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The Weird, Random or Interesting Things That Fit Nowhere Else Thread


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“Political philosophers have often pointed out that in wartime, the citizen, the male citizen at least, loses one of his most basic rights, his right to life; and this has been true ever since the French Revolution and the invention of conscription, now an almost universally accepted principle. But these same philosophers have rarely noted that the citizen in question simultaneously loses another right, one just as basic and perhaps even more vital for his conception of himself as a civilized human being: the right not to kill.”
 
-Jonathan Littell <<Les Bienveillantes>>
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"The chancellor, the late chancellor, was only partly correct. He was obsolete. But so is the State, the entity he worshipped. Any state, entity, or ideology becomes obsolete when it stockpiles the wrong weapons: when it captures territories, but not minds; when it enslaves millions, but convinces nobody. When it is naked, yet puts on armor and calls it faith, while in the Eyes of God it has no faith at all. Any state, any entity, any ideology that fails to recognize the worth, the dignity, the rights of Man...that state is obsolete."

-Rod Serling

 

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Someone ( I didn't actually read the article... ) released rankings of the countries in the world. USA was #8. Woo hoo! Suck on THAT France!

 

Canada was #2 which tells me the judges were Canadian. Sure they love Canada and have that smug superiority complex thing (French influence there) but are too self effacing to vote themselves #1 :lol:

 

 

Edit: Doh! Forgot the link the article https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/overall-full-list

 

Also Donald Trump is less liked than Vladimir Putin. Let THAT one sink in. He hasn't even invaded anyone.... yet.

Edited by Guard Dog
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"While it is true you learn with age, the down side is what you often learn is what a damn fool you were before"

Thomas Sowell

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"While it is true you learn with age, the down side is what you often learn is what a damn fool you were before"

Thomas Sowell

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Hi res image from the Juno spacecraft. Jupiter cloud tops. It's amazing how the centrifugal motion is churning out dozens of "hurricanes" each larger than the continent of Asia. You have to love Jupiter. It's a big, high gravity "catcher's mitt" scooping up most of the random rocks and comets that otherwise might have hit us. Without it's mass in the exact place it's in it's likely none of us would be here. It's difficult to dismiss the notion of a designed system when you consider this is yet another example of the exactitude of the balance that makes life on this little blue marble possible, So much so that one of the considerations of exoplanets as possible habitability is the presence of hi mass outer system cousins.

 

(edit: removed image to reduce clutter)

 

well, as to intelligent design, it is easy to forget  just how large the galaxy is.

 

 

tv and movie notions o' traveling the galaxy is soooooooo misleading. our planet and solar system might seem improbable, but such ain't the case on galactic or universal scale. there is literal hundreds o' billions o' stars in the milky way galaxy alone. many solar systems similar to ours is pretty much a mathematical certainty given just how many solar systems there is in this galaxy and beyond.  converse, one can also observe how the size o' the universe might simple be part o' intelligent design. einstein suggested God doesn't play dice with the universe, although he were not speaking in favor o' intelligence behind the design when he made the remark 'bout dice.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

It's also due to the 'sample size of one' effect, the setup is favorable for life, thus we are here, but it's the only place we know of so far with life (including simple forms of life). I suspect that once we find places with life on them elsewhere, we'll find that the Solar System isn't so unique in terms of supporting life.

 

Of course, the Solar System will always feel special to us because it's our home.

 

Still, if we were to look for places that could have life, it does make sense to look for systems that look similar to ours, but we shouldn't look only at those places.

Edited by smjjames
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@ Gromnir & smjames I think it would be more apt to describe it as deliberate arrangement rather than "intelligent". A few years back I read a book by UC Santa Cruz professor Bruce Schumm called "Deep Down Things" about the four forces of particle physics and the exactitude of the balance between them. It completely changed the way I thought about physics. You won't find "proof" of the existence of God in the study of physics and cosmology but you will absolutely debunk the notion of randomness. I'll hit this more later. I'm at work at the moment and don't have the book here with me.

"While it is true you learn with age, the down side is what you often learn is what a damn fool you were before"

Thomas Sowell

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Assuming a quantized theory of the universe is correct. Just because the underlying structure is somehow consistent, symmetric, and balanced; It doesn't mean it was created to be as such. It can be that it's one of a variety of fundamental orders which generatively builds out a structure from it. If any such structure could form Goldilocks pockets which would form life, then it's not surprising that life would look at itself and come to realize just how perfectly everything had to be to arrive just at their moment. But the very same goes for some exotic crystal cavern on the opposite side of the universe.

