the random thought thread
- Thread starter skinny mike
- Start date
The universe will die a cold death. Entropy and thermal decay will eventually halt all the atomic reactions and the only remaining heat (from random fluctuations between particle/wave duality) won't be enough to fire up any significant subatomic interaction.
The black holes will shrink via Hawking radiation and disappear, any remaining matter will also eventually decompose into photons. When all matter is converted in to energy/massless particles the fabric of time space will cease to exist as massless particles do not experience time. Roger Penrose hypothesizes that this will create a singularity identical to the one at the beginning of the universe triggering a kind of universe recycling process.
I hope Elizabeth Holmes gets lady raped in jail.
Which expresses the limits of our modeling more than anything.
If we ever manage to have some beer together again, it'd be worth discussing, but not here.
Ya know, sometimes I really just want to punch a computer.
For example, a simple task like deleting a folder. I'm being told by this system that "You require permission from xxxx\xxxuser to make changes to this folder". If I could slap it, I would. Its telling me that I need to ask myself for permission. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. Maybe I'll just discard the entire drive and show it who is the real boss.
For example, a simple task like deleting a folder. I'm being told by this system that "You require permission from xxxx\xxxuser to make changes to this folder". If I could slap it, I would. Its telling me that I need to ask myself for permission. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. Maybe I'll just discard the entire drive and show it who is the real boss.
The whole Active Directory security schema is fucked up. And making every single personal computer a potential network/AD member for the sake of making the life of MS' developers easier is as fucked up as it could be.
I had to set up a local backup node today to replicate data to an Azure Box. The stupid MS engineer who was helping us kept saying the only way to copy data to it was via a REST API. The old backup node didn't support that connectivity method, and the customer didn't have upgrade licenses. I dug through the Azure Box documentation and found out we could use NFS. And the guy still maintained it wasn't possible/acceptable.
That guy was supposed to be an Azure guru. He might be, but he knows squat about UNIX connectivity.
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Don't get me started... I'm recovering some old data to get it off tape, and the bullshit I've run into trying to delete these files after I'm done with them is infuriating. They seem to defy *every* attempt to delete them, regardless of taking ownership, removing "read-only" flags, etc.
I've taken to simply formatting the drive after I'm done with the recovered files.
I'm sorry
Sounds like a good project for an intern. Though you might need to educate them on what a tape is. Pretty these noobs won't know what a spinning hard disk is.
We have piles of hard drives laying around as they are expensive to dispose of in a manner than satisfies auditors and just common sense.
We've asked if we could send them through the presses in the factory... never got a real answer on that one
It's an old NetBackup system and I'm having all sorts of exciting problems with both the images *and* the tapes. It's excruciating...I'm sorry
Sounds like a good project for an intern.
I have put some on a burn pile...We have piles of hard drives laying around as they are expensive to dispose of in a manner than satisfies auditors and just common sense.
We've asked if we could send them through the presses in the factory... never got a real answer on that one
If someone would have told me how good Jersey Mikes subs were. I would have hit them in the head with a hammer and then carved a swastika into their forehead. Instead, I got a coupon in the mail. I was able to enjoy it at home instead of jail. Things have a way of working out for me like that. I am indeed blessed. Being able to insert the word "indeed" into a sentence also. Fucking awesome!
I need to get me a spare liver, just for full gas parties. Kinda like the DH tires I have in the bike shed for my sparse trips to the mountains..
Bertrand Russell
·
"If an opinion contrary to your own makes you angry, that is a sign that you are subconsciously aware of having no good reason for thinking as you do. If some one maintains that two and two are five, or that Iceland is on the equator, you should feel pity rather than anger, unless you know so little of arithmetic or geography that his opinion shakes your own contrary conviction.
The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there is no good evidence either way. Persecution is used in theology, not in arithmetic, because in arithmetic there is knowledge, but in theology there is only opinion. So whenever you find yourself getting angry about a difference of opinion, be on your guard; you will probably find, on examination, that your belief is going beyond what the evidence warrants."
— Bertrand Russell, An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish (1943)
·
"If an opinion contrary to your own makes you angry, that is a sign that you are subconsciously aware of having no good reason for thinking as you do. If some one maintains that two and two are five, or that Iceland is on the equator, you should feel pity rather than anger, unless you know so little of arithmetic or geography that his opinion shakes your own contrary conviction.
The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there is no good evidence either way. Persecution is used in theology, not in arithmetic, because in arithmetic there is knowledge, but in theology there is only opinion. So whenever you find yourself getting angry about a difference of opinion, be on your guard; you will probably find, on examination, that your belief is going beyond what the evidence warrants."
