RationalWiki:Saloon bar/Archive121

Largest Asshole
Wait, what? :P Osaka Sun (talk) 06:45, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It's a joke.  displays the name of whoever's reading it. --  Nx  / talk 06:53, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * There's another dumb blonde moment by yours truly. Osaka Sun (talk) 06:57, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I just assume that it's the "myname" trick by now whenever I see my name on pages. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 07:03, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I always assume it's my name, even if I see the source and the myname trick, because the world centers around me.-- 07:08, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I think the correct phrase is "biggest arsehole" - largest arsehole sounds like a description of Ace after a night's fistin' fun with Bubba and the boys. I also notice that that the joke name has the most votes, I assume because everybody thinks they are the biggest arsehole here and thus the best user. Modest, ain't we? -- PsyGremlin  04:32, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Actually I picked that option before someone changed it. I can't remember what it used to be, though.--  04:34, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It was "every other fucker" and had one vote. 05:08, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That was me.-- 08:14, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * By the way, who voted for me (the actual me, not the fun trick)? Apparently two people did so.--  19:10, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

mega disaster TV
What is with Science-lite "the Discovery Channel"'s obsession with not just "disasters" but "mega disasters". I think the current version "mega disasters, Glacial meltdown" is like the 6th series on this type of thing. --Godot     Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:08, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Because if you call every other event a disaster, you need something that sounds even bigger. -- 16:57, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Nothing sells like hyperbole. AMassiveGay (talk) 17:18, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It's been around a while... Robothead.svg dot.svg 18:03, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Sen (talk) 20:18, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That's exactly it!!! that's how stupid most of these are! "what would happen if teh earth were shook by an unexpected 56.9 on the Richter scale earth quake, at a site with a nuclear testing facility that had just been hit by a terrorist attack which was spurned by an explosion in the Gulf."  Pens - what if....Love it.--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 22:40, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Disasterbation. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 03:39, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

change.org
So I find myself signing a lot of petitions there (it's an online petition aggregator), but I can't help but wonder if it's at all effective. If anything, it further reinforces the banality of the petition now that I can simply click the "sign" button. I mean, it's better than nothing, but is it anything at all? Also I'm sick of getting notifications for DNC petitions to support Obama or whatever. Yeah, like I'm doing that (maybe I'll vote this coming election, but only because having a Republican would be infinitely worse).-- 02:57, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've never really heard of an online petition doing much good. Better off to spend the time writing an elected official, writing a letter to a newspaper that people read, or write some letters for Amnesty International's Urgent Action campaigns. I mean, besides getting off your ass and doing some actual activist work. But at least these things make tiny dents in the public/political sphere. --B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 03:28, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I work for an elected official and I've processed a lot of the letters and calls he gets. Believe it or not, they do make a difference (especially before major votes), even if the Congressman never reads them himself. Anyway, BbDFA speaks the truth. 04:46, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * There's a difference between being really caring about something and having a preference. If you really care then you write letters, agitate for action, start the petition, raise funds, run a charity marathon or otherwise get involved. If you merely have a preference then you sign the petition, put a dollar in the collecting box or sponsor someone on a charity event. You can't commit to everything but lending your support in the simplest way does carry some weight.  The whole idea of getting the public to have a say in things was covered in the Arming the Independents episode of Dan Carlin's Common Sense.  05:45, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * In that case the observed effect is really "number x passion". A lot of people who don't give much of a fuck would come across as influential as a few people who really do. It's how lobbying works. For a petition to have any impact you need thousands - indeed, to get an UK ePetition discussed in parliament takes 100,000 votes when they average out at a few hundred at the most. Meanwhile, the same influence can be exerted by a well financed lobbying group consisting of less than a dozen people with the time and inclination to make their case. Arguably it's easier to do the latter because finding a dozen people who really do care (or at least paying people to care) is less problematic than mobilising a base of many thousands because you still need your half dozen people who can give the time and effort to help get those thousands interested enough to sign the petition. Then you approach the argument about whether it's democratically fair for 90% of the population with no vested interest and a general "meh" attitude to something they only just approve of by default get to overrule the 10% who disapprove for strong reasons and are passionate about getting their voice heard. E.g., approval of racial profiling against illegal immigrants in Arizona; approved by a majority, but the majority of people weren't part of a racial minority who would be unfairly targeted by such action. Just getting a certain number of people to sign something doesn't automatically make it right - although polticians, obsessed with the raw numbers who vote for them, wouldn't give a shit about that. If 100,000 people signed a petition tomorrow to say that the MMR jab should be recalled because it causes autism, or that we should scap all tax on fuel because global warming wasn't real it wouldn't make it right. Indeed, 100,000 people who know fuck all about medicine and climatology shouldn't reasonably be allowed to overrule even 1 person who does know about it. ADK ...I'll push your teabag! 16:20, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Indeed, 100,000 people who know fuck all about medicine and climatology shouldn't reasonably be allowed to overrule even 1 person who does know about it. But one person shouldn't get to rule over 100000 just because he went to college (although I'm pretty sure you weren't saying that).--  01:29, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Cached thoughts
Someone linked to this article above, and now I'm curious; is that idea unique to lesswrong.com? The first ten or so sources in google all link back to that specific article, so I'm guessing this isn't something that has been studied extensively outside of online posts. However, having just taken a hardware systems class that dealt extensively with caching, I'm really interested in any studies or discussions of those concepts applied (loosely, of course) to neurology. Any thoughts or suggestions for where to look? άλφα Ταλκ 13:47, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm actually quite dubious of their premise. As best as i can tell, "cached thoughts" as he's using them is a made up term - something he's stumbled upon somewhere, which he has in his blog "expounded upon" to created his own meme by which he can tell other people they "aren't really thinking" they are just "filling in the blanks". For what it's worth, this entire article is BS according to modern theories of Cognition and actually studies on how we create thoughts, access memories, value our memories against our modern experience, and of course, solve problems.  At best, to me any concept of "cached thoughts" would be the fact that we chunk memories together, and that when faced with a new problem (or trying to write new lyrics, or study new languages) our brains filter information and send us memories (also, knowledge, which is *not* memory - but he doesn't bother to deal with that, here) which could be useful in the novel problem before us.  I don't think you're going to find anything that relates to "cache" the way hardware does it, though, cause I have never read this term in any Cognitive article or theory of mind article.  by the way, this article is all about how "i've learned to think, but you people still 'fill in the blank".  how frigging arrogant.  ;-)
 * And by the way, Science Citation Index does not have one single entry on "Cached Thoughts". The guy either made it up, or it's a "cached thought" he found. ;-)  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 14:20, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That's LessWrong for you. Just a bunch of shut-ins idly speculating, without any evidence or anything.--  14:59, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've not read anything else of theirs, but it does have this strange, "jehovah's witness' pamphlet feel to it. "You've been misled by the evil World.  Think.  Think and you will be saved!"[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:08, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Steven Pinker reports on a great example of the boundary between creative thinking and memory/knowledge, when he talks about what happened (I'm thinking this was 1950s, but I've forgotten the time frame) when new communities of people in africa were found. They were handed tools from the western world, and immediately began to 1) figure out what they 'were', and 2) figure out what they could do.  And within minutes they had tested the new tools against things they had experienced. But, the quick analysis would never give useful answers for tools like can openers which require a foreknowledge of cans.  But, the can-openers would still be put to use, as levers, as hooks (the bottle opener part) and as ways to cut with the sharp blade.  Novel uses for a tool they had never seen, but still only applied thought that which they had experienced in their world.  Of course, once in a generation, someone comes along who can truly think outside of the box, and give 100% novel ideas.  "damn, gravity!" or "what if the world is made of tiny atoms" or "that whole god thing we all believe in, is dumb. rain falls every year, in a cycle."  But I think what Pinker was trying to show, is that our minds are biologically programmed to take any "new" thing, and analyze it based on what we know, and "put it to use" to better our lives.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:17, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Have you been reading any Nassim Taleb recently? ADK ...I'll break your lava! 16:03, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Black swan is next on my list, actually. but it's been there for a few months, pushed back cause it intimidates me.  I liked the RW synopsis, but i'm concerned that it will be far too statistical/math for me to grok. (oh, no, grok is not my own idea, it is someone elses, i'm doing cached thoughts or group think or something.  help help) [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 17:36, 18 September 2011 (UTC)


 * It has this strange pamphlet feel because that's what flies with the lolbertarian frat boys they are targeting. I think the technical term for this syndrome is "Hacker News". Mountain Blue (talk) 17:18, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Most of his writing feels like that. I never really found it annoying, but apparently that puts me in the minority (though I am not a "lolbertarian frat boy"). 19:15, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Required reading.
Among the Truthers. A look at contemporary and historical conspiracy theorists that balances not demonizing its subjects while arguing that their ideas put Enlightenment rationality in jeopardy. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 23:50, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've read some good press on that, I'll probably pick it up at some point. The basic premise sounds like Matt Taibbi's The Great Derangement, which has a number of truther chapters and his run-in with my favorite local mega-loon Nico Haupt. Jon Ronson's Them is another similar book, but probably requires some knowledge of the characters (David Icke, Alex Jones, etc.) for full appreciation. The chapter on the "kinder, cuddlier" KKK chapter head who bans the use of the word "nigger" is hilarious. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 02:52, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Another "Bring It On"-er speaks
Andrew Breitbart is a douchebag, well we know that. But a potential gun-crazed rampaging psycho killer? I didn't know he was close to going Timothy McVeigh on us?. DogP (talk) 05:49, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Your political scene is simply getting unbearable to watch. Osaka Sun (talk) 06:15, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Damn dentists
Suggestions for how to eat well with only liquids are welcome. Oral surgery is the worst. I'm on three different drugs and all I can eat is Jello, pudding and broth, and I've barely consumed anything in 24 hours. 00:29, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I fail to see the problem Go to the grocery store and buy lots of jello mix and carnation instant breakfast. A pack of Jello mix makes a full bowl, eat it all. CIB contains a lot of calories, see if you can drink it. Robothead.svg iron, yet caring fist 00:35, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Buy a blender. Voila!  All your food is now liquid.  It may even be possible to rent a blender. --  00:46, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * No one has mentioned beer? Seriously? Doctor Dark (talk) 00:55, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yogurt gives you lots of protein, and feels physically filling. Ice cream is da bomb when you've had oral surgery.  all cold and tasty.    cream of wheat (farina) is very filling and has cals.  Mashed potatoes (I used flakes, cause i could make them extra runny) but they were tasteless.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 00:57, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Mashed potatoes can be improved with melted butter and ground cayennes. Robothead.svg iron, yet caring fist 00:58, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Lentil soup is your friend. Go buy about 15 tins. -- 01:03, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Also, having done it myself, I should mention there really aren't any noticeable ill effects to not eating anything until about the fifth day, and you don't start seriously threatening to black out when you stand up until about the 8th. Nutrients are for wimps. -- 01:07, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Wow, thanks. @Doctor Dark - Beer is one of the forms of alcohol I find disgusting in general. Wine on the other hand... perhaps not a bad idea. More difficult to come by where I am, though. @WfG, Ty, Jeeves - great suggestions, thanks! And I probably shouldn't be driving until the oxycodone wears off, so I'll have to wait to obtain these delicious things. 01:14, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * WAIT -- DON'T DO THAT -- I didn't know you were on oxycodone. Thought the meds were to ward off Horrible Tooth Syndrome or some such. But mixing opioids (e.g., oxycodone) with alcohol can really mess up your day. Ask Janis Joplin. Doctor Dark (talk) 01:55, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That probably would have crossed my mind before it happened, but thanks a ton. [[File:Nods.gif]] 02:01, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Also it's actually hydrocodone, not oxycodone, but they're both opioids anyway. 02:21, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Are you kidding? Mixing meds and alcohol make the meds stronger and faster acting!  Who needs a liver, anyways?--  01:58, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * hydrocodone? Isn't that another name for Vicoden? Lucky. My Dentist only gave me Tylenol #4 (codeine). Send me any leftovers you have... <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 04:10, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * {ec-nobody ever takes my advice...}I've gone for a few days without eating, back when I was a wrestler. But seriously, if you want to eat well, like you said, don't rely on iced cream and mashed potatoes. Eat soup (not some American soup flavored salt, either- make your own. Boil water, add vegetables, blend- vrrrrrrrwwhhhirrrrr).--
 * Milk has more than enough protein. --145.94.77.43 (talk) 01:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * APPLE SAAAAAAUCE! Mmm...Yummy. Good Luuuuck! Feel better. --Dumpling (talk) 02:25, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Soup, cream o'wheat cereal, instant mashed potatoes, pre-made pudding cups, macaroni & cheese. I had a couple of wisdom teeth out recently and lived off these for 3 days. :-( <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 03:57, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * and what did you mean "wine is difficult to come by"? Where do you live, Utah? <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 04:01, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

