Comments

  • How is a raven like a writing desk?
    @Vera Mont

    In the following link, a bird watcher hears a greater racket-tailed drongo mimic the sound of a crested serpent eagle to protect its nest. It's a bit of a taxonomic gap from the corvids but am sure the corvids have some interesting predator/prey dynamics on account of how intelligent people say they are. The sociality of corvids probably makes such defensive/offensive mimicry unecessary.

    Tale of the Avian Trickster

    The calls and croaks of ravens/crows may direct other scavengers, like coyotes and wolves, in tracking quarry. No mimicry is necessarily involved here (but I'd like to know if it ever is). It's just like the association that forms for the cattle egret, as the birds are drawn by the sound of lawn mowers for what it draws out of the grass. What can be stolen from, opened or left behind by the canids/mowers is propitious for the birds.

    Maybe ravens don't know what they are doing, just like the writing desks.
  • Art Lies Beyond Morality
    (There is a proffered escape clause, but nowadays that business is too controversial, so I’m leaving it out.)ucarr

    Very interesting post but you should've left this out if you don't want us to ask what this controversial escape clause is. Is it obvious? You must be sinning here.
  • How is a raven like a writing desk?
    can't be fooled by soundVera Mont

    Many species do predator call mimicry. If the nest is being attacked they make the sound of even larger predator to scare off and deter the threat.
  • Human thinking is reaching the end of its usability
    The urge to think is a strong one, and one of my big questions is why evolution switched from non-thinking (animals) to only-thinking (humans). But any meditation practice is meant to relax that urge.Carlo Roosen

    An interesting analogy would be in the dance of sexual selection, where the subject/object of your desire demands a great performance. If you pass the test, you get to mate. On the other side, you play competitive sports with your own rivals to practice for ever new encounters. The competition of either the love or war dance ensues, age after age, and they are both linked (ex. the Trojan War of Homer's epic). The evolutionary pressure in competition generates new ways of doing (grows the capacity for doing) which get copied for all kinds of ends.

    The ability to manipulate the world via thought has been so tremendous that what constitutes the transient subject/object of anyone's desire is so incredibly varied. But behind it all everyone is still just "getting off" in one way or another, under the restrictions and sublimation of culture.
  • How is a raven like a writing desk?
    @Vera Mont



    Maybe their imitation is in very limited in scope and range, as their squawks sound much lower frequency than many little song birds. Haven't heard anything very delicate or melodic from them. So yes, am attributing far too much in their capacity, as harsh squawky black birds.
  • How is a raven like a writing desk?
    Neither can sing.Vera Mont

    Ravens can mimic song like many other Corvids. I wonder what they get up to in a natural setting, whether they imitate other birds. Could ravens lure prey out with imitation, as a tactic? I would be comfortable with the belief that no birds sing, if primarily a human affair. So, neither can sing if none ever do sing.

    Both are evil.praxis

    Well, I imagine you're wearing your Puritanical vestments, brush in hand, looking forward to guiding the wayward spirits this All Saints' Eve to their proper places in hell. The dark raven man is menacing and inky, standing on his desk. Perhaps he is Poe's vengeful spirit.

    They aren't evil. It is the third figure that fuses them together in mind, the weirdo animal that sits, thinks, writes and paints, is the most cunning agent of strife, who ponders nonsense riddles. It is the lunatic raven man that turns the charming bird meeting of a "murder" and a "conspiracy" into real murder and conspiracy (sometimes at a desk).
  • AI and pictures
    Looks like AI generators have the same skill issue that Adolf Hitler had. Either the perspective is wrong or its just an aberration of architectural features.

    Now that the story level problem is solved, how do you solve the windows and doors problem?
  • How is a raven like a writing desk?
    How is a closet like a blue tit?Baden

    If only we could make Socrates a bit glad and mad with the question.
    He is somewhere, strolling about, talking with poets,
    Extolling the virtues of stranger comparisons.

