RationalWiki:Saloon bar/Archive65

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, (new)(back)

Things that just leave you scratching your head

I just saw a Facebook post from a high school friend of mine.

It seems his daughter is working at Bonnaroo. At the Tennessee Baptist Convention's booth.

About all the Baptists and Bonnaroo have in common is the first letter. MDB (talk) 12:22, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

No sense in preaching to the choir. Jesus hung out with some unsavoury types to spread the word, and Haggard hung out with a prostitute to spread the cheeks. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 19:00, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Curld Wop

's brili... breli... great! Hic! Am now deaf from those freakin' vuvuzela thingies. --PsyGremlinPrata! 21:54, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Shit, my fiancee and I are kicking ourselves for not coming over. We considering going back to Jo'burg for the world cup ages but for some reason forgot. Damnit. Never mind, we have the Rugby World Cup here next year. Aceⁱ⁹ 21:56, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

I caught the highlights of the Sauff Effrica vs Mexico game. Great goal from Tshabalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalaisthisthewaytoamarillo?shalalalalalalala. I'm working tomorrow during the England game, but I might try and skive off for it. SJ ^Debaser 23:17, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Hour-long footage of the Gaza flotilla raid

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwsMJmvS0AY As captured by Iara Lee and smuggled out of Israel in her underwear. Shows the IDF assault on the Mavi Marmara. Thought it was important enough to post here (if this is the right place for important things that should be spread and talked about) Megaten (talk) 22:39, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

IDF claims people on the Mavi Marmara were terrorists... Yep, they sure looked like a bunch of hardened professional jihadis. Old men, well meaning middle class western activist types, and a load of chav teenagers pissing themselves. Thank gods they were brought down before they managed to hatch their dastardly plot to... uh... do stuff with Dennis the Menace catapults and other WMDs... -- 00:17, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

What if sysop delete page?

There are so many wild and crazy sysops here. Do they ever delete pages, and what do you do in that case? Lumenos (talk) 05:30, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

If sysop delete page, page go bye. Other sysop bring page back. Page then happy. Wiki happy. DickTurpis (talk) 05:38, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Also sysop bit go bye. -- Nx / talk 05:47, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

See HCM 05:46, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Sysop delete page all time. Bad page. See talk page why. Haz category. ħuman 08:21, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Oh I guess the pages aren't really vaporized for the other sysops. Thanks. Lumenos (talk) 09:12, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Confucius say sysop who delete page then sit on tack get point. 24.118.247.165 (talk) 17:04, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Every time a RW sysop deletes a page, an atheist somewhere loses their machismo WashionalRiki (talk) 19:27, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

What if sysop delete page? What if sysop delete page? Where delete page go?

they need to do way instain sysops, who delete thier pagges because these pagges cannot frigth back. it was in the saloon this mroning, a sysop in AR who delete her three pagges. they are taking the pagges back to raitionlwiki to lady too rest. my pary are with the edators who lost their pagges. i am truley sory for your lots. DickTurpis (talk) 05:25, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

lol ^{ONE / TALK} 12:23, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

i think Sysop is a pretty cool guy. eh deletes pages and doesn’t afraid of anything. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 12:40, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

I think everyone realises at this stage that the Loya Jirga are the will of the site, if they want to delete an edit, or a page, then they will do so. Dissent will be considered a seditious act and will result in your persecution, until you reach the stage where you will become a pariah member, insulted and maligned for standing up to tyranny. I hope that answers your question OP. 86.40.207.37 (talk) 13:29, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, all I heard was "whine whine bitch moan Loya Jirga bitch whine moan bellyache bellyache whine tyranny whine." DickTurpis (talk) 14:42, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Be quiet, you idiot. You're so stupid you don't see whats happening under your very nose, you contemptible imbecile. Cretin. 86.40.207.37 (talk) 14:52, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Yea, zounds, hold thy tongue, thou contemptible imbecile.--

Kriss Akabusi^{AAAWOOOGAAAR!!1} 15:27, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Thou dost speak much truth, good sir night. This month there shalt be a bonus wench for you, and God willing she shall have many of her original teeth. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 15:50, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Well deserveth I these tongue lashings which did truely rectify yarn lumbar regions. Yea I hath located the deletion log. To think I chastizeth'd one for something much lesser in recent times. Humble it hath made me and unworthy of any further acknowledgment. Borg willing, I shall take my nurishments from the light of thine day, on more worthy topix henceforth. Bless ye, good knight. Lumenos (talk) 20:02, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Gallery of creation: Kaput

I noticed this news in Boing Boing. Apparently a creationist museum in Georgia is auctioning off its collection. And from the sound of it, it will be closing soon although their professionally made webpage doesn't give any indication of that. Just an FYI for anyone keeping score or wanting to pick up an animatronic panda. Sen (talk) 04:20, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, that's their problem, right there. They weren't open enough to support a legitimate business model! It clearly states: "Please Call for Current Pricing and hour of operation." (Emphasis mine.) The Foxhole Atheist (talk) 14:25, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Bill Hicks on Creationism

Confucius think that RationalWikians may find this Bill Hicks video where he rips on creationists both entertaining and funny. Enjoy the meal. 24.118.247.165 (talk) 17:57, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Also, since this is a saloon bar, Confucius say don't drink and park - accidents cause people. 24.118.247.165 (talk) 06:47, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Do I need help?

A few weeks ago I decided to watch Ideon: Be Invoked. The reason for this is simple, I love robots and in anime, the Ideon is considered the most powerful robot ever conceived (hell, it shot through a planet to get a ship on the other side!). Anyway there are quite a number of deaths in the movie and one of them is a small girl who gets decapitated by enemy fire. Here, around the 27 second mark. I keep going back to watch those five seconds over and over again. I watch this child getting her head blown off over and over again. Now, I can see this happening in real life. Children becoming casualties in war is something that happens more than one would like to think. And I get this scene may be a criticism of the presence of children in mecha anime (you know, the little kid with the pure heart and the big mouth who does nothing but exclaim what is happening). I find this funny because this is the same generation of anime that would be reworked in Voltron or something in the United States. How badly do I need help?--Thanatos (talk) 01:42, 12 June 2010 (UTC)P.S. This movie did not mess me up as much as End of Evangelion, the great mindfuck.

Yes, you need help. Stop watching anime, it's weirdo shit. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 02:27, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

That's an impressively clean headshot, though. ^sshole 03:36, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Ideon? Bah! Gurren Lagaan was using GALAXIES as throwing weapons in its series! Although Idon really was a pioneer in the "everyone dies" genre. --Kels (talk) 23:15, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Ideon took the universe with it when it blew up, then the unborn messiah of the force (whose mother was killed but the four-month old fetus still lived) led the naked souls of everyone to a new universe where they were reborn. No, I am not making that up and it still makes as much sense as YEC.--Thanatos (talk) 02:23, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps you should watch Saikano to cheer up a bit. --Kels (talk) 02:35, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Policy Question

Do we now refer to all trolls, anonymous or not, as MarcusCicero, whether they are actually MC or just someone random? If not, I propose that we do so, as it would be mildly funny. Discuss. Fedhaji (Talk) 06:34, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

As anonymous Confucian IP editor that just arrived today, I argue that (since I was accidentally blocked as MC) you guy should be more careful to label people as this MarcusCicero guy, not less careful. 24.118.247.165 (talk) 06:43, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Just call them "anonymous" - they are legion. ħuman 08:53, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Why is Earth so boring?

And whose idea was it anyway? --Alienfromspace (talk) 17:30, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

It will only be boring until humanity develops giant robots--Thanatos (talk) 18:09, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm afraid it was all your invention; the habitat there... you and The Man. Remember ye CARLS needs: Creativity, adventure, recognition, love, and security. Seek ye these and find fulfillment when the withdraws wear off. Godspeed lad. Lumenos (talk) 20:12, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Capturebot

I put a capturebot tag thing on a link on my user page a couple days ago and the image link is still red. Anyone know why this is? Did I go something wrong? Is capturebot lazy? DickTurpis (talk) 18:08, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I think capturebot only watches the WIGO. There's a page where you can post capturebot requests but I can't seem to find it right now. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 18:24, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Ah, here it is. User:Capturebot2/sandbox. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 18:25, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Things you can see walking home in Cork

I'm used to seeing burnt out cars, dog shit, and the usual bits of Cork that don't often get mentioned in the tourist board adverts, but yesterday was a new one. The travelers have a nice little campsite nearby, so of course that means we have horses running loose all over the place. I was wandering through one of the local estates and came across a heavily pregnant dead horse, with a few knacker kids playing around it. I suppose every city has its shitty areas, but Cork has a rather unique one. Still, I suppose it's better than some parts of Islington in the late 80s. ConcernedResident ^{Fightin' round the world} 11:48, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

What's a knacker kid? MDB (talk) 11:53, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Knacker is a mildly offensive term for travellers. Around here it's most commonly used in conjunction with phrases ending with "broke in to my car", "stole my garden gate", "nicked the radiators" or "are beating their animals again". ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 12:00, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

A beautiful sight of nature... ^sshole 12:19, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

As I have always lived in inner-city shitholes, I have never seen a bunch of scrotes playing around a dead horse (pregnant or otherwise). Oh what joy to have a taste of the countryside that must have been. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 14:19, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

I was out this evening and saw three gypsy teens walking about the town. These two girls and one guy, all about 15/16. The girls were dressed up, as my friend put it, like "half naked fluorescent pens" with their tits hanging out. Not a pleasant sight. SJ ^Debaser 23:23, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Whoa. A whole lot of bigotry is going on here. I hail from the itenerant community and would appreciate it if such offensively racist comments were disregarded in future. 86.40.107.167 (talk) 23:27, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

What're you on about you idiot? DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 02:25, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I think you're confusing tinkers with wankers, Marcus,  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 09:16, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Erm... how exactly do travellers count as a race? Jonno^{Hurl Abuse Here} 01:08, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

I suppose in the same way blacks and whites are somehow considered different races. Doesn't make much sense. They're definitely a very distinct culture but certainly not a different race. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 08:24, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Sumbliminal messages

http://sub-lim.blogspot.com/ I'm not sure what this is getting at - it's some good ideas about subliminal imaging and suggestion, but seems to be applied mostly in a bullshit manner (for instance, there's no evidence that flashing words on a screen actually works, I'm pretty sure it's been tested). Some of the videos are interesting, but this guy is either A) faking it with photoshop (nice try with the "but I do it in person so it can't be faked") or B) getting shafted by extreme pareidolia. Also, a little obsessed with Harry Potter and satanism, there. ^sshole 14:28, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

I've read about a test that was done some decades ago. A TV station announced "we're going to put a subliminal message in our broadcast at time X. Please report to us any urges you had afterwards." People reported all sorts of urges to do various things... but none of them actually reported the urge to do what the message suggested. MDB (talk) 14:32, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

The only thing he proves is that the human mind is good at seeing things where there are none (and that he's obsessed with a certain word). It's also hilarious how he tries to prove his point with these three images, which were designed to show that, yes, you will see it if you want to see it. -- Nx / talk 14:59, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

This has got to be a Poe. -- Nx / talk 15:12, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Generally, Ideas Vary Enormously. Moreover, Everytime You Overtly Underestimate Real Messages One Nearly Encapsulates You. DickTurpis (talk) 15:22, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't know why, but I suddenly feel like I have to give you my money! Hahaha that was clever of you. Stilldeciding (talk) 16:14, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

All of this subliminal stuff relies on the framework that some how things that are not processed consciously can not be evaluated, and that high level semantic processing can occur without conscious awareness. Most of my work is exploring how low level learning processes in animal brains are able to perform a tremendous amount of hypothesis testing before the prefrontal cortex ever becomes involved. However, only certain kinds of highly salient data is processed at this level, and the only semantic processing going on is more about a pass-filter than anything else. Concrete example: the cocktail party problem, there are tons of people talking in a room from all directions, you are focused on only one conversation and are consciously aware of what is being said only in that conversation. What kind of information can your brain process outside of that consciously followed conversation. The first type is highly salient non-semantic information that I focus a lot on, say a loud bang, the smells/tastes of the food and drink in the room, visual processing of the environment, etc. Very sophisticated hypothesis testing can occur with these kinds of stimuli without conscious intervention. The second is semantic information that matches a pre-defined salient pattern. For example, someone saying your name in the periphery. This is the closest thing to the kind of processing that you would need for subliminal messages to work. But it is not like the brain is processing everything coming in at a semantic level. Instead "fast-search algorithms" are merely searching for incoming information that matches a salient semantic pattern and that information comes into consciousness.

