Funny Thought

1. According to the Justice League cartoon, Nth metal is an isotope of iron with an atomic weight of 676.

2. According to the Bible, god can be fought off by iron chariots.

So, just how badly would an Nth metal chariot mess up god?

In Lighter News: Zombies

I stumbled on Project Zomboid one day, and something about it caught my interest. It's still early in development, and they have a deal like Minecraft where people who sign up in Alpha will continue to get updates and help contribute to the creative process. What makes this different from other zombie games I've played (Most often with my brother who's a fan of zombies. A very big fan.) is part of the premise: "This is how you died."

It reminded me of an article I read a long time ago about some old school games, especially shooters, "It's man versus machine. You know the machine's going to win, but the question is how long can you last?" Project Zomboid has no win conditions, and fittingly, it has a "sandbox mode" right now.

For the zombies themselves, the creators look towards Romero for inspiration. An individual zombie slow, stupid, and easy to splatter with a baseball bat, but you can't last forever against a horde. They're attracted to light and noise, so carrying a flashlight and firing your shotgun are generally unsafe actions. Once, while I was hiding in my safehouse, I ran instead of walked and ended up making a small thump which attracted a zombie to bang on my door, which subsequently attracted the nearby mob. I had to abandon that safehouse and run for another shelter.

Right now, the game is very solitary, but the creators plan to create more interactive NPCs. Once they have that going, the real danger may very well be your fellow humans. Got scratched by a zombie? The gun nut might prefer to shoot you now, rather than waste food on a potential zombie in the making. Hyperactive kid making lots of noise? You've got a decision to make about whether or not he lives.

Aside from keeping your belly full in the current version, there are psychological mechanics in the works. Staying indoors for days at a time causes boredom, making it worthwhile to grab newspapers and magazines along with other supplies. Psychological effects will build up into dangerous things like hallucinations and other insanity.

As I was typing this post, news on a big update comes through my brother. Things are going to get a bit more interesting. I should probably keep my food closer to my bedroom if NPCs are going to actually going to 'play the game' now.

...I hope they fix it so that I can get wood from barricades back when I take them down.

Still Alive

I've just been dealing with a fair bit of stuff. In gaming news, I just beat the single player mode of Portal 2 a couple hours ago. I'm looking forward to co-op mode with my brother after PSN finishes maintenance.

Oh, one minor achievement I'm glad about: I got the "Preservation of Mass" trophy. I won't spoil it by telling you what it is.

Super Ultra Mega

My brother's been tinkering with Game Maker, recently and posted his first simple game for download. Check it out and maybe give him some ideas for his next game. Or suggest improvements for the sequel, Super Ultra Mega Deluxe. :)

Font of (Character) Knowledge

I hope you're enjoying yourselves for the holidays, whichever ones you might celebrate. I've been relaxing since I got my shopping done, and while tweaking some (donning my cloak of defying flames) 4E D&D characters, I thought I'd design my own character sheets that appeal to my organizational and note-taking preferences.

So, in comes a request for suggestions, just in case anyone might like their own copy of the final PDFs: What are some good fonts to use, or to avoid? I'm thinking about going for some fancier fonts for the bigger bits of text and an "ordinary" san serif font for smaller things for the sake of readability.

Of course, I suspect the thread may very well turn into a display of horrible fonts as others groan and beat the dead horse of comic sans.

Minecraft!

It's getting a big Halloween update including the highly anticipated biomes and a rather nasty dimension you can use for fast (and likely dangerous) travel.

So anyway, I'm doing a bit of brainstorming for what I'll build, starting from scratch. Since multiplayer survival's going to be getting some bug fixes, and I may be able to invite other players to my map, I'm thinking about some standard features as well as unique ones.