    How is a closet like a blue tit?
    Half of the question is up in the air, flitting about, like those birds I can't see.
    Half of one solution is in a gun closet.

    To shoot or not to shoot, that is the question
    For the sake of an innocent inquiry.

    Rather we also wait with patience, a cage in hand
    Adventuring in dales of the countryside
    Cunning and quiet
    Climbing trees to steal (t)its progeny.

    One dead, one living
    One closeted, one caged

    All for the sake of a needful comparison:

    How is a blue tit like a closet?
  • How is a raven like a writing desk?
    Perhaps I'm missing the deeper meaning of this topicOutlander

    Doubtful. The topic is as shallow or a deep as you'd like it to be. It actually requires others, like yourself, to give it depth or shallowness. And books, mountains of books! Maybe a living and a dead Raven would help too.

    The negative feedback from both sources tortured Edgar Allen Poe while inspiring him at the same time.Paine

    Henry James wrote the following, perhaps on or at a desk: “An enthusiasm for Poe is the mark of a decidedly primitive stage of reflection.” I wonder if James would say that about Borges.

    Bryan W. Proctor: “Edgar Allan Poe was incontestably one of the most worthless persons of whom we have any record in the world of letters.” Ouch. Quoth the Ravens: "Nevermore!"

    Source -->Twenty-Five Ways to Roast the Raven
  • All joy/success/pleasure/positive emotion is inherently the same (perhaps one-dimensional?)
    I guess it just seems to me there's always more "going on" when it comes to a negative experience or circumstance than a happy positive one where basically nothing is "going on" or like was said "requires no response" and "sets no challenge".Outlander

    One could just as well affirm the opposite of this. Some states of first world discomfort, the emptiness of modern material life from the perspective of a depressed person, "require no response" and "set no challenge" if everything worth pursuing has been given up on. There is no energy left beyond the rutted work of the high standard of our wealthy subsistence (eat, sleep, work, repeat). That is pretty dull.

    Though one could characterize the battle to hold on and keep pushing that rock up the hill as a challenge too, to strive against the final surrender to the unknown or the fear of a downward spiral, becoming those sad, forgotten people on the street.

    It sounds like a state which "requires no response" and "sets no challenge" isn't really a contented one. Hedonic adaptation is possibly a big complicating factor of our human experience. I think it is going to destroy society (ongoing). One can become accustomed/jaded to ever new levels of experience. I always think about Peter Thiel in this regard of boundless desire. He has 5 billion dollars in a tax free Roth IRA and yet has some weird motivation to mold the world according to his immoral Libertarian dream (that the world should belong to those who can take/shape it and flavors of "might makes right"). There is definitely something wrong with Thiel and maybe it is that he is deeply unhappy. He needs to forever ascend to new challenges, no matter how terrible they seem to us.
  • If you were God, what would you do?
    The archaic metaphysics/myths of Indian religion (Vedanta/Hinduism) seems to have room for all manifestations of God.

    Paramatman/brahman is supposedly devoid of all attributes, despite the attributes of the "absolute", "eternal" and "blissful" sticking to it. It is a true enigma. Is it just the space in which all things occur?

    God is empty of God, until some representative/avatar swoops down to try to tell you about extending your cars warranty.
  • All joy/success/pleasure/positive emotion is inherently the same (perhaps one-dimensional?)
    Depression/anhedonia as a sort of locked flat state without the alternation of good emotion, could be characterized as one dimensional. Though even here there is a rhythm of what the mind presents to itself in pulses of exacerbating negativity as a vicious circle, as if one had an itchy wound which when scratched causes both relief and new pain. Maybe sadism/masochsim could be means for such folks to find relief by emotional alternation, or as an solution for a dullness which seems at times intolerable.