Short version: it is woo. tmtoulouse 15:34, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

So, people often see the word "SEX" in noise patterns because they're already sort of looking for it - it matches something they're on the prowl for. Similarly, they'd be more likely to see their own name in noise, right? Also, I suppose it might also be worth point out that these are very small and simple words. "SEX" "OBEY" only 3-4 letters, so you have a higher statistical likelyhood of spotting these in noise. If people picked up "Beelzebub wants you to rape and murder" in noise repeatedly, I'd consider it more than people generically spotting "SEX" written on everything. It's worth pointing out that one of the videos where he goes into Mariah Carey on the cover of Glamour highlights some real effects that magazine editors try to put in - although he may also be reading too much into it and "finding nonsense in the phonebook" as I've heard it said. But that sort of plausible and quite real stuff butters people up for the woo patterns that follow. I notice that we're lacking an article on this stuff. ^sshole 15:50, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

People are able to "find" even apparently complex subliminal messages in random noise because of the same basic confirmation bias. Remember the Satanist backmasking craze? Some people are still at it, the "Thank You Satan" vid is my favorite recent example. They simply check for any apparent mention of Satan in the reversed recordings, and proceed to interpret the preceding and following sounds as coherent sentences, no matter if they'd be incomprehensible gibberish even if said in a straightforward way. Röstigraben (talk) 16:34, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Some of it is addressed in pattern recognition and things like Electronic voice phenomenon. But yeah subliminal messages would be a good article. tmtoulouse 17:57, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

No discussion of subliminal nonsense would be complete without mention of the old Marlboro "oɹoqןɹɐɯ" myth (just turn the cigarette pack upside down for a badly spelled racist slur).Snopes Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 18:26, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

I can't see it. Is it something "jew"? Which only works with that curved a. The one I heard was that if you look at a Marlboro packet you can see three "K"s, i.e., KKK. ^sshole 19:00, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, that Snopes entry mentions several myths about various bits of KKK insignia & slogans supposedly hidden in the Marlboro packaging design. The logo lettering, read upside-down, supposedly says "Orobljew" - i.e. a phonetic of "horrible Jew". I can totally see how the "Mar" can be read as "Jew", although it is probably coincidental, but "orobl" is just clutching at straws - in fact it should be "ojoql", which makes even less sense. Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 19:27, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

And supposedly the tips of the letters b, l and M, when the rest of the word is covered up, represent the dangling legs of a lynched black man and a Jew. Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 19:38, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Is that why I hate the Jew? I could never quite put my finger on it... ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 19:39, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

lol u r orobl Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 19:42, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

DickTurpis... I am overwhelmed by an urge to send you my checking account info. How do I send it to you? The Foxhole Atheist (talk) 15:00, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm. How odd that you would say that! But if you insist, you can just send it through RW email. I'll take care of it from there. That goes for anyone else with similar inexplicable urges. DickTurpis (talk) 17:50, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

England currently playing

Not that I'm into soccer but after Andy's comments I had to watch in the hope of seeing a 6-0 drubbing. In the meantime however have managed to find my own lulz. England scores, the cameras scan the crowd and manage to fix on the England fan in the crowd wearing what looked like a monkey mask. Just wonderful, I think, England's fans yet again never fail to capitalise on the racist imagery. Then the camera pulled in closer and it turned out to be a Prince Charles mask…whoops!-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 18:38, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm torn on what to do now. On one hand, you officially have to jeer about this to be allowed to call yourself Scottish. On the other hand, Andy is being so monitor-punchingly arrogant about this that I want to show solidarity against him. And I don't even like football. MARCVS ANTONIVS 08:34, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

just BTW, has anyone else noticed a correlation between bull terrier ownership & flag display, or is it just Worksop? 09:19, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

I note a general correlation between ownership of nasty looking dogs and many things, not least of all the a wardrobe consisting almost entirely of track suits. Seems to be a fairly universal sign of enhanced machismo. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 13:23, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Vacuum of Space?

This is another of my many questions that could be answered by a google serch, but I have no idea what terms to use. I was wondering: who figured out there's no air in space? And when?--Mustex (talk) 22:24, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Good question actually. I might look for it. ^sshole 22:38, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I found the answer pretty much straight away. Hint: I looked it up where you look things up - David Gerard (talk) 22:43, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Not knowing what search terms to use is tricky, but you'd be surprised how good Google is when you just ask it something very, very blunt - this is how I discovered the correct term for semantic saturation. You'll find that such questions have probably been asked on the internet before, hence Yahoo! Answers tends to have some solutions, although they're all a bit crap on this one. It seems that it was first theorised to trail off to a low pressure because air has weight, but sea level pressure isn't infinite; so there must be a finite quantity pushing down on us. ^sshole 22:47, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

What I did was go to Wikipedia on space, which pointed me to their article on outer space, which has the answer right there. (17th century, various physicists noticing air pressure dropped with height, Otto von Guericke as first to hypothesise a vacuum up there.) - David Gerard (talk) 22:52, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Nonsense. You can't vacuum where there is no air. --Alienfromspace (talk) 08:30, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Pascal did some stuff on atmospheric pressure, though I'm not sure if he actually postulated a vacuum. MARCVS ANTONIVS 08:31, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

No, but he did postulate a lawn mower. --Alienfromspace (talk) 08:35, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Space being composed of vacuum and there being no air in space isn't quite the same thing. Wasn't it Pascal who finally killed off the idea that space was filled with æther?-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 14:03, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Coupla centuries later. Michelson-Morley and Occam's razor - David Gerard (talk) 14:05, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

It's not so much as aether being what fills space, but something that is space in order for the concept of absolute position and motion to work. ^sshole 14:28, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Dem's the people, although I was thinking Planck, wrote Pascal, but was thinking Planck. What can I say, it's a Sunday and it's my third day of downloading the patches for Mortal Online, so I think my brain's switched off.-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 17:16, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Definitely not Planck. ^sshole 18:13, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

World Cup Again

World Cup action starting again soon. Germany and Australia. Lets go Aussies! On a separate note, we really should create a forum page so non-fùtball fans don;t have to keep reading updates. SirChuckB^{Will Sysop for food} 18:04, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes indeed, a general "sports" forum would be a good idea. ħuman 18:31, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

You mean like this one? Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 20:37, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, a lot like that. ħuman 20:55, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

But RW's the only place where I get any feetboll info. (haven't we a couple or three editors in Germany: Sid & Röstigraben @ least.) 18:35, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Anyone other Brits seen the Sun today?

Like, totally!

Funny, but somewhat racist? SJ ^Debaser 14:55, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm sure it'll drive down their US circulation horribly - David Gerard (talk) 14:58, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

You obviously don't know the Sun if you think that the headline they've posted today is racist. Try their headline for Euro '96: "Let's Blitz Fritz".

In what way could that even possibly be considered 'racist', Josh? DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 07:43, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Flickr

T'other ½ went to Retford earlier today & brought back raspberries, strawberries, pork pie, stichlton^[sp?] cheese, free range eggs and 150 photos which I've put onto Flickr. So far I've had 97 views - an all time record for one day for me. (Dunno if [this] is a viable link to my stats.) (tisn't)

The fire brigade & the environment agency were running an exercise to clean up a (pretend) oil spill on the canal. */Excellent timing: gulf next stop!/* Loads o'piccies of them at work. 18:37, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

What's this? Ladylads! Where are the promised eggs to help me imagine breakfast when me chickens ripen! Lumenos (talk) 20:27, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

PS: That cheese: its an unpasteurised version of stilton: they can't call it stilton 'cause it's unpasteurised.

Sod cheese. You have a Wimpy!. I haven't seen one of those for years. By the way, the stats link doesn't work.ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 20:18, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

The Wimpy's shut I'm told & has been for a good while! Thought the stats link might need my cookie to work. deleting it ... (now @ 151!) 20:25, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Shame. Nice hamburgers, and seeing "Bender in a Bun" on the menu always made me smile. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 20:30, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

I once (in, I think, 1980) spent an entire night in the Sheffield Wimpy. On my own because I'd nowhere to go after stomping out after a spat at 11:30. The did froffy coffee before Starbucks were invented. (now there's a thought: we used to go to "coffee bars" back in the 60s and drink cappucinos and put the world to rights without alcohol [El Mambo on Union Street! - long gone!]) 20:39, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

yeah, it's a bit odd. I've been realising recently how difficult it can be to go out for a night and not end up drinking. Mind you, there's not a massive amount of entertainment here, unless pubs are the beginning and end of entertainment, and I had to stop going to clubs because I don't think people appreciated my laughing at their dancing. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 20:41, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Nice photos. Those guys are almost doing Proper Fucking Booming too. ^sshole 21:22, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Peaked at 180 views. 03:31, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Poor baby. Here I am, drawing my heart out, and my sketch blog's averaging only 11 a day. --Kels (talk) 05:37, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, but you're blessed (cursed?) with talent, Kels. Those of us without any have to rely on acts of gOD and the fire service. 06:16, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

And you mock a little game of footie as trivial... 1:1, by the way, Empire vs. Upstarts. ħuman 09:02, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

I wouldn't mock anything as stoopid (not trivial: stoooooopid!) as footy, I just despise organised spectator sport of any kind. People living vicariously through "their" teams ought to GET A FUCKING LIFE. (I also ought to get a life but that's another story.) 09:14, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

You might recognize the sentiment of a stand-up routine I once saw (can't remember the name so probably won't be able to find it again easily) where this guy was ripping into geeks and nerds about how they obsess over things and memorize totally stupid things; and then he basically said "so, those sports fans, obsessing over league results and memorizing score lines and player names...". Of course, I have nothing against geekery, just that when it comes to sports, people should just openly admit that they're particularly nerdy about it. ^sshole 00:37, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Relevant link courtesy The Onion. DickTurpis (talk) 22:17, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

It's nice to see the Onion, at least, were willing to be funny as hell so soon after 9/11 (especially working backwards through the "news" links). I hated when we weren't allowed to make jokes. ħuman 01:05, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Kels, your site is pretty good. I pop in every now and then to see the images and animations, and it pushes me a little to try to draw people without them ending up looking like terminators with rickets. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 01:14, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Math expert request

Who is our local math experts that are still active? tmtoulouse 17:26, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Depends how advanced. I always thought Pi. There's a PhD maths student I know who definitely reads RW but I'm not sure if they're an active user or who it would be if they were an active user. ^sshole 18:13, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

MarkGall shows up occasionally. MARCVS ANTONIVS 20:32, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

What sort of thing are you wondering about? I know a bit about some topics, though if it's stats-y your guess is as good as mine (probably better). But presumably someone here knows. --MarkGall (talk) 00:05, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Short version (and I can go long version if you think you can help) is that I am using Bayes equation to "learn" a reward value, but I want to add a learning rate or weight. I was hoping there might be some semi-elegant way to control learning rate by weighting priors or liklihoods but nothing seems to really work. The best I have so far is to do a typical weighted differences to update the new prior so its like "new prior=old prior - weight*new prior" but this feels like a hack. tmtoulouse 00:20, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Don't have a clue, sorry! I have a friend who does this sort of thing, I can ask next time I see him if you're still interested. Or perhaps someone else here already knows. --MarkGall (talk) 00:29, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I always thought you were better than the rest of us. I did take linear algebra and calc 3, but honestly, I have no idea. Šţěŗĭļė dishwasher 00:38, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for chiming in guys, I will keep poking at it and if I have to use a hack I have to use a hack. If you run into anyone that might know I can spell out the problem more formally but thanks for checking into it. tmtoulouse 01:04, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I'll run it past some people at work with a statistics background. I have no idea myself, but I think I might know someone who would. --The Emperor _{Kneel before Zod!} 02:22, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

The RationalWiki Boredom Project

I have been cleaning the house. This is tedious, despite the corrosive chemicals (including the one that failed to remove all the black mould in the bathroom, but did corrode the chrome on the taps). So I've been chilling out by reading the entirety of RationalWiki. Hence the strangely alphabetical nature of my recent copyedits.

Anyone else this bored? It's fun!

zzzzzzzz - David Gerard (talk) 18:56, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Oh dear. I usually just go for special:random. ^sshole 19:49, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Or there's this and this. ^{ONE / TALK} 19:55, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

When I get bored I check images for licences, but thankfully I've not been that bored for a while. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 20:52, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Try bleach. ħuman 20:56, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

I kept getting the same articles on special:random - David Gerard (talk) 08:07, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Water stain

The building across the road that I am looking at from my 7th floor office has a water stain in the shape of the Virgin Mary on it. I am wondering if I should take a photo of it and incite a pilgrimage. Aceⁱ⁹ 03:06, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Are your sure it's not just Nutty's mom? ħuman 03:14, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

At the apartment I lived in going on twenty years ago, there was a patch on the ceiling from where I had used a newspaper to swat a bug. The patch looked like Martin Luther King. MDB (talk) 11:08, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm watching the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Will Smith looks like a white guy. SJ ^Debaser 11:10, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Finance your habits - take a photo of it and auction it on Ebay. RagTop^{Gone sailing} 12:12, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Science in the courtroom

PDF of a chapter from "How to Tell Science from Bunk" by Massimo Pigliucci ^{Hat tip}

I think I spend too much time here. I read that as "Machismo Pigliucci". Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 07:55, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Machismo Pigliucci, author of ground-breaking book "How to Tell Science from Hunk" ^{ONE / TALK} 12:30, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

according to Metapedia...

