• Collaborative Criticism #2
    ↪praxis


    They are just notes of a premise.

    Youtube star causes outrage because of Ortolan Mukbang...
  • Collaborative Criticism #2
    Vignettes of Ortolan eaters across time from Roman era to today. One involves an a medival ship import and something happens... Someone steals inventory to try it out. Punishment is macabre.

    Servants having moral reservations while pricking the eyes of the small birds. Philosopher chef biased by gustatory lust defends the practice with his reasons.

    Dialogues as to the purpose of the veil of the Ortolan eater. Different humorous scenarios that cause the veil to come into being.

    Recipes from the Apicius cookbook (1st century?) Must be a roman recipe for Ortolan somewhere.

    Scald the flamingo, wash and dress it, put it in a pot, add water, salt, dill, and a little vinegar, to be parboiled. Finish cooking with a bunch of leeks and coriander, and add some reduced must to give it color. In the mortar crush pepper, cumin, coriander, laser root, mint, rue, moisten with vinegar, add dates, and the fond of the braised bird, thicken, strain, cover the bird with the sauce and serve. Parrot is prepared in the same manner.
  • Tired and exhausted.
  • Get Creative!
    When I get my act together and become an accomplished illustrator from 10,000 hours of practice, I'll be presenting:

    Oriental Landscapes using tea as paint.

    Tea dragon carrying toilet roll instead of pearl.

    Cups of tea colored tea, enjoyed in a tea house by tea drinkers.

    A sea of tea with a galleon of tea ahead of a squall.

    Toilet roll prayer wheels stained with tea runes.

    Biscuits and tea.

    Tea and biscuits.

    Tea Samurai beheading Coffee Samurai in duel.
  • Happy Star Wars day everyone!!
    The one in which a rogue Sith lord, Darth Exitus, initiates vaccum decay of the Star Wars universe in all time lines.
  • Genes Vs. Memes
    Now you’ve shifted the discussion to the disproved position of the tabla rasa (empty slate). If someone is born and denied sensory experience or help they certainly won’t go far and die quickly. That has very little to do with memes and more to do with basic sustenance.

    You seem to be equates memes with experience. That is patently false.     — I like sushi

    Eh, you're not being very charitable. Why wouldn't basic knowledge about how to survive constitute learned knowledge, culture (memes)? Subtract any culturally transmitted know how in absence of built-in instincts and there is a survival learning curve that can't really be easily overcome.
  • Genes Vs. Memes
    Another way of thinking about this would be to say that our genetic inheritance can no longer cause us to be evolutionarily unfit. What would make us unfit would be if somehow we failed to pass on our knowledge of science, medicine, etc. — Pinprick

    Whatever continues into the future is still dependent upon the actual continuity of genes. The memes need the genes as much as the genes need the memes.

    Curious comparison. Dawkins wants to explain human behaviour in terms of attributes of particles of human make-up that entirely lack such behaviour. Whereas you are objecting to explaining the behaviour of the whole (corporation) in terms of the actual behaviour its parts, (people). It seems a more reasonable project. — unenlightened

    Isn't animal behavior well explained by genes in theory? Memes (as a kind of horizontal information transfer) helps to explain the added complexity of human behavior.
  • Genes Vs. Memes
    Obviously genes are not selfish, and do not try to survive or multiply. — unenlightened

    Likewise, corporations are not selfish (they literally aren't persons) and do not try to survive or help their shareholders to multiply.
  • Can I change my name to 'Professor Death' please
    I'd rather be dead than in debt if that is any consolation.
  • What afterlife do you believe awaits us after death?
    Might as well throw the something from nothing thread into the Lounge also to be consistent.
  • Ideas for during quarantine
    FF7 Remake

    Let Madam M. give you a hand massage at the wall market.
  • What afterlife do you believe awaits us after death?
    There is only what it is like to be something. A world that isn't aware of itself at all is equal to a world that doesn't exist.

    So long as there is any life after death, there is an afterlife. Who is to say "our" life is by any means coherent as a piece rather than continuous with the whole universe.
  • Get Creative!
    ↪praxis


    Good stuff.

    It's an alternative world to Harold and the Purple Crayon.

    Hakuin and the Toilet Roll.
  • Member Picture Thread
    ↪Metaphysician Undercover


    Can't imagine a mustache, some sunglasses and a MAGA hat would change it much.
  • Get Creative!
    ↪praxis


    You must do much more of these.

    Maybe a silhouette of a retriever with toilet roll. Man shooting other folks for toilet roll, while retriever brings it back.

    Or ducks in sky carrying toilet roll being shot by man, dog retrieves toilet roll instead of duck.

    Flying toilet rolls being shot, carried back by dog.
  • Member Picture Thread
    I want to see more photo shopped members.
  • Problem solving thread
    @Wheatley

    You could always start acting like your "friend" to see what he thinks of his own behavior. Persistently ask for money.

    @Sir2u

    You can try asking Brittany Spears (and her network) for a grant. Make a list of rich people and start asking.