    Happy lives perhaps are full of wonderful dynamism, balanced in a natural cycle of highs and lows. Contentment pursues itself, not without challenge; it just hasn't been upended and forever frustrated by intractable problems/situations or a perpetual feeling of doom.
  • If you were God, what would you do?
    If I was God, I wouldn't do what I would do if I was God.unenlightened

    But what would you do that you wouldn't do? That is what we do and don't want to know.
  • A really bad sci fi story I wrote
    It's less a story than it is an attempt to sketch a picture/scene by words.

    Perhaps a "mathematically invalid" structure could employ illusion or contradiction that breaks or bends classical/known laws of physics. But non-classical physics/phenomena, however bizarre, still is captured by the language of maths, assuming one has the time, and resources and body of knowledge to model its recurrent patterns. Detailed observation from either Shang or Xi would make it more interesting -- what precisely are they seeing that leads them to what make such an inference. If their instruments are compromised, why would they jump to the conclusion?

    Maybe the structure changes radically depending on their location. Shang might register a Parthenon while Xi sees something like a giant coral. They share each other's data to know the structure pattern is seemingly location or observer dependent. Data sharing could also change the structure.

    Though if this happens may they should just flee at this point and return to their consensus reality if at all possible. Back to their home, where Shang and Xi open the fridge to find the cold beer is cold beer and the couch is as soft and comfy as they remember. Hopefully they are not forever entangled/changed by what they encountered in a harmful way.
  • Facts, the ideal illusion. What do the people on this forum think?
    Facts are only an ideal perfection, something we would like to achieve but cannot.Plex

    Many facts aren't ideal perfections written in stone, they're relative, provisional, ephemeral, context dependent, general or specific bits of information that help us navigate the world and achieve goals (whether "foolish" or "wise").
  • If you were God, what would you do?
    I always tell the protagonist in a horror movie or thriller to stay the hell out of that basement; I yell and swear at them, but they never listen. God probably feels the same way sometimes.Vera Mont

    God wouldn't get to watch the dramatic unfoldment by his own (atrocious) desire if no one comes around to open the basement door. Someone will always open the basement door. You can count on it.

    Having just watched Robert Eggers The Lighthouse, after learning he is reviving the cinematic tale of Nosferatu, the horror fantasy influence is too much on my mind. Halloween is going to last until the very end of this year what with the scary election in Nov and the cult of the skin wearing orange man. Will we survive?

    "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" :death:
  • 'It was THIS big!' as the Birth of the God Concept
    the concept of God arose through a combination of competitive story telling (one-upmanship) fed into real life boasting to the point where slowly a Higher Being came into fruitionI like sushi

    Most of the commentary in this thread seems mutually compatible and complimentary to your idea here.

    Gods are definitely inflated and deflated by human rivalry/competition. The divine right of kings is an example of leveraged belief to secure/conserve power. One invokes the bigger fish of spirit as a representative of official sanction.

    "The doctrine asserts that a monarch is not accountable to any earthly authority (such as a parliament or the Pope) because their right to rule is derived from divine authority." — wiki: Divine right of kings

    One can imagine the endless stories that serve to secure or depose one who enjoys the blessings/curses of a high status positions. If gods are not born from politics per se, they certainly evolve through it.

    In Mandrills, sexual competition between males results in a hormone feedback cycle. Successful males gain a phenotype change. The troop leader is adorned by a phenotypic aura of color and shape, which serves as a signal to all others. Now throw story telling into the mix. His color might be a sign of his divine right as a king. If he may potentially be deposed by a rival, there is "always another Mandrill" to take his place. One may fantasize about the other (if fantasy is possible) and dream of all kinds of unsettling surreal exaggerations. These stories generate from all tellers, all dreamers, and are shaped by desire and fear. Mutually recognized/affirmed status between unequal members might favor the perpetuation of a shared story from shared desire. A rival might seek to subvert consensus belief for personal advantage.
  • The relationship of the statue to the clay
    I think both form and content are missing from the blob Bob received.frank

    You mean that intended, desired or expected form and content are missing. The blob is still a form and generates content for Bob. If it didn't have form or content, as the thing he knows should be otherwise, Bob wouldn't know what he received.