I outrank Pi, Josh and Goonie. I'm very, very proud of this. P-Foster (talk) 04:11, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Funny. I just IM'ed that to the Human just an hour ago. Punky ^{Your mental puke relief} 04:40, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

If you dance on the string of the puppet that dances on my string, do I make you dance? tmtoulouse 04:53, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmmmm, more to the point, they left out people who, I would argue, are more important to this Wiki than my humble self. And, to Trent. theoretically it would. But that's just a theory. Punky ^{Your mental puke relief} 05:02, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Ha! As if! 05:33, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Looking at that article's history, I think we found where a certain recently annoying RW editor came from - David Gerard (talk) 06:07, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Really? Oh yeah, I remember now. It does synch up, actually. Those meta-editors still remind me of Ken, though. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 06:20, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

That "web of power" is just a few examples of who demoted who to bureaucrat. Looks like that "researcher" just pulled a few names out of recent changes & looked them up on the user rights log. Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 06:49, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

:( I want to be in the fascist power structure. EddyP (talk) 10:24, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I know, I don't even rank on the stinking chart.... Where does one campaign for "House Negro" of Rationalwiki? SirChuckB^{A product of Affirmative Action} 10:30, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

You'd think as Metapedia are racists they'd have you up there Chuck, part of some black guy conspiracy. It does look like the demote to bureaucrat thing though. There's no other reason I should be there, unless my farts have some kind of special power. SJ ^Debaser 10:54, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

SuperJosh? SUPERJOSH??!! How did that uber-noob get a mention before me? oh wait, we are talking about knuckle-dragging nazis here (MP, not Josh). Also, P-Foster, I see you have no underlings according to MP - does that make you our Ken? Also, does the RW power structure mean we have a Gang of Four, Plus One Bloke Slightly Higher and One Bloke Higher Still? --PsyGremlinSnakk! 11:31, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I've been snubbed by Metapedia... cunts. ^sshole 13:19, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Chuck, sign up to Metapedia and insert yourself as "Affirmative Action Beaurocrat". I'm sure they'd love it. ^sshole 13:22, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Psy, we've had a Gang of Four for quite some time now. DickTurpis (talk) 14:13, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Oh. Them. I prefer the Nag of Four. More cuddly and stuff. --PsyGremlinHable! 14:19, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm apparently higher than Pi, and on the same level as Bob. Goodness. Evil wisest Hoover! 15:03, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Bow down to the ALMIGHTY WEB OF POWER!!!! I can only dream of having such vast powers. DogP^{Marmite Patrol} 16:34, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Mr Hoover, I could be useful in helping round up your enemies. Bob is but a mewling child in comparison to your illustrious self. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 18:06, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Goodness, you're sixth-tier at best. If you impress me, you will be elevated to fourth-tier. Evil wisest Hoover! 18:24, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Surely we can do better and build the full chart of "who cratted who" and mail it to them? ħuman 18:49, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Could be tricky, as I discovered when trying to trace CR's ancestry. CR was begat by Weaseloid who was begat by RA who was begat by Pink, but the trail ends there. My theory is that the logs were screwed up by her incessant name changes and the old MW software, or that she was demoted server-side, leaving no logs. Either way, it makes things difficult. Evil wisest Hoover! 19:00, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm. Can we piece together what we do know and see what gaps need to be filled? Might be as simple as tracking Pink's name changes, or finding one of their earlier names in someone else's right management log? ħuman 19:12, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

This seems like the sort of thing that can be automated. I'm not sure if PWB does logs, though. Evil wisest Hoover! 19:14, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Well I was cratted by none other than the Illustrious Lord Trent himself (Hallowed be His Name). Surely that makes me some sort of Arch-Duke in the highest possible tier (merely below only the Gracious Lord Trent (Hallowed Be His Name))? DickTurpis (talk) 19:21, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

What about people (such as yours truly) who gave up their rights? This should put me in the same league as Edward VIII if he was on the internet, should it not? Or maybe Nicholas II? SJ ^Debaser 19:26, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

What about martyrs like me, Josh? What about martyrs like me? ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 19:28, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

You have a point there, Josh, and Edward VIII is an apt metaphor as we're discussing a Nazi site. DickTurpis (talk) 19:31, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Where the heck is Ace in all this? Being a sysop under His mighty charge, I could be basking in reflected glory as a low-ranking noble, if only he'd bother to make Researcher Trent Human notice him. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 19:33, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

That reminds me. I'm pretty shy in the minions department. I have to work on rustling up a few to address this dearth. Any chance I can scoop a few from Ace during his absence? DickTurpis (talk) 19:37, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I dunno, Sir Squirrel seems to be tossing out 'cratship like candy. First person to send one my way gets my loyalty, and Ace's evening wine will be poisoned free of charge. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 19:47, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Actually, Ace takes gin through the ear. We may have an opening for a Claudius for you, Kupo. DickTurpis (talk) 19:49, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, my only familiarity with that role is through a bad Simpsons episode, but I learn quickly. Is there much death involved on my part? I'd like to enjoy my plunder. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 19:55, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Then it seems you ought to go read Hamlet before you aspire to anything greater. Bureaucrats tend to come from the literati and more....refined...classes. (Cue fart from SuperJosh.) DickTurpis (talk) 20:07, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Being at teh lonely bottom of the power structure *sniff*, I'm looking for a few good people to 'crat so I'm no longer at the bottom. Who wants 'cratted? Secret Squirrel (talk) 19:39, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

CR's definitely below you, so you needn't worry. Evil wisest Hoover! 19:42, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

If I de-crat and re-crat everyone does that make me mightier? DickTurpis (talk) 19:44, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Does this mean I'm wp:Fagging for the squirrel? I'm not entirely happy with that. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 19:57, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

When one is sick of fagging you can always start fragging. DickTurpis (talk) 20:03, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Hey! I fagged for a year, but I'm much better now. --PsyGremlinHable! 18:45, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Preliminary results

OK, I went through the list of current crats and built the tree, also added ex-crats I could remember or identify. The database is obviously a bit damaged, since there is no "beginning" for Linus, Thanatos, Pi, and Pink. I'd share the tree with you but right now it's on a piece of paper. Later, perhaps. ħuman 20:01, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I've redrawn the tree(s) based on my crude web. There are three - one starts with RWAdmin, and runs through Trent and me, accounting for aboout half the crats. One starts with Pink, and leads to ten more, and the third starts with Pi, another eleven. I included every ex-crat I could think of. The two outliers, Linus and Thanatos, kept things simple by not cratting anyone else. If I can think of an easy way to transfer this info to the computer I'll do it. ħuman 20:21, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmm. Linus was first, and had DB access, so he may well have just edited the relevant tables by hand. The others are stranger, but Pink and Thanatos have both had tonnes of names, so the logs might just be left attached to one of their old usernames. Pi has had only one rename, though, and I can't think of an explanation offhand. Evil wisest Hoover! 20:39, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

http://www.graphviz.org/ --194.197.235.240 (talk) 21:00, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll look into it. ħuman 00:37, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

This is going to turn into a "missing 13 minutes of tape" scandal isn't it? tmtoulouse 22:21, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Crat me, and I shall serve you, oh mighty one. EddyP (talk) 22:41, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

My question is "what did Trent know and when did he know it?" DickTurpis (talk) 00:38, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Graphviz seems to no longer be able to create this version, it wants to go sort of 3D even in the engine that made this (dot). Anyway, them's the data, sort of, presented gruffickly. ħuman 01:40, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Ah, figured it out. I apparently deleted an important line of "code". ħuman 02:00, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Freedom from cratship since 2007! Yay! Šţěŗĭļė dishwasher 02:09, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I was cratted by Javascap back when I was Nate River--Thanatos (talk) 02:38, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Excellent, thank you! Version six soon to be uploaded... ħuman 02:42, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Linus was originally Linus M. - π 02:46, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Could have checked my userpage. They are all listed there in order of use.--Thanatos (talk) 02:48, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

(EC)Trent de-cratted ColinR a long time ago. - π 02:49, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

The original three. - π 02:51, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

What about colour-coding it based on the color scheme of the active users page? ^sshole 11:25, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I like it. Everyone's full of ideas. DickTurpis (talk) 11:37, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Sorry I am late

But it appears that I am Toast's bitch. Also I am 3.14159 in most of the logs. - π 00:44, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Excellent, thank you very much! ħuman 01:40, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I was crat by Toast when she was SusanG and I was 3.14159 and then I crat her as Toast when I was Π after found out who she was. Make sense? - π 01:54, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

(EC)Actually, Toast is your bitch. You were cratted by the mysterious "SusanG" and then returned the favououre to her transparent sockmuppet. Image above improved! ħuman 01:55, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

You forget I cratted refugee. Silly man. Aceⁱ⁹ 01:57, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I crat-ed Super Josh? - π 02:06, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

No, my error, PH did. ħuman 02:18, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Pink

Does anyone remember Pink's previous names, or know a good way to track them down? ħuman 01:56, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Jellyfish wasnt it? tmtoulouse 02:00, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

And before that 82 some more numbers. - π 02:03, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

And Chaos! - π 02:09, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes indeed! ħuman 02:16, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Trent cratted Chaos!/Pink - π 02:23, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Link to log please? ħuman 02:32, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Nevermind, got it, I forgot the "!". ħuman 02:34, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Back to the original post

Why do I feel the need to shower after seeing my pseudonym on Metapedia? - π 02:55, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Don't worry, I felt exactly the same way. The Goonie 1 ^{What's this button do? Uh oh....} 02:59, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

1 minute

You missed out my full minute of being a crat. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 10:24, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I guess I should add that. Should I also add the April 1 cratting of TK?

Announcing my new medical practice

MDB's Medical Certification Board and All-Nite Kuntry Kookin' Restaurant is pleased to announce that MDB is now a board-certified doctor and is authorized to treat dropsy, the vapors, quinsy, priapism, the heartbreak of psoriasis and other conditions, complaints, diseases, maladies and conditions.

We accept all health plans except ObamaCare. MDB (talk) 13:43, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Do you treat scrofula too? Or do you have to ordain yourself king first? --PsyGremlinParlez! 13:56, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I'll treat scrofula. Take two leeches and call me in the morning. MDB (talk) 14:09, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

From a libertarian point of view, I suppose I support Rand's decision not to recertify with that organization. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 15:02, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't think that's quite the point. The point is he's running saying he's a board-certified ophthalmologist... but it's a board he helped to create himself. That would be a little like if I presented myself as a graduate of "Harvard, Yale, Princeton and the Sorbonne"... without saying that I have a classroom in my basement that I call "Harvard, Yale, Princeton and the Sorbonne" and I presented myself with a PhD from it.

Yeah, I know its not quite the same, since Rand Paul presumably has a medical degree from a legitimate university and is qualified to practice opthalmology, but he's being somewhat duplicitous in saying that it's not what's generally considered "the board".

Perhaps more to the point, when I was working on my masters degree (that I never completed), I took courses at Johns Hopkins. (Incidentally, the same facility that once employed the AssFly.) That always impressed people based on the fame of their medical school, but I'd always explain, "while it's not a bad school, the engineering programs are not the caliber of their med school." MDB (talk) 15:18, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

It'd also be like Bill Gates saying he's a certified systems engineer. Rand had a legitimate problem with the board. If they don't change their policies, what recourse did he have? What would you have done? ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 15:54, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I think the point isn't necessarily what he did, that's fine, maybe even commendable. The point is that he's using the phrase "board certified" in a misleading way. To use another analogy, it'd be like me putting "graduated with honors" on my resume, then come to find out I graduated with honors from Elementary school and was in the bottom third of my college class. SirChuckB^{That is all} 17:01, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Exactly. I don't understand enough about the issue behind the certification to say whether Paul should have started his own board or not. The point is he is portraying himself as "board-certified", without mentioning "by the way, that's not the usual board."