1. Forts with biome-themed megastructures. I'm going a bit OCD on hexagons and the number 6. The hexagon remains my favorite shape, and it's fun to think of ways to play with this sort of thing.
---Desert: Giant hourglass with obsidian caps, like I've repeatedly failed to build in Dwarf Fortress. Unlike DF, I can fill this one with sand and make it look like it's in the middle of falling. The center of the top chamber will have a mini-oasis. The bases will be hexagonal, and the rooms inside will be 36 meters (blocks) from opposite corners.
---Tundra or Taiga: Something involving a giant six-pointed snowflake, possibly made of ice. It may be tricky to find a way to light it without melting any of the ice.
---Forest: ?
---Swamp: ?
---Ocean: Giant truncated tetrahedron (hexagonal face pointed up) floating in the air. I'm thinking of access by waterfall: Boats will float up waterfalls, and there'll be one in the down-pointing triangular face. The other three triangular faces may act as entry points for a minecart station on the top floor.
---Savanna/Grasslands: ?

I'll probably spend a long time getting all the resources together for just the desert fort and hourglass, but if I do get to the point that I can get other players on my map, I may give some of you creative control over the megastructures and the nearby support forts. Just remember: Do something with hexagons and/or the number six.

2. Cabins: Distributed cabins, including one at the spawn point (assuming my priority desert site isn't right there.) They're meant to be waypoints in case night falls while traveling from one place to another, or if the sun sets sooner than I expected. They'll have some nice decorations, chests with basic supplies, and generally be a nice quiet place to spend the night. They'll also be connected to nearby mines and serve as a base for mine workers.
---Standard features:
A. Cobblestone or brick chimney with a furnace (fireplace) inside for smelting.
B. Chests with basic equipment a lost/respawned player might need.
C. Cozy atmosphere (Decorations, windows with a good view)

3. Lighthouses: For navigation aid. Each will have an identifying rune made from lava behind glass. For easy memorization, make it look like a twist on a standard character.

4. For my desert fort, I was thinking of making it a big stone hexagon, maybe with glass extensions at the points. Inside, there'd be a ring of 12 hexagonal rooms with a large "lab" in the center for me to tinker with redstone, minecarts, and whatever else Notch might be adding. As for the purpose of the various rooms, well, I haven't decided on all of them. Some would be workshops for different materials, but others would be there to look good, like a library, swimming pool, dining room with makeshift table and chairs, sitting room in a glass point to watch the sunset, and so on. Floating above this fort, of course, would be the hourglass I described.

Pointless Question #78

Why is it that whenever a building or other large structure collapses, it usually does so in a way that allows a hero access to the next location for his quest?

Pointless Question #77

Do the superhero teams in Atlantis always have one pathetic guy with land-based powers?

Dwarf Fortress Thread

I'm still new to Dwarf Fortress, but I suppose everyone's a little bit newer with the 2010 version still fresh. Like many players, I have big dreams. In my case, I'm thinking of building some giant clear glass hourglasses. The primary hindrance I face is not being sure how to get everything up and running. So, I'm trying to get some solid advice.

Location, location, location:

As much as I'd like to have those hourglasses standing in a nice flat, sandy desert, that'd probably be too much of a challenge for a beginner like me: Clear glass need pearlash, which needs wood. Unless I get lucky and find a desert adjacent to a forest (or a cavern where I can grow tower caps), I'd be in short supply. A sandy marsh might be better for that.

Rivers: Do I really need one? An everlasting supply of water would be nice, since you have to muddy underground farms now. Rain's probably another option if I can make some sort of collection spot.

Magma: The new version is supposed to have magma pools everywhere if you just dig deep enough. Since you can't search for magma pipes anymore, I'd need a bit of luck for mass production of obsidian, if I felt like making the mega hourglass out of volcanic glass.

---

Starting Dorfs:

I'm still not sure what starting skills I should go for. I read one suggestion now removed from the DFwiki that involved a Leader with all the doctor skills, who'd quietly build up his mining skill until he's needed at the hospital or trade depot. I also wonder if I should start with a proficient glassmaker who gets to work once I get a magma kiln.

Here's something of a first draft:
1) Medic Leader: One point in all the medical skills, with appraise, negotiator, and judge of intent. Spends the rest of his time as a secondary miner.

2) Outdoorsman: Woodcutter, Herbalist, Axeman, maybe hunter.