One time I got some sort of an infection in my jaw and was unable to chew a thing for about ten days; I survived on Sport Shakes. I repeated the regimen when I had my wisdom teeth pulled (though fortunately I did not need any stronger dope than ibuprofen on that occasion). 04:04, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Whey protein shakes, thick pea soup, dhal, V8, cottage cheese, scrambled eggs which are not overcooked (60 seconds in microwave - YMMV) maybe cooked with some grated cheddar to make a pseudo rarebit. 07:33, 17 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Christ, is this an eye opener into American food preparation or what? Can't you guys buy fresh food any more? Ajkgordon (talk) 08:18, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * All milkshakes, all the time. That's what I did. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 09:00, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Not sure how this is under "Damn Dentists" since it seems like it's your body that started it not the dentist, but... I spent a while arguing with some friends that a guy trapped in a (not airtight of course) shipping container with bottles of Coke will live a bunch longer than a guy trapped in a container with bottles of mineral water (obviously both will live a damn sight longer than if the container has boxes of Barbie Dolls or copies of Sarah Palin's book). So please try this! Plus, living entirely on Coke is bound to mean more quality time with your dentist. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 11:09, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * AkJordan, are you kidding? we've never had fresh food here.  At least not in my life time.  I went to France for the first time and said "my god, food tastes good!". [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:37, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Demonization of names like LaQuisha and LaTrenda
Is anyone else tired of the racist, prudish, bourgeois conservative fuckers in this country who hate these unique, beautiful African-American names? They are always promoting discrimination because they do not have the boring old Biblical names that these religious nuts like, and they mock them in obviously racist ways. It should be illegal to discriminate against people with awesome names like Cliffornadello. The conservascum white christians do so because they are a threat to the christian patriarchy, and because - worse - they're (gasp!) BLACK names. Howard McWashington (talk) 03:59, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure I've ever seen any demonization of those names. It wouldn't surprise me with some of the more nutty conservative Christians, though. <font color="teal" face="Comic Sans MS">SoCal  212  04:06, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I would imagine that a significant contingent of the racists (e.g., Wotanists) dislike the Bible names (which have been and are still given to people of all races) as much as the new crop of African-American names. 04:10, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * But lots of middle class white Christian male heterosexuals make fun of those names, insult them, and see them as subversive, countercultural, black and a threat to bourgeois society. And some Fundies seriously believe they are beyond that - they are utterly evil, Satanic and depraved because they are not from the Bible. Both of these groups of scum are the same sorts who think that body piercing is "disgusting". Fuck them. Howard McWashington (talk) 04:13, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've seen this kind of thing in action, and yes, I find it problematic, to say the least. That said, the tone of both your posts at least whispers "parodist." B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 04:16, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * (ec) LaToya and LaKisha are staples of racial "humor" (or Tyrone and Darnell, for males), at least in my experience. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 04:17, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Tyrone is actually Scottish, and many whites are named Tyrone. Anyways, sometimes traditionally African-American names are mocked (such as the joke about the woman naming her daughter "Chlamydia," or sometimes more absurd names are fabricated, such as "Chopeefa"), but I don't see it as particularly prevalent.  Maybe if someone can find some writings on it, we could justify an article.--  04:22, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia has an article on "black names and racism in the hiring process". It's very prevalent, people have been denied reservations for having these names as well. It is a mixture of racism and the general conservative christian capitalist dislike for anything "unconventional". Truly disgusting, unlike sodomy. Howard McWashington (talk) 04:25, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * "Truly disgusting, unlike sodomy." You're trying too hard. Also, that's a really, really poor Wikipedia article about a topic that deserves better. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 04:32, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * What I am wondering is if he is the person who wrote that Wikipedia article; it seems the author might soon be looking for a new place to park it, when the NPOV axe comes down. 04:36, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * IIRC the Freakanomincs guys looked into this and they found there is no discrimination on name. However, they did find that the poorer and less educated the parent, the more likely their children were to have a Shaniqua-esque name. --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  05:35, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yup. They also found a somewhat continuous range, so that the poorer and less educated the parent the more unconventional the name. So Jasmine's mother might be reasonably well off, Jazzmine's mother poorer, and LaJezzamine's mother poorer still. Doctor Dark (talk) 14:35, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That's really interesting. I know several people with "unique" names and this holds true for them. I have always wondered at the motivation for giving a child such a name. <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 12:32, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've seen a political reason given, which is that most established names come from non-black traditions. People descended from freed slaves have had the connection with their 'own' culture broken, so they have no bank of names to pick from, so they make names up instead.
 * The other motivation is simply that people think they sound nice, and individualistic. Trouble is, where you see an expression of individuality, onlookers often see someone following a somewhat faddish trend.-- 19:07, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

...say the people naming their kids Tanner, Mason, and Addison. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:17, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not like there aren't socioeconomic status clues among 'white' names, too. When my wife rattles off the first names of the babies in the NICU it isn't hard to guess who is the child of rich IVF'ers and who is the child of the 16 yo methhead. Of course, this is, if not cyclic, then perhaps phasic with 'new' names moving from high SES to low SES parents over a couple of years, along with a 'uniqueifying' of the spelling: Courtney-->-->Khortnee, for example. Tanner, Mason, and Addison are well into their trickle-down phase if not bottoming out now. For those interested, the site babynamewizard.com has some neat statistics and analysis of naming trends in the US.--Martin Arrowsmith (talk) 21:03, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't get the joke. Explain for the Eurotrash in the audience please? Mountain Blue (talk) 19:43, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Men's rights
Another BON attacking the MRM article. I'd like to see some organizations or sites actually promoting men's rights rather than just as a cover for misogyny. The closest I've found is the Good Men Project as noted in the article and even they distance themselves from the MRAs quite a bit (and are derided in MRA circles for it), which should say something. Can anyone point to other similar organizations? Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 08:56, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I was busy counting the extra money that I earn as compared to a woman who has the exact same job as me. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 14:43, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * BAM. Osaka Sun (talk) 17:14, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I was working my extra job so i could pay for the two kids i got saddled with, when he decided he didn't want to be a dad.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot     Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:00, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, you should have thought of that before you let him have sex with you.B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 15:18, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * My penis doesn't become an enlarging sex organ for nine months then popping out a fetus-wait, I mean fully adult human being that deserves death if he/she is guilty of crime. It therefore makes me more powerful than you (big-boobies...hehe) ladies.
 * No seriously, that's their argument. That's why I've always admired this commercial. Osaka Sun (talk) 17:14, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Excellent commercial. by the way, dame Judi Dench could make the instruction manual to Windows sound dramatic and important.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 17:38, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, I think the idea had potential, but most of the groups seem to exist only for the purpose of whining about the dirty feminazis. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

On the equal pay thing, I don't get how that works. We outlawed it, right? I mean, the UK definitely outlawed it, and I'm pretty sure I remember reading the US outlawed it. So how is it still possible women get paid less for the same job? Or does it require some creative squinting to call it the "same" job? Or is it just "women don't tend to apply for high paying jobs" ? 82.69.171.94 (talk) 19:01, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It is what some people like to call a "systemic inequality." There is comparatively little actual pay discrimination (i.e., companies deliberately paying women less than men) remaining, so the "anti-discrimination" industry decided to keep the money rolling in by moving the goalposts. Now, when more women than men pass up high-paying jobs or cut back to part-time employment, it is called "gender discrimination," even though it does not actually involve any discrimination based on gender. 21:01, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Gendered workplace discrimination, backed up by the judicial establishment. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 21:09, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, I think some of the people commenting on that lawsuit care more about splattering Wal-Mart, for slightly different reasons, than about women's pay rates. 02:00, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Equal pay for women has never been passed in the us.  And i fully disagree with Listerner that it's "women's choices" being passed off as pay inequity. that's called blaming the victim.  Look at job rates in any company, say at my old University.  The women there (University of Colorado) who had been there as long, had published as often, and taught as many classes, made on average 40K different from the men in aggregate.  now, granted, we have two or three football coaches who skew that number slightly, and we have this famous guy who mapped the human gene who's paid a bagillion dollars, so that also skews it.  but when the women of CU removed those outlayers, you were still looking at roughly 20K disparity.  So they are CHOOSING?   [] is a good site that lists specific stats in specific cities of total average salary of comparable jobs. Women are not choosing to make less.  sorry. but that's just BS.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 02:09, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Um, wait a minute there... you say you compare men and women who had been there as long, published as much, and taught as many classes, but then the comparison suddenly involves coaches? That can't be right. Are you sure you're comparing apples and apples here? Mountain Blue (talk) 02:18, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Equal pay for women has never been passed in the us. Huh? What about Title VII of the Civil Rights Act?
 * Yes, studies of that sort do tend to be a little dodgy. One questionable thing they do is to try and reduce all alterations in pay to a small, fixed set of criteria, which likely does not even come near to telling the whole story. 02:24, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Isn't the correct conclusion to take that the university is not paying for the number of publications? --145.94.77.43 (talk) 02:30, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * you are right on equal pay. I'm sorry.     As for CU coaches, there is a status of Coach at CU that makes them the equivalent to professor, so they have to be worked into the formula.  but it means someone with little to no publishing is making 10x a first year prof.  so it skews the numbers, and has to be pulled out of the comparisons.  But i think, listener, saying "women choose" to get less pay is nonsensical in the fact of the overwhelming evidence that pay inequity exists.  In any field you study - from oil rigs, to cooking, i think you would find real pay inequity. want more sites?[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 02:35, 18 September 2011 (UTC)(keep getting edit conflicted)
 * Lucky, our coaches are the highest paid people at my university. Robothead.svg dot.svg 02:48, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I was not trying to claim that deliberate pay discrimination has vanished altogether, only that it is far less pronounced that it was in the past. My remarks were addressed instead toward any pay differences that are not due to deliberate discrimination, one well-documented example of which is when women have children and consequently pass up a higher-paying but more demanding job or scale their work back to part-time. 02:44, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * "As for CU coaches, there is a status of Coach at CU that makes them the equivalent to professor, so they have to be worked into the formula." So the result is largely meaningless because you're comparing researchers with coaches. You can't ad hoc your way to a sound and fair comparison starting from that. What happens if you compare male physics professors and female physics professors, controlling for experience, number of refereed publications, and cumulative number of citations of same?
 * "But i think, listener, saying "women choose" to get less pay is nonsensical in the fact of the overwhelming evidence that pay inequity exists." I'd like to see some of that overwhelming evidence please. Be specific. I will admit there are papers that purport to show statistically significant pay gaps, but every single one of them I've actually seen so far has obvious issues. One study compares male PhDs with female PhDs and ergo engineers with English department types. One study compares male IT workers with female IT workers and ergo programmers with graphics artists. One study compares male GPs with female GPs but forgets to control for time spent on continuing training. One study forgets to control for number of years in the workforce... in a country in which mens' minimum retirement age is five years higher than womens'. Of course everybody forgets to control for weekly hours. And so on, and so forth. Mountain Blue (talk) 03:38, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Those are concrete examples of what I was trying to get across when I said that many pay studies do not take the whole story into account. Lies, damned lies, and statistics, to be sure. 03:47, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