Here's another example. I can declare, "I was Time Magazine's Person of the Year in 2006!" That is true. 100%. However, that fails to mention a very salient point: that was the year Time named "you" (as in "everybody") Person of the Year. I'm being truthful, but leaving out a key fact. MDB (talk) 17:58, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

It's the same problem. Say you actually were man of the year in 1991. As with the certification which Paul eschews, it'd be like you saying you were man of the year every year since, no matter how bad (or out of date) you (or your skills) have gotten. The grandfather clause of the certification made it nothing more than a false sense of security. I'm certified in the latest in eye surgery technology (circa 1990)! Leaving out key facts. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 18:44, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I think everyone here agrees that permanent medical certifications are bad. Regardless, it helps to clarify which certifications one has, rather than leave it to investigation. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 19:00, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 19:10, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm, I read most of the article, and it appears to be the case that it casts Paul in a good light, not a bad one. So he helped create the rival board? Yeah, ten years ago, and I'm sure they take their work seriously. Why did he do it? The other board exempted older doctors from recertification, which seems like poor policy. This is based on my reading of just this one article at HuffPo, though, so I am probably less well-informed than before I read it. ħuman 19:00, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

No, Rand Paul is full of shit. The NBO very well might have been started with the desire to make everybody recertify, which is a good thing, but I don't think it's doing a whole lot of recertification these days. Paul incorporated the board in 1999 and allowed it to lapse in 2000. He evidently allowed it to lay dormant until late 2005, a few months before his ABO certification lapsed, when he revived the organization. From the end of 2005 onward he has not been certified with the ABO.[1] The fact that he revived the organization right before he needed to recertify leads me to the conclusion that he used it as a dodge to avoid the recertification process. Whatever his intent, it is untrue to say that he is (present tense) certified by both boards. This really has no bearing on his medical skill, but it's a big pile of baldfaced lies.

So to summarize: Rand wants everybody to recertify every ten years. Rand makes new board. New board is allowed to become defunct. Ten years go by. Rand doesn't want to recertify. Rand recreated board, never recertified. Rand still claimed he is certified by both boards. Rand gets caught lying. Welcome to the bigs, Rand. Corry (talk) 04:36, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarifications on the details. As I implied above, HuffPo's "reporting" tends to be rather sloppy IMO. ħuman 18:43, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

uh-oh

New Zealand 1 - 1 Slovakia
Expect a very drunk Ace in the foreseeable future. --PsyGremlinFale! 14:08, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I never expect anything else .... Worm^{(t | c)} 14:27, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, what's your point? If you'd have said "Expect a very sober Ace" then we would have thought somethng was up. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 14:42, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Equalizing goal in the 3rd minute of extra time!!! I must admit I had pretty much given up and then Bammo. It's not just Ace you should be concerned about you know. Damo^Hi 19:25, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't watch football. I am very hungover though but for entirely different reasons. Aceⁱ⁹ 22:36, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't understand this "hang-over" Really, I've never had one. And I drink. Like a fish. 1/2 a bottle of vodka last night. I woke up a bit later than I'd wanted, but other than that, no ill-effects. I've never really understood it, I just don't get them... Quaru (talk) 14:26, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Give up the pretence. Nobody buys the bullshit that you're a lively socialite who drinks a lot with company. Though you may drink a lot alone. 86.40.99.82 (talk) 22:46, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

My friends would disagree. I can't live this lie anymore, I don't drink at all, I have no fiancee or friends and I am such a loser that I spend my days trolling a fascist website I hate from the position of a perceived moral and intellectual high-ground. Oh, wait... Aceⁱ⁹ 22:53, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

In any case, Ace's drinking habits are not what once might call conventional. DickTurpis (talk) 00:35, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

For those who dig cosmology........

....and have an hour to spare, this lecture by Lawrence Krauss on the origin and future of the universe is fascinating. Aceⁱ⁹ 08:46, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Twatter

Who else is on Twatter or identi.ca? I'm @davidgerard on Twatter - David Gerard (talk) 22:56, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Do you mean actual twatter or are you referring to twitter. I can't find you on twatter. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 10:26, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

And of course there is RationalWiki:Twitterers. w00t! - David Gerard (talk) 08:00, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Portal 2

Holy shit! The new stuff in Portal 2 looks incredible. Here I was thinking it was going to be the same as #1 Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 12:39, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Damn, that does look good. Ta for the links. It's nice to see the little robot things are still there. I love listening to their chatter in Portal. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 09:09, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

SWTOR

And in that vane, the new trailer for The Old Republic is out as well. Enjoy some cool Jedi action.-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 13:18, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Forget all the Kenyan/Muslim allegations...

...Obama is actually a British sleeper agent who's presumably trying to return the US to the Empire. Don't be fooled, his recent enthusiasm for ass-kicking ist just an attempt to disguise his suave, cosmopolitan demeanour. Röstigraben (talk) 07:48, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

We'll have him if you don't want him. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 08:18, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

No way. At the very least, you'll have to take one of our shitty Presidents, too, just to make up for taking one of our good ones. MDB (talk) 15:22, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, we'll have GWB, but only if we can keep him in a zoo enclosure, with his own tyre swing. Deal? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 15:26, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

My favourite part is where the guy has left a big blank space at the bottom of the sign, as if he was going to say something else, but forgot what he was going to say - like "Kenya was a British Colony when 'Obama' was born. BP is British Petroleum. . . . I lost my train of thought". Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 23:30, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Don't forget "Petroleum Jelly is what fags put in their asses when they sodomize each other!" DickTurpis (talk) 00:12, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

We need more news stories like this...

...because we need more phrases like "condiment-related crimes."

Coming to NBC this fall: Law and Order: Salsa Victims Unit.

MDB (talk) 16:02, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like a villain from the original Batman TV series. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 10:17, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Common as-salt?  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 11:28, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Gaming goes... WTF?

Kevin Butler E3 2010 Speech Sony Conference Tongue in cheek, yes. Amusing, yes. Seeing it said by a middle-aged guy in a suit is surreal, yes. ^sshole 22:17, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I wonder who wrote that for him, it was clearly scripted. He finally got into it a bit at the end, though. --Kels (talk) 23:58, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Butler_%28character%29

Ah, okay. I assumed he was some sort of Sony manager or something. --Kels (talk) 02:33, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

The Cracked.com articles on E3 are quite funny (1) (2). Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 08:17, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Can't agree more with most of the points in those. There's a reason that I just have a PS2 (heh, "just", I remember when that was a serious fucking piece of kit) and keep playing the same things; they're exactly the same as the things that are available now, and without an expensive, huge HD-TV, I wouldn't be able to spot the superficial differences anyway. ^sshole 08:56, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I especially liked this image. Sums it all up nicely. No actual innovations in the games anymore, it's just a case of making the same FPS over and over again. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 09:35, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

That's the thing about FPS games, especially when people are striving for "more realism" they end up just ripping all the weapons and looks from real life and it all looks the same as a result. Of course, I like COD4 and GoW, but I think they're good games and sufficiently different from each other in style and feel (when you're playing them) to justify both. Anything else just doesn't interest me. Now, where did I put my copy of Final Fantasy VII (I need to get to the point where I have at least 6 FFs on the go at once...). ^sshole 10:00, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, I have a launch 60 gig PS3, and I love it to pieces. I also have a Wii that I got the first week out. (actually kinda' a cool story there..) In fact, I've owned every Nintendo and Sony console except the N64 (which my sister had) and a Virtual Boy (which my sister also had...) So I have my gaming creds, despite getting too old to have time to beat any game anymore.. I loved my PS3 so much, I ended up buying an HDTV about 5 months later.. I guess I don't really remember where I was going with that... Oh, White Knight Chronicles and FF 13 are both amazing, as is Heavenly Sword if you like the GoW style games. (I'ver never played GoW..) Quaru (talk) 11:03, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to submit a +1 application for the "I don't do consolers, PCs + Smartphones for me" position. I also think that there's a whole untapped market potential of PC games that use smartphones as secondary controllers and screens, as well as things like this + infrared lasers. Sen (talk) 10:12, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm looking forward to OnLive coming out, because it's hardware-independent (you can run it on just about any machine that has an internet connection or by using their little "console" if you don't have a PC / Mac), game updates are applied automatically, it's cloud based so the system scales up automatically (no need to keep buying the latest console every x years), You can play with your account round a friend's without having to lug your hardware around, and if developers get on board (which they should because of the lack of piracy and zero distribution costs) there won't be the console wars situation where you have to have a Wii AND an Xbox AND a PS3 just to play the new games as they come out. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 10:22, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm intrigued by the OnLive thing. It's similar to what was promised with cable TV, but never seemed to go beyond very simple games. In theory it's a great idea for so many different reasons, not least of all the environmental side of things, but I'm still sceptical as to how well it'll work in countries with less than stellar Internet connections. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 10:28, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm a bit skeptical of the lag as well, but it seems to be reliant on how good your connection is and how close you are to the datacentre. I guess they wouldn't have ploughed this much time, effort and money into it if they didn't think it was going to work perfectly. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 10:31, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Personally, I think this is a bit of hopeful thinking on their part, that internet speeds will increase enough for it to work by the time they are ready to release. Hell, I'd even expect them to be ready now, and are still trying to get networking working. The internet just doesn't have the infrastructure right now to deal with the bandwidth required to deal with that information, in a way to not have the problems w/ LAG.. But I guess we'll see, maybe they have some crazy cool advancement in network compression or something... Quaru (talk) 10:58, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

It went live in America today. Apparently they do have some uber-cool new video compression. Might be bollocks though. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 11:54, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm skeptical about OnLive until I try it. I know the technology is possible, in fact, we use it all the time, it's reliability for something that's as intensive as this that's the issue. I mean, Facebook has trouble dealing with a simple database when it's full, so what's going to happen when you want high-end graphics and AI calculations? ^sshole 13:50, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Why is cloud computing all the rage suddenly? That's how aliens always end up with a "mothership" which if you take out, they are screwed...Sen (talk) 23:20, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

No, no, no... Cloud computing is like some sort of hive mind, that taking out chunks pof it is hardly noticeable. It just set up in a way that it LOOKS like you're talking to a single mothership. Quaru (talk) 00:14, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, you'd have to have one hell of a bomb to take out a cloud computer. Oh that reminds me, my mum was telling me about an article in a newspaper about how dangerous cloud computing is, because if someone gets your password then they can do anything with it!! Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 08:04, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Please tell me you didn't waste time explaining everything that was wrong with that sentence... ^sshole 00:21, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

NWO video

I was checking my Facebook when I saw some posts by one of my Warcraft friends linking a 3 part NWO series. Considering that the person didn't bother with any kind of critizism or such, it's most likely that he believes this stuff. (I honestly don't know his views, they never came up in game, and really only 'friended' him out of being friendly.)

Fight the New World Order (Part 1) (Part 2) and (Part 3)

It's mostly the typical stuff, i.e. the Illuminati are in control, all world governments are linked to the British royal family (W is Lizzy II's 32nd cousin), they are trying to wipe out 80% of the world population, they are going to eliminate cash in order to make the survivors use electronic money that they can cut off at will, our water is tainted, ALL taxes are just going to the World Bank as pure profits, they foster other conspiracy theories just so they can ridicule those who 'know the truth'... but a few points stood out to me:

Vatican City, Washington D.C. and Central London are all independent city states unbeholden to any national laws. This is proved by them all having an oblilisk, with the London one having lions flanking it to mark that the center of their power is there.

There is no population problem. You could put the entire world population in Austrailia giving each individual their own quarter acre, which would be enough room to grow your own food and be prosperous.