3) Farmer/Cook/Brewer

4) Mason/Stone Crafter/Building Designer

5) Carpenter/Glassmaker

6) Mechanic/Weaponsmith/Armorsmith

7) Miner/?

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Early Building:

I'm still trying to figure out everything I'll need early on.
1. Food storage: Get everything out of the wagon so it won't rot in the wagon and that my dwarves won't need to go outside for a bite to eat.
2. Wood/Stone/Furniture storage: Keep supplies near the workshops.
3. First farm: Can muddy an area by digging into the side of a murky pool.
4. Workshops: Carpenter, Mason, Still, Kitchen, Craftsdwarf shop, Butcher shop, Leatherworks. For the latter two, I could use some advice on how to make sure my hunters don't leave their catch to just rot.
5. Barracks: Dwarves have to sleep. I neglected one on my last game, jumping a bit too directly to individual rooms.
6. Meeting room: Outside the main entrance, so that my dogs will gather there and spot thieves.

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Magma workshops:

I plan to dig down until I reach magma so that I can build a workshop level with all the magma-powered sorts. Since I don't want to be overrun by fire imps and the like, I'd appreciate suggestions on how to safely go about this. One idea is to build an exploratory vertical shaft that I can block off with a locked door. Once I know what level the magma's at, I can build workshops with imp-blocking grates in the floor.

---

Lesser dreams:

Greenhouses: Some farms for above ground crops covered by green glass ceilings, safely below the surface.

Guard towers: Shaped like hourglasses, for the overall aesthetic.

A road paved with glass.

An overly organized 'garden' sort of look for the entire surface of my area. More "rock garden" than lines of trees or hedge mazes.

---

The big dreams:

Hourglass Megastructure: I'm still trying to think about the shape of my hourglass tower(s), since round isn't the easiest thing to do. The first idea is probably the simplest: A pyramid with an inverted pyramid on top. The other is similar, though with some straight vertical sections. I'd like some ideas for what to fill them with. Probably include some wood bases for the top and bottom.

Raised River: A six-tile wide river on a raised platform. The supports will be smaller versions of the hourglass tower, possibly doubling as guard towers. If I get a magma pipe, I may try another of magma that ends up forming obsidian where the two meet. I could probably use some help figuring out how to handle the pumps to get the water up there.

---

So, chime in with whatever.

Pointless Question #76

What if the Transformers landed on Earth in the 12th century, instead of the 20th or 21st?

Quote of the Time Being #26

This one's a comment posted by thalesc on Neurologica.

Being a software engineer who works on large projects I find quite amusing how creationists look at a living thing and conclude it’s too complex to have evolved, therefore it must have been designed in a similar way to how humans design technological artifacts – intelligently, that is.

Clearly these people have never designed anything of significance in their lives – and no, putting together a display for the Creation Museum does not count.

If they had, they’d realize that the process of designing complex things intelligently looks a lot more like Evolution than the clean, purely top-down idealization of a guy that sits at a desk and draws the complete plans for something anew out of pure inspiration. On the contrary, design is a dirty process that involves a lot of experimentation, discovery, creativity (i.e., randomization), refinement and selection.

For instance, humans didn’t come up with today’s modern computers in a single try. If we look at the history of the computer we’ll see a progression from simplicity to complexity where each new machine was built on previous successful technology. More importantly, we’ll see lots of failures that were quickly discarded, and even more failures that never saw the light of the day. Of course if we look only at the successes we may get the wrong impression of intentionality and predictability. However, if we look at the failures too we’ll see a different picture, we’ll see that the technological progress is quite random and unpredictable, and that it happens mostly through the selection of the random ideas that worked.

Some people can’t see how one can arrive at functional complexity through evolution. I have quite the opposite feeling, I can’t see how one can get there otherwise.