There are shitloads of studies on this. It seems like feminist advocacy groups cherry-pick the unadjusted numbers and studies showing the biggest gap while the misogynists cherry-pick the ones showing little to no gap. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 05:22, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * OK. So, caring about whether the differences are outright discrimination or not may seem pointless. But it's actually really important because it has ethical and policy implications. If employer X is quietly writing "Foo Associate" on the HR paperwork for women and "Foo Manager" for men, knowing that this way the men start $2k pa higher up the ladder for essentially the same work, we can fix that with government enforcement making sure the job title (and associated pay) are gender blind. There is no ethical problem with investigating, warning and if necessary prosecuting employers in that situation. Meanwhile though at employer Y the "Blah Associate" role is substantively different from "Blah Manager" in that managers are on call 24/7. If every new employee is given the option, and women are only half as likely as men to choose the extra pay for being on call, then we're in a very different situation even though we've still got a "pay gap". It would certainly be unethical to force more women to be on call 24/7 for example. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 14:36, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

My own observations suggest one reason why women are paid less than men, is that women tend to be less aggressive in the pay negotiation process. One of my friends told me about how she went on this "assertiveness" course, and found it really helped her in her career, because it made her willing to walk in that door and demand more money and better opportunities, rather than just accept whatever she was offered. (And she is a childless woman in her forties, who seems from some of the things she's said to me rather accepting of the prospect that she will never have children—although maybe that is just the happenstance of her life than a deliberate decision on her part—so the usual explanations around part-time work or family vs. career choices don't really apply to her.) Another factor I'd point to, is most university courses are now at or near a female majority — especially high-paying careers like law and medicine — the main exception is science/engineering/mathematics/IT, but to be honest our society just does not seem to value those roles as highly as law/medicine/finance/etc. So I would not be surprised, if in the medium-to-long-term, women end up being paid on average more than men, as the most highly-paid professions become increasingly female-dominated, and as fertility rates continue to decline and more and more women lose interest in bearing children. 09:16, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Wiki whoring
It would be great if you'd like to take the time and give Essay:Voting a read. It's a general treatment of how and we might go about crafting a set of standards for voting here, talking about things like categories of votes, the role of moderators in votes, the "goat" option, and much more. Cheers! 04:43, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * We need a corresponding hedgehog option to the goat option. HollowWorld (talk) 10:35, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Or BEARS!‎(ó㉨ò)ﾉ♡ --Dumpling (talk) 16:59, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Hot custard or cold custard?
So a few weeks ago I was at my friend's flat and was shocked and disgusted when she tried to serve me warm custard. As far as I'm concerned, custard should always be cool and the warm stuff is a horrible, runny abomination fit only to pervert the concept of 'pudding' in many a school dining hall. I was even more shocked and disgusted when I asked around and found I was significantly outvoted by my peers on the matter. I just wondered where folk here stood on the matter. Grumblejaws (talk) 15:41, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Hot

 * Silver Sloth (talk) 15:47, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll plagiarize your bevel! 16:01, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * 16:16, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Custard should always be hot.  And served on Rhubarb Tart.   DogP (talk) 17:43, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * You are aware how custard is made, right? -- 18:18, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Cold is just wrong.--BobSpring is sprung! 10:08, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Cold

 * Grumblejaws (talk) 15:51, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * DogP (talk) 05:53, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll only eat the cold and solid stuff. That runny stuff is disgusting. My mum's custard is the best - solid, chilled in the fridge, on top of trifle — trifle with preserved peaches and strawberry jam Swiss roll, and lotsa lotsa sherry, topped off with solid custard and a dusting of coconut on top. I also like the custard they put in danishes or fruit tarts... 10:18, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

goat

 * Custard, hot or cold, is Beelzebub's vomit. Ajkgordon (talk) 17:12, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Before I swore off food made of animals, I enjoyed custard in all sorts of ways.-- 17:22, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That's why Mr Bird made this Travancus (talk) 18:50, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * If you're trying to show me vegan custard, I should point out that that formula contains milk protein-- 18:53, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Depends on when I'm eating it. Warm in the morning, cool in the evening. Robothead.svg dot.svg 18:05, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Depends on WHAT I'm eating. :3--Dumpling (talk) 19:18, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Goats taste good hot or cold. 23:53, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Custard goes both ways. Tielec01 (talk) 05:24, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

discussion
Urgh, you're a bunch of food perverts. @Jeeves, yes I am, I don't quite follow what you're getting at Grumblejaws (talk) 19:02, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Both Hot and Cold custard are acceptable, they serve different purposes. It's like asking whether pizza should be a thin, delicately flavoured restaurant meal or a big thick slice bought from a street vendor. They're both valid foodstuffs, not alternatives to one another. Cold custard is an essential trifle component, and an excellent way to fill unused space inside doughnuts; Hot custard is the right solvent for thick steamed puddings, and a good accompaniment to pastry products. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 21:07, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Since I am a huge fan of a nice big bowl of sherry trifle, and a large spoon, it's impossible not to realise that I may have voted hastily only for hot custard.  I enjoy both, and thus must split my vote.  DogP (talk) 05:53, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Indeed! Without hot custard one would not be able to fight over who gets the skin on top, and cold custard is just made of awesome. However, and this is most important - WE ARE ONLY TALKING ABOUT REAL, OR AT LEAST POWDERED CUSTARD HERE! This long-life bought in a box just is Satan's semen. Arrrrr! --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  06:10, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Just to be clear, I'm talking about a straight bowl of custard, rather than as part of another dish. Grumblejaws (talk) 08:54, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, but does it have slices of banana in it? Bob Soles (talk) 09:04, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I have never seen anyone eat just a bowl of custard before. And I've never seen anyone advocate it cold except in the case of trifle. What planet are you living on!?!? <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll deconstruct your escape pod! 09:33, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * A straight bowl of cold custard? Weird. Having said that, there are a number of cold deserts in Spain  - all with differing names - all of which look and taste exactly like to cold custard to me.--BobSpring is sprung! 10:12, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I have a relative who tries very much to be "English". She serves straight bowls of custard frequently. Robothead.svg dot.svg 11:06, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, I eat bowls of custard, often with banana slices as Bob Soles suggests and was regularly served it at school (hot and disgusting I might add). Is this really not the done thing for most people? If so, forget the qualification I made above. Grumblejaws (talk) 11:23, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I have enjoyed a 'straight' bowl of cold custard on a number of occasions.  But I won't tolerate having bowls of custard that are advancing the homosexual agenda around the house, depraved degenerates that's what they are.    DogP (talk) 14:09, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Ubuntu Scanner
Hey mob. I want a flatbed scanner to run on 10.10. I want to spend less than $100. I want to plug it into my machine and have it work. any suggestions? B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 01:01, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Most work with ubuntu if USB(and what isn't these days) except Lexmarks. My old HP was PnP, and it worked. Robothead.svg dot.svg 01:03, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * My Canon don't work, and I don't wanna deal w/ SANE backends. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 01:17, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * (EC)HPs usually work very well with Ubuntu, you need to install HPLIP, from add/remove software. I've had problems with most cannon devices. Robothead.svg dot.svg 01:25, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 01:40, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * You're welcome. Robothead.svg dot.svg 01:43, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't want to get into recommending specific hardware but the comment "I don't wanna deal w/ SANE backends" intrigues me. Unless things have changed remarkably since I was last involved with SANE they're the only game in town, not just on Ubuntu but across maybe a dozen operating systems. Or does it just mean "I don't care that it'll end up using SANE, so long as I don't need to know about it" ? 82.69.171.94 (talk) 14:31, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Buy a trombone instead. It's louder and it works with any Linux, or even without it for that matter. Not sure about plugging it into your machine though. You're welcome. --79.50.119.147 (talk) 19:56, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * @ 82etc. If I could find SANE directions that were written at my skill level, i.e. none, I'd bother with it. As much as I love Ubuntu, I simply do not have time for a learning curve this week. I need to plug the scanner in and have it work. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 21:07, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Ty. Thanks. Got a HP, it worked just fine. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 23:36, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Happy to help, a scanner's on my list now too. Robothead.svg dot.svg 23:42, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Demoted
How do I get demoted? Captchalol (talk) 14:32, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Call your boss fat-- 15:18, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Funny. Captchalol (talk) 15:28, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Ya all be suckin' aaarrr
Seriously? ITLAP Day and not one "arrrr!" to be seen. You should all be keelhauled for bein' unpirate! --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  18:51, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Wut? I thought it was constipation day. Or something. --79.50.119.147 (talk) 19:52, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Not in the UK anymore, as Mad Cap'n Tom be be lost at sea <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll watch your blender! 20:26, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It probably would have been a badidea for me to honor it during my job interview today. MDB (talk) 00:41, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Ha, ya nancy landlubbbers. Not only have I been yo-ho-hoing but I've been at sea all day. Currently I'm stuck on the Black Pig on the blue sea Blue Pig in the Black Sea. 04:28, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

sharing is caring
Kitties are so cute! -- 23:34, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Cute? Look at those eyes and tell me bloody revenge isn't being plotted. Probably involving the intestines of a small creature under your pillow. --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  04:59, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * More likely the laceration of upholstery and apparel with those razor claws. 05:18, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but the cats taking showers, that was ADORABLE!-- 05:22, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Hmm...
Israel, they do some funny things sometimes. Like making weird laws around Muslims and Palestinians, and occasionally taking organs from the dead without permission, and telling Palestinians to live some place else, and then bulldozing their homes to make living spa-WAIT A MOMENT THIS IS SOUNDING FAMILIAR. HollowWorld (talk) 19:17, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, the familiar rhetoric of leftist anti-Semites and neo-Nazis... Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:32, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * How am I being anti-semitic by pointing out that Israel is just a weeee bit... you know... off? And thanks for Godwining already. HollowWorld (talk) 19:38, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * You make a Nazi allusion in the OP and I Godwin first? Irony meter - you're breakin' it. Take a look at some anti-Semitic, anti-Zionist crank sites. They love to harp about the "Palestinian Holocaust." Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:47, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Nebby,I agree that Hollow's first post was poorly put, but if you're gonna play the "criticizing the actions and policies of a particular nation-state automatically = antisemitism" card, we're gonna have to agree to disagree. Or have a fistfight or something. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 19:50, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I am sorry for trying to be humorous at all by drawing the irony that those who do not learn from history are fated to repeat it. I also disagree with Neb's "UR A NEONAZI IF U SAY ANYTHING BAD ABOUT ISRAEEELLL" and saying "oh look you see, this stuff appears all the time in anti-Jewish sites". I say 'terrible' stuff about the USA all the time, why aren't you breaking my neck over that? I just disagree with Israel's policies, not its existence. Also I do apologize for the poor taste of my original post.HollowWorld (talk) 19:55, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I disagree with Israeli policies as well (and am therefore forever a "self-hating Jew"). Just sayin' -- making a drive-by comment comparing Israel to Nazi Germany that sounds like a talking point on some anti-Semitic crank site isn't helping your cause. The issue of Zionism is already a bullshit-flinging festival, no need to add more. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 20:07, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Nebby, you're the one who snapped at me going "ANTI-JEW RHETORIC", how is it a drive by comment if I am responding to you. If anything it made you seem unreasonable and quick to jump to defending Israel against all criticism. Considering the sort of person I am and the sort of people on here, perhaps I was trying to be (rather darkly) humorous in my comparison. Clearly I am a terrible person. I do apologize that I somehow offended you. Now if you excuse me I must go polish my husband's jackboots and pump out another kid. HollowWorld (talk) 20:13, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Wait, you're a woman? I thought there were no girls on the internet. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 20:17, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I am actually Leto II. HollowWorld (talk) 20:19, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not saying you're a terrible person, but it's an old canard that you stumbled into. LMGTFY. Sort of like the people who go "ever notice how high the black crime rate is? What? Just asking questions! Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 20:29, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Aaaaaannd... you thought I was doing that? That was your first assumption? That I was JAQing off? Ahahaha. Ok. My assumption is that you're an ebil zionist who eats babies (by the way, this is a joke, so don't take it seriously). Well, you derailed this enough, happy now? Can we get back on topic? HollowWorld (talk) 20:37, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

I fail to see what the topic is besides Israel = Nazi JAQing, but whatever... Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 21:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I fail to see why you're still going on about me saying Israel is turning into Nazi Germany. Certainly I said their methods are rather similar, I did not say that OMG ISRAEL = NAZI GERMANY/AUSTRIA OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG. Yes I went "WAIT A MOMENT", but did I go "ISRAEL IS CLEARLY BECOMING NAZI GERMANY. HIT THE DECK." Since you're being a total butthurt dick about this though I'll explain it in a way that you can understand.

