It wasn't always this way. If you look at the Old Testament laws, you get a glimpse of a highly ritualized culture where everything has its strict place in the community, including sex. A lot of those laws made social sense in their original context.

Technically speaking, "too long" is a contextual standard. I wouldn't be willing to read a 30,000 word Io9 comment, for example. Offering a tl;dr option lets people select their level of involvement in the conversation. Maybe it's a bit lazy, but it also shows respect for other people's time.

I think the real lesson here is always to have a back-up plan if your bet falls through.

I've thought of making a card game version of this. It goes something like this:

Because they knew that anecdotal evidence could not be trusted. They were Important Thinkers, and had the heavy burden of deducing how many teeth a horse *should* have.

Part of the issue is that professional philosophers are performing, in a highly specialized way, a job that mostly everyone does as a matter of course. If you actually talk with the professionals, of course, they're using rigorously-defined tools like modal logic and engaging in a form of peer review with other…

In fairness to the theologians, I think it's more probable that non-theologians made it up.

The bullies would all be parents.

Well, more like I'm trying to talk apples and you're talking apple pie without acknowledging the need for apples. BUT YOU NEED APPLES BEFORE YOU MAKE THE PIE, MAN.

Ah, it seems I have failed to communicate my point, and I do apologize. I'll make another attempt.

What, would you rule the world any differently? I wouldn't.

No one's talking about religion here. Let's clarify some terms:

Let's be clear. The only way to hold this belief in good faith is to voluntarily become part of the cannon fodder.

AI safety is a concern because AI might kill us all while pursuing whatever task we assign it to. Could we get around that by programming it without goals?

Shadowrun, here we come.

I propose the Nolan Corollary: The barber is secretly a pair of twins that pretend to be the same person. Thus, the barber is shaved by the barber but does not shave himself.

The future may be renewable, but history is not.

Let's recast this entire story:

Contextless links to random websites are all fun and exciting, but 1) there does exist a sociocultural group whose members self-identify as Christians, and 2) use of the word "Christian" is understood by most parties as referring to this particular sociocultural group, and moreover 3) none of this sudden nitpicking…

"If you believe in your dreams, and you follow your star..."