    Bob's blob would be more interesting if it were a story entry. Bob watches The Blob after receiving the blob. The unformed blob now terrorizes Bob, makes him feel nauseous because he cannot grasp its form or content. It becomes for Bob a mentally pernicious all consuming entity. Bob must form it himself, must tame the clay, to calm an agitation or cure his ill. The newly fired figure he makes works for a while but serves as memory of its origin. Bob is contaminated by endless spontaneous content of the blob and is driven into madness and ends his life.

    Bob's ashes happen to be dispersed into a clay deposit, from which an artist of a future period takes source material.

  • If you were God, what would you do?
    I'd be afraid to tell humans that they are the children of God (my children), for fear of what that privilege entails in their own minds.

    Whereas Adam and Eve were caste out of the garden for a transgression they didn't understand, some new great reversal might occur by putting up a sign on my (God's) basement door that reads: "Do Not Enter!"

    Do you dare go into the basement? That odd smell coming from the basement is a sign that you should not go in there. It's locked, you can't get in. Don't try. You're not allowed in the basement. You wouldn't understand what you see there anyway. It's nothing. Don't worry about it.

    Under no circumstances are you permitted to go into the basement. There will be consequences if you do.

    Indubitably, you will copy me (God) as soon as you see what I'm doing in the basement. So stay out!

    You can't be God if I am God. Duh!
  • Why should we worry about misinformation?
    Simply because you don’t share your boss’ motor-cortex. You are responsible for what you do while your boss is responsible for what he does. It’s simple physics and biology.NOS4A2

    This could be a matter of mutable perspective. I might as well be a mechanical limb at this point, controlled by speech impulses, which he would gladly toss if it stopped working.

    Would The Malleus Maleficarium cause you to kill someone? I doubt it.NOS4A2

    It's much more a condition of mass belief, or socially pressured acts. If everyone was in danger of being targeted as a witch it is possible I'd be much more likely to participate in finding witches as a survival mechanism.
  • Why should we worry about misinformation?
    False information cannot cause people to believe false information or act on false information.NOS4A2

    This seems to me like a ridiculous generalization. If I lie to my boss this morning which makes him take unnecessary action, why can't I be held responsible for causing my boss to take action? False information has probably driven people to commit suicide on rare occasion. There have been those sextortion crimes of young folks on social media recently causing suicides. The Malleus Maleficarium of the 15th century caused paranoid adults to kill a lot of people. It is an example of the dispersal of a text ramping up domestic terror.

    Global society is built on the power of people acting on information they trust is true. Misinformation at an excessive level undermines this trust.
  • Why should we worry about misinformation?
    Let's see which injuries you can inflict on me with your speech.NOS4A2

    Jesus Christ NOS. We could get you killed with speech.
  • Coping with isolation
    I assume that those were painted by you.javi2541997

    It is dyed cloth, using cold water dyes (procion) under melting ice. The mandala is very similar to making snowflakes out of paper. You fold natural cloth that has been soaked in soda ash into eighths or sixteenths, bind sections with twine, apply dye either via bottles or on top of ice. Just a version of tie dye.

    The surprise aspect, not knowing what to expect makes it a bit addictive.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=tpUR035WZsA
  • Coping with isolation
    I am isolating because of COVID and about to lose my mind. I have a question for you.

    What would do if something awful happened and as far as you know, you are the only one to survive?
    Athena

    It would free the world up for exploration. No zone, aside from apparent risks, is a no-go zone any longer.

    You can always do art projects or read, if those things are fun and you're not consigned to one room. Recently discovered ice tie dye. Though there be so many things to do (or nothing at all) if I was the last person on earth.

    43wTNv6.jpeg

    WH7m8cB.jpeg
  • Paradoxes of faith?
    I would submit that the doctrine of vivarious redemption by human sacrifice is utterly immoral.Gregory's Christopher Hitchens

    Very cool Hitchens quote.