Israel is using some methods that seem to come across to me as rather similar to those used by Nazi Germany(and other conquering nations in the past). Because of Israel's own past, wouldn't they be the ones MOST against such things? Why have they unintentionally walked into Godwin's Law? Is this not an ultimate irony? HollowWorld (talk) 22:27, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * PROTIP; It is completely possible to criticize the policies and actions of the state of Israel on its own merits without ever, ever, ever mentioning Nazi Germany, any alleged similarities to Nazi Germany, or any alleged ironies that arise from any perceived relationship between the two. Try it. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 22:31, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * B-Maj, I understand you are trying to help and settle the dust down here, but I'm not the one who went and jumped to HEY ANTI-SEMITE/NEO-NAZI. It is entirely possible at the same time that Nebby could have gone "ok" and responded like a more rational person and ignore the off colour joke that was made at the beginning, instead coming in and saying "why yes Hollow, some of Israel's policies are rather disagreeable and they should aim to fix those." and I would say "indeed my good sir, let us sip our tea and further discuss these alleged bad policies and wonder why they are in effect." However, I will defend your right to come in here and tell me that drawing any comparisons to the policies of those bad people from long ago is vile and immature to death, and I shall defend my own right to refute the supposed vileness and immaturity of my own words to the death as well. HollowWorld (talk) 22:39, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Now that we're back on track
The whole idea that the Palestinian request for recognition from the UN (which will make it easier for them to access the ICC) is being stonewalled by the US (because of the Americans' relationship with Israel) is really pissing me off today. "It will jeopardize the peace process. !?!!? Seriously? What "peace process" ?!?! And it is doubly enraging that Israel might "retaliate" against a people that sees itself as a nation asking for recognition as such in a completely legitimate fashion by annexing more land upon which it is illegally squatting. Above all that, it's an incredible strategic mistake to stymie the Palestinians when revolutionary movements are sweeping across the Arab world. Bad, bad, bad. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 20:38, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I love you bby. Also I don't know the whole story but I heard that someone is telling Israel to support an extremist group against Turkey? Israel won't do it though, I think. Not even they would go that far... right? HollowWorld (talk) 20:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)


 * After NY-9, Obama has to pander harder to those drinking the Faux Noise Kool-Aid. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 21:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Clearly those articles just hate on Obama. NOTE: THIS IS A JOKE HollowWorld (talk) 22:27, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've been anti-isreal for quite a while. I find it hard to stomach that we so openly support a theocracy, where you can only get married if it's an acceptable marriage; where women can be blocked from some jobs (ironic, considering the country itself was lead by a woman - ah back in the good ol' days), and where a free citizen could go about on the Sabbath if they damn well wanted to.  It's changed so much in just teh 12 years I've paid any attention.  On top of that, I find the more I do read about their policies, they are as much, if not more, the true terrorists.  They treat the Palestinians much the way we treated our native americans for so long.  "here is your land, it's sucky land, but it's yours. and if we want your sucky land, remember, we will take it, it's our right to do so, even if we made a treaty with you."[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 22:35, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * But we're Americans, we can do what we want, clearly, and anyone who is a BFF of ours can do so as well. So our nuclear dick says, at least. HollowWorld (talk) 22:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

copypasta
Here's some copypasta I made for such discussions. '' In a fit of disturbing irony, Israel has begun behaving like Nazis.
 * They kick Palestinians from their homes, move in Israelis, and forbid Palestinians from even entering towns where this is the case.
 * They force Palestinians into ghettos and use military force to prevent food and medical supplies from arriving there.
 * They invaded Lebanon to "find terrorists" only to bomb hospitals and at one point, UN peacekeepers.
 * The Mossad has murdered innocents in nations where they have no jurisdiction (see the Lillehammer affair), and they've stolen plans from the French for a nuclear power plant.
 * Against proliferation treaties, Israel has forged an arsenal of nuclear weapons in secret, and when one of their own scientists revealed this to the world, they imprisoned him.
 * They bar their critics from entering the nation.
 * They brutalize civilians, blasting doors open with explosives with no regard to casualties.
 * They attack people with missiles coming out of mosques, with no concern for bystanders.
 * They've adopted strict laws classifying Jews, based on genetics and parentage, and grant Jews full citizenship (naturally, other ethnicities are excluded....)
 * They made a law so that it's illegal to claim to be Jewish in order to get laid (while this law is not so specific in its lettering, it is in its application. A man was thus charged for rape because he told an Israeli woman he was Jewish in order to get her into bed).

'' At this point, Israelis living in Israel have as much a right to be there as their Palestinian predecessors they unjustly evicted. But that doesn't mean that the state of Israel is not guilty of serious crimes. ''

'' And this is not just me saying this. Others agree. Jews even. Neturei Karta, for example. Or Norman Finkelstein. The "United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict," which Israel decried as horribly biased, was directed by Richard Goldstone, himself a Jew. ''

'' So do not brand me an anti-semite. This is by no means an attack on Jews, but an attack on the state of Israel and its criminal methods. ''

-- 02:36, 18 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Without getting into a point-by-point, this whole thing would be smarter and more effective if you replaced the phrase "like Nazis" with the phrase "in a manner contrary to international humanitarian law." Then people wouldn't be able to discount your arguments with a Godwin's charge, and we could talk about these acts in terms of their own merits and their own specific historical contexts. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 02:41, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I know. Trolling's half the point of copypasta.  I'm not proud of it, but damn if it isn't fun getting Zionists' panties in a bunch with stuff like this--  02:45, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Which is why no one likes you, Brxbrx. We're not trying to insult Jewish people here or Zionists, we're discussing the eerie happenings that Israel is doing and why they are being allowed to do so. I'll see you at Mill Avenue. Also, B-Maj, once again I understand how you want to settle the dust here. People will discount it as Godwin's no matter what, they'll go "hmm, contrary to to international law WELL THAT SOUNDS LIKE NAZIS", no matter what you do people will invoke Godwin's whether or not it is even there. Especially overly defensive people, because how DARE anyone say anything bad about Israel, right? Even if you just go "I disagree with Israel's policies", people will go "NAZI" or "GODWIN". Even if the words "contrary to international humanitarian law" is used, it'll still make people think of nazis ie it's futile.HollowWorld (talk) 10:23, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Ooh, sorry that opening line was too dramatic for you. I guess that as rational human beings,  we can ignore everything else, right?--  11:17, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Stop hating on jews, BrxBrx. That is bad and you should feel bad. HollowWorld (talk) 13:59, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * ??? So you didn't even read it?--  14:47, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't read stuff from jew haters, you jew hater. Terrible terrible person. I'm sad I even live in the same county as you. Jew hater. HollowWorld (talk) 15:01, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I try not to troll here. Instead I lightly troll comment boards, eliciting hypertension from impotently raging ideologues (usually on the right, but I try to be an equal opportunity gadfly).--  17:19, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Stop haeting on jews u bad person. HollowWorld (talk) 23:02, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Jews have even more a right to occupy that place as we Americans and Canadians have a right to occupy the +18 million square kilometers of land that we do--perhaps moreso as Gawd told them to take it from the Canaanites. All the surrounding countries behave like Nazis, and Israelis haven't killed 5% (my guess) of Arabs than Nazis have Jews, and certainly less than other Arab governments have. Muslims don't allow non-Muslim men to date Muslim women. Would racists allow in Ethiopian Jews in?Civic Cat (talk) 20:17, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

This topic is now about Godwin's Law
Drawing any comparison, even if you are trying to be retardedly humorous, makes you an anti-Semite or a neo-Nazi. Godwin's Law is God. Discuss. HollowWorld (talk) 10:34, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I think Godwin's law is as over applied, as the use of Hitler is. In this case, when saying "isn't it ironic that people killed by hitler are acting like him" it's 100% valid to use hitler.  Godwin's law (to me) was supposed to be about abortionists, and democrats, and Evolutionists, and creationists, when we exaggerate something by linking it to hitler.  I personally don't think that "if you mention hitler, you are invoking godwin".  And personally, i agree that these people should be the first to say "oops, maybe we are doing something that was done to us". but, hindsight and all that. (shit, this is godot and i didn't log in)
 * Well, then, when the Israelis use an industrialised killing system with the intent of wiping every last living Palestinian off of the face of the planet, we can compare them to Hitler. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 16:55, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * So you cannot make the statement that they are moving along that path? comparison can only be made when equal devastation and obliteration has occurred?  I think the very point is that "let's stop this BEFORE it comes to that". And I have to tell you, i know (and know of) some Jews and some palistinians and many arabs who would say that "the other" should be fully obliterated from the earth as worthless animals.  What is so wrong about pointing out that Isreal is acting like Germay at the start of the anti-jewish movement?--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 17:16, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Because that's teleological thinking, and assumes that all human rights abuses follow similar paths to identical outcomes instead of dealing with particular social/political/historical contexts. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 17:25, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * So if we compared it, say, with Native Americans would that be "ok". or with the way the Tutsi and Hutu began their path, would that be "ok"?  I guess i do not see why comparing moments in history is ever a bad thing.  If you went to the stage of "therefore, Israel is Hitler, or is the Americans in the Native American thing", fine that is too far.  but saying "we see parallels, and it's worth addressing" seems to me a very important and valid exercise.  Otherwise, why study history, if not to see today, the same patterns building.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 17:31, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Looking for broad patterns is okay; trying to force particular situations into the frameworks that we get out of those broad patterns with an intellectual shoehorn isn't. Genocide and other gross human rights abuses are a sui generis category of human behavior/historical event that need to be treated with a degree of sensitivity that other topics don't typically require, and it's really damn hard to put the Hitler and Israel in the same analytic scope and not end up with a bunch of people coming to the conclusion of "therefore, Israel=Hitler," which does nobody any good. I could see comparing Nazi Germany with Rwanda, because both cases fit under the rubric of genocide. The case of the Palestinians in no way meets the requirements to be called genocide, so it's a problematic comparison before we even take into account the emotional weight that such an analysis would entail. B♭maj7 "If two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong." 17:42, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Ok, that makes a lot of sense the way you put it. I mistook your intent to be something more along the lines of "you can't compare, so don't", rather than "if you compare (to see patterns, to look at a variety of possible outcomes in the future, etc), you must be very careful cause most of the world will say A=B once you've made the comparison". [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 17:55, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

We should keep in mind the debate about how big a role Hitler actually played in the Holocaust. Intentionalists like to paint Hitler as sitting in the Reich Chancellery reviewing drawings for the gas chambers at Auschwitz and trying to work out how much cyanide to use. Functionalists argue that many of the major elements of the Holocaust, including shootings and gas chambers, were not Hitler's ideas at all, but the innovations of the lower levels of the Nazi bureaucracy. Hitler's personal responsibility for the Holocaust then, was not in detailed orchestration of the event, but in simply creating the ideological and emotional environment that made it possible, and in accepting the results when they occurred. Viewed in that light, comparing the actions of contemporary individual or groups to Hitler (let's not talk about Israel specifically, let's just talk about situations of inter-ethnic conflict more generally) actually makes more sense, since the same laying of the groundwork, and potential willingness to accept certain extreme outcomes if they eventuate, may in fact be there already, even if those extreme outcomes have as yet not eventuated, and hopefully never will. I think viewed in a Functionalist light, Godwin's law sometimes functions as an invalid attempt to shut up debate, by demanding that atrocities equivalent to those of the Nazis must be permitted before we can point out that much of the same group psychology which lead to the Nazi atrocities is present in other cases also, just thankfully most of the time this psychology does not have as regrettable results as it does in Nazi Germany's case. Godwin's law can be used to neutralise any attempt to learn from history, by demanding that the history of the most extreme results ethnic hatred has produced is only relevant in those circumstances when results as extreme are produced again, rather than seeing it as just an extreme manifestation of a very common problem. 09:30, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Good news, everyone!
To lighten things up, here's the result of some tireless work:

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Fun:Futurama Osaka Sun (talk) 13:02, 18 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I think that is awesome, though I added an episode to the list of emotionally charged episodes (The Late Philip J. Fry) MarkeDC (talk) 14:23, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Autosave
Anybody here liek video games? I do. Of course, I'm also quite bad at them. That's why rely heavily on autosave. But on occasion there comes a game that either does not have autosave, or autosaves too infrequently. I just lost 2 hours of progress in The Witcher because the damned game can't be bothered to save upon entering/exiting cells (not that I support cells in videogames- cells are for lazy programmers and they ruin the game's smooth functioning). So I'm very frustrated, because I hate doing things over in a videogame and I was hoping to play The Witcher for the next week or so (it'll take me a bit to get over having to repeat two hours of gameplay).

