Culture.

Playful experimentation is an essential component of our culture's continuing advance, but I think the best formalwear will always include a cumberbund.

PS- He was great in Tinker Tailor, 
as were they all.

The compelling audacity of postwar American technology, in ascending order of WTF:

1. Apollo moonshots. (☑!)


2. Orion (note especially the "Potential problems" section; see also the 8-minute Ted clip on YouTube from Dyson's son).


3. Sweet Jesus, are you insane????

Honorable mention: 47 flights.

Sex, right? Note especially her smug amusement at his discomposure... This will be a theme in his life.

Also, the NFL is pretty much over.

Rent-A-Minority is a revolutionary new service designed for those oh-shit moments where you've realized your award show, corporate brochure, conference panel is entirely composed of white men. For, like, the fifth year in a row. Suddenly you're being called out on Twitter and you need to look not-racist and not-misogynist fast. Actually doing something meaningful to disrupt institutional inequality would be way too much work; so why not just Rent-A-Minority instead?

http://rentaminority.com/

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla (D) announced the ballot proposal's approval, which would ask the state's voters in 2020 if they want to discuss declaring independence from the U.S. If the initiative passes, that vote would take place May 4, 2021.

Those in favor of secession have to meet an October deadline to collect 365,880 signatures from registered voters in order to put the measure on the ballot.

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/988933870866321415

Sweet Jesus, are you insane???? ~ Crid at April 25, 2018 1:09 AM

So, cause tidal waves across the planet to avoid a nuclear explosion?

How deep would the supports for such a project have to be sunk in order for it to even have a chance at success? Otherwise, you're just tearing the cover off the planet.

I'm guessing the "scientist" who came up with that idea was quickly and quietly let go and moved on to writing the movie script for Superman.

Fake, but accurate?

https://twitter.com/BecketAdams/status/988789817952661505

I'm guessing the "scientist" who came up with that idea

They said "officer". And by that I'm guessing it was a 1 star general. A follow up tweet asked if it was even possible. A RAND scientist thought if it were possible, it would "potentially rupture the earth's surface from its core". I'm not sure what that means, but I'm sure it isn't good.

https://twitter.com/MikaelThalen/status/988752737704738817

If it is this engine, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_LV-3B I'm thinking that even with 5 minute burn at 363.22 kilonewtons by 1,000 of them wouldn't much of anything other than burn off fuel from 1,000 engines.

The mass of the earth is estimated at (5.9722±0.0006)×10^24 kg. I don't even need to do a back-of-the-envelop calculations to see that the orders of magnitude just don't cooperate.

You'd need something yuge, something on the order of Jupiter to muck up with the earth's rotational speed.

The Hannity Rule?

https://spectator.org/the-hannity-rule/

Put the sad sack of a Fresno State professor in campaign ads? sure, why not?

https://twitter.com/LegInsurrection/status/988188484484689920

It's not even that I don't think this is real. It's that the guy will be building a career around it even if it's just a beer-night joke with buddies that escaped into the popular mind.

The compelling audacity of postwar American technology, in ascending order of WTF

I like NASA images of Pluto over the past 25 years: from a few pixels then, down to mapping the actual surface undulations now

https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/views-of-pluto-through-the-years

They said "officer". And by that I'm guessing it was a 1 star general. A follow up tweet asked if it was even possible. ~ I R A Darth Aggie at April 25, 2018 8:38 AM

Um, Darth, my comment was mocking a similarly ridiculous plot point in Superman, not mocking scientists or even officers. You'll note I had the word in quote marks, indicating skepticism of the person's scientific skills, whatever his position.

And, technically, the book said "officer." We don't know the officer wasn't a scientist.

Ellsberg was pointing out the naiveté and chaotic nature of the country's nuclear deterrent program in the '60s. His argument is that we had only the illusion that our nuclear deterrent was a safe and controlled system; and that the people arguing to bring it back today are playing with fire. Perhaps this book was in service of some attempt to cast his reputation as a wise statesman after leaking the Pentagon Papers.

Your assumption this was the stupidity of a one-star general discounts the stupidity of multi-star generals.

If it is this engine, I'm thinking that even with 5 minute burn at 363.22 kilonewtons by 1,000 of them wouldn't much of anything other than burn off fuel from 1,000 engines. ~ I R A Darth Aggie at April 25, 2018 8:38 AM

As a later tweeter points out, this was a game theory idea. That is, can we get the Soviets to believe we can do it and react to it. Since it was not feasible at all and the Soviets had competent physicists who would know that, the idea was dropped.

Now that Disney has assimilated Fox, guess which character is now a Disney Princess? Hint: She's out of this world

https://twitter.com/perfumegenius/status/988142516825305088

PS- He was great in Tinker Tailor, as were they all. ~ Crid at April 25, 2018 12:48 AM

Nah, Alec Guiness was great in the earlier version. The later version was passable but had to be cut down too much to fit feature film restrictions in length for anyone to be "great."

my comment was mocking a similarly ridiculous plot point in Superman

Oh, so that wooshing sound was your pop culture reference flying past my head? D'oh!

Remember this story when someone insists health care is a right.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/950335/alfie-evans-latest-update-news-Facebook-alder-hey-liverpool-protest-lethal-injection

Remember this story when someone insists health care is a right.

I'll remember this as a case of government overreach.

The only books that will make you cry are the Math-related ones

https://twitter.com/aJackieLarsen/status/988820882717003776

I now understand clearly why Peterson is the subject of such rage in some people.

https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/988974121261256705

Remember this story when someone insists health care is a right. ~ I R A Darth Aggie at April 25, 2018 12:16 PM

That's two in two years.

What is it with the NHS and its fervent desire to kill children? Gives a whole new meaning to "shake 'im like a British nanny."

Here you go Conan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhsLDaCTXVI

Dragon energy -

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/989225812166696960

White people need to promote Black voices, as Donald Trump is doing -

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/989252420294336512

Here you go Conan ~ Here you go Conan ~ lujlp at April 25, 2018 1:55 PM

Very nice, Luj.

Just like Venezuela

https://twitter.com/TheBabylonBee/status/988835601892937729

Cruz is doing a good job lately -

http://www.breitbart.com/radio/2018/04/25/exclusive-ted-cruz-use-antitrust-laws-to-break-massive-power-of-tech-lords-to-subvert-our-democratic-process/

You'd need something yuge, something on the order of Jupiter to muck up with the earth's rotational speed

Nah, just need Stupendous Man

http://www.rabittooth.com/calvinsm.htm
(5th strip down)
the earth slowly stops rotating...and begins to turn in the opposite direction

The guy aught to be suspended from a bridge by an anal hook and beaten to death with bamboo reeds

https://twitter.com/marcorandazza/status/989327859121508352

On the other hand, he did grow up in a society that blamed him via association for literally every ill based on his skin color and his penis

Can we really be that surprised in a society that so easily demonizes men, that men start to act like demons?

Darth & Conan:Before I'd even try for an order-of-magnitude estimate of the number of rockets needed, or the resulting earthquakes and tsunamis, I'd have one simple question: Can you build a rocket engine that, fired on the ground, would shoot its exhaust into space at escape velocity? Otherwise, there's no net thrust, but just a temporary angular momentum transfer from the ground to the atmosphere - and considering the relative masses of the earth and the atmosphere, you'd blast every living thing off the surface before there was a noticeable change in the earth's rotation.