    Am pretty ignorant about which version of atonement theory becomes go-to dogma of any specific flavor of Christianity. The moral influence theory of atonement seems the least bizarre to me, aside the scapegoat theory. But I kinda gloss over the others.

    Abelard not only rejected the idea of Jesus' death as a ransom paid to the devil,[1][2] which turned the Devil into a rival god,[2] but also objected to the idea that Jesus' death was a "debt paid to God's honor".[1] He also objected to the emphasis on God's judgment, and the idea that God changed his mind after the sinner accepted Jesus' sacrificial death, which was not easily reconcilable with the idea of "the perfect, impassible God [who] does not change".[1][7] Abelard focused on changing man's perception of God as not offended, harsh, and judgmental, but as loving.[1] According to Abelard, "Jesus died as the demonstration of God's love", a demonstration which can change the hearts and minds of the sinners, turning back to God.[1][3] — Wikipedia: Moral Influence Theory of Atonement

    Substitutionary atonement theory grows out of trying to give meaning to ritual of the scapegoat. The restless crowd, frustrated by a wrath of a god, is looking for a target to blame, and subject gets chosen whether guilty or not. The accuser finds resolution (possibly a kind catharsis) in the punishment of the accused. This drama is in someway psychologically purgative insofar as the target is associated with the cause of accusers' problem. There is release in every cycle of purging ourselves of internal vindictiveness. Communal vindictiveness focuses itself energetically to an appropriate target. To the degree that we have learned that our target is truly innocent, we can become aware of what we are doing.

    Girard would have us believe Christianity puts new spin on an old blood magic to make us better people. The target/victim once guilty and deified is now innocent and deified. God, the son, joins the tragic theater and gets crucified by us twats to show his good will.

    If you remember your time on the playground (we are still on that shitty playground ), you might have witnessed the earliest version of this kind of human dynamic. Groups are especially nasty in they way they form arbitrary alignments and vent frustration onto outliers.
  • A Thought Experiment Question for Christians
    From a self-identification and core belief standpoint, Mormons are Christians because they center their faith on Jesus Christ and His teachings. However, differences in doctrine, additional scriptures, and unique beliefs have led some other Christian denominations to question or reject Mormonism as part of traditional Christianity. The debate largely hinges on theological differences and the definition of what it means to be "Christian."

    The Book of Mormon repeatedly emphasizes that Jesus Christ is the Savior and Redeemer of the world. It teaches that through His Atonement, all people can be forgiven of their sins if they repent and follow Him. One of the most well-known verses, 2 Nephi 25:26, states, "And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins."
    — ChatGPT

    Alternatively, we could go with Nietzsche's observation to further appease everyone: "There was only one Christian and he died on the cross."
  • Paradoxes of faith?
    On atonment, is not it crystal clear that someone cannot receive merits from someone else. How can another man's actions change the karmic situation of a person when dealing with his conscious.Gregory

    The Christian apologist, Rene Girard, has a radical non-theological interpretation of what the Christian myth could means. The crucifixion is a symbol of a perennial scapegoating rite which pacifies a crowd or disperses escalating violence at a moment in time within a social group. Supposedly for Girard, Christianity brought revelation to this perennial ritual of spontaneous sacrifice (propitiation/expiation) which was (pre)historically important to keep the social order, where people finally begin to empathize with the scapegoat who is a true victim (innocent) of man's sin/ignorance.

    Jesus becomes the model of atonement (expiation), not so much for reconciliation between people and God, but between people, as they acknowledge their tendency toward unconscious violence (born from a concept/impulse he calls mimetic rivalry/contagion).

    What at least is interesting with Girard's theory, is that it struggles to appropriate/renew the power of Christianity's myth in an age of non-believers and rationalists. One could imagine now a Christian atheist, where the supernatural belief in God is no longer needed.
  • What does it mean to love ones country?
    What does it mean to love one's country?