 

There is a reason why those who carry out science often maintain an agnostic or atheistic position. It doesn't preclude that God exists, just that our strongest forms of reasoning don't need one, and don't affirm the notion of one. If God did design the universe, then he did so through systems which are emergent in properties and effective hide his hand. So you'll never really know if there is a hand behind his brush strokes.

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Propanolol has been around for a while. It's mostly for lowering blood pressure in the short term. Not as a long term persistent medicine for hypertension.

 

If you have the nerves before a speech, your blood pressure seemingly drops to zero. It also blocks the fight or flight response, and prevents hand tremors or voice quaking. So it's a performance medicine for vocalists and musicians. Orchestras often use them, either for nerves or to quiet the hands.

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DUYp376X4AAqGqk.jpg

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“Political philosophers have often pointed out that in wartime, the citizen, the male citizen at least, loses one of his most basic rights, his right to life; and this has been true ever since the French Revolution and the invention of conscription, now an almost universally accepted principle. But these same philosophers have rarely noted that the citizen in question simultaneously loses another right, one just as basic and perhaps even more vital for his conception of himself as a civilized human being: the right not to kill.”
 
-Jonathan Littell <<Les Bienveillantes>>
Quote

"The chancellor, the late chancellor, was only partly correct. He was obsolete. But so is the State, the entity he worshipped. Any state, entity, or ideology becomes obsolete when it stockpiles the wrong weapons: when it captures territories, but not minds; when it enslaves millions, but convinces nobody. When it is naked, yet puts on armor and calls it faith, while in the Eyes of God it has no faith at all. Any state, any entity, any ideology that fails to recognize the worth, the dignity, the rights of Man...that state is obsolete."

-Rod Serling

 

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‘Anti-phobia pill’ breaks link between memory and fear.

 

WooHoo! This could probably obviate the need for trigger warnings left, right and center!

Heck we've had something for that for a long time now:

 

knob-creek-smoked-maple-straight-bourbon

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"While it is true you learn with age, the down side is what you often learn is what a damn fool you were before"

Thomas Sowell

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On the other hand, misuse of that has probably led to the requirement of said trigger warnings on some occassions.

 

DUYp376X4AAqGqk.jpg

I loved his bit in his famous commencement speech about how he used to imagine a man with a clipboard coming to his door and saying 'it's over, time to get a real job'.

 

Sometimes mental illness feels like imposter syndrome about life.

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Guess which of the two is still alive, though.

 

well, peter jackson is only in his mid 50s.

 

HA! Good Fun!

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"If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."Justice Louis Brandeis, Concurring, Whitney v. California, 274 U.S. 357 (1927)

"Im indifferent to almost any murder as long as it doesn't affect me or mine."--Gfted1 (September 30, 2019)

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Scott_(criminal)

 

Meanwhile, authorities on both sides of the river teamed up with federal authorities to investigate the case. Their investigation eventually led to Joe Flachs, an old friend of Scott's. Flachs told authorities that Scott had told him he had broken the levee so he could strand his wife, Suzie, on the Missouri side of the river. Suzie worked as a waitress at a truck stop in Taylor, Missouri.[3] As the story went, Scott wanted to be free to party, fish, and have an affair.[5] Investigators subsequently found other witnesses who said Scott boasted about breaking the levee at a party after the flood.[1] Based on this evidence, Scott was taken to Missouri for trial in November 1994.

Why has elegance found so little following? Elegance has the disadvantage that hard work is needed to achieve it and a good education to appreciate it. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra

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Oh for God's sake. Can we all just agree that if something that has nothing to do with neo-nazis happens to look a little like something some neo-nazis MIGHT wear it coincidental, unintentional, and nothing to get in a huff over?  https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/30/world/europe/norway-skiing-knitting-nazis.html

"While it is true you learn with age, the down side is what you often learn is what a damn fool you were before"

Thomas Sowell

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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/01/technology/amazon-wristband-tracking-privacy.html

 

 


What if your supervisor could identify every time you paused to scratch or fidget, and for how long you took a bathroom break?

What may sound like dystopian fiction could become a reality for Amazon warehouse workers around the world. The company has won two patents for such a wristband, though it was unclear if Amazon planned to actually manufacture the tracking device and have employees wear it.

Why has elegance found so little following? Elegance has the disadvantage that hard work is needed to achieve it and a good education to appreciate it. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra

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"While it is true you learn with age, the down side is what you often learn is what a damn fool you were before"

Thomas Sowell

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Seems like not a big deal changing it. Is that motto sacred or something?

 

We changed our anthem this week for similar reasons http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/politics/anthem-bill-passes-senate-1.4513317

Why has elegance found so little following? Elegance has the disadvantage that hard work is needed to achieve it and a good education to appreciate it. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra

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