— Bertrand Russell, An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish (1943)
Galileo Galilei entered the chat
I was a fat child, I really enjoyed store bought apple pies because they were tasty and my dad showed me how to make hydrogen from the aluminium tray and Draino when I was about ten.
Filling balloons with hydrogen then making them explode was good fun, don't think we even lost an eyebrow, good times.
Filling balloons with hydrogen then making them explode was good fun, don't think we even lost an eyebrow, good times.
Wtf is with Coldstone Creamery? Who thought, "You know what would make ice cream even more delicious? Let's slap it all over this cold piece of rock before serving it, maybe mix in a few toppings. That'd be a killer way to serve it."
It is a killer way to serve it, but people that get gummie lollies mixed in need their heads examined.
Fuck chinese agents living in the US and pretending to be students
Berklee student arrested for stalking person who posted fliers in support of Chinese democracy
A Chinese citizen enrolled as a student at Berklee College of Music was arrested after he allegedly threatened and harrassed a person who posted fliers in support of democracy in China.
www.boston.com
ertrand Russell
December 9 at 10:37 AM
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What to Believe?(1931)
"To disbelieve what one is told is the method of the rebel and as a general practice has nothing to recommend it. Wisdom is not achieved by refusing to believe that 2 and 2 make 4, or that there is such a place as Vladivostok. When the authorities are unanimous, they are usually right; when they are not, the plain man does well to suspend judgement. A general habit of intellectual rebellion is more foolish than a general habit of intellectual acquiescence, and if it became common it would make civilisation impossible."
[ FULL CITATION ]
"There are three ways of arriving at an opinion on any subject. The first is to believe what one is told; the second is to disbelieve it; and the third is to examine the matter for oneself. The overwhelming majority of mankind practise the first method; of the remainder, the overwhelming majority practise the second; only an infinitesimal remnant practise the third.
To believe what one is told is the right method for most people in regard to most questions. I believe there is a place called Vladivostok because the atlas says so and because I have met apparently veracious people who assert that they have been there. But if I were engaged in making a survey of eastern Siberia for the Soviet Government, I should have to verify the existence of Vladivostok for myself. Believing what one is told is proper whenever there is a consensus except in matters on which one is a professional expert. In many of the most important questions there is a local but not a world-wide consensus.
To disbelieve what one is told is the method of the rebel and as a general practice has nothing to recommend it. Wisdom is not achieved by refusing to believe that 2 and 2 make 4, or that there is such a place as Vladivostok. When the authorities are unanimous, they are usually right; when they are not, the plain man does well to suspend judgement. A general habit of intellectual rebellion is more foolish than a general habit of intellectual acquiescence, and if it became common it would make civilisation impossible.
It is wise, however, to feel some degree of doubt, greater or less according to circumstances, as regards even universally accepted opinion. Few things seemed more firmly established than the Newtonian theory of gravitation, yet it turned out to need correction. The rational man, in such cases, acts upon the accepted opinion but is willing to give a hearing to anyone who advances serious reasons against it.
Rationality is shown not so much in what you believe as in how you believe it. You are rational if you believe it on evidence and as firmly as the evidence warrants and if, further, your belief leads you to act only in ways which are no obstacle to the discovery of error.
Freedom of opinion is important, since, without it, no generally received error can ever be corrected; therefore no belief should be so firmly held as to lead to persecution of those who reject it. But so long as freedom of opinion is safeguarded, all except professional experts have a better chance of being right if they accept than if they reject the prevalent opinion.”
— Bertrand Russell, Mortals and Others, Bertrand Russell’s American Essays 1931–1935, Vol. II, Essay. 37: What to Believe, p. 454 (24 August 1931)
In the early 1930s, the New York American and other newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst published a literary page to which a large number of writers and artists contributed. Bertrand Russell was one of the regulars, contributing a total of 156 essays from 22 July 1931 to 2 May 1935. In one year alone (1933), he contributed fifty items, virtually one each week, that quickly made him a household name in the United States. Intended as they were for a wide newspaper audience, his popular essays made frequent reference to the events and problems of the day, the Great Depression, the rise of Nazism and Stalinism, American Prohibition, the fading of the British and French Empires, the New Deal and many more.
December 9 at 10:37 AM
·
What to Believe?(1931)
"To disbelieve what one is told is the method of the rebel and as a general practice has nothing to recommend it. Wisdom is not achieved by refusing to believe that 2 and 2 make 4, or that there is such a place as Vladivostok. When the authorities are unanimous, they are usually right; when they are not, the plain man does well to suspend judgement. A general habit of intellectual rebellion is more foolish than a general habit of intellectual acquiescence, and if it became common it would make civilisation impossible."