    Patriotism is more about virtue/social signaling, which helps to organize groups/movements with shared goals/identity/politics/delusions. We say we love our country insofar as it says something about ourselves to other people, as a means to certain ends.
  • Ponderables of SF on screen
    I meant no disrespect to you or your mother. I apologize if you feel I've been disrespectful or vulgar.praxis

    Just what we'd expect a philosophical zombie alien with a false conscience to say.

    Luckily, we humans will come to the rescue in doubting what the omniscient narrator says about your experiential emptiness. You are too much like us to be denied and ought to belong to the cult of humankind.

    So we will perform a ritual, here and now, kind of like the Eucharist. Eat of the body and bread of man, endowed with the blessed curse of sentience, to be as the creator intended us.

    Benedicat tibi Spiritus et vive, ride, ama
  • Ponderables of SF on screen
    rebooting Star Trek TOS (1966-69)180 Proof

    As an old millennial I've not watched even one full episode of TOS. My fondness for the fantasy escape is limited to Next Generation, Voyager, DS9. Am just a casual viewer and don't have much enthusiasm or mind to imagine show improvements. Sounds like real Hollywood homework.

    Maybe these shows could give us something new in the way glimpsing how strange/unsettling the universe really is/could be. I like Sci Fi that is truly unsettling. Though to get too bizarre, realisitc or futurist is maybe to wreck what makes it comforting (the same old familiar crew who always is in control and overcomes whatever problem is thrown at them).
  • Ponderables of SF on screen
    A lot of Sci Fi has a problem with technological inconsistency for the sake of conflict, story. Star Wars is a great example. All war would likely be by a more tech advanced proxy. Instead of worthless droids engaging in gun battles there could be invisible sniper probes or mines, or even nano machine assassins, that would be far more efficient and effective.

    In Dune, a tiny insect like assassin is sent to kill Paul. If one needed to ensure the job, why not send a dozen backups. But then the story would end there.

    Star Trek is absurd insofar as many of the scenarios seem impossible to overcome and survival appears to be a matter or pure luck. Living on a ship where these kind of heinous problems happen all the time makes it more of a horror show than an inspiring odyssey of scientific exploration.

    This is always an issue with fiction, especially with modern tv fantasy series which have to sustain more seasons than they ought to. The writing becomes worse, protagonists make terrible decisions, so the story can drag on and action can happen.
  • Ponderables of SF on screen
    Flame has more of the properties one might attribute to deities (dynamism, power, transformation) and its use might be explained as a kind of sympathetic magic (like invokes like).

    Lighting a candle is much easier and less dangerous than blood letting and sacrifice. It's more amenable to contemporary moral sensitivities.

    Fire dispels darkness. If a deity dispels darkness, then the metaphor is suitable.

    Also all technological transformation began and continues from fire. It is the natural ancestor of any human ship which traverses space.

    For space faring scientific humanoids, fire is a natural deity (enabler, protector of all).

    :fire:
  • Animal agriculture = wrong ?
    - no livestock farming can take place without causing suffering to the animalsLFranc

    In an ideal situation, livestock farming could possibly reduce suffering/pain below the level that happens in nature. All animals die but under controlled conditions they could go unconscious without having any anticipatory stress. When we put animals down due to illness/disability we often believe this to be a humane act. However, in the never ceasing drive toward the economic bottom line, abject forms of negligence and abuse are probably inevitable.

    Often I feel we project our own capacity to suffer onto animals but I think we're far worse off in terms of our capacity to suffer. For example, we suffer the guilt/awareness of doing harm in the satisfaction of our pleasure, where animals have no concern. They don't know the globe is warming and that their burps/farts are doing it on our behalf. We're each materially responsible for so much, so much hinges on our ability to perform toward a complicated future which we desire but never really reach (we're always reaching, have the most insatiable/paradoxical needs), while animals just get to be. Humans are probably the most angst ridden animal in the history of Earth.
  • Is Karma real?
    If Karma applies to only intentional acts, the influence of non-intentional acts (acts from ignorance, compulsion, nature) make the concept muddy/incoherent.