PS- Yeah, I should use quicksave... But I'm lazy...-- 18:58, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * On consideration, I realize that literally every game I play is one where I save every few minutes (Baldur's Gate 2 or an N64 emulator game like Goldeneye) so all I can recommend is that you do use that quicksave - until it becomes a reflex!-- 21:52, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * AARGH! Just now the game froze as I was quick saving.--  01:22, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * -- 01:34, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * But sarcastic melodrama is so entertaining...-- 01:38, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm sticking that website on speed dial for the next time anyone tries complaining. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll analyse your fiddle! 09:27, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * We do seem to have gone backwards in terms of game saves. In the old days you either didn't get to save at all, or you had to write codes down to get back to the beginning of the last level you played (like in Flashback). Then saves came along but had irritating caveats (like in the first tomb raider) where you have to find some kind of save token or make it to a particular place, which in RPGs could be a 10 min hike away. Then quick saves came along and everything was great. Then quick saves got replaced with autosaves, which are fine in games like Assassin's Creed 2 / BH because if you do just about anything it saves, but games like LA Noire are a pain in the arse because the autosave seems to be completely random, and when you have the wife screaming at you to turn off the Xbox but you haven't saved in the last 10 mins it gets to be quite infuriating. <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 12:45, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Well you can save manually-- 18:51, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Things We Should Have Learned In High School
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/senior_year

So fucking right on the money here. Last panel has a great abstinence-only gag. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll ruffle your xanthochroi! 10:25, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I actually do use calculus, but most don't. Fuck the Imperial system. Robothead.svg dot.svg 11:10, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Lady K. can't load a dishwasher. 12:23, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Splitting the bill is a pain in the arse. We had a situation a few days ago whereby an entire wedding party ate at a restaurant and at the end the bride and groom worked out that splitting it evenly would mean everyone has to pay 22 euros each. Problem is, the people who only ordered a salad and had a glass of water put in exactly how much they owed, and the people who splashed out on an expensive starter, a steak, and enough booze to tranquilize a whale just put in 22 euros, plus some people don't factor a tip into their share. I found out later that the bride & groom had to foot a 40 euro shortage, so I threw an extra 10 euros in for them because I thought it was a bit unfair for them to pay so much. <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 12:39, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I refuse to go out to eat with tight bastards who do the "I only had a salad" routine. Take the bill, add tip. divide by no of diners, round up to suitable amount. End of. Anybody who doesn't like that can ask the waiter for a separate bill and will not be invited next time. Bob Soles (talk) 12:56, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Or agree up front that it's individual bills for everyone. It's not anti-social - it's practical particularly where you have a group of widely differing wealth or eating/drinking habits. Ajkgordon (talk) 13:00, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I generally work out my share for the opposite reason; I often order more than the average (usually for drinks :) ) and I feel uncomfortable paying less for what I ate while others pay more for me to get drunk. On the above wedding trip on a previous meal I fancied trying sea urchins for a starter, which was 17 euros, and so I made sure I paid my exact share because I didn't want everyone tutting about having to pay a share of my expensive starter (and three pints). <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 13:15, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * i never actually learned calculus. I did get taught about bill stuff and personal economics, twice actually. --SmithRob (talk) 13:05, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've never even seen a dishwasher in real life X Stickman (talk) 01:16, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Charity
Recently there was a thread asking about worthwhile charities. This isn't quite to the point but someone mentioned "Smile Train", I know this isn't in India but ...

I defy anyone to watch all that dry eyed. Thematic (talk) 13:04, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Evil humans going against god again and his wise plan. Sen (talk) 14:52, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Should the Tea Party sell out to the Tea Party?
Windsor's Tea Party may have a name worth a fortune. Their first hit in very early 90's: The Tea Party - Save Me The Tea Party - The River. Where he sounds (and perhaps looks more like Jim Morrison) The Tea Party - The Bazaar (kinda features a nekkid lady). and my 2 favourites The Tea Party - Heaven Coming Down The Tea Party - Sister Awake. Civic Cat (talk) 18:53, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, they should sell and then donate the money to gay rights groups and leftist politicians. For the lulz--  21:15, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Extinction/endangered species denialism?
I've found some tracts, namely by Bjorn Lomborg and Tom Bethell, denying increasing extinction rates and/or arguing that endangered species aren't really endangered. (Climate deniers love to do this with polar bears.) Is there enough of this stuff out there to make an article on? Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 02:06, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

BBC, you fail me again
I submit to the good people of RW this hilariously bad piece. How many fallacies, obfuscations, and outright falsehoods can you find? I count at least 15 incorrect cached thoughts, two or three fallacies, and several blatant untruths. 02:14, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yudkowsky meanders too much for my taste. I always get bored and go back to masturbating halfway through. Mountain Blue (talk) 02:40, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * He's a pompous uneducated twit who'd be better off writing hard science fiction than pretending he somehow has an impact on the future.-- 02:50, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I tried to read the article but the pain of hitting my head on the desk became too great.--BobSpring is sprung! 14:06, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I dont' know about the errors or the memes, but i have to ask / say this. why are people who are *thoughtful* at least from the outside, so damned determined to make religion and science be and do the same thing?  I get why pedantic minds want them to be the same - science challenges literal religious views.  But when you claim you are thoughtful, what is the point?  it is really that science has value in our society that religion is losing (and part of me suspects this is the problem).  Or is it that he thinks we need to recast religion, cause science really is winning the battle he claims doesn't exist?  the entire article seems -- off, somehow.  as if he does not believe himself, what he's writing.  or is it me that's off?  --[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 14:51, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Godot, that's an interesting question. I wonder if it comes out of some kind of political correctness or desire to proclaim that everyone's worldviews are equally good? And yeah, it does seem a bit off. There's just so many cliches in such close proximity to each other that it feels like he's not even trying. 19:12, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

I liked the article, I thought it was pretty good. I don't necessarily agree with everything the author says, but I understand where they are coming from, and I agree with their general gist. 09:31, 19 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, I think it's a good article too. I think this is a fundamental mistake that Dawkins and others make - the idea that religion primarily tells people what to think, rather than what to do. The interesting thing is that a lot of Christians (eg the CMI lot) have become convinced of this as well. In other words, they miss the point of their own religion - but then, they miss the point of a lot of things.
 * Bob, maybe all that head-desk banging is having a negative effect on you!
 * Must go and read The Golden Bough now.-- 10:06, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Kriss, historically that has not been the case. If you look at the old-timey religions (that is, those that haven't changed significantly in hundreds or even thousand of years), such as Orthodox Judaism or certain interpretations of Islam, it's pretty clear that holy books do tell people what to believe. I suspect that if you went back to the time of the Old Testament and said "God exists in a separate magisteria and don't really have an impact on reality," you would be burned at the stake. The whole NOMA/retreat to commitment thing is actually a pretty recent invention designed to protect religion from being supplanted by science.
 * Now, if people want to treat religion as a moral compass but not a science textbook, that's another thing. But even then I would have to ask: why try to hold onto religious memes when we can just create new traditions? (Especially because religious ideas have some particularly nasty memes lurking around, too.) 11:39, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Religious texts do prescribe certain beliefs, yes, but not as often as you might think. Where does the Torah do this, for example? Also, when these texts were written people didn't have quite the same grasp of what they did and didn't believe. As the article says, the idea of an orderly belief system that all fits together came from the Greek tradition - it isn't intuitive. When the doctors of the Christian Church tried to set out exactly what Christians were meant to believe in in the first few centuries AD they got into a terrible pickle and came up with a lot of absurdities that nobody actually believes in today, but which still form part of official Catholic doctrine because it's such a fuss to change it.
 * Why not create new traditions? Well, they are being created, since religions are changing all the time. But the codified, written creeds of religions necessarily lag behind what people actually believe in. Changing them is a terribly slow and difficult process, and it's so hard to get everyone to agree on a new version that you may as well do what millions of believers have always done and fudge the issue. That upsets the "rationalists", but hey, it isn't their religion is it?-- 12:25, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Tetronian, you are focusing on the Abrahamic religions (Jewish/Christian/Islamic), and ignoring that other religions have rather different histories. If you went to ancient Israel and started talking about NOMA, you may well have been stoned. On the other hand, if you went to Athens 500 BCE, you may have heard many people intrigued to hear you out. In Hellenistic culture, non-literal interpretations of religious beliefs were quite popular—you are mistaken to think it is a purely modern phenomenon. Even in Christian times, if you look at the history of Biblical interpretation, the most popular method of interpretation from Roman times up to the Middle Ages was allegorical (i.e. non-literal), it was only with the Protestant Reformation that literal interpretations gained ascendancy. Likewise, if you look at the Jewish and Islamic traditions, you'll find that traditional scriptural interpretation is far more flexible than many today paint it to be. In the Greek/Roman worlds, religion was important to the state, and the gods of the state had to be publicly supported; but among educated company, one was free to entertain a variety of interpretations, including those which would treat the gods as allegory for abstract principles of rationality or ethics. Or look at Buddhism, and the Buddha's repeated refusal to answer philosophical/theological questions, such as those about the nature of God/Gods, the origin of the universe, etc., positively or negatively, on the grounds that the answers are irrelevant to saving us from our present state. 09:21, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, dreadful piece. (Although I can see why Maratrean would like it). Not necessarily because it's pro-religion or anti-science. But because in his criticisms he fails to distinguish between people who believe "science will save the world" and science itself. And his final conclusion is simply risible. In the end it's simply yet another thinly disguised attempt to claim that science doesn't and can't know everything therefore God. But it's the BBC. They have a quota to fill. Ajkgordon (talk) 12:37, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * By the way, I don't agree with the whole article, especially about humans not being built to understand how things work. But I do agree that a lot of attacks on (and defences of) religion rather miss the point.-- 13:03, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It kinda misses the point from the off when he says that science and religion are fundamentally the same thing. Except, no, they're not. They're really, really not. One is adaptable to reality the other is - in principle, if not in practice - dogmatic and unchanging. Science expects to alter and adapt it's theories. Religion doesn't. Religion is like a marriage; you don't go into a marriage thinking "well, I'll divorce in 10 years anyway" just as much as you don't go into a religion thinking "I'll change my mind and become an atheist later". It's absolute and unchanging and that's practically the entire point. Getting into bed with a scientific theory with that attitude, however, is wrong and can lead to a lot of trouble. Trying to say that they're the same thing is the sort of intellectually vacuous things people want to say to sound "reasonable" and "smart" and "tolerant" - it's not something they say because it's correct. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll shove your pencil! 10:24, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I DISAGREE WITH ISRAEL'S POLICIES.
Discuss. HollowWorld (talk) 10:32, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * What, all of them? And do we discuss Israel's policies or your disagreement? 109.154.225.108 (talk) 10:54, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Seriously? Is there not a thread for this already?--  11:19, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * -- 13:34, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * No Brx, that thread is now about Godwin's Law. Duh. HollowWorld (talk) 13:58, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * (somewhta @ UHM) All which have suffered more, in cases far more, than Palestinians have.Civic Cat (talk) 20:22, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * For me it's the first one that does it. A jewish boy in ghetto, saying "I'm a Palestinian". I honestly have to clue how to compare suffering and something tells me we shouldn't start to. -- 10:13, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Hmmmm. Either way, the anti-semites fail. Quantitatively, Palestinian suffering at the hands of Israelis is but a small fraction of Jewish sffering during the holocaust. If however, one wishes to cite that the Nazi comparisons are valid because suffering is suffering, and implicitly no matter how the amount, then one can say that the PLO and Hamas are morally equal to the Nazis.Civic Cat (talk) 17:33, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Freakonomics/SuperFreakonomics
Worth getting? I've been meaning to get around to it at some point, but the epic fail of a chapter on global warming in the second book is making me think twice. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 04:53, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * The first one is definitely worth reading. It is clever and engaging, and not too full of itself (the crappy preface aside).  The second one is much less so.  So I'd recommend the first to anyone, but the follow-up only to people who really loved the first.-- 05:04, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * (ec) Freakonimics was quite good, the sequel is a bit of cashing in on fame. Grab the audio book first. Oh yes, and "Arrrr! Shiver me timbers. Send forth yonder wench with ye flagon o' rum. Arrrr!" --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  05:11, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I think the global warming thing is an example of the Igon Value Problem - the authors just didn't know enough to contextualize when they spoke to various people who gave them information on climate change.-- 05:18, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, looks like they Lomborged that chapter. I guess I'll get the first and skip the sequel. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 06:14, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm going to add that one as my Concept of the Month. There seems to be an interesting trend for books that tell us "the not-so-obvious is right and you're dumb and the author is smart" going around these days. So it doesn't go for the smug route as some of them do? <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll zap your daffodil! 09:25, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Or "Everything you know about x is wrong!" Which is guaranteed to be either cleverly amazing or a total train wreck. Add in a very complex subject matter and the desire to hippie-punch and you get Superfreakonomics on global warming. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 16:13, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I have this theory that the easiest way to get someone to believe you isn't to pull any fancy word games or something silly like neurolinguistic programming - just say "most people think this, but actually..." before you spout out your opinion. The General Ignorance round on QI doesn't help with this, but at least they admit that there's only so many things that people believe that is wrong. I think it's the same psychological effect that makes people like "alternative" music, specifically a band that no one else has heard of. My pet theory there is that it's a form of identity crisis, that we desire to carve out individuality so much we confuse it with uniqueness - and so we want to seek out things that no one else knows about to define us. Whether that be an "everything you know is wrong" fact, a band that no one has heard of, or some specialist boutique down a back alley that's frequented by only 6 people a month. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll reconstruct your hub cap! 20:34, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Or in its crudest form, the secrets they don't want you to know about. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 01:45, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I fuckin' hate that guy.-- 06:45, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm just wondering how far you can push it before someone calls bullshit on the whole thing. Could be worth trying out. Could even go all Milgram on it and wear a lab coat while telling them cows can breath on the moon and not many people know that NASA actually sent some to the moon before humans to make sure it was safe. And not a lot of people know that. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll discalceate your Furby! 10:12, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I seem to have gotten on WND's mailing list and everyday I get about 5 emails, they are always prefaced with "thing the mainstream media won't report", "what the experts know but won't tell you", "the secret to wealth that only the rich know", "suprising simple medical break through doctors won't give you that has been cleared by the FDA". My last one says "The book the controlled media want to hide from you..." -  <font face=times color=black>π    silverbrain.png 08:13, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Expert application of the trope. Anyone know what it's actually called? <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll navigate your padlock! 08:35, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Cheers for the info, I was thinking of buying one of those books, so I got the first one today. "Whoops!" by John Lancaster was a good read to someone who wanted to know just what had happened in the last few years... 22:05, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