[ FULL CITATION ]
"There are three ways of arriving at an opinion on any subject. The first is to believe what one is told; the second is to disbelieve it; and the third is to examine the matter for oneself. The overwhelming majority of mankind practise the first method; of the remainder, the overwhelming majority practise the second; only an infinitesimal remnant practise the third.
To believe what one is told is the right method for most people in regard to most questions. I believe there is a place called Vladivostok because the atlas says so and because I have met apparently veracious people who assert that they have been there. But if I were engaged in making a survey of eastern Siberia for the Soviet Government, I should have to verify the existence of Vladivostok for myself. Believing what one is told is proper whenever there is a consensus except in matters on which one is a professional expert. In many of the most important questions there is a local but not a world-wide consensus.
To disbelieve what one is told is the method of the rebel and as a general practice has nothing to recommend it. Wisdom is not achieved by refusing to believe that 2 and 2 make 4, or that there is such a place as Vladivostok. When the authorities are unanimous, they are usually right; when they are not, the plain man does well to suspend judgement. A general habit of intellectual rebellion is more foolish than a general habit of intellectual acquiescence, and if it became common it would make civilisation impossible.
It is wise, however, to feel some degree of doubt, greater or less according to circumstances, as regards even universally accepted opinion. Few things seemed more firmly established than the Newtonian theory of gravitation, yet it turned out to need correction. The rational man, in such cases, acts upon the accepted opinion but is willing to give a hearing to anyone who advances serious reasons against it.
Rationality is shown not so much in what you believe as in how you believe it. You are rational if you believe it on evidence and as firmly as the evidence warrants and if, further, your belief leads you to act only in ways which are no obstacle to the discovery of error.
Freedom of opinion is important, since, without it, no generally received error can ever be corrected; therefore no belief should be so firmly held as to lead to persecution of those who reject it. But so long as freedom of opinion is safeguarded, all except professional experts have a better chance of being right if they accept than if they reject the prevalent opinion.”
— Bertrand Russell, Mortals and Others, Bertrand Russell’s American Essays 1931–1935, Vol. II, Essay. 37: What to Believe, p. 454 (24 August 1931)
In the early 1930s, the New York American and other newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst published a literary page to which a large number of writers and artists contributed. Bertrand Russell was one of the regulars, contributing a total of 156 essays from 22 July 1931 to 2 May 1935. In one year alone (1933), he contributed fifty items, virtually one each week, that quickly made him a household name in the United States. Intended as they were for a wide newspaper audience, his popular essays made frequent reference to the events and problems of the day, the Great Depression, the rise of Nazism and Stalinism, American Prohibition, the fading of the British and French Empires, the New Deal and many more.
Moving the problem instead of solving it:
Plastic bags, while not great, were actually reused. I know most people reuse them at trash bags, cat litter bags etc etc. Now instead of reusing ones given from grocery stores, we'll just have to guy them, so the original problem is still there.
Plastic bags, while not great, were actually reused. I know most people reuse them at trash bags, cat litter bags etc etc. Now instead of reusing ones given from grocery stores, we'll just have to guy them, so the original problem is still there.
The problem with plastic shopping bags is that they are easily blown by the wind so they tend to end up everywhere and can be rather harmful if they find their way into waterways. There are places in Eastern Washington were you are an hour from civilization and plastic bags blow around like tumbleweeds. We have been plastic bag free for years here and at first you end up forgetting to bring them with you at first but much like remembering your wallet, it becomes second nature.
I'm on board with the change, some of these companies need to rethink what they're doing though.
The grocery store I normally shop at hasn't had plastic bags in over a year so I'm good with it.
If only the bags were biodegradable. Same with Tim Hortons cups, much like your bag problem, these things are a common sight in ditches, farm fields and random spots on trails.
Though before I went to college I worked at a facility that made biodegradable bags. Sure the product was compostable, but what went into manufacturing them didn't seem to be that great.
The problem with biodegradable bags, or plastics for that matter is that they need to be put into the industrialized compost process. Bury them on their own and they just sit around forever. They need to be ground up and mixed with high nitrogen materials like food to decompose.
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The amazing thing about human language is that it didn't necessarily evolve genetically. Pre-language humans could communicate similarly to other mammals and had the same brain structures. Language was learned and never in a single individual as communication requires multiple participants. The brain learned language by using existing structures. The real revolution of language actually is that is actually changed our inner monologue. But this new language of conscious thought may have alienated our subconscious which cannot communicate via words as we know them.