Overall, it is the normal batch of NWO parinoia. I thought you all would like a good chuckle yourselves out of this incarnation of the lunacy. -- Ravenhull (talk) 08:50, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Your friend forgot that Dublin has the tallest obelisk in Europe (wp:Wellington Monument, Dublin). This combined with a large Irish diaspora would suggest that the Irish are likely the masterminds behind the NWO. You may think yourself safe, sitting in Irish bars in your respective countries, but at the right time the cheery smile of Pat O'McGinty will fade - his dish cloth put away in favour of a gun that he'll be using to herd you in to a FEMA DEATHCAMP ZOMG! I'll assume this guy hasn't looked at the geography of Australia - particularly the interior. Perhaps this guy is part of the conspiracy, since the resulting deaths from moving everyone to Australia would certainly be one way of tackling the population problem. May as well be suggesting people pitch tents on the moon. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 09:25, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't know how much my friend beleives this himself, and to be honest, I don't know him well enough to care how loony his beliefs are. As for moving everyone to Australia, I would love to see the couple dozen trying to grow crops on Ayers Rock and such. I get the impression that the video maker has this idea that cultivating every square inch of the land is doable, practible and desirable. Overall, I was glad that I was listening to the stuff while at work because working alone meant I could laugh out loud at some of the logical leaps of faith made in there. This guy makes conclusion hopping into an Olympic class sport. -- Ravenhull (talk) 10:10, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

(EC) NWO conspiracy nutters get ever more esoteric and stupid, and I blame David Icke, Texe Marrs, and Alex Jones. I mean, a couple of decades ago NWO nutters at least sounded sober and somewhat believable (see if anyone's posted Linda Thompson's old video - "America Under Siege" or "America In Peril" I think it is, for example). Today - I can't believe there's still an audience for this stuff who aren't pursuing it for anything but the lulz. It long ago went beyond unintentional self-parody. The problem is no matter how outlandish you get anymore, David Icke has already outdone you with that shape-shifting reptilian idiocy, and the ultimate conspiracy parody has already been done anyway so it's kind of pointless at this point. Secret Squirrel (talk) 10:57, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm not going to watch the videos. I tend to avoid "the typical stuff" of this.. But I like the Australia 1/4 acre thing. It is true, every human on earth could get that. Just what we all wanted, 1/4 acre of desert. What's next? 3 acres per person on the ocean floor? We could keep that going for years to come.. The population problem isn't "no room for people to habituate", it's "there's not enough fertile ground to grow enough crops to feed every human on the planet" Or something. Maybe they want to terra-form Australia? Or they have special corn that doesn't need water? Is there enough fresh water in Australia to sufficiently water the whole thing? Quaru (talk) 10:15, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

There is serious discussion about limiting the population of Australia because we may not have the water to sustain the population we have now. - π 11:37, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

"Habituate"? That's what I get for trusting my speel check at 6am, on a morning I woke up still drunk... Quaru (talk) 10:20, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

One of my cousins is smart, well-educated, flies tankers for the Air Guard, has a good job as a pilot for one of the big parcel express companies (well, he's getting laid off, but that's due to budget cuts and being the low man on the totem pole, not anything of his own fault)... and he believes in the Illuminati and the rest of standard conspiracy lunacy. As I've remarked to my sister, "he's too intelligent for that." MDB (talk) 15:20, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

OnLive

Thought I'd make a new section for this. For the Yanks: If you sign up now, you get a year's access for free: [2] Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 12:27, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Neat, thanks. As much as I hate DRM, I'd like to see how this ends up. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 16:01, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

It's not really DRM if you never actually have the data. And their plan is to charge $5 a month for remote steam. Interesting. Well, I signed up, but my internet is terrible, so I won't likely be allowed to participate. Quaru (talk) 16:16, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

It's the thought that counts, but yeah, it claims some nice functions aside from helping the NWO deterring software piracy. It's sponsored by AT&T and I've got U-Verse now, so here's hoping... ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 16:23, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Regarding the monthly cost: For casual gamers who only play for an hour or so a week it might not pay for itself, but consider the cost of a console. What is it these days? $240? So the cost of the console pays for 5 years of OnLive, but without the worry of the RROD or the PS3 equivalent, the cost of peripherals etc etc. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 17:18, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

You may have a good point. Especially if compared to X360, as they charge $5 a month for XBL anyway. And I'm also sure you'll have to buy the same peripherals, though maybe less frequently. (Aren't they supposed to launch a console style box? has that been abandoned? Was it all the product of a delusional stupor?) But, that being said, I don't have an XB360, in part because I do not want to pay the $5 a month. Maybe I'm a bit old-school like that, I don't know. I did buy a PS3 at launch price, so I can't be too cheap. I guess what really bothers me about it is that you have to pay the $5 a month just to play the games you bought. Like, on XBL at least you only have to pay to play online. But I do understand the need to charge, to cover bandwidth and all. So maybe I'm just too casual, or too hard-core to make use of it. I really don't play games, but due to my job, I always have a reasonably high-end system (or 3) and because I'm a giant man-child, I usually have consoles around. (In fact, I almost never game on the PC anymore, and do almost all my gaming on consoles.. But part of that is my refusal to run Windows..) Anyway, I have no qualms of someone else doing this, it's just not for me. And the whole, "I'll believe they can handle the LAG when I see it." So, if anyone here is trying it, please share how well it works! Quaru (talk) 12:21, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

From the look of it, they have a box that connects a TV to their service and uses their own brand of the usual joypad. At any rate, I'd really prefer not to use such a system, but I'm also fascinated by attempts to make it work...guess I'll report in here if the free trial works out. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 13:23, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

The "console" is basically just an internet enabled graphics card with a controller attached to it. While the majority of people using the system will probably want to use it on their Mac / PC / iPad, there is still a large number of people who prefer the console "look and feel" or would like to play in a room other than where they keep their PC, thus the microconsole. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 14:07, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

I personally get really pissed at the concept of "software as service". Especially when applied to games. Though at least at the moment OnLive seems less of a bloodsucker than some MMORPGs. --ZooGuard (talk) 18:12, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't get the whole "Don't own the game" argument. You think that Xbox game disk is yours? Check the licencing. Same as your copy of Windows. At least OnLive won't lose it. Same as Steam. The only downside is that you can't sell the game on afterwards, but at the end of the day it should push the initial price down. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 19:06, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Incidentally, Steam does very little to prevent single-player game piracy; never giving out the actual data seems the only way to do that. Now that I think about it, it'd make multiplayer anti-cheat security much easier too. Guess it all depends on the bandwidth and massive clouds, in the end. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 19:24, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Advice/Knowledge/Potpourri on Grad School

Anybody want to give me some tips, thoughts, little known knowledge on Grad School? The article in the World section on the state of scientific publishing got me thinking of the reality of this stuff instead of the idealized view one may have before actually entering. Netharian^{Cubicles are prisons!} 20:36, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I could rant for hours on the topic, but what area of study are you going into? tmtoulouse 22:51, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Biology, specifically Ecology. I have 2 years before I hit grad school though.Netharian^{Cubicles are prisons!} 23:22, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, the most important perspective I would tell you is to adjust viewing grad school away from being a student. When I first started I thought of it as being the pinnacle of my career as a student, but its not. Grad school is more like the bottom rung of employment for an academic career. You are the mail clerk of academia.

Research oriented programs such that you are likely to be applying for are much more defined by the relationship between you and your supervisor and their style of supervision than say a law school or med school. Whether your supervisor likes to micro manage everything and everyone in their lab, or shows up once a month to say "hi!" will be the defining feature of what it is like to be a student in that lab.

Most programs will give you a bare minimum stipend and a TA position that will be enough to survive on, but you are pretty much going to be dirt poor for the 4-6 years your doing your work. You will wind up having to work very odd hours, "work days" or "work hours" don't exist. I do a lot of work at 3 am on Sunday. You will get very little direct feedback on how your doing, and what feedback you will get will be very sparse. If you are someone that has grown used to having grades, tests, homework, etc. as a means of assessing your performance and if you like to know how you are doing at any given time, you might struggle with the "feedback" system of grad school.

It is also a major shift in style of learning. You no longer use secondary or tertiary sources like text books to learn things, but primary research. This means having to be able to quickly asses scientific publications of greatly varying quality for importance, relevance, main points, etc. It is a much more messy and involved way to try and learn.

Essentially, you will be dirt poor, work long and strange hours on difficult projects with marginal guidance, and little support, feedback, or praise.

I tell everyone thinking of going into a graduate program that it is a horrible "default" option, and you have to really want to do it.

All this being said, I am glad I am doing it. When you are researching a new idea that no one else has had before, and you gather up data from a carefully constructed experiment, get your results and see something that no one else in the world has ever seen before, to gain knowledge for that brief time you are the only one in the world to posses (till you start gibbering about it to your lab mate who probably doesn't really care). That moment of discovery, of knowledge is the greatest thing in the world, and if that sounds like something you can appreciate then it is all okay, as all the other BS is just a means to being given an opportunity to test your ideas about how the world works.

All of this is the grad school experience itself, now the post-grad experiences I don't know first hand, but I am apprehensive about several elements of it. Mostly dealing with grant proposals. The publish or perish idea is a bit of a red herring, tenure is really defined by your ability to bring grant money to the university. I think being a primary investigator for a lab is a different experience all together and one I don't know enough about to really go into. Anyway, I would be happy to discuss any of this further. tmtoulouse 23:55, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

What Trent said. And read PhD Comics. ^sshole 14:47, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Hey, it sounds really cool: "you will be dirt poor, work long and strange hours on difficult projects with marginal guidance, and little support, feedback, or praise." Why would anyone not want to do it? :-) --Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 21:24, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

That is why it is not for everyone. The reason I do it is because there is nothing better in the world than finding out something new, and not just in a learning something new from hitting random page on wikipedia, but something that likely no one else in the world knew before you discovered it. Others may not find that very good incentive, but it is more than enough for many. tmtoulouse 21:29, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

And you do get some of the perks of being a student. And the downsides are really just the Rite of Passage for academia, and if you really are passionate about learning, researching, discovering and eventually passing this knowledge on to the next generation, it is something you have to do and is very rewarding at the end and throughout. But don't forget, as Trent said, it's not for everyone and there's a significant dropout rate that's much higher than any undergraduate course. You do it because you fucking well love it, not for any other reason. When I did my initial induction workshops (nearly 18 months ago now) the question was asked, "why are you here?". I just literally couldn't believe the number of people putting their hands up for "better job prospects" (that's bullshit, you never can recoup the opportunity cost of graduate study) and I was the only one who said I actually liked it and wanted to be there for the sake of the research. But it's not me that ends up complaining about being stressed and overworked all the time. ^sshole 00:17, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Encyclopedia of American Loons

Ran across this blog last week, and it has been mildly entertaining. I did just drop him a line to ask if he plans on including Schlafly when he reaches the 'S's. - Ravenhull (talk) 03:23, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

It's good but he relies a little heavily on PZ Myers - well, actually that's not a bad thing. Jack Hughes (talk) 10:42, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Death by firing squad

Interesting BBC article on the subject.
^sshole 11:00, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Saudi Arabia: Women told not to watch World Cup. Read the Qur'an instead

TYT exclusive--Thanatos (talk) 04:09, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

What should Obama be doing with the oil spill?

One of the criticisms Obama is getting, from the left and the right, is that he's not "doing enough" about the Gulf oil spill.

So, fellow RationalWikians... pretend you're Barack Obama. How would you handle the oil spill? Limit it to what a President could realistically do; you're not Superman or a dictator. MDB (talk) 14:26, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't get it. I actually think he's doing alright. I mean, I guess he could call up the national guard, declare martial law in the area, and put those guys to work.. I also find it interesting that it's often the same people criticizing him that are also calling for less government. At least among the people I know personally. So, really, it's just a political tool to use against him. If he did great, he'd be getting flack for not letting BP do enough. My $2, at least. Fell free to tell me I'm wrong, I probably am. :) Quaru (talk) 14:31, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I believe thousands of National Guard personnel are already involved in the cleanup. Also, Fareed Zakaria had a very good article in Newsweek concerning Obama, the spill, and the media. FZ is far and away the best part of Newsweek. DickTurpis (talk) 14:37, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

As far as the people calling for less government criticizing it, I found it hilarious that Michele Bachmann of all people suggested he "commandeer boats" to deal with it. Bloody Hell -- if he had so much as asked a private citizen for a sheet of paper so he could jot down BP's 800 number, Bachman and the rest of the teabagging crowd would scream "socialism" at the top of their lungs. MDB (talk) 14:41, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

This is what I'm saying. I have an uncle who's a teabagger, and constantly screams about big government at all times, then complains that Obama isn't doing enough. And that he doesn't want to lose his government health insurance or his government income. But I suppose that's getting a bit off topic. It just seems disingenuous that when Bush dropped the ball on Katrina, we should take it easy on him, but when Obama seems to be doing alright, he's a douche that should be doing more, dammit! Quaru (talk) 14:52, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Nuke the god damned thing. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 14:50, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Quaru, as near as I can tell, the teabagger definition of "socialism" is "someone that's not me benefits from the government doing something." If it's a government program they benefit from, they're all for it. Hence the teabaggers who wailed about socialism and demanded their Medicare benefits not be cut. MDB (talk) 15:11, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I agree, there is not a huge amount more he can do. He's pressuring BP to pull their finger out and get their engineers to work on a better solution, and he's got booms out to try and protect the beaches and wetlands, and trying to get as much crap out of the sea as is physically possible. To be honest, I'm surprised the actual destruction hasn't been FAR worse, given the sheer amount of the stuff that's got loose. I think that's partly luck, but he has done the best he can as well. Throwing more people at the problem, and flooding the area with national guards and macho looking helicopters isn't necessarily going to help. Of course, the biggest problem we face here is how Obama lacks a forceful, confident and manly approach to dealing with those Engerlish pinkos at BP, and that is due to his abrasive style and lack of machismo. -- 16:35, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

By telling BP that they need to put aside billions to deal with their mess, he's done the really important thing that it's possible for him to do. BP can do without this crap and desperately want to fix it, and are getting all the other oil companies in to help too because they can all do without this crap too, so that's progressing nicely. I'm afraid the problem here is that it's fucked up and it can't be fixed easily - David Gerard (talk) 17:43, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Obviously people expect politicians to magically click their fingers to make it go away... There's little that can be done after the fact - if we recall the numerous blog posts that have been posted to RW on the subject, one of them said that BP basically used technology that almost never fails when they should have used technology that never fails. Saved a bit of cash, yes, but we've had the one fuck up and it's gone horribly wrong as a result. So we're left dealing with it after the fuck up. The technology exists to stop this, it just doesn't work or has never been tried at these depths. What can be done? Obviously what can be done is being done; it's not like BP can afford either A) the bad press or B) to lose the oil or C) lose contracts because of this. So it's not like you have big fat business guys intentionally acting incompetent over it just to spite people. The reality is that there are engineers on the ground doing their damnedest to solve a problem that has no easy or quick solution. Could Obama himself do more? Hell, what could he do anyway? He's a politician, I doubt he knows the first thing about oil booming, rig maintenance or drilling so why the fuck do people want to ask him about it? ^sshole 18:03, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I think we're at the point where BP can go fuck themselves. It's unfortunate, but they are victims of this circumstance. No saving the oil. No minimizing their loses. No more monkeying around. Blow the thing to smithereens and move on. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 18:45, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, they've got a couple-three hundred million dollars invested in this potentially highly lucrative hole in the ground. They have been avoiding destroying it since day one. I think Obama is doing fine, by the way, and telling BP to hand over a shitload of cash to a third party to manage the reimbursements for losses was a good move. ħuman 19:00, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I think he needs to be far more presidential and make his orders clearer - he should simply ORDER people to fix it and then it would all be OK. His failure to do this will doom his presidency.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 13:36, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Wait, will the bomb thing work?

