To be fair, quacks that claim to be able to do magical stuff are still around, some do quite well well for themselves even

I mean, you can’t really say that we’re going to drive ourselves to extinction, until we’ve been driven to extinction. Most things people list as likely to do this, climate change, nuclear war, are things that could conceivably do so, but honestly aren’t likely to. Destroy civilization maybe, but that just takes disrupting supply lines hard enough. Extinction means nobody, anywhere on the planet survives, even if it’s some little pocket of people in some corner of the world whose climate is good after warming is considered and which isn’t a target of any nuclear arsenals, because in a number of generations such a little pocket can grow to repopulate the planet again. It’s not an impossible thing for sure, but killing off a species capable of surviving in almost any climate zone found on the planet, with the ability to manipulate the growth of it’s own food supply, and adapt new tools actively in response to problems within a single generation, is a difficult task.

My suspicion is that it’s abiogenesis, but it’s only a suspicion that I can’t have any certainty of

to be perfectly honest, Ive not had sunny d since I was in like, kindergarten, so I dont really recall what its like much beyond that its orange flavored.

I dont drink alcohol myself, but isnt there some kind of drink, like the kind they mix up at bars, not sure the term for those kinds, that is just orange juice mixed with vodka? I must imagine this is intended to be similar but premade.

I dont think Ive ever even pretended to think they are, for me children, especially babies and toddlers, give me a pretty bad case of the uncanny valley effect and look eerie and cause discomfort, as well as anxiety since Im even less sure than usual what they’re going to do and dont want someone’s kid getting hurt because of something I failed to notice. I dont hold it against them or hate children for it, its not their fault after all, but I do try to avoid being around them where practical.

Id say yes to that statement, but for reasons that dont have to do with AI as I dont really view AI training as piracy.

Would this even be necessary for automated ordering anyway? Given that every company under the sun wants you to use some app of theirs these days, including fast food companies, Im kinda surprised they dont just get rid of the speaker/microphone system, and just put a sign with a qr code in front of the drive through telling you to download and use their app to put in a drive through order

If they’re calling a brain their original processor, these robots could be a result of successful transhumanism rather than conventional robots, ie, they could be humans that have made themselves into robots, rather than robots built for some specific purpose. In that case, they might create child robots and grow them over time to reproduce, just because they find that mode of reproduction familiar and wish to continue it.

Similar story where I work, manufacturing a type of x ray emitting tool. Never seen anyone having problematic readings on the dosimeter badges, but when I was hired I did get told that they had only once had an incident, where one of the engineers had been for some reason repeatedly testing a prototype by directly holding the sample the x ray was firing at in his hand. Not sure what happened to him

1442? surprised its not 1444

If you’re actually curious, or someone else reading this is, you never can get a rocket, or anything with mass, to the speed of light either, not just faster than it, but you can get arbitrarily close. However, you never notice anything stopping you going faster than your current speed, there’s no point where your rockets stop working or anything, rather, time and space stretch and squeeze such that neither you nor anybody else see you going faster than light. If you have a magic rocket that somehow has infinite fuel and can fire forever, you can actually get anywhere as fast as you want, from your perspective.

Alpha centauri is famously about 4 light years away, but you can get there in 2 seconds, from your perspective, if you go fast enough. But, everyone on earth will see slightly over that roughly 4 years go by in the time that for you is just 2 seconds. (You’ll see them move slowly too at first, since they’re moving relative to you just as fast as your ship is moving to them, but when you slow down, you’ll see them seem to speed up until you’ll have seen them do 4 years worth of stuff by the time you stop). Meanwhile on your ship, you don’t see yourself crossing that 4 light year distance in less than the allowed time either, because space itself is squished kinda, so that the distance to alpha centauri is shortened to the point that if you’re getting there in 2 seconds, it’s now less than 2 light seconds away, from your perspective, and you’re not moving faster than light to cross that distance in that time. People outside will also see your ship compressed like this too.

This isn’t just a regular optical illusion either, space and time really are different for the people on and off the ship (and indeed very slightly different for everyone anywhere). Nobody has the “correct” view of the universe, because everyone’s perspective is equally valid.

I imagine any explanation of the expansion of the universe for people that are not themselves studying astronomy is going to be simplified in a way that gives the average person the basic idea but not the complete picture to avoid confusion when explaining the concept. Ive not studied astronomy, but I did get most of the way through a physics degree, and know that at least there, a lot ideas are explained in that sort of way to people without much knowledge of the subject, especially the more confusing concepts. I wouldnt be surprised if thats the case for most fields of science. For a different example as an analogy, its common knowledge that you cant move faster than light (ignoring the whole expanding spacetime stuff), but it isnt always explained why this is the case, leading to questions from some people like “what happens if I fly a spaceship to the speed of light, and then turn on the rockets to try to go faster?” which have easy answers or just dont make sense as a question if one has had the behavior of objects at high speed explained, but which seem reasonable enough questions to ask if all youve been told is that the speed of light is just some cosmic speed limit. People cant reasonably blame you for finding an incomplete explanation you’ve been given, well, incomplete, and then asking questions that come to mind as a result.

Dont we see other galaxy groups though? Im no astronomer, but I do recall the universe having some degree of structure above the scale of individual galaxies, with groups and clusters of them forming larger groups or filaments surrounding voids of space with fewer galaxies in them.

Edit: quick search in wikipedia brings up a list of a few groups and clusters known, of which the local group is merely one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_galaxy_groups_and_clusters

Ah, sounds like someone going for the herostratus approach to fame

I think you have an unrealistic estimation of how much most people understand the topic of communism, if you think not labelling different types of communism as the same ideology is living under a rock. More than half the country doesn’t even realize that socialism and communism aren’t complete synonyms, and a good fraction think paradoxically that center right liberalism is somehow communist.

Basically, I think you’re doing this: https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/average_familiarity_2x.png

In what sense is this semantics or bad faith? I meant this sincerely.

As I understand it, “real communism” is supposed to be some kind of stateless society. As the GDR was, well, a state, it clearly did not achieve that. Nor would it ever have been likely to, as actually doing what was ideologically promised would have required those with power within that system to relinquish that power, which is incredibly rare as it conflicts with human nature.

Not sure why nobody would expect an italian inquisition of food, they literally have a unit in one of their law enforcement agencies trained to do things like find fake extra-virgin olive oil. Ive seen people jokingly call it “the italian food police” even. If anybody was going to run a food inquisition, itd be the italians

Gotta bait them with something…