller piece of glass is less likely to break when dropped, so the size is a sort of protection in itself.

Not absolute pressure, but pressure per unit of work (i.e., efficiency).

Even if they were physically separated you’d want them to pump in sync, to maximize the pressure. So having them share electrical signals is just the optimal setup for two hearts.

It’s better, which is why we already do.

Mammals have a double circulatory system, with the left and right ventricles effectively acting as separate hearts that happen to be physically connected.

Yeah—I was basing that claim on Joseph Henrich’s survey of expeditions in The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter.

The world is littered with the unmarked graves of explorers from the Age of Exploration who had: D) every piece of equipment that money could buy and experience could suggest.

The ones who survived being stranded in remote environments did so not by virtue of their possessions or preparations, but by throwing themselves on the mercy of the local inhabitants.

Life insurance.