Merry Christmas, if you’re into that sort of thing!

@Jenora Feuer

I consider Yudkowsky to be a prime example of why we should teach engineering types more philosophy so they stop reinventing it badly. And I say this as an ‘engineering type’.

Pfft. If those philosophers were so clever, how come they didn’t take up engineering?

Next you’ll be telling us that physics isn’t the only real science, and everything else is somehow not an abstracted kludge practised by fuzzy thinkers.

@Kat

She wore glitter — and nothing else — on her breasts.

And a short skirt, yes. Outside of summer it’s mostly too cold to dress like that here and glitter is a pain to get off.

@PeeVee, so sorry to hear about your loved one <3

I miss Boink x5. She's been gone for ages 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁
(Boink x 5, if you’re reading, I did one sad face for every boink xxx)

Re YouTube celebrity – fame and celebrity as an academic area took a while to warm to it, but it’s now an established category. It’s just as real (or not real, depending on your viewpoint) as any other kind of celebrity.

@Mish

Same here – I remember those videos in school, and of course The Day After, which hit extra hard because at the time I was living not that far away from Ground Zero in the film.

I stopped fearing nuclear war some time after the Berlin Wall fell. I’d like to get back to that state of non-fear now, please.

@ Surplus, all:

Physics? Pah! Physics is just fuzzy-thinkers’ mathematics

@Surplus to Requirements

Physics? Pah! Physics is just fuzzy-thinkers’ mathematics. ?

Well, seeing as we’ve already resorted to posting webcomics,

http://smbc-comics.com/comics/20111012.gif

The fake news awards is the most pathetic thing I’ve ever seen. Outside of the manosphere anyway. I’m sure he thinks he’s getting in some great zing but all it’s doing is highlighting how fragile his ego is. Being the president a job that inevitably comes with a lot of scrutiny. Everyone else who’s had his job before him has managed to deal with it. He can’t manage it. He can’t let it go and thanks to the first amendment, there’s only so much he can to shut down the press, so he has to do this.

I tend to think that what you find funny reveals a lot about what kind of person you are. I’ve noticed that about the only time Trump tries to be funny is when he’s tearing others down to avenge a slight to his massive but fragile ego.

I tend to think that what you find funny reveals a lot about what kind of person you are. I’ve noticed that about the only time Trump tries to be funny is when he’s tearing others down to avenge a slight to his massive but fragile ego.

You are – as always – correct. 🙂

While all likes on the culture side (for want of a better term) show a bit of your soul, your comedy likes seem to show more. Maybe because laughing is by its nature uninhibited? I’ll leave that for the smarter people to ponder. I will note, however, that Trump’s favorite movies are nearly all Mob related. 😛

I’m confused as to why her outfit needs explaining?

Edit:
Hi, amy! Hugs offered. I find those kinds of anniversaries go better for me if I distract myself with an outing or project. Best of luck.

Axe said (way back on the last page)

@Kat
Considering that ‘classical liberal’ is brospeak for ‘just world fetishist’, choosing it more likely does one of those screen fulla confetti, congrats on your ‘rationality’ dealies

I wondered about that, too. Many of the comments referred to Ashley Madison and speculation about the number of actual (as in non-bot) women the site would attract.

In other news, Kidbeast was here over the holidays and new kittybeast Desmond was thrilled because he thought we got him a teenager for Katmas! Kidbeast left Sunday and Des has been making his unhappiness known by zooming through the house at top speed more than usual.

New kittybeast Stoffy, on the other hand is enjoying the quiet. He has relocated himself from a tiny space in the closet to under the bed and comes out a lot at night now. Plus, he comes out for me without much prompting, which is huge! We’re hoping he comes out for Husbeast soon.

And since 2018 still has that new year smell, Happy New Year everyone!

Twitter has decided that threatening another nation with nuclear war doesn’t violate it’s terms of service.

Thats … not reassuring.

I wonder if David has ever thought about having a few guest bloggers create posts to pick up the slack? That might keep too many commenters and readers from giving up and leaving? Idk, just a thought.

I hope he is considering this.

Interesting piece from Slate

In many ways, this is the argument anti-rape activists have been making for years about rape culture: How we respond to those who say they have been sexually assaulted and preventing sexual violence in the first place are not unrelated issues.

Granted, a number of people suspect that North Korea’s opening up to South Korea now is primarily for two reasons:
1. North Korea would like a chance to show off at the Olympics, as it’s being held next door
2. North Korea wants to capitalize on current tensions to drive a wedge between the South Korea/United States relationship.
With the fact that the North Korea/China relationship is a bit strained at the moment being another contributing factor.

Honestly, if letting North Korea parade their flag around at the Olympics gets them more involved in international diplomacy and more interested in how they look from the outside, I’d consider it worth it.

And yeah, Trump just can’t handle not being the yugest at everything.

@Surplus to Requirements:
Well, that day was a vacation day as far as I was concerned anyway, and I can’t exactly complain about flights getting redirected when there was a snowstorm going on. The only thing I really have a possible point to argue over was the security inspector who decided to hand-inspect things despite knowing that I was on a flight that had already announced ‘final boarding’… and that would immediately be ignored behind a ‘just doing my job’ excuse anyway. Everything after that inspector was Mother Nature and reactions to same. I’d all kind of angried myself out over the matter after the first hour or so.