They do kill birds, but it tends to be weaker birds that wouldn’t have survived to breed anyway. Remember that adults produce many offspring, and on average all except two will die before breeding. See http://www.rspb.org.uk/makeahomeforwi… for more detail. Conclusion:

For a UK perspective, see: http://www.rspb.org.uk/makeahomeforwi….

She didn’t know it was a pet. In the UK, we put collars on our pet cats and dogs so anyone who comes across them knows they are owned. (And usually the collars have name and address tags so the pet can be returned to its owner.) Is that not the norm in America, or were the owners of the cat delinquent in this regard?

Eh? Most video porn is made with real women. It’s easier and cheaper. It looks like this VR porn was made by scanning real women, because what else would you use if going for realism?

What’s wonky? If he wanted to marry her, presumably he wanted to protect and care for her, and for that to continue after his own death. He knew about the local laws, that she’d have nothing if he died intestate. He could have said, “I can’t marry you, but I can do this instead”, where “this” was a formal, legal and…

Yes, but they aren’t in the situation of receiving death threats so serious that they feel they can’t marry for fear of exposing their partner. If he wanted to marry her and couldn’t, making a will would have been a useful alternative.

You thought the writing was brilliant? I thought it was pretty poor. He generally does not give the impression he knows what he’s talking about. Except when it comes to Apple computers, which he specifies in loving detail. It also has the usual wish-fulfillment nonsense with the 50-something bloke getting to have sex…

This doesn’t explain why he never made a will.

I think this application of the technology is interesting. Historically, a lot of innovation is driven by porn, or at least quickly adopted by it. At one time I wondered why there wasn't more computer-generated porn. I decided then (this was decades ago) that it probably cost too much and the result probably wasn't…

As the article says, most of the controversy happened before the game was released. People heard about the scene and imagined it as being worse than it was.

Enid has been in Alexandria for 8 months, according to the dialogue. That's a long time to be scouting. And she spoke to no-one for the first several weeks, which again is no way to collect information. I think she's just wary because of things she's seen, or had done to her, outside. (And possibly inside - I wouldn't…

She gave up her sword in Woodbury, too, so she's consistent. It's what you have to do if you want to join a community. No-one is going to let untrusted newcomers wander around with weapons.

That's pretty close to (3), paraphrasing, "I'm seeing it right and people who see it differently are wrong".

One of my many problems with Half-Life 2 versus Half-Life 1. In the original, I cared about the scientists and guards and would try to keep them alive even though it's sometimes hard and the game doesn't reward you for it. In the second game, your buddies respawn, so I stopped caring. I reached the point where I'd…

I believe this is half the reason we can't have VR porn. Simulating naked women to useful fidelity is hard.

Absolutely. The original Far Cry has drivable vehicles, and it also has sections where you're not supposed to have one. There's a barricade between sections which you can't get a vehicle over. Except if you are really desperate, you can. I needed to because I needed to use the mounted gun to get past that section.

Agreed. I'd add that I distrust using "girl" to refer to an adult woman; it diminishes them even when it isn't sexist. Classic example is The (UK) Apprentice referring to "boys team and girls team", which makes it sound like they are children playing rather than 35-year-old business people.

The article says, "The students were given two exams, one graded by outsiders who did not know their identities and another by teachers who knew their names." So the two groups of teachers were not grading the same math tests.

Far Cry 2 had some problems, but none of them really mattered provided you adapted your play style. Weapons wearing out wasn't a problem if you replaced them frequently. Malaria wasn't a problem if you made sure you got the pills when prompted. Guard posts weren't a problem if you stayed off roads and avoided noisy…

As I recall, it mostly did until it got put in a pound with other dogs. Those other dogs knew it wasn't a dog and were building up to either kill it or drive it away. It felt it should change to prepare for the fight. That's when the humans caught it.