Logic is a Wreath of Pretty Flowers That Smell Bad

Or so many woos try to argue. It's quite common when I deal with various trolls that they'll argue how "telling" it is when I point out a logical fallacy they committed. I've heard it pretty often with Creationists and the ad hominem fallacy: Rather than argue about the science, they'll make some accusation about a skeptic's or a scientist's sexual orientation, racism, or whatever, as if that somehow changes the color of a fruit fly's eyes or the constant radioactive half-life of a particular isotope.

I haven't performed any extensive sampling, but it seems to me that the vast bulk of logical fallacies are types of subject changes. Red herrings. A subtype of the non-sequitur. My being an atheist, for example, doesn't change the fact that multiple lines of converging evidence agree on a single phylogenetic tree. The fact that I own D&D books does not falsify the fact that the Big Bang theory accurately predicted the cosmic microwave background radiation before it was measured. Science, it works, bitches.

In the world of woo, it seems, emotion matters infinitely more than truth. Self-esteem matters more than learning. Certainty matters more than honesty. It reminds me of several episodes of the original Star Trek where Kirk and crew blew up "logical" computers and androids by behaving oddly. The only difference is that they're going for the tiniest expression of frustration, as if it's impossible to be logical and emotional at the same time. Being right and being stoic are completely unrelated things.

Of course, since most woos never pause to understand what logic actually is, they declare victory, even if they only contributed gibberish, contradictions, and transparent subject changes to the discussion. Science doesn't care about how you express your ideas, only if they're logically sound, and proving that often takes work. Woo and faith, however, only exist to prop up the believer's self-esteem or to make laziness self-justifying.

Bioshock and Quackery

Last night, I started watching a Let's Play of Bioshock. For those who don't know much about the game, I think I can say this much without spoiling the plot: The game takes place in an underwater city that was intended to be some sort of Objectivist paradise.

There, scientists weren't 'burdened' by ethics and developed some DNA modifying chemicals to give people superpowers like telekinesis or the ability to shoot bolts of electricity from their hands. Unfortunately, the scientists responsible apparently bought into 'greed is good, altruism is evil' rhetoric, and didn't bother with extensive safety tests. As a result, the city is now crawling with insane people swinging around monkey wrenches and climbing the walls with hooks and mad Science!-enhanced agility.

The city's leader response to the growing insanity? "Yes, people have died, yes, people have gone insane, but we can't abandon our ideals when they're being tested. The market is patient, and we must be patient, too."

This reminds me of all too many quacks I've heard from: "If it was dangerous/useless, people wouldn't buy it!" One of the biggest problems the caveat emptor philosophy has is the need for everyone to be an expert in whatever field is relevant to their purchase. The problem isn't quite so bad with simple purchases, but when it comes to our health, we shouldn't all have to be doctors to evaluate the safety and efficacy of a product. Contrary to what quacks will tell you, you are not born with innate expertise in your own body. The human body is a complex and intricate thing that was pretty much built to last a few decades. It's because people sought a deeper understanding than superficial pain/pleasure responses that we've been able to take 70+ years for granted.

Many people also tend to be poor at risk assessment. Someone who goes on a beach vacation might be more worried about getting attacked by sharks than about the much higher risk of getting into a car accident on the way. Anti-vaxxers, for example, are more afraid of the infinitesimal risk of exposure to trace amounts of everyday chemicals in the vaccines than the much higher risk of death by the diseases they prevent.

My conclusion: This sort of extreme capitalism, like Communism, could only work if the world was already perfect, full of well-educated, rational people. We need regulatory bodies made of experts to keep our food and medicine safe and effective.

Another Game Ping

Recently picked up a game on PSN called Greed Corp. It's a turn-based strategy game my brother and I are enjoying. Anyone interested in a few rounds with us?

Setting Up For a Letdown

I like the movie, Pulp Fiction, but there's one thing I can think of that would improve it. For the two or three of you who haven't seen it, one of the MacGuffins is a briefcase that contains something unrevealed, and shines orange light onto the people who look inside. The improvement I have in mind: They should have left the lightbulb out of the briefcase.