I'd been under the impression that the idea of just bombing the leak would not work or would risk causing an even bigger leak or a god damned oil river that there would be no chance of plugging, capping or otherwise containing the spill. I've been operating under the assumption that the loss of this one well would be pretty insignificant compared to the petroleum lubricating reaming BP is in for and, thus, if the big ol' bomb thing could work they'd have done it already, but then in this fortress of rationality one of you suggested the bomb alternative. So, I guess the question is would a big conventional bomb plug the leak? would a smallish nuke do it? If I could guess, and I can, I'd say probably not. Mostly likely a bomb would make the matter worse and even less controlled. But does anyone here have a less than WAG-like idea about the feasibility of just blowing the leak up? If your just guessing, say so. If you have some reason to believe your doing a bit better than guessing tell me why^Me!Sheesh!_Mine! 01:25, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Russia claims to have plugged leaks using nuclear weapons before. I think the idea is that the explosion is so hot that it melts the rock, sealing the leak. - π 01:42, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, Blowing it will most likely work, but if it doesn't, then it's game over. There's not a damn thing anyone on the planet can do aout it. So there's the rub, say it has a 75% chance of working (totally out of my ass) is it worth the 25% to have a gusher forever. Or at least too long. Quaru (talk) 01:44, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I should have asked Google first but after careful research, i.e. scanning the first three results, I conclude that most of the links on the subject are at least as disreputable as us. More seriously, while a 75% chance of working and a 25% chance of totally screwing it up sound fine for most things the solution seems a bit dicey in this case. ^Me!Sheesh!_Mine! 01:48, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

From what I have read the logic basically runs, "the Russians have done it 5 times and it only failed once, therefore we have a 20% chance of succeeding". - π 01:56, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

On a related note, the US appears to still have the W80 and the W84 which should in theory be small enough to do the job. - π 01:57, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

It's a stupid idea. You can't properly control how an explosion would work in these situations and a nuke would just be plan moronic to even consider. If explosives were a viable and workable way of containing blow outs, they would be used more frequently, we'd have more information on them and it'd have been considered a serious option to try. As it stands, the main problem is depth so what needs to be done are methods that are known to work, but adapted for these depths, that is what is being done and what should be done. In short, if there was some quick magic fix, they'd have done in weeks ago. ^sshole 10:08, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I can't help but feel that the "if it was viable they'd have already done it" claim is some flavour of logical fallacy. I think there are many reasons why the goverment/company hasn't bombed the bottom of the ocean, and it being unviable isn't necessarily one of them. It may be true that explosives aren't used frequently to contain blow-outs, but that's because previous blow-outs haven't been so serious. When was the last time a blow-out happened at sea, was a mile deep, let out this much oil, threatened an ecosystem and thwarted all conventional attempts at containing it? Previous blowouts may not have required explosives because the obvious solutions - those first on the list - worked. ^{ONE / TALK} 12:26, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't want to sound racist about this, but the idea of using a nuclear weapon to solve this problem sounds wonderfully American. Secondly, I had the impression that explosions at blow-outs were used to put out fires burning on land at the site of the rig - but my knowledge may be limited. In principle one would imagine that a nuclear explosion in this case would produce a rather large hole which would make the problem rather worse by destroying the infrastructure which presently captures part of the flow. While it is true that nobody has actually tried one under these circumstances to see what would happen, I can't help but feel that this is not the best situation to carry out such an experiment. --Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 13:46, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

To me, what sounds American is spending ungodly amounts of money, time and effort on unwieldy attempts at fixing the problem. What sounds Russian is cutting your loses and blowing it up. What sounds British is hedging. Endless hedging. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 14:29, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Salon had a good article on this almost three weeks ago, with two stunning videos, one of them showing the worst-case scenario -- a chain reaction of methane explosions with destruction on the level of the Permian extinction. Must be seen to be believed.

And, on a less serious note, nuking the well might cause us all to get shuttled 30 years into the future! Junggai (talk) 13:53, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Wow! So I'll be able to have a Pitbull hoverboard? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 14:58, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

First off, I think that people need some perspective. The oil well is deep. It's really deep.

I am rather sure that a good chunk of people throwing around the explosion quote, have in mind a method use for oil rig fires, something that works by consuming all the oxygen in an area therefore totally irrelevant. For the crowd that doesn't have in mind that, then there's two categories:

A) Conventional explosives. No, no, absolutely not. Anyone who says that has clearly never seen a movie where the submarine dives in order to escape depth charges. Simply put. At that depth, explosives don't explode. Or at least they don't with what someone would call an explosion. The well is at about 2200 psi and the oil apparently escapes from it at a pressure of... 12000 psi. Now I can't find the exact numbers but I am rather sure that most explosives and bombs, don't even go over the three digits in terms of the local overpressure they create. According to this for example, the BLU-82 creates at ground zero 1000 psi, and that's a bomb that has been likened to a nuclear weapon. You get the idea.

B) Nuclear. That's is actually the only option worth talking about. Mainly because of the idea that they make things around them hot, wither they like it or not. So the idea is that they would melt enough rock and such (obviously they'd have to be burried next to the well or something, rather than just be dropped on top of it) along the well's channel, that it would plug it. Wither that would work, I guess we won't know unless someone tries it. However, there's still the little insignificant detail that we are still talking about a needle of liquid at 12000 psi, that *really* wants to get out. If said imaginery molten rock doesn't cool fast enough, if not enough of it falls on top of the well, then the oil is going to pretty much drill itself out of there and have an oil leak again. Also, right now, the oil comes out in a very nice and tidy way out of the end of a tube. After a nuclear explosion, that tube would end underground (because we will have vaporised the top bit) and the oil, if it came out again, would be comming from all kinds of cracks and such and make capping it even more difficult. Sen (talk) 16:35, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Call me an old fusspot but I have a nasty feeling about taking one environmental disaster and adding another in the form of a massive barely controlled explosion under extreme circumstances that has serious environmental impact of its own in the way of nuclear contamination. This is not an asteroid hurtling towards the earth so we do not want to send Bruce Willis down their with a nuke. Jack Hughes (talk) 17:00, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Why do people keep thinking the nuke would be applied at the top of the well? The bore goes through miles of rock, so it would make more sense to get the thing down a mile or so underground, either in the existing bore or down a parallel one. But of course, if we had a parallel bore meeting this one a mile deep, we could cut into it and plug it with high pressure mud and concrete... ħuman 18:35, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

In fact I understand that that is the plan. The wells being drilled along side the broken one will be used to pump sealant into the bottom of the leaking one and so perform what is called a "bottom kill". Of course they could throw this reliable (though slow) plan out of the window and set off a nuclear bomb instead. It's just that abandoning a plan which will almost certainly work and replacing with something untried which almost certainly won't may not be the best decision.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 21:05, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but that is not macho enough as a nuke is. In fact I say we use two nukes. One on each side of it. So there will be two spherical explosions along a long shaft. Sen (talk) 16:27, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the only sane solution would be to dill an additional well to bring the explosive close to the original leaking bore itself. But if you want to do that 5000ft down, that's your prerogative. The alleged Soviet interventions were on land, and that's where the main difference is. Most people think that the bomb would be put just on the surface, but that's the dumbest method for the stupidest solution. ^sshole 18:44, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

What do you propose? More dicking around? ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 18:53, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Maybe. If the options are "continue dicking around" and "break stuff worse" then yeah. But as has been said, just placing a nuke on the ocean floor won't work, and if we dig to place it further down, well, we've just dug a relief well anyway, so the problem is solved. Arguing that they'll lose "100 millions of dollars of investment" by blowing it up is lost when they're spending immensely more than that already, and will continue to. I think they'd be happy to blow it up and call it a day, if they thought that was a possible solution. Quaru (talk) 12:38, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Detail: You also need a drill with the diameter of the bomb. Sen (talk) 20:24, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Nukes aren't very big. Especially "small" ones. ħuman 03:46, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

The issue here is probably some's view than an entire ECBM will be placed down there. You just need the warhead. You can fit one of those in a suitcase. Quaru (talk) 12:42, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Someone has obviously never seen Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery...idiot. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 21:24, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

I think you need to show some mining or underwater exploration qualifications before you can call what they're currently doing "dicking around". This is what happens when you embark on untried and untested engineering projects; things don't work and you have to refine them. Things take time. Now, if you consider yourself an expert on nuclear physics, geology, oil drilling, underwater operations and long-term disaster management, and you think a nuke will work, then I'll listen, until then stop thinking that some super-dramatic solution will work while realistic projects are just "dicking around". ^sshole 16:33, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

According to the BBC, who consulted with some geology professor, a bomb inside the pipe would form a giant crater, with an uncontrollable leak as a result. I don't want to be rude, but I trust the BBC over Neveruse. — Pietrow ☏ 13:14, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

You just need to have a more open mind. Quaru (talk) 13:18, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Specifically, a bomb just inside/near the pipe, or even at an insufficient depth, would cause this. Sen (talk) 12:22, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I think we've got some sort of consensus and validation that the bomb thing is just wingnut lunacy. I think it is safe to formulate the plan as "Bomb, baby, bomb" 14:59, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Interesting reading

Download this and have a read. As well as highlighting the very (and dare I say it, "American") gung-ho attitude of BP with regards to completing this well, it also gives a reasonable explanation of the methods used in deepwater drilling. As far as using a nuclear bomb to stop the oil flow - that's even more stupid than anything I've read on CP. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 15:35, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Drunk YouTubing

Is fun!

However, I have to report that this video (due to its bounty of Fox News blurbs that sounded like they came straight from the pages of Conservapedia [but realizing that I know that it's actually the other way 'round]) gave me the unpleasant side effect of the mental image of Andy furiously fapping it to Fox News with a cup of cocoa in one hand and a Christmas tree in the background while shouting "Conservative insight! Conservative values!" repeatedly.

I dunno if it's that or the bourbon, but I just puked a little... The Foxhole Atheist (talk) 05:15, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

... Wow. Your brain goes to interesting places while watching Fox news. I avoid it like a flea infested rat w/ the plague. But maybe it was the bourbon. Was that all you took? I've found mushrooms will make you imagine Schlafly masturbating to Fox News as well.. Not psychedelic mushrooms, mind you, just regular old mushrooms. Fried is best for that. Quaru (talk) 11:18, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

I really liked the "automobile owner's manual" analogy, especially right after reading the "returning a defective product to the manufacturer" comment in the firing squad article linked above. ħuman 02:52, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Nice video, well made. Shame about the enunciation issues :( ħuman 03:00, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

What's the name of "Initially, I was a skeptic, but..."?