    @Fluke

    It's all about placebo, so pick something that you know to be benign and believe that it works without letting yourself know its a placebo! Grate fresh horseradish in the bath (that seems like an unusual experiment) and tell us what happens.
  • Compliments of the season.
    " I love you all, platonically of course." — Nils Loc
  • The Lounge
    Are you leaving The Lounge for the main forum, 2 days ago?

    I wish The Lounge was more popular than it is but far less popular than the main forum.
  • How to become an overman
    How to become the Alphamensch?

    You need to take risks, become physically strong, eat more meat, quit your cubicle job, learn to bow hunt, start testosterone doping and start a podcast.
  • Why do we demand Saffron?!
    I don't think Saffron is anymore labor intensive than any other agricultural crop, just that the amount of yield is low compared to the demand for it. It might be preferable to picking pineapples.

    Global agriculture is rife with labor injustice. Check out Rotten on Netflix, very interesting.


  • Coronavirus
    Coronavirus Age, Sex, Demographics

    I'm in the .2% risk pool if these rates aren't entirely nonsense. They say a majority of Chinese males smoke and this may exacerbate the the death rate since viral pneumonia is the principle killer.
  • What are you listening to right now?


  • Unexpected Human Experiences
    I read it.

    My default setting was somewhere in England and it abruptly changed to New York.
  • The burning fawn.
    The simple solution to this conundrum is to stop thinking of God as either omnibenevolent or omniscient/ omnipotent or else to simply stop thinking of God at all. — Janus

    Good solution.
  • The burning fawn.
    To be ominbenevolent would be to wish no harm or suffering on any being. — Janus

    Just wishing? That ain't good enough to be benevolent.
  • The burning fawn.
    Is the notion of omnibenevolence at all coherent? You can make up as much crap as you'd like concerning God. Religious faith doesn't hinge on arguments. It's like fawns burning in the forest. Shit happens, like faith or the lack of it happens.

    Maybe suffering is God's favorite condiment (the ketchup of creation).

    Maybe God is feeling it all and that it continues is testament to his will that it is all worth it.
  • Zanny Worlds
    I live in a reality where we spell zanny with one z turned on its side, unless zanny is slang. All this time I thought it was spelled with two side-turned z's and the dictionary says otherwise. I think I've entered another dimension.
  • Have I been an uppity slave?
    The amount of energy spent in the way of living our mundane lives is absurd.

    To be productive, and therefore turn the economic wheel, requires a huge and unsustainable energy expense, most often to satisfy superfluous wants, but we all know this.
  • Jordan Peterson in Rehab
  • Jordan Peterson in Rehab
    I too am afraid God might exist. That is why I read the bible and try to distill its perennial wisdom, to hedge my doubt.


    Disclaimer: I do not read the bible.
  • Jordan Peterson in Rehab
    And I don’t get it. What exactly is going on with that? — Brett

    Because of the politics his narrative supports. The hate just reflects the polar divide of our political landscape.

    He's a religious conservative who fears big government because the USA could become communist if we don't stop all this postmodern neomarxist monkey business (whatever it is).
  • Once Upon A Time
    Yea, it's a play. What were you doing, a documentary? — frank

    Ha! Yeah, I get it.

    It's getting expensive.
  • Once Upon A Time
    Could we have the whole thing spoken by Jonah while he's sitting inside the whale? Maybe he's explaining all this to Pinocchio. — frank

    Don't be stupid Frank.

    Jonah and Pinocchio are fictional characters while Attenborough and Herzog are hot stuff.
  • Riddle Thread
    So there is no answer. Ha!

    The Eye of Providence brings to mind political conspiracy (Illumanatism), what with its Masonic origins.

    Because God is now dead, his eye has been inherited by the special interests of the state, which gain more power through the market of surveillance capitalism and state corruption.

    If the eye turns against itself it could mean self-exposure of the surveillance activities of a neofascism.

    When the Eye turns Inward and the mouth speaks to the public, it Wikileaks a tear for the state of the nation.
  • Once Upon A Time
    The F word is jarring. It's something that best comes out in character dialogue with appropriate context rather than third person narration. I'm thinking we should get David Attenborough to do the audio version but edit it more towards a BBC wildlife documentary style.

    After some transition, where the monkeys become the inheritors of the earth, you can switch to Werner Herzog, so he can drive home the existential gravity of how fucked everything might be.
  • On Drama
    And the winner of this years Golden Drama award goes to the only true being in this lonely universe, Wallows, who stands in the center of it all, owner of the last remaining soul of Libertarian Free Will.

    The rest of us are merely the detached seeds of the tree of life: vegetal parts blown by circumstance.
  • Self Portrait In a Convex Mirror by John Ashbery
    Sounds like Ashbury is just reflecting upon his creative process.

    Trying to achieve what works
    Gleaning bits of inspiration
    Waiting for something with the body of a spirit
    The critic speaks
    As draft edits yellow the green leaves

    This is probably wrong and unsophisticated but oh well.
  • How do I go on living?
    The community college I attended is right next to a state run psychiatric hospital and I can tell you I'd never want to be committed there, or work there for that matter.
  • How do I go on living?
    Voluntary commit to an institution?

    I'm not making this shit up.     — Wallows

    Do they really keep you or isn't this always a temporary situation. Or are you talking about jail?
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