Without the lightbulb, we could interpret the briefcase's contents as "anything." With the lightbulb, our choices narrow down quite rapidly to little more than "something most people would call supernatural." One of the resulting dominant theories I've heard seems a little too obvious: Marcellus Wallace's soul, thus the 'miracle' that saved Travolta and Jackson's characters was God intervening to make sure they save his soul.

It feels too restrictive to me. And I think that feeling carries over to real life science mysteries: Woos so often seem to love restricting the answer to what our limited imaginations can come up with. Science is liberating because reality isn't restricted to our imaginations. How does consciousness operate? The answer of "the soul" is restrictive and unsatisfying. Many soul hypotheses are little more than the process of ad hocking away the evidence, instead of making predictions and daring to risk being wrong. Being wrong is not something to be ashamed of in science. Every experiment scientists conduct is an act of bravery and humility: The results may not be to your liking because the universe does not exist to conform to your desires. Every scientifically-minded person knows that, and welcomes the opportunity to be surprised.

AC Ping!

Just thought I'd see again if any of my readers play Armored Core. I've got For Answer on my PS3, and tweaked Aria to be more competitive with humans. That includes a fair increase in speed.

Had a good series of matches this morning where I ended up being the guy on the ground taking cover from a flying opponent. Normally, I'm the eye in the sky.

Gabriel, If You're Reading This...

...Pay very close attention. Reread it multiple times if you have to. You may not realize it now, but this post is going to become very inconvenient for you. You've got a lot of psychological defenses erected that prevent you from even trying to pay attention to what I really think. That's the source of my frustration, and why I so often bury my face in my palm. It's also a great source of amusement for me to dissect the contradictions you end up trapping yourself in.

Of course, none of that has broken you out of your distorted modes of thought: Black-and-white thinking, reference to television stereotypes instead of the real people you're arguing with, a disdain for complex answers, and probably many, many others. That's why I'm going to provide some summaries of my actual views on the various topics (and relentless subject changes to your pointless obsessions) in one handy space. Any additions or edits will be accompanied by a time stamp.

Genetics and Intelligence:

I currently have little or no reason to believe there are any great differences between any large groups of humans on the genetic "hardware" level. Intelligence, knowledge, skill, and whatever other mental abilities others may care to bring up are primarily built on nurture, not nature.

In other words, if you're born and raised in a place that has easy access to good schools, libraries, experts, and laws that protect the free exchange of ideas, you've got a much, much better chance at being an intelligent, educated, and capable person. If, on the other hand, you're born into a place without schools, are forced to spend the bulk of your time and resources just staying alive, have limited access to modern knowledge and theories, are surrounded by superstitious, unscientific people, and live under an oppressive government that outlaws free speech, then you are very unlikely to prosper.

I see nothing controversial about this simple prediction. You can ramble on about personal responsibility, but that doesn't change the fact that human beings are profoundly affected by their environment. Individuals who can bootstrap themselves up from nothing by sheer will are true rarities, more suited for Mary Sue fiction than a discussion about the real world. You can raise complaints about the exact proportionate responsibility between internal and external influences, but a few percentage points won't wash away the full depth of human interdependency. If you can't get reliable access to good sources of knowledge, it's doubtful that you're going to be a big contributor to the progress of human civilization.

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Equality:

No, I do not for an instant believe that someone raised in an impoverished nation without an education, without good health care, etcetera, like in many third world countries, is equal in ability to me. I know it's not "PC" to say so, and I am not one of those excessively sensitive TV stereotypes who thinks blunt truths should never be spoken. The good news, however, is that the inequality can be treated by education and a developed infrastructure. There is a difference in ability, but not for any of the reasons you think, Gabriel.

The only place we should be judged as equals is in the eyes of the law: We should both have equal rights. In an ideal world, we would have equal access to opportunity, In this hypothetical scenario, we should rise or fall by our own merits, which would not be overshadowed by accidents of birth.

Measuring us by genes alone, we're probably going to be quite close. The difference in our abilities comes primarily from upbringing, available resources, and so on. It wasn't my DNA that placed my birth in the US. It wasn't my DNA that paid for my college tuition. It wasn't my DNA that ensured the various doctors who looked over me were able to earn their credentials and save me from dying of measles or other childhood illness. It wasn't my DNA that put the books in the local library or good science shows on my television. My DNA had little, if anything, to do with my prosperity.