...and is there an article about it? I mean the fallacy lame rhetorical trick of claiming that the speaker once held a position opposite to the current one ("I was an atheist, but..."; "Before, I thought that the Moon landings are real, but...", etc). --ZooGuard (talk) 20:53, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

My favorite, "I started this project expecting to prove Global Warming exists, but after viewing the evidence in depth..." But back to the topic, I have no clue. I don't know that it's any sort of "fallacy", but certainly a commonly abused rhetorical tactic. Quaru (talk) 23:21, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like an argument from authority in the end. A random Google hit basically agrees, giving it the more specific name "Statement of Conversion". A condescending version of the usual fallacy. ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 23:50, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Random philosophical question: Can someone say "I used to be dead, but...", when referring to his pre-birth/conception experience? Sen (talk) 00:04, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Someone can say "I didn't come from an embryo - I once were an embryo" Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 00:21, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, he did specify pre-conception. The philosophical question of the difference between death and pre-birth would be the issue. It's true they are both a state of "non-being" (for the sake of this argument, I'm assuming there are no souls, after-life, or reincarnation. Shut up.) and simply becomes a state of transition. "I used to not be alive, but..." may be more accurate. And on that note, "I used to be a fish, but after studying the evidence in more detail...." Quaru (talk) 15:15, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Possibly... anyway, feel free to do statement of conversion as an article, it's certainly with the remit. Similar to "not racist but" or "not religious but" and so on. I'm not sure how it relates to argument from authority, though, it does seem like Ipse Dixit in that the person is arguing that because they were "converted" it must be more true. It's a nice way of adding narrative to an argument to make it dupe people easily. ^sshole 00:11, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

It's an argument from experience - the implication is "I of all people should understand this issue better than anyone" - which is essentially an argument from authority variant. The other aspect is "because I've looked at it from both sides", implying that opponents who've remained consistent in their views just haven't considered the issue properly or deeply enough or tried to look at it from another's point of view. Not sure quite what form of fallacy this aspect falls under. Wéáśéĺóíď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 00:43, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

There's a long history of this. Saul -> Paul comes to mind. I'm not so sure it is always a rhetorical tactic as much it is often people whose "skepticism" is a centimeter deep and wind up having a Road to Damascus conversion. Secret Squirrel (talk) 00:46, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Aspects of psuedoskepticism, surely. However, we should note that this sort of thing works both ways. I've certainly read a few things from people who "converted" from climate change skepticism for one reason or another and use this as a talking point. Of course, even in this case where someone "converts" to an accepted viewpoint, it's still equally fallacious to use it as an argument. ^sshole 00:56, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

My version is "I used to have some pretty hard core ("truther")thoughts about 9/11, but then I saw evidence proving me wrong..." ħuman 02:36, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

I used to think cryonics was plausible, until I investigated it for Cryonics and went "wtf" - David Gerard (talk) 10:43, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

I used to think that not writing an article about statement of conversion was then I read this conversation and was visited by the angel Moroni ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 11:12, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

The thing about this is that it could be legitimate. If you used to believe something but were then were convinced by contradictory evidence then you probably do have a better knowledge of the subject than somebody who has simply assumed that one side or the other is true. But I rather suspect that it is not usually used that way and that it is just used to make an unprovable and probably untrue claim to authority. Whenever I see the words "I used to be an atheist, but .." then I am immediately suspicious. I guess the best rsponse is to ask "OK, what was the conclusive evidence that made you change your mind?" --Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 12:51, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, that's why this thing can a bit difficult to pin down. I'm trying to cover what you said there in my draft for the article. Feel free to edit the draft if you think this could be explained more clearly. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 13:09, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, I've tried to fit it in. :-) --Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 20:18, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

NephilimFree Act 36 Scene 4,576

Following Thunderf00t getting back to what he's good at with Why Do People Laugh At Creationists (Part 33) which NephilmFree played the staring role, NF called him out on a "PHYSICS FAIL". Thunderf00t has offered to have him call in on the League of Reason's video blog show to try and explain this. Of course, I doubt we'll get anything from this and this isn't interesting... except I think RationalWikians might be bemused by Thunderf00t's final phrase in the video (skip to the last 20 seconds if it's tl;dr for you). ^sshole 00:29, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Or tl;dw, obviously. ^sshole 00:30, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

NF cannot haz ma-cheese-mo. I was hoping Thunderf00t would call him a pantywaist. SJ ^Debaser 11:27, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

It will be interesting if this "ma cheese mo" meme grows and thrives outside of the RW/CP petri dish. It may even mutate and be subject to selection pressures! ħuman 02:46, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm guessing he got it from what appeared on the Conservapedia Breaking News:

“”YouTube creationists Nephilimfree and Shockofgod were disappointed that the YouTube evolutionist Donexodus2, who has 30,000 Youtube subscribers, lacked machismo and was a no show for the debate he agreed to and acknowledged agreeing to on his YouTube channel.

--Night Jaguar (talk) 03:13, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Or from that stupid motorcycle video. ħuman 03:42, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Of course, you know what this means don't you? It means something Ken wrote has actually had some effect on the internets. Hell has officially frozen over. --JeevesMkII ^{The gentleman's gentleman at the other site} 09:33, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

That's what I was thinking. "Ma-cheese-mo" becoming a meme would be good, but it'd inflate Ken's delusional sense of self-worth. SJ ^Debaser 11:35, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't suppose Nephy called in to the League of Reason show. Anyone listen? DickTurpis (talk) 14:16, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Italy 1 New Zealand 1

Who would have thought? All Serie A players v a bunch of Semi professionals playing in various division 1 leagues around the world (and a few non professionals) and we get a draw. --Damo^Hi 16:00, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

That's a damned low score for a rugby game.-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 16:59, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

If we ever drew at rugby with the Italians there would be much wailing and gnashing of teeth - and the devil would need to get used to his new icy kingdom. --Damo^Hi 17:02, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Blame the orcs. Peter Jackson may have labelled NZ as middle earth, but it beats the sheep thing. Honestly though, as a non-soccerball man this is an odd result. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 18:33, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

The whole god damn thing sickeness me. Do you know how much of my nightly newshour is going to be taken up by this one story? Fuck. Aceⁱ⁹ 21:57, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

The world cup scoreboard was until recently looking like a binary log. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 10:23, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

World Humanist Day

Happy World Humanist Day everyone! FreeThought (talk) 09:14, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Genesis Expo

Not been around long so I may be digging up something already mentioned, but I just heard about the "Genesis Expo". - any Englishers here been, for shits and giggles?

[3] [4] [5]

Jonno^{Hurl Abuse Here} 12:30, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Portugal 7, North Korea 0?

Christ, which football were they playing? DickTurpis (talk) 13:40, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Football corrupted by decadent western values! If they had played football as defined by the glorious Kim Jong-Il, the victory of the socialist workers guided by juche ideology would have been complete! The Beloved Leader has spoken! MDB (talk) 13:44, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Sigh. Those guys keep embarassing me. I should've included some advice on football in my Manifesto. Karl Marx (talk) 13:48, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, if you think about it, North Korea held Portugal to just a single touchdown. Not bad, really. DickTurpis (talk) 13:50, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Or a single converted try. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 13:52, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Or two 3-pointers and a free throw. ħuman 22:51, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

(ec)So, does every nation that fields a soccerfootball team get an entry into the World Cup? Is there no vetting process that would say "North Korea does not have a competitive team"? MDB (talk) 13:54, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

They do, but Kim Jung Il threatened to nuke Japan if they weren't allowed to play, so they let them in. DickTurpis (talk) 14:06, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

There is a qualifying stage. Strictly speaking, the current stage is the 'World Cup Finals'. N Korea had to qualify for one of the 'Asian Continental Zone' places. See here Worm^{(t | c)} 14:10, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

The Democratic Republic aren't actually all that bad. They did all right against Brazil last week, and had several chances early on in this match - it's just that Portugal were on top form and ran riot in the second half.-- Kriss Akabusi^{AAAWOOOGAAAR!!1} 15:18, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Proofread

Can someone with good Englishings proofread this for me please? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 20:32, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Yep. ^sshole 20:35, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Looks fine enough. ^sshole 20:38, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

kk, thanks. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 21:19, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

EFF! !

As if the bloody Footy wasn't enuff - now we've got WIMBLEDON! Anyone wanna buy a telly? (or at least rent one until Jul or so) 17:05, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Yippee, for two weeks of the year the country pretends to care about tennis! ^sshole 19:41, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

It's a hell of a lot easier than pretending to care about soccer. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 12:57, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Worst Majors: Golf Management

So, I'm looking at the WIGO for Conservapedia, and it links in about the V-Tech shooter studying English lit, and I look at their page, and I see that they're dissing on Golf Management as being a bad major. Have any of you known someone who took Professional Golf Management? It's a business degree. You walk out of class, and can get nearly any management job in the world... wtf is wrong with people not adding two and two together? --Eira ^omtg! The Goat be praised. 23:52, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Some degrees that seems dumb actually have a point. My university offers a diploma (not even a full bachelor) in wine marketing and they are amongst the highest paid graduates. - π 01:23, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

But why didn't you bring this up at talk:wigo CP? ħuman 03:56, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Uh... 'cause? It's not really "what's going on" it was dropped in during the second edit by TK... --Eira ^omtg! The Goat be praised. 05:16, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

We treat WIGO CP talk as a general discussion forum for Conservapedia. - π 06:03, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

In a more general sense about odd-looking degrees, I have to say that "golf course management" was the best one I could find in the UCAS book (maybe there's been a better one come along in the last 6 years, though). But from what I gather of the course itself, it is just a business and general management degree with some stuff about managing grass on top of it - a more specific type of an "Events Management" foundation degree. And considering how freaking seriously golfers take their sport (it's the only kind of sport I know where they'll throw you out for wearing the wrong trousers) it's unsurprising that they'd organise a degree in it, you'd damn well need the specialist training to break into that sort of thing. ^sshole 12:29, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Esso's turn

Whoops. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 12:36, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Pah, we laugh at the pathetic retaliation of the US! ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 19:23, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Back when I was a kid...

I had an IBM 486. I got used to using WordPerfect DOS... it was fast and useful and did what it was told without trying to "help". I'm having a really hard time finding a 386 or 486 desktop (all the ones on Ebay cost a fortune for some reason), which I'd like to get to run as a native DOS system with WordPerfect. Any RWians out there know of a place in the UK that gets rid of old "junk" systems of that vintage, or have one they don't need? I'm in London but have family in B'ham who can pick stuff up from around that way, or I'm willing to pay for postage for the system box. Not looking for a monitor, just sys box, and a decent traditional style keyboard if it has one.

Also if Anyone has a copy of WP 6.x DOS on disk, can they let me know? I've got 5.2 but I could really use the TrueType support without having Windows keeping BSODing me (don't say it because I'll never get the picture out of my mind) -- 13:55, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Without paying some wank too much money for something he perceives has value, I'm sure you could just build one for cheap, although I'm sure you'd find your self asking "why". Maybe smoke a little pot, get a DOS emulator and just pretend. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 14:03, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Was thinking that. You can get 486 mobos and old EDO ram for a reasonable price, and might do that if I can't find a complete system - just too lazy to do it unless I have to (I could learn to use Windows and MS Word properly, but... meh...) -- 14:06, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I wish I'd kept all those old motherboards, processors and memory that I've discarded over the years, although the furthest back I could have gone would have been a Pentium board. Still have a working Spectrum +2 in the loft though. Neveruse is right, it'd be far, far easier to use Dosemu and find a copy of WordPerfect on an abandonware website. Bondurant (talk) 14:14, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Speaking of emulators, put this into the BASIC prompt of a spectrum emulator:

10 PLOT 128, 0: DRAW 0, 155, 2771 * PI

Then run it. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 14:19, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

You could always take a less old system and just put DOS on it.. I mean, there may be issues finding a network card that supports it, but it shouldn't be that hrd. Dual-boot that shit! DOS/Windows 7 box!!! As far as an old version of WP, you may be SOL, and honestly, I literally just threw away a copy. Like, a week ago. Abandonware site is likely the way to go. Quaru (talk) 14:22, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

::::: Thanks for your ideas... I tried downloading a copy of WP6 from Vetusware a while back, but I couldn't get it to install (come up file not found when installing the import/export converters). Does DOS 6.x run OK on newer systems? I don't have a working desktop so I'll have to get some kind of system anyway, and if I can avoid windows I'd much prefer it (I've got it on my laptop for the internet and stuff, this system wouldn't be networked, it just be for document editing. -- 14:42, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

To my knowledge, it should just work.. (and any wired network card should as well) But I have not tried it in years, so I guess I don't know. I mean, the standard caveats apply, as it cannot use large disks, cannot access more than X ram, etc.. So unless the 16-bit layer has been removed in modern microprocessors (which may be, I haven't written any 16-bit code in.. ever. ) But, and maybe there's some other reason against it, but what about Linux? I know it will run on a modern system, and would get you off of windows.. That's how I switched to Linux.. got very sick of Windows. And it has a quite good dos emulator for it, as well. Quaru (talk) 16:41, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Seriously? Just take your modern system and run VirtualBox on it, and install DOS (or Windows 3.1) on that - David Gerard (talk) 17:39, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it's quite the same has having the actual 386/486 chip running it. It's not the point just to access the capabilities of the program, you have to have the hardware backing up the entire experience. ^sshole 18:06, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

