There’s a lot to love here, a lot to love.

Ha true, good point. Buddhism can be a little atheistic, I believe, the Buddha isn’t an actual deity for most adherents. (I think..?)

Ah gotta get Festivus on the calendar! I like the rules idea too, maybe a few super random things just to be quirky.

That’s a great analogy, perfect, I might repeat it around if you don’t mind.

I don’t think we need more religion, no. I think people would like options with less archaic ideas, and that they would like the community and activity that religious groups can offer if the strange belief requirements can be left behind.

I’d make it atheistic, include meditation and be proactive with volunteering or useful projects.

Huh, today I learned, and that’s crazy.

Thank you for sharing this, their claims to the whole territory of the sea are ludicrous.

? If Biden runs he’s going to lose, and Trump will win.

No one who saw that debate was inspired by Biden, no one. Ok maybe 1 out of 100, maybe. But 99 of them were not. Gaslighting won’t help, the goose is cooked.

What? I wanted Biden to succeed. And he wasn’t doing good in the metrics, his approval ratings were bad, being other dems who are way ahead of him in polls. He was tied with Trump, which is insane given how bad of a candidate Trump is. Most all voters (65% I think) thought he was too old before the debate and wanted another choice.

What will they think now?

Whatever that dish is I bet it’s damn good. I miss food like that.

You can’t? I can think of 20 of them who all have a better chance to win than Biden, who now has a zero chance to win.

If Biden is the head of the ticket he’s going to lose. Full stop.

That’s a good setup.

Pornhub is just good about making news about them, raises their profile and perception as the main porn site.

I like the “Dark Forest” theory I learned from the Three Body Problem books. Basically it’s dumb for civilizations to make a big footprint and reveal themselves because other civilizations won’t know how powerful and dangerous you might become, and so out of precaution they might just zap you. Ironic and over dramatic, but just because that’s a possibility it might be wise to keep a low profile and not invite trouble.

Why does using a VPN break it?

Meanwhile the rest of us have already known it, and tell them, but they won’t listen.

Control = More Power

Sure, but it’s just small game chatter. We start building a Dyson sphere powered starkiller cannon or some such nonsense we might pop up on somebody’s radar.

I also like this theory. In the Ian Banks Culture series civilizations that get advanced enough head off into the “sublime” they call it. Basically a higher level of existence. In my own more simple version, I’d figure VR and the biological/cyborg mix get so good the powerful can start living kind of forever, so they head for that substrate and don’t need big megastructures for anything, they just need computing power.

I think others wouldn’t bother with us until we started demonstrating likelihood of using dangerous tech or crazy exponential expansion.

I don’t remember well, but I think civilizations stationed their defensive or offensive tech away from their own civilizations, just dispersed around.

I think its explanation for why no one or anything has colonized the galaxy though is that if anyone shows signs of becoming that strong, they get zapped. Nobody wants to see a neighbor rise up into a behemoth, you get that bold you’re a threat.

My real preferred theory of why we don’t see other civilizations though is that I think they choose more inward, VR, computer-based evolution that doesn’t result in big mega structures.

They can exploit you , one example: “Firefly it’s me your (known family member) I’m stuck at school (known school, place of work, etc) but lost my phone, can you send $50 to (scammer address) to pay back this nice person helping me get home please?” is the weakest variation.

Legendary

Is it not an issue that duct tape can be pretty flammable?

Yep exactly. Who knows how murderous other civs might be, maybe they’re nice but maybe not.

OK good to know thank you. I’m located in China, so they block it locally, so I can’t view it from either side, then. (I’m sure there is a way around it somehow)

This is a security risk though, fyi, someone could pics together all the info and exploit it.

Yeah without the engagement of power users we maybe wouldn’t have a platform going here.

Holy moly,

I agree, I don’t think they’d wait until the last possible moment when the civilization becomes super powerful or builds the mega weapon. I just mention it along the range of development to highlight the why.

I think they might let weaker civilizations keep going, though, just out of hope they wouldn’t be too mean. Also, zapping other civilizations when you don’t need to exposes yourself and your own aggression.

About the shift to VR /computer substrate worlds that wouldn’t have huge footprints, I agree that not all would do that, and it only takes one to go the big building and footprint route and it’s weird we don’t see it.

My guess then would be that maybe they do build big, but they just conceal well..? You get good enough tech at some point you can choose to be hard to see.

He’s a whacko but I agree with you on those 3 items, nice.

Ah really? He’s nice and thoughtful.

Did you watch it? I’m 100% for the Democrats but Biden is incoherent, he is not up for the job. From what I saw he isn’t up to doing the job through November. He needs to step down immediately. If he doesn’t Trump is going to win.