It's the difference in infrastructure that bears the lion's share of the responsibility for the disparity between people of developed and undeveloped nations.

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Genetics and Race:

When it comes to the human genome, eugenicists like Adolph Hitler were idiots. There's no "pure" thing to be "diluted". Genes do not work that way. Genes are not a solvent that can be concentrated or diluted. Genes are more like cards: You copy and then shuffle decks together to produce a child. You can't get half a Jack of Spades. And people often have more than one child. If there's an advantageous gene in one of the parents, there's a fair chance it'll get passed on and copied. Maybe even multiple times. Now imagine this done with thousands or millions of decks that get copied every generation.

Sex is so popular with us multi-cellular organisms because it allows advantageous traits to propagate faster. An asexual organism with an advantage can only spread its helpful genes at the rate it personally can have children. Many organisms sharing DNA take advantage of variety in that way. If genes were continuous, instead of discrete, it could have been a death knell for evolution: Advantageous mutations would be diluted immediately in the next generation.

One of the most important things for the long term survival of a species is genetic diversity. Diversity gives a species a greater chance to have an answer to unforeseen problems. Right now, the place with the greatest genetic diversity is Africa: Those of us who descended from migrants are touched by founder effects: When a migrating tribe left Africa, they reduced the pool of possible candidates to reproduce with. It's a lesser form of inbreeding. Thankfully, as technology advanced, methods of travel became more commonplace, allowing people to potentially pick from the entire world. Given generations of crossbreeding, I think I have plenty of reason to believe that those ancient founder effects are only going to get weaker and weaker.

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Infrastructure and Health:

Gabriel's often brought up long life expectancies in Scandinavia. Despite some of my reader's links that show a fair mix up at the top, even if Scandinavian nations had a solid hold on the best lifespans, there's no reason to attribute it to genetics. This may come as a shock to you, Gabe, but there are other reasons for people to live long lives. You know, like doctors. Europe has a lot of nations with better access to health care. Doctors don't just sit around twiddling their thumbs all day. They prevent and treat diseases. There's also law enforcement and national stability: Countries with capable police and stabilizing political influences tend not to end up with people being killed in their prime. There's also technology: Developed nations have all sorts of networks to keep food, water, and electricity available. Developed infrastructure begets progress. The lack of an infrastructure breeds stagnation.

None of these things are dependent on individual genetic variations, only on social and economic order. There is no clear difference in the "races" to cause social and economic change. I'd need an in-depth comparison between genetic samples to reverse that opinion. You, however, seem to prefer the laziness of casual observation over the hard work of science. This isn't about your knowledge versus mine, it's your knowledge versus the collective work of hundreds if not thousands of scientists. I just favor the scientists and the self-correcting nature of science over a self-declared authority who seems to pride himself on doing less than the bare minimum science demands. Is that so unreasonable?

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What a Nation Needs:

A civilization is not something that just happens when people bump into each other. A stable, sedentary lifestyle requires an equally stable food supply. For agriculture, you need arable soil, predictable weather, steady rain, and some plants that are nourishing enough to be worth raising and breeding. Africa wasn't quite as graced with those things as other continents. And that's just for food. Founding a nation requires many, many things we so easily take for granted.

Gabriel, your conversations seem to utterly dismiss this. You place your concept of "race" as the one founding cause of everything. It reminds me of a Creationist argument about human population growth that treats it as only a function of time, as if food, disease, and war had no impact on the number of people in the world. The world is a messy, complicated place, full of events that have multiple causes. In science, things should be a simple as possible, but no simpler. Occam's razor is not a chainsaw.

