Zeuglodon Beta

In short, the moralizing is camouflage for dominance. The American electorate are either those whose reasoning and connection to the reality of the situation are so detached and undisciplined that they’ll be […]

Marco, Michael 100, and Strato: If you’re looking at Trump through a moral lens, he doesn’t work. It’s the power lens that matters, and with that all the dominance, dysfunctionality, and delusion that […]

Joe M: But Trump has corrupted the Supreme Court, his minions and his aptly named “base” continue to support him, and I grieve for America. After the July ruling, everyone should be regarding the Supreme Cou […]

Strato: Noting Musk’s blatant financial toadying after Trump, I’m reminded of the Mr Burns scene from a certain The Simpsons episode, “The Joy of Sect”: Mr. Burns: Smithers, why haven’t I heard of this “The […]

Joe M: Would that be this section? Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United […]

Also Strato: I think this capacitation for heat within the atmosphere and oceans, from solar, geothermal sources and from combustion, is potential energy which it might seem is released in hurricanes, as […]

Strato: Goldenmane This might be a dumb question, but was he a brony, by any chance? Sounds like a ponified username to me. Or is it simply a mundane reference to a hairstyle? And he was totally right. The […]

Marco (October 8): I feel we’re in danger of confusing how we treat people with how we treat ideas. At least practically, I see the point of lowering people’s defenses. Regardless of motive, people rarely […]

Strato: Sorry, I didn’t reply to this nearer the time (October 5th). Gimme a sec… I read in, I think, The Ancestor’s Tale, that prior to the slow oxygenating process, unlocking the oxygen under the advent of t […]

Marco: Steelmanning is a worthwhile activity in the first place – if you’re going to intellectually “spar” or “stress test”, it’s more fruitful to go up against a worthy opponent than an obvious weakling – but my […]

In other news, cosmology might be due an upgrade, according to this article: Cosmology is at a tipping point – we may be on the verge of discovering new physics I particularly like the closing two paragraphs d […]

Darn, I feel like I’m popping up just to poke at things, but… Rituals, beliefs, and ideologies persist because they keep the tribe intact. I’m not sure I go with the group selection implications here. Unlike […]

Agreed, Marco. I’ve seen Monbiot’s reports of similar injustices, and while it’s not surprising (because power tends to use the same tricks throughout history), it is absolutely outrageous.

Michael 100: “Designoid”. It looks a bit clunky, but it gets the job done. 🙂 Also, I clean forgot about The Genetic Book of the Dead. But I know I’ve seen that phrase before e.g. in Unweaving the Rainbow. […]

Michael100: I find myself falling into the trap of talking about “randomness” as well, but we need to watch our Ps and Qs. Yes, I think the problem is the one identified in The God Delusion – a lot of peo […]

Well, we’re doing well. #Sarcasm Climate policies that achieved major emission reductions: Global evidence from two decades We provide a global, systematic ex post evaluation to identify policy combinations that […]

More broadly, the epistemic principle I’m not on board for when people invoke the Bible is the idea that something’s written in an important book, so it must be true. Well, no, to put it frankly. It doesn’t […]

Marco: First, it is rooted in the idea that, from the moment we draw our first breath as newborn babies, we are inherently evil and deserving of everlasting torment. I’m almost tempted to leave it there, b […]

Strato: Certainly dimorphism isn’t a ne’er the twain shall meet, fixed sexuality status quo, especially given modern pharmacology, like hormones, steroids. But I think, from looking about me all these years tha […]

Nick Wormley: an animal that randomly came into existence by evolutionary, natural selection I have difficulty with the idea of randomness in evolution by natural selection. Natural selection itself has an […]