PETA Again
So now, how do we raise awareness of animal welfare? I know, let's create a porn site!. I'm starting to think that the guy in PETA who comes up with the gimmocks has something else on his mind other than animals. <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 21:35, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * "The nonprofit organization, whose controversial campaigns draw criticism from women's rights groups, said it hopes to raise awareness of veganism through a mix of pornography and graphic footage of animal suffering." --145.94.77.43 (talk) 21:37, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * "Suck suck, bang bang, BUNNY WITH SHAMPOO IN ITS EYES!!!" <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 21:40, 19 September 2011 (UTC)
 * BUNNY WITH SHAMPOO IN ITS EYES wouldn't really turn me off any more than most contemporary porn. Mountain Blue (talk) 01:37, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Maybe the Question Evolution! campaign might actually have some success if they went down this route. 04:33, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Porn with Ken in it? Hm. SHOW ME YOUR MACHISMO! Mountain Blue (talk) 11:13, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not convinced by the viability of this idea. Let's imagine that you are watching some, shall we say, "interesting" porn and it cuts to slaughterhouse or vivisection scenes. Two things that occur to me are:
 * It will rather spoil the moment and break one's concentration somewhat.
 * Far more disturbingly, it might condition watchers to associate animal distress with sexual images.
 * In either event it's not a good idea.--BobSpring is sprung! 12:31, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Good piece on PETA's insanity. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 03:36, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Maybe it helps if I briefly explain what's going on with the XXX TLD. A registry was selected to run XXX. They knew that whitehouse.xxx, paris-hilton.xxx and so on would cause controversy that might mar their commercial success or lead to endless lawsuits, so from the outset they've tailored policies to two parallel streams. Right now that means you can apply to the registry under Sunrise A or Sunrise B. Sunrise A is for existing brand owners (e.g. Playboy) to buy a domain in XXX for pornography. If Coca-Cola wants coke.xxx they can have it using Sunrise A, but on the understanding it's for a porn site. Sunrise B allows brand owners to "blacklist" a domain. So Coca-Cola might apply under Sunrise B to ensure that coke.xxx never "exists" (well, that's not technically exactly true, but the details don't matter) while Playboy could consider Sunrise B if they feel a Playboy.xxx would just dilute recognition of their existing registrations elsewhere in the hierarchy. Now, PETA presumably was told they should apply under Sunrise B, so that no horse fucking porn sites end up owning peta.xxx and as usual for PETA they went insane and decided that Sunrise B wasn't acceptable. The "shock porn" site idea would qualify them under Sunrise A - and as well as publicity always being valuable anyway making a stir about this ensures that when PETA's lawyer tells the XXX registry that they really do want control of peta.xxx it will be an easier sell. The reality, I strongly suspect, will be that peta.xxx launches as a redirect to PETA's existing site, and eventually the XXX TLD registry backs down and it becomes "normal" for outfits like PETA to uselessly duplicate into this new TLD. Any journalist or blogger who cares to follow up the "story" will be told the shock site is coming soon at first, and then once the Sunrise B hype dies down the shock site will be just another tactic to generate press coverage. No actual porn, and no real intention to make or distribute porn, just cynical manipulation, PETA's main day-to-day tactic. But hey, I might be wrong. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 07:57, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Don't let the creationists see this!
8 simple questions science can't answer --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  15:36, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * a second sun?? wouldn't that at least, be knowable.  I know we supposedly might have a second moon, but if it is, it's far away and its orbit is erratic enough some say moon, some say "stupid rock in space", some say "don't exist either way, nertz to you". but a second sun??[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:45, 20 September 2011 (UTC) -- and wait, we don't even know how bikes work??? what the hell has science been doing all these years.  inventing a computer is all find and dandy, but i'm dubious the computer is really working if you can't even explain a bike.  ;-)  this article is making my head hurt.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 15:48, 20 September 2011 (UTC)


 * It would probably be a brown dwarf, and a large fraction of the way to Alpha Centauri, so it'd be virtually unobservable. WP has the skinny. And don't bother reading Isaac Asimov's book of the same name. When the cover calls it "The best thing he's done for ages!" it's true, but that wasn't saying much towards the end, alas. –SuspectedReplicant Support democracy - Ace is the REAL moderator 15:59, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * We'll (eventually) find the answers to most of these anyway. That's the difference between scientists and creationists: they won't be able to figure out anything. Osaka Sun (talk) 16:14, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Some days, i get why creationists are how they are. It does feel as if science makes things up cause it can.  "this star was originally postulated to explain perceived cycles of extinction" - seems so damn hedgie.  But unlike what the creationists do (or say about what science does), it remains "just an idea" till someone has more proof than "it would make what we know, easier to understand".  So I trust the process, even if the ideas make me go "huh?"  ;-)  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot      Warning, chocolate will make your clothes shrink 16:22, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * QI did get the "second moon" thing wrong. Cruithne actually orbits the sun, not the Earth. So it doesn't have the properties of a moon in the sense that our current moon, the moon does. However, the magic of orbital resonance and a few other effects makes it appear to orbit the Earth in a weird. WP does have some funky animated diagrams to show how it works. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll adhere your university! 08:20, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I assume somebody knows this
So, I'm tired of looking online and don't see my more tech-savvy than me friends often enough and they rarely go on Facebook. I have XP, (Home To be specific), on a 2007 dell comp... Do i have to do a clean install to 7? (Probably Home premium)or can I do a Upgrade. I would look online but I get contradictory statements (up to and including Microsoft themselves). --SmithRob (talk) 16:39, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * If your wondering why I don't know this, it's because the last time we actually upgraded a comp at my house was back in the 98/ME/XP days, so, yah --SmithRob (talk) 16:40, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Upgrade is pretty clunky. Get a new hard drive, put 7 on that, and have your old drive as reference.  You'll have to provide permissions for it, though (either you right-click on the whole drive and do it then, or get prompted each time you try to alter/move a file).  You may even be able to run programs off of your old hard drive.  That's what I did, and I can.--  16:47, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * A clean installation is much better than an upgrade. Upgrades are notoriously unreliable. Make sure your PC has 2GB RAM. It will run on 1GB but a bit slowly. Ajkgordon (talk) 17:20, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * There's really no such thing as a Windows XP to Windows Vista/7 upgrade. Any install is going to wipe your hard disk. There's also precious little reason to upgrade. Windows 7 doesn't really offer extra over Windows XP (OK, wireless is easier now, but if you have Dell they shipped wireless config software with XP so it's a non-issue), and it'll probably make your PC run like a dog. Plus there's whole new layers of things to click to get to the settings. Basically, the stock advice is never, ever upgrade an MS OS. Wait until you buy a new PC and get whatever is current effectively for free. -- 18:15, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
 * To clarify, you can buy a Windows 7 upgrade disc (cheaper) but do a fresh installation. Ajkgordon (talk) 18:25, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

First, why do you want to do this? I have computers running both XP and 7 and see no advantage to such an upgrade. If you have a particular reason then sure. But if you just want the latest-and-greatest, well, no. Doctor Dark (talk) 01:19, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, XP is no longer supported software. Latest-and-greatest might seem to belittle the idea of keeping your OS with the times, but it's essential to do so. If there's no pressing need to upgrade, then it possibly is a little needless, but if you don't plan on getting a new rig in the next 3 years, it's worth it. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll employ your cabinet! 08:16, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * For the non-techie, Windows 7 is a much nicer environment in which to work. As long as your hardware is up to it (and with a 2007 PC it should be - at least dual core processor and 2Gb RAM) then the interface is slicker, troubleshooting is better, and it supports some software that won't work in Windows XP including Internet Explorer 9 (if you have to use IE). On the other hand, you might have some older software that no longer works in 7 even in compatibility mode. I run 7 on a 2006 Dell Dimension dual core and it's fine, even with apps such as Photoshop and video editing software. Ajkgordon (talk) 10:00, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Prepare for flame war
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Debate:Israel_and_Palestine