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Stay-at-Home Moms:

When you changed the subject to this, it was one of the biggest Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moments I had with you. It came out of nowhere, and there was absolutely no question that it was more desperate stalling on your part. My view is quite simple: Not all stay-at-home spouses are lazy. Cooking, cleaning, child care, accounting, home maintenance, volunteer work, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera all take time and effort. Whether or not you and the IRS call it a "job" or "work" is irrelevant. Whatever a homemaker's motives for scrubbing the floor, a choice of label will not change the amount of chemical energy or time expended. Calling it a "responsibility" will not make the work done less productive. That's my point. These things take time and effort, and fiat will not change that.

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My Alleged Jealousy:

As implied by my links to Doggerel #2, this is utterly irrelevant. The Secret is pseudoscience. My emotional state, whatever it may be, does not magically alter reality. Science is about removing the effect a person has on the data. If I were jealous, it would not change the outcome of a genetic analysis. It would not alter the capabilities of the F-22 Raptor. It would not reverse the burden of proof in logic.

The fact that you keep trying to change the subject to your delusions about my mental state tells everyone that you've entered this debate unarmed: You can't cite genetic studies to back up your pseudoscience about "diluted" racial characteristics, so you resort to ad hominem. You can't even commit to answering my question about whether or not race is even genetic. You're all rhetoric, no logic or evidence.

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Wikipedia:

I went over one of your other favorite Whiskey Tango Foxtrot subject changes in another post... In which you were unable to focus on anything, judging by your comments. It seems when the subject isn't Wikipedia, you're free to parrot your favorite television stereotypes by changing the subject to Wikipedia, but when I explicitly tell everyone my very pragmatic views about the site, you're too scared to respond in a meaningful way.

What makes your argument so pathetic is that my view is a null hypothesis: Wikipedia deserves no special treatment. You, on the other hand, imply that all the rules of scholarly research and even the objectivity of the universe are overturned when Wikipedia is involved.

Wikipedia is a big encyclopedia on the Internet. That's it. It is not a magical reality alteration device. Wikipedia is ordinary.

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World of Warcraft:

I don't play it. Just not that interested. Even if I did, I doubt I could hold any stereotypical obsession that's friendly towards TV and newspaper "journalists" who like to show the crazy extremes in their efforts to call any new media evil. If anything, I'm growing more and more into the casual gamer category. Gaming is a hobby. Some people watch football. Some people like to soup up their cars. Some people paint. Some people read classic novels. Some play musical instruments. There is no fundamental difference between videogames and other hobbies.

---

Now that I've covered some of my perfectly ordinary, sane opinions on Gabriel's favorite topics and distractions, I'm curious just what to expect if he comes back. It's going to be rather inconvenient for him if I can clearly and distinctly point to my real opinions, rather than the ones he can only parrot, citing daytime television as his source.

Pointless Question #75

So, where exactly do the villains get all that kryptonite? Do they have dollar store specials on it or something?

Goddamn Hippies!

There was a time when I kind of liked the hippie counter-culture: Standing up for people's rights, rebelling against rigid structures and crazed, inflexible government. Nowadays, however, there's no shortage of people who have inherited all the negatives of the culture and none of the positives.

They use "arguments" that normal people would expect from drug-addled minds. They think that reality is subjective to the point of solipsism. They think science is just another "narrative" and has no value as a means of ascertaining the truth. They think words are more real than the things they describe.

I remember an episode of South Park where Stan temporarily joins some hippies at a concert where they talk about overturning the bad elements of society. They spend the whole time lazing about, just listening to the music and partying. Stan gets on stage and simply asks the crowd, "What are we doing?" followed by his disillusionment when the crowd seems to think that partying harder is the most productive means of getting "positive energy" or some such nonsense out. It probably didn't help that one of them was a "college-educated hippie" category who didn't seem to understand that a collection of people that trades services for mutual benefit is called a "town." He then proceeded to say that they don't understand his lofty thoughts because they haven't been to college, yet.

That's the sort of image I get nowadays when I think "hippie": An ineffectual lot with unearned arrogance, a de facto force for the status quo, utterly divorced from any sort of real world logic.

MST3K

As you know, I'm on Netflix. I've watched a few episodes of MST3K on streaming, but they're rather limited right now. Any suggestions for the DVD'd ones?