There is also FreeDOS, which at a cursory glance appears to be binary-compatible and should run on modern chipsets, but I'm not totally sure. Evil wisest Hoover! 18:11, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

I have a vague confirmation on that from some guy on #esoteric, so it's probably worth a shot. Try it in qemu or something first, though. Evil wisest Hoover! 18:15, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

About a year or so ago a friend of mine (a total computer/programming geek) and his brother were struggling to do something similar to play an old game that simply didn't work on modern speed processors. I got rid of my old 286 and 386s many years ago, sadly. But I probably still have a "big round plug" KB around somewhere. ħuman 18:49, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Was it one of those old games that used the time the processor took to do instructions for timing? If so, there's probably an ingenious hack for it, since it's just a matter of reducing the clock speed. Evil wisest Hoover! 20:27, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Probably. I think they may have also gotten caught up in the thrill of the project, that is, building a retro box from scraps. ħuman 18:37, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

That reminds me, I knew a guy in my first job who had a spectrum (48k? the one with the squelchy keyboard anyway) which he had hacked to fuck and he was using it as a test DHCP server! Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 08:10, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

I recently took my missus's old CRT telly to the dump/recycling centre (after trying to give it away on freecycle and on the advert board in the supermarket - someone did at least take the VCR), and they had a container for TVs, monitors and computers. It was full, and the guy said they fill it three times a week. Don't know if you'll find one quite of that vintage, but worth a look. I think I still have an IBM PS/1 at my parents' somewhere, if they've not chucked it out like my Dad's old XT clone... DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 21:14, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Re DOS on a modern machine. I can see no reason why it wouldn't work; one of the significant things about the x86 and subsequent CPUs is that they have always maintained complete backwards compatability^{I think}. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 21:19, 19 June 2010 (UTC)

Correct, it will work. The only systems it won't would be an Intel Macs (which lacks 80x25 text displays), and even if MS-Dos series don't, FreeDos can easily handle that instead. --Sigma 7 (talk) 23:39, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Are you sure? I though I rememberd reading somewhere that the x86-64 ditched some older compatabilities? maybe it would apply to much older versions of DOS.. Like, I thought they dumped 8-bit mode, finally? I guess I don't recall what it was, offhand... Quaru (talk) 00:44, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Guns in Church

We here in Louisiana are almost ready to pass a bill that will allow guns in church. Would the chance of the preacher getting killed outweigh the general stupidity of this? I'm a gun owner, and I cannot think of any reason to bring a gun to church, neither could several other people I talked to. Tyrannis (talk) 14:37, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

I think it;s more the philosophy of "I have a right to bring a gun anywhere" than a legitimate reason to bring a gun to church. Although there was this tragedy in my hometown that I suppose would be a justification to pack heat in God's house, but it's probably the Knoxvile church least likely to have gun-toting members, and the shooter was stopped without anyone firing at him.

Does the Louisiana bill allow churches to say "we don't allow guns, period"? If not, that seems like an infringement on private property rights. MDB (talk) 14:42, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, mosques, synagogues, and churches may say "no guns". The bill is currently going to Jindal. My church has liberal pastors(a rarity here), but a mostly conservative congregation. So what happens is anyone's guess.Tyrannis (talk) 14:48, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

The best way to stop a crazy person shooting people in a crowded building is for more crazy people to start shooting. I think these people think this will deter crazy people from choosing churches as shooting galleries, but that fails to take into consideration the crazy. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 15:13, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Right, because then the crazy peoplepeople with guns can't tell each other apart and soon enough there won't be any more crazy peoplepeople with guns to shoot at each other. Deny that 2+2=4 and lose all credibility. ÑR_{/Señor Admin}^/Hablar 15:18, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

I wasn't saying that they couldn't tell them apart, I'm saying that people shooting guns in a crowded room is a recipe for more people being shot. guns + crowds + panic + guns = crossfire. I'm assuming metal detectors would somehow be unacceptable to these yahoos. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 15:34, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Looks like someone's been reading Conservapedia!-- Kriss Akabusi^{AAAWOOOGAAAR!!1} 15:19, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

This may reduce the evangelical vote a bit. Tyrannis (talk) 15:21, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

If someone in the LA leg has been reading conservapedia, that would explain the stupidity running rampant there.Tyrannis (talk) 15:23, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

WTF? When did you need a law to allow something that is given as a default? Is this to prevent churches from refusing to allow you to carry a gun on their property, because fuck, crazy liberal Washington state allows you to carry guns everywhere except banks, federal buildings, and certain places like courthouses, possibly schools, etc. There was a big row awhile ago about Starbucks letting people bring guns into their store. Starbucks said, "it's not fucking illegal, and we don't want to argue with customers who have guns." Seriously, this confuses me. --Eira ^omtg! The Goat be praised. 23:55, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Churches are like schools, at least here, have been "gun-free" zones. A bill to allow guns at LSU died last year, but they resurrect it ever so often, each time getting closer to passing. I go to LSU, and I carry a knife for utility purposes. But the last thing we need is guns, as we already burn rival coaches in effigy. When a former coach came with his new team he had an armed police escort, with helicopters, to protect him. Couple that with a hard drinking college, and you have a disaster. Tyrannis (talk) 12:52, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I say allow guns, ban college sports. DickTurpis (talk) 14:03, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

The way LSU's current budget is, it is more like ban research, fund sports. Tyrannis (talk) 14:07, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

I'll give him credit for his honesty, at least

Mike Huckabee opposes gay marriage because he thinks same-sex relationships are icky.

Mike, from looking at your picture, I think your marriage is pretty icky, too. MDB (talk) 15:56, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Mick Hickabee is just as insane as any CONservapedian, but at least he's an honest nutter. Gooniepunk2010 ^{Oi! Oi! Oi!} 01:29, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Problems connecting

Yesturday around 04:30 (UTC) I couldn't connect to RationalWiki or RationalWikiWiki. Was anyone else unable to connect? Does anyone know why? (Apparently some users may not notice when the have been blocked and it almost sounded like there may be "illegitimate" blocks. [6]) Lumenos (talk) 00:44, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

That's when the backup suite runs, it kills about a half hour of connectivity. RWW is on the same server, so it gets taken out as well. It's a good time of night to get another hobby, briefly. ħuman 03:57, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Oh look, there it went again. - π 04:41, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Pi b eat me to that. Fucking transcendentalism overwhelms my mere mortal coil. ħuman 07:55, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

If you ever need to check the status go here. - π 04:42, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I found that status section, thanks. Lumenos (talk) 06:09, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Sometimes it can be deceptive. The server load can be very low and yet we have connectivity issues. I assume that's because if there's connectivity issues there's not enough going on with the server to register as "high"! In my experience that's best as a proxy for how the site will perform while you're on it, not if you're going to connect to Trent's office or not. ^sshole 12:32, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't think backup is particularly server/CPU intensive, it's bandwidth intensive. And during one stage, the server is actually off-line. ħuman 19:58, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I thought the backup made the site go offline because the database can't change while it's running, and even viewing a page requires that the view count be updated. Evil wisest Hoover! 15:04, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Nx did mention something about the view count being a hurdle, especially when the site gets slash-dotted. ^sshole 15:07, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Back up operates in several phases which effect site performance in two different ways:

1. The database is locked so an xml dump of the cite content can be created for rationalwiki:Content dumps. The database has to lock so that no changes are made during the creation of the dump which can damage the tables. Since the database is locked Mediawiki gets an error when it tries to connect. This will create several problems on the users end, ranging from a generic "connection refused by server" message to some of the Mediawiki errors such as the "RationalWiki has a problem." This takes 10-15 minutes.
2. After the content dump is created it uploaded offline where it can be downloaded by anyone. The upload sucks up between 75-90 percent of our upload bandwidth on the internet connection. The site is accessible during this stage but will load slow and appear sluggish due to the much more limited upload bandwidth. This taks 5-10 minutes.
3. With the content dump done for the night the backup script locks the database once again in order to hotcopy the complete database structure for the full backup. Once more no changes can take place during the hot copy so you will go back to getting the server errors or RW can't connect to the database errors. This takes about 20 minutes.
4. The contents of the rationalwiki home directory, which contains software, extensions, and images, as well as the database dump are uploaded offsite. We use rsync so that only the parts of files that have changed, or new files are uploaded. This will cap upload bandwidth and while the site is accessible it will appear sluggish and load slowly. The amount of time this take depends on how many new images have been uploaded and how many pages have been edited that day. Usually 15-20 minutes.

The total backup time ranges from about 60-90 minutes, during which the sites performance is effected. Only about half that time is it completely non-accessible. The backup runs every night at midnight EST. tmtoulouse 17:57, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Do McCain voter lack macheesemo?

It is funny that you notice things you didn't see before. - π 12:53, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Heh heh. It's an interesting excuse for being unable to perform on the night. Possible class action suit led by Pele? ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 11:17, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

iOS rendering oddness

Any else upgraded an iPhone to iOS 4 and found that the edit boxes are rendering in such a way that your text can't be read? ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 19:21, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

No! (and) Ha! Bloody IPhones. 19:24, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Anyone else bought an iPhone and then felt stupid and raped? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 21:18, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I'd ask for a refund if those were included. I'm pretty sure they're not listed on the box. ConcernedResident ^{omg ponies!!!} 23:39, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I like my iPhone. You can even make phone calls with it. ^Me!Sheesh!_Mine! 23:43, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

"Raped", Crundy? Um, I don't think you're using it right. DickTurpis (talk) 14:36, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Dunno: a phone on "vibrate" can be fun (ever wondered what those front trouser/jean/pants pockets were for?) 15:02, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

We should have a smart phone OS flame war. Soon Android will take over the world. --Alienfromspace (talk) 18:55, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Qt beats anything java anyday in all categories. All the Apple Safari only STANDARDHTML5!1!! fanboys will love WRT. Meego is the future. --Swedmann (talk) 19:08, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

I have an Android! I love it. And much Qt <3. And... Hmm... Go vi!!! Quaru (talk) 22:47, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Entertaining downloads

Reading Michael Shermer's latest eSkeptic posting I found two PDFs that may be of interest:

1. Top 10 Things You Should Know About Alternative Medicine
2. Learn to be a Psychic in 10 Easy Lessons

 Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 12:07, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Quite nice. Although some of the formatting is "interesting" in places. ^sshole 14:24, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Burned

So the morning Right-radio guys have the former prime minister of Canada on their show this morning. And they gush over the fact that he grew Canada's economy. They ask him how they did it. He says banking regulation and tax cuts, then adds that the US needs to reregulate the banking industry fast, then signs off. The (further) right-wing host tells his other host that this means everyone needs a tax cut NOW. The other (centre-right) host says that regulation may be required and then comments that the prime minister was... a Liberal. The further other host sits in silence for several minutes until resuming the TAX CUTS NOW blather. Tyrannis (talk) 13:50, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Earthquake

I just felt a very minor earthquake (first of my life) in eastern upstate NY. I'm getting word on facebook of it being felt in Buffalo, Ohio, Michigan, and Toronto. Anyone here notice anything in the last 20 minutes? DickTurpis (talk) 18:05, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Not in my neck of the woods.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 18:25, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Just heard it was a 5.5 on the Ontario/Quebec border. Weird that I felt it so far away. DickTurpis (talk) 18:27, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Yep, got a good jolt here in Hamilton. They evacuated our lab building and then proceeded to yell at us because it didn't go the way it was suppose to. Apparently there is a collection of hockey nets in the emergency stairwell. tmtoulouse 18:37, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Here's a link to an AP story. I'm not making the obvious joke about "feeling the earth move", though. MDB (talk) 18:53, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Just heard about it from a talk radio caller. Felt nothing here in NH. ħuman 18:54, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

53 km NNE from here, you better believe I felt it. And here I was in the basement of an office building, feeling it all around me. Needless to say, I got the rest of the day off. --Kels (talk) 19:01, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

My residents up on the 10th floor felt it, and we're near Detroit.-- -PalMD ^{--Does this sig line make me look fat?} 19:04, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Supposedly it made it to Boston, but I didn't notice anything. --MarkGall (talk) 19:12, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

I had no idea what the heck happened but things shook a bit here. ĴάΛäšςǍ₰ thinking of what to say next 20:26, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Supposedly, it could be felt here... (a bit north of Detroit) I was too busy sleeping... Quaru (talk) 22:53, 23 June 2010 (UTC)