Enter if you wish. Osaka Sun (talk) 03:35, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * You set it up so big, but you left me underwhelmed. -- 07:20, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Both act like small children that need a good hiding, I really can't see where the controversy is. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll stir your hostel! 08:12, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Yo gummint so big...
Good piece in the WaPo on Solyndra, which has already engendered a round of "the government shouldn't pick winners and losers" and other such Reaganisms in the wingnut-o-sphere. Meanwhile, the GOP is backing massive loans to the nuclear industry. Such is the rhetorical vacuity of "BIG GOVERNMENT!" Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 03:46, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yah well we know the jobs created in the nuke field will more than pay for themselves, whereas all that "green collar" pie-in-the-sky bullshit has been exposed for the fraud that it is. nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 17:23, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Nebuchadnezzar, he's insinuating that he agrees with the subsidy. SOCIALIST! Osaka Sun (talk) 23:24, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Verisimilitude
Is a word I learnt today but does not appear on the wiki. I am still trying to get my head around it but basically from what I can gather "the Earth is an oblated spheroid" has more verisimilitude than "the Earth is a sphere", whilst neither are strictly true. -  <font face=times color=black>π     04:50, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It's a pretty broad multi-disciplinary concept. It's just the degree to which something has elements or characteristics reflective of reality as experienced.  In literature we say that a book or scene that sounds real (vivid dialog, good referencing of place, etc.) has verisimilitude - it sounds "real" or "true."-- 04:54, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * i've just done a search and found three recent mentions of that word in the Saloon Bar, so it does exist.  04:59, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * If you don't understand verisimilitude, you are probably wronger than wrong. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 07:13, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Beat me to it. Damneth you. But yeah, that appears like the best way to explain it. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll push your oxygen! 08:11, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * In realist fiction, verisimilitude is used to describe fiction that can be said to represent reality, even if the events didn't actually happen or the characters didn't actually exist.-- 08:12, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Pot dispensaries lower crime rates
lol -- 12:47, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Truththeory
http://www.truththeory.org/

Repository of free (or pirated!) documentary films. Some woo, some look interesting. --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  18:23, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Everything I've seen in that list is either great or utter bullshit. Speaking of the latter, they carry some Scientology propaganda. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 23:46, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I've actually been looking for this one. Sweet. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 05:09, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Voting standards
After several days of discussion on the talk page of this essay, I've started Forum:Voting standards. Head over there to start hashing out RW's first voting standards! 04:47, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

how did you decide on your username?
I was just thinking about this and I'm curious. If you're willing to share, how'd you pick your user name? Some of them I understand, or presume I understand the reference they're making, but others I don't. The deep reasoning behind mine is because I wanted to use something simple, but the letter "A" was too boring so I shook it up a bit. Also, it's the most common letter in my last name. άλφα Ταλκ 03:19, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * My initial username was TomMoore, from my CP username. It was a reference to Sir Thomas More - both ideologically and by way of mocking their general inability to guess at it.  My current username is my initials, which became even more meaningful to me (beyond the obvious) after five years signing them a dozen times a day to paperwork.-- 04:56, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I like Kriss Akabusi, and I like saying "Awoogar!"-- 07:05, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Mine is my name. Sod that internet anonymity! Ajkgordon (talk) 07:54, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I was staring at the sign in form for a while, left, came back a day later, stared at it some more and typed the first thing that came into my head: 3.14159. Later I changed my name to Π when I realised I could. -  <font face=times color=black>π    silverbrain.png 07:59, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I have no idea. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll insult your wigwam! 08:13, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * was name I and a couple of others had used for various nefarious purposes. Pretty representative of me as a person I thought. Aceace 08:27, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I took Andy's advice and used my real first name and last initial.--BobSpring is sprung! 08:34, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Originally my name was Tyrannis which was how I thought Count Dooku's Sith name was spelled, I always loved Christopher Lee movies regardless of how bad they were. I renamed myself Ty after Pi called me that once. My sock is my RFNALI. Robothead.svg dot.svg 11:28, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Having been given a tongue-twisting Welsh name as punishment for a long and difficult labour, I've been Gremlin ever since my earliest school years. When I started DJing, the name was already taken, so I stuck the 'psy' on the front, for psychedelic, and the rest, as they say, is history. --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  11:55, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Looking up at the DVDs above my computer desk and seeing Bladerunner. If my eyes had alighted on a different part of the shelf, I suppose I'd be TeenageCumSlut. –SuspectedReplicant Support democracy - Ace is the REAL moderator 12:09, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * nobs = no bullshitTM. nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 17:26, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * 'nobs' has a somewhat different meaning in the uk. Possibly more apt. AMassiveGay (talk) 16:58, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I always wondered! I used to set up "neveruse" (usually followed by pseudo-random numbers) accounts for places that I either did not want to register or didn't think I'd ever come back. After I'd left here, got bored and decided to come back, I decided on "Occasionaluse", I love the way "Occasional use" sounds. Occasionaluse (talk) 19:20, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm just really dull so I used my real name. One of two such, the other being Trent, until some CZ refugees stopped by - David Gerard (talk) 13:28, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * My usernames in the RW sphere have all been the names of fictional characters. My current moniker (and signature) is Blue van Meer, from wp:Special Topics in Calamity Physics. 17:23, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Mikalos is... i dont honestly know. I needed a new uinternet wide username and mikalos was the word i typed out. I tend ot do mikalosa now though--SmithRob (talk) 20:08, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Neat, neat. Thanks for satisfying my curiosity! άλφα Ταλκ 23:18, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * It's short for "Senator" which was the class name of a Romulan ship I really liked in a Star Trek game called Klingon Academy, which I played so young, that my english weren't good enough to know that it basically means "politician". I was also RPing the fact that in multiplayer I didn't want the ship to have any specific name in order to stick a thumb to all those using names like darthuberkiller666 etc. So that essentially other people would see the generic class name in their sensors making that dashing enemy decloaking and killstealing from the dark seem even more mysterioussssss. Ahem. So yes, it's actually as geeky and simple as that. Then I kept using it. And then I shortened it to "Sen" because of the economy and I couldn't afford to be buying so many letters. Sen (talk) 02:05, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * And the respective character in Spam Wars was Magnificent Bastard. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll optimize your octopus! 09:09, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Well there are two versions I have been told. The first is my family found me in a park after dark, they took me home and called me Mark. The other is that my mother always wanted a Mark, and the short version is it took 4 other kids before a 'Mark' popped out (I guess my dad hates my name). The eDC is a play on words with my initials and the past tense of the verb 'mark', also my mother always called me MarkyD. MarkeDC (talk) 19:18, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I waited and waited every so long. And no one would get Rhinocéros.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot   The Peyote God awaits 19:26, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I still don't. Yew eksplan nao pleez? --<font face="Wild Words"> PsyGremlin  19:30, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * So a big Rhinoceros comes into the village square, see. and it kills a cat, see.  So we all get human and dissusse, see, but do nothing about it, till we are all running around like chickens with our heads cut off.  And the media and the politicians.  and.  see????[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot   The Peyote God awaits 19:36, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Wait, i have an even better explination: Rational Wiki Chicken Coop!!!![[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot   The Peyote God awaits 19:37, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I was eating Dumplings. I look like a Dumpling. So Dumpling it was. It was either that...or the usual 'Corpus' or 'Dire'--Dumpling (talk) 02:39, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

What do you guys think of back-to-work laws? (to those outside the United States)
A crapload of hilarious news from Canuckistan yesterday, but something that particularly interested me was the deal met between Air Canada and its unionized workers (the federal Labour Minister threatened to legislate them back, spurring negotiations and stopping a strike in the process). Along with a sudden anti-collective bargaining masturbation (it's all the leftist unions' fault for everything, right out of nowhere!) and worship by the droves of Bush Harpie supporters, I noticed a little bit of irony:

1. Air Canada is now a private company, and the apparent pro-free market Conservative government just used executive power on the economy,

2. The airline's CEO gave himself a massive raise during the recession, and

3. The final agreement resulted in raises to the workers' wages

And it looks like they totally forgot about the $90,000 in taxpayer money being sent everyday on consultants to find ways to cut public spending, and the attempt to reinstate a PATRIOT Act in Canada while nationwide crime rates continue to drop. The stupid, it burns!

End rant. Have you ever experienced something like that before in your career? Osaka Sun (talk) 08:58, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Linkage? -- 10:07, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Yah, and in most publicly held companies a CEO can't give himself a payraise, the Board of Directors has to ok it. This stuff most likely came out of some commie rag. nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 17:20, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Rob, corporate laws are different in other countries with different regulatory systems than those of the USA. I know next to nothing about Canadian corporate law, but I caution you against assuming that all laws outside the US are the same as those here. άλφα Ταλκ 17:58, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I assumed Canada, being the commie state that it is, has stricter regs. The key here, of course, is "publicly held". nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 22:05, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Things Rob doesn't like = Commie. Aceace 22:07, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * The world to Rob = The USA. B♭maj7 "Voted in two different votes, but there was never a vote." 22:16, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Doing a quick google it becomes obvious why Air Canada was privatized. As a government run agency, the CEO's salary was capped and enjoyed no stock benefits. For years incompetent stooges mismanaged it, while the best qualified talent worked in the private sector. So it was privatized to make managing it competitive with industry standards. nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 22:57, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Hello, this has nothing to do with the privatization of the company, if you read anything here. We're talking about the credibility of a government that prides itself on less intervention in the economy, while denying the rights of workers to strike behind their backs.  If you think doing this while pressing for more cutbacks from the bottom is an intelligent move, then something's definitely wrong with you.  And if Canada is so communist, then why does the Heritage Foundation list it as a more freer economy than the United States?  Hmm.


 * Also, UHM, here are the links. Osaka Sun (talk) 23:12, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Let's get this straight, flight attendants are public employees? or in common parlance, flight attendants suck the public tit? And Canada is not communist? and I suppose it's fair to some back woods country bumpkin or hillbilly, or inner city minority with no pot to piss in, or destitute Native American on the Res, that they must pay for the bourgeois lifestyle of overpaid public employee flight attendants? and their only customers are "the rich" who can afford airline tickets?
 * And the Heritage Foundation report I'm sure refers to the fact Canada has elected a responsible executive versus the US that after fighting the Cold War for 40 years, in a mass psychotic spasmodic fit suddenly embraces Communism. nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 01:52, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * And Canada is not communist? No. Aceace 01:56, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * A country, where flight attendants suck the public tit, is not communist? nobsabandon hope all ye who enter here. 02:09, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Um, no. Aceace 02:10, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * We should archive this somewhere. He can't realize the difference between the public and private sphere, and the largest neoconservative think tank on the planet is now Communist?
 * I didn't know the situation in the US was this bad. Osaka Sun (talk) 03:00, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Rob, communism=totalitarian government with a planned economy and in most instances without private property rights. Canada has none of these things. Now Socialism on the other hand, may be applicable to Canada. but even than it's all on the right wing of socialist thought. I spent two years explaining that shit to my mother, I have no problem doing the same thing to you. -- 10:41, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Wait wait... Stuff exists outside of the United States? Can you cite this please? MarkeDC (talk) 19:23, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Not without citing "commies"… -- 22:28, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Beware women bearing whips
Or, more accurately, beware the New York Post (that's like our version of the Daily Fail for you Brits), because they will screw over your career if they find out you're doing something "saucy." Douches. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 16:16, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Comments are full of some serious special too. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll shake your can opener! 18:52, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Awesome: "I call sexist hypocrisy here. Because who knows how many men working for the AG’s office are herclients. Who knows how many of these guys spend their days getting bitched around by Biglaw partners making 10 times the money and politicians with 10 times the power, and then want nothing more than to be tied up while Alisha Sparks conducts an internal investigation on them." Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:20, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * "Dear New York Post: By day she gets paid to dominate people, restrain them, and whip them. By night, she gets to enjoy it." Ha! Ha! Saucy indeed. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll write your cob! 09:13, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

