-dsr-

Since nobody else has mentioned it:

The (fictional) Ringworld is an immensely old mega-engineering project, requiring super-strength materials to put a habitable ring around a sunlike-star; a day-night cycle is provided by solar-collecting shadow squares in a smaller (thus faster-moving) orbit, connected by super-strength wire.

This is an unstable arrangement, and requires repeated adjustments every century or so. Naturally, that system broke down (via capitalists grabbing the expensive fusion power plants for their own purposes) and the backup system was destroyed by a bioengineered weapon.

The resolution to all this depends on psychic luck produced by evolutionary processes over the course of a handful of generations on Earth.

Truly, “hard SF” means that enough details have been given that you can be sure it won’t work.

This inspires the feeling of hating both sides of a fight and hoping that they do as much damage to each other as possible before it ends.

“Do you want to have a good time?” said a voice from a doorway.

“As far as I can tell,” said Ford, “I’m having one. Thanks.”

“Are you rich?” said another.

This made Ford laugh.

He turned and opened his arms in a wide gesture. “Do I look rich?” he said.

“Don’t know,” said the girl. “Maybe, maybe not. Maybe you’ll get rich. I have a very special service for rich people…”

“Oh yes?” said Ford, intrigued but careful. “And what’s that?”

“I tell them it’s OK to be rich.”

Gunfire erupted from a window high above them, but it was only a bass player getting shot for playing the wrong riff three times in a row, and bass players are two a penny in Han Dold City.

Ford stopped and peered into the dark doorway.

“You what?” he said.

The girl laughed and stepped forward a little out of the shadow. She was tall, and had that kind of self-possessed shyness which is a great trick if you can do it.

“It’s my big number,” she said. “I have a Master’s degree in Social Economics and can be very convincing. People love it. Especially in this city.”

Nah, they all consider themselves justified in sociopathic behavior.

Worm is great at what it does, which is to lure in people wanting to read power fantasies about being a superhero and then smashing every trope. (All the powers involve deep trauma. Everyone needs a therapist. Very few get any therapy. The world ends because we can’t take care of each other nicely.)

Every competent apocalyptic cult leader knows that committing to hard dates is wrong because if the grift survives that long, you’ll need to come up with a new story.

Luckily, these folks have spicy autocomplete to do their thinking!

I was going to make a comparison to Elron, but… oh, too late.

Convincing people in San Francisco Bay Area that you’re about to invent Star Trek technology is basically the national pastime there.

Ding! Ding! Ding! Upvote.

“Rationalism” is to normal logical thinking what blindfolded multi-board speed chess is to tic-tac-toe: you can only see in retrospect how anyone could get there from here. The things which occupy a Rationalist’s mind are completely divorced from ordinary concerns like ethics. Nobody would or could have predicted this quantity or quality of lunacy.

Boo. Hiss.

Explanatory spoiler for those who don’t want to read Worm, a million words of deconstruction/reconstruction of superhero comics:

Sure, but then you have to generate all that crap and store it with them. Preumably Github will eventually decide that you are wasting their space and bandwidth and… no, never mind, they’re Microsoft now. Competence isn’t in their vocabulary.

As long as it isn’t where he is, why should he care? He’s retiring on Mars, anyway.

(Please, deities, send Musk and Thiel to Mars soon. Together, if possible.)

You must prove yourself in the Outer Circle before being granted leave to study the Inner Mysteries. Or at least attend the right parties.

Tchah! Decker does not go far enough!

It is clear that there must be people better suited to raise children than a dimwit like him! He should arrange for his genetic superiors to breed, then give the babies to the perfect parents, and he should give them the one thing he has of value: money!

(and please have nothing else to do with children ever again, k thx bye)

It’s not just going to return quotes! It will return distorted quotes! I suspect you can get it to totally reverse a Singer position within five or six interactions.

With luck, you can then show it to Singer and cause him to die of shame.

We don’t have that much luck, though.

I have seen some controversy about whether white-passing people of Jewish ancestry count as “white”

Let me clear that up: the people who ask if someone is actually white are racists.

“When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.”

I suspect that he is incapable of admitting to himself that he is in a hole, much less that he dug it himself.

The history of technology teaches us that every non-trivial problem – and a large fraction of trivial problems – require specification beyond the bounds of conversational language.

Greek geometers may have invented the idea of formalizing language with specific definitions, and inventing new symbols to represent special meanings. When important consequences accrue from getting things wrong, people develop jargon: knitters and sailors and shepherds and farmers; engineers and lawyers and plumbers. If you want to convey your knowledge and intentions, you can’t chat informally and expect a human to really understand what you want.

For about a century now we’ve had devices that turn instructions into actions. Everyone who uses these becomes an expert in the particular form of instructions that the device needs, or else they don’t get what they want.

No wristwatch, but I have glasses and without electricity I stop breathing. (While asleep.)

So, yeah, cyborg.

Grew up in fairly rural upstate New York, where you can expect lots of snow and you can unironically envy neighbors who have working Franklin stoves when the power goes out.

I can confirm all of the above, plus: if you are lucky enough to have an Army-Navy surplus store around, one of your handmedowns is likely to be an N3B parka. Definitely not Russian or German or stylish. But it will keep everything above your thighs warm, except your hands. The pockets are uninsulated.