If you haven't seen this:
It is an absolute must watch make you cry make you happy so beautiful video. Surely something that will be down in the history books. -- 18:51, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Then he pulls ten dollars from his wallet, hands them to his wife and says "well thanks for letting your mother win that one, son." <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll seize your snowflake! 19:00, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * ?-- 20:46, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Is that authentic? I'm always sceptical of emotional moments "caught on tape." (to be completely honest, I'm sceptical of virtually everything upon first impression) άλφα Ταλκ 20:57, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * -watched, didnt cry from happiness and didnt see it as anything to groundbreaking---SmithRob (talk) 20:58, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * tl;dw Ajkgordon (talk) 15:21, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Just skip halfway to the good bits. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll exercise your factoid! 15:32, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * You ain't the boss of me. Ajkgordon (talk) 17:00, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * What a sad world we live in when one considers a father giving his son unconditional love special. I would be more shocked to see the father disown him. I may be desensitized in that my brother came out to my family over decade ago, the only thing that was noticeably different about our family is we stopped attending Catholic church. It may have been the catalyst that kept me away from religion as a teenager... I never looked at it that way before... MarkeDC (talk) 19:34, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

The US, UK, and Canada are plutocracies for the wealthy raiders, not democracies
Don't believe me? You don't have to take my word for it. The corporate dictators at Citigroup were the first to admit this, and very openly, to their wealthiest clientele. 09:57, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm scanning for signs of sarcasm or an internal prank but I can't find any. Best I can think is that they're sending out cynical memos of "as far as we're concerned". But the difference between that and it being played straight is pretty minimal. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll explicate your time! 11:25, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

Stop trying to stop the funny, it just makes it funnier
I'd never heard of SNL's Schweddy Balls skit with Alec Baldwin, but now that Ben & Jerry's have released an ice cream named after it, right wing Christian Moms are complaining. Except that their press release reads like the joke itself. When you're in a hole, Ladies, stop digging. PS I sort of loathe SNL's frathouse humour, but this wasn't a bad example of campy innuendo. DogP (talk) 15:44, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * The true genius of the Pete Schweddy Skits (There were two of them, Schweddy Balls and then Schweddy Weiner is that they were radio programs. While we, the audience were seeing the real events, the supposed radio audience was only hearing the audio from it..... That's what always made me laugh about it: imagining how many people were listening in and just staring at their radios thinking "WTF?"  17:29, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I do love how much these people will complain - "In the past, Ben & Jerry's has released controversial ice creams, like a special edition of Chubby Hubby called Hubby Hubby last year which celebrated gay marriage".. But i do wish i'd know about that ice cream.  how fun.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot   The Peyote God awaits 17:39, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

The Speed of Light
Just... wow. (It's been WIGO Worlded). So, what does this mean? 01:29, 23 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Look about four topics up. Osaka Sun (talk) 02:11, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

What I did on my (extended, unplanned, unchosen) vacation
As you may remember, I am currently unemployed. While I have found a job, it doesn't start till October 3. And I'm no longer actively interviewing, since there's no point with only seven business days till I start the next phase of my career. (I am willing to consider other offers, but most companies can't hire someone that quickly, not a mid-career software engineer at least.)

So, I've got spare time. Living near DC, with its great collection of free museums, I decided to do something a little unusual for a local and be a tourist today.

I went to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

A friend asked if I "liked" it. "Like" isn't the right word -- it's about the Holocaust. I was moved, I was impressed by the museum, I'd recommend seeing it, but it's not something I'd say I "liked".

The outside of the museum looks like any other museum in DC -- a big stone building. The main hall, though, is architecturally amazing -- it's lots of raw metal and brick. It's supposed to feel like a death camp, but it also has a glass roof... so there's hope.

You enter the main exhibit by taking an elevator up to the fourth floor. In the elevator, they play an audio of some of the first American soldiers discovering one of the camps. "Some kind of prison" was what they thought at first. Once you exit the elevator, you see a quote from Eisenhower, explaining that he chose to go to one of the camps personally so he could serve as a witness that the Holocaust really happened, that it wasn't "propaganda". (The museum doesn't cover it, but I'm told Patton vomited the first time he went to a death camp.)

The main exhibit then starts by covering Hitler's rise to power, the Nazi's use of propaganda, and the rising anti-Semitism in Germany. It's not pretty to see, but the reality of what the museum covers doesn't hit you till the next part.

That's when you get to the camps and the ghettoes and the rest of the horrors.

In a word, "damn." There's some video screens that are shielded by concrete barriers, so you have to stand close to see them and young children or the easily upset won't see them accidentally. That's where they include things like footage of the victims of medical experiments and the films taken immediately after the camps were liberated. I've got a strong stomach, but I had to turn away from the medical experiment videos. I'm glad I took a friend's advice and didn't eat before going. I visited Dachau in April, but that was "just" a work camp, not a death camp. It didn't prepare me for this.

Then there's things like a boxcar that was used to transport victims to the camps, and a replica of the infamous "Work Will Make You Free" sign that hung over the gates of Auschwitz. Just walking under that sign or through the boxcar is intense.

I think the most moving part was the shoes. They have a pile of shoes that the Nazis collected from the victims. I think what struck me most, oddly enough, was that, over sixty five years later, the room still smells like a shoe store. But still... those were the shoes worn by people before they were gassed. I find it impossible to put into words the intensity that brings to the room.

After that... well, I was so overcome I don't remember a lot of the museum. I do remember the Hall of Remembrance. It's a circular marble room, skylights on top, with an eternal flame. The walls have the names of all the camps, and candles that can be lit as a remembrance of the dead. I considered lighting a candle, but I just couldn't bring myself to, since I don't have any victims in my family.

There's a poster at the entrance. I don't remember the exact wording, but it's something like this: The next time you witness hatred The next time you see injustice The next time you read about genocide THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU SAW It's not an easy place to visit, but if you're in DC, go. MDB (talk) 22:57, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Walter Benn Michaels makes a provocative argument about what we choose to commemorate that starts with a provocative question: why is there a Holocaust museum (commemorating an event that happened on another continent) in the national capital, but not a slavery museum? B♭maj7 "Voted in two different votes, but there was never a vote." 23:07, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * So as to remind everyone why Palestine shouldn't have its own state. Aceace 23:08, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, one thing to remember is the the Holocaust museum was funded entirely with private donations. (I don't know if the government donated the land, though.) If someone wants a slavery museum in DC, they can raise the funds to build one. I'm not arguing that there shouldn't be a slavery museum, but Michaels' quote seems to be based on the assumption that the Holocaust Museum is like the Smithsonian and is a federal project. There was a campaign to build one in Fredericksburg, VA, but it's apparently defunct,or at best moribund. MDB (talk) 23:23, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Fascinating. Though I wonder, what is the message you took from that sign at the end? On the one hand it could be "You think that's hatred? That's nothing!" (which is the BS version, but people still use that trope). But on the other I think it means "Take this as a warning. Let simple 'hatred' slide and it will turn into something else". Because that latter one does frighten me quite a bit. Racial profiling is becoming the norm against terrorism, and religious tolerance is slowly dropping. One guy suggests putting atheists on a register, another suggests invading Muslim countries and converting them to Christianity. I do wonder if it's more a case of "when" and not "if" something will kick off and we'll see this happen again in what we would today call a "civilised" country. <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll anglicise your shank! 23:37, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
 * My take on the sign was that it's another way of saying "Never Forget. Never Again." As for your points about rising religious intolerance, yeah, it's a valid concern. We've not reached the point where anti-Muslim propaganda is as bad an anti-Semitic propaganda in Germany, but I could definitely see parallels. MDB (talk) 00:24, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * According to WP although public subscription built the museum "the federal government made available 1.9 acres (0.77 ha) of land adjacent to the Washington Monument for construction" and in 2008 it had an "operating budget of just under $78.7 million ($47.3 million from Federal sources and $31.4 million from private donations)". So although they raised a lot of money to build it, it couldn't have been built and run without government assistance; in fact when you take the price of prime Washington real estate into account the USG is probably the majority benefactor. Not wishing to detract from its noble aims, the question of why is there no comparable national slavery museum does become more significant. 05:39, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Pedantic point -- it's not quite adjacent to the Washington Monument; its two or three blocks away, with the Department of Agriculture in between. MDB (talk) 08:16, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Quick question. A few relatives of mine recently went to Washington and described all the monuments and museums there. By number alone it seems pretty cultured, but it's all about war and death and holocausts and that sort of thing. Is the place really that depressing? <font color="#CC0000" size="3">ADK <font color=#330033>...I'll crystallize your whip! 09:07, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * No, not at all. Yes, there's the Holocaust Museum and the WWII and Vietnam Memorials. And the FDR Memorial can't help but cover WWII. But there's general history museums, art museums, the National Archives, the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial. I suppose it's a matter of perception and all, but I don't think it's fair to say "it's all about war and death and holocausts and that sort of thing." MDB (talk) 20:04, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * As most of you will know I actually am from Germany and still living there. I go to the University of Hamburg, while classes are running pretty much on a daily basis, if not at least weekly because there's always something to do there. The campus - or at least the main campus - is located in what was before a jewish neighbourhood. This is the main reason the campus was built there later, because most of the houses were empty after WWII. But there is a little "park" that is a memorial for all those who got deported - next to the institute that that covers studies of ancient cultures and hosts today some courses of the department for Arabic studies. But that is not all. About 5, 6 or 7 years ago the German authorities authorized an art project. The project consists of a guy putting golden sett stones into the sett of the streets. In those names are ingraved and the stones are set in where those people actually lived. These things are all over campus. And now, almost in front of every house of the campus there are these little golden reminders. "People that were killed in the holocaust lived here", "Look a little six year old girl called Maria lived here", "Look this family had six children, all eight were killed by hatred" those are the things I hear in my head when I see these stones. Rather suprisingly they are kept quite clean. No gum or cigarettes are ever thrown on them.
 * A holocaust museum may have a great effect once you visit it, but these stones have great effect too. Every day one is reminded of what happend. Every day some of the 40.000 students of the university are reminded of what happend, that these weren't just some people, but people with names, families, a home, neighbours and a whole life that got wiped away by unfounded hatred and conspiracy theories. It's truly beautifull. -- 11:33, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * The company I work for initially hired a Polish company to do a lot of the grunt work (if you can call something that needs at least a degree level education grunt work) and as one of two real employees on the technical side I went out there on some of the trips to talk to the contractors. Our CEO arranged for us to all get an extra day there and go visit the Auschwitz museum and take the tour. It's definitely something I'd recommend if you have an opportunity. I'm not sure how I'd feel about being lectured on this stuff in a US museum, given the US still retains and makes frequent use of the death penalty any general condemnation of state-sanctioned murder would seem to involve a sly wink to the American visitor "it's OK if we do it, of course". We also took a trip around the city (Kraków) looking at how it has changed as Poland went from Soviet control to EU member state which was fun but no more so than visiting any historic city. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 12:27, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * BoN, while the death penalty is abhorrent to many of us, equating it to the holocaust in any sense is just Godwin. Seriously. For all its faults, the US is a bastion of liberty and freedom even if it's fashionable to deny it. Ajkgordon (talk) 20:45, 22 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Despite its popularity with creationists and so on, just asserting something firmly isn't a convincing argument. That the US claims to be a bastion of liberty and freedom is not in doubt. North Korea claims to be democratic. Actions speak louder than words. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 01:27, 23 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not going to research it for you. If you want to believe that the US is somehow not free compared to most other countries in the the world, then go ahead. But you might need help putting your trousers on the right way round. Ajkgordon (talk) 21:43, 23 September 2011 (UTC)