    All intentional acts rely on a vast array of non-intentional processes for which the agent is mostly ignorant of.

    Suppose we're all perfect in our intentions but nature just seems to always interfere with the act to produce and multiply harmful results. Or we're all perfect in our moral intentions (from our collective point of view) and an asteroid comes down to block out the sun from its dust impact and we suffer a while until death... where is the karmic justice in that?

    Maybe most of the harm/suffering in the universe, by karmic standards, is really unintentional and the outcome of either incident or ignorance.
  • Fall of Man Paradox
    Do you believe that the set of all natural numbers exists? Is it reasonable to stipulate its existence? If infinite sets can exist in some realm, why can infinite dice not exist in God's realm?keystone

    Infinity is an unreasonable stipulation and whether or not numbers "exist" is not all that relevant to me. The natural numbers definitely have a limit of physical representation and there'd be an infinite amount of numbers beyond that limit.
  • Fall of Man Paradox
    only a finite number of outcomes were lower, yet an infinite number were higher, making the serpent's probability of beating him exactly 100%.keystone

    We are just concerned with the finite numbers that appear on both dice and which is greater than the other. Sounds like 50/50 chance.

    Once the player knows what the serpent threw, there will be an infinite amount of numbers greater than that number and a finite amount less than, and therefore chance of winning against the serpent approaches 0. The limitation of possible representation is still an issue here; there must be a finite maximum magnitude for the game. Infinity cannot be a stipulation.

    You could fix the problem with doing away the limit of natural numbers and including the negative integers to infinity. Chance of 50/50 seems locked in here, even after the player becomes aware of the serpent's number, unless the chance is actually undefined here. Maybe it's undefined for the natural numbers also.

    If the serpent pulled 42 on a number line of integers what is the chance of throwing a higher or lower number? Does it even make sense to ask?
  • Fall of Man Paradox
    There would be no way to read the numbers because any of them could appear to be unlimited and by the physical limitations of the universe would therefore be impossible. Most numbers wouldn't fit in our universe.

    If the numbers cannot manifest, if they aren't allowed, then the dice cannot be infinite.

    I guess you could use compact symbols though but you'd come up against some limitation of discernment, where what conveys one number is indistinguishable from what conveys another. The capacity for subtle discernment would have to be infinite also.

    The serpent would end up disagreeing with you what number is on the face of the dice and you'd have to bring in a third party (God, if you trust him) to verify.
  • Asexual Love
    Valentines Day ought be about more kinds of love.Moliere

    Sounds good. What do we do now to reconstruct the public's ideas around Valentine's day. If you use Valentine's day as an excuse to tell your friend how much you love them, you might get some awkward looks/confusion. Then you'll just have to explain to them: that "Valentines day ought to be about more kinds of love." I'm sure it is for some folks, who are not so culturally repressed.

    Cultural construction is a tall order.
  • In defence of the Mediterranean products and farmers
    This is not true. Another filthy lie coming from them.javi2541997

    As they say, it only takes a few bad apples to ruin the bunch and to stoke resentment. Agricultural fraud is rampant where folks stand to increase their profit by manipulating consumer perception and can get away with it. Some French are no doubt passing off Spanish wine as French wine. This behavior transcends national identities.There is a great series on Netflix, Rotten, which covers global fraud/corruption related to specific agricultural crops/resources. Both olive oil and honey are also major adulterated/mislabeled commodities.

    But why do they sabotage our products?javi2541997

    So that the governments of both countries, or whatever EU political body, is forced to address their grievances. Throwing this tantrum of blocking highways, piling dung at the capital, sabotaging the competition as a statement, is a means to their end.
  • In defence of the Mediterranean products and farmers
    Here is an article which pertains to comparative (dis)advantage between France and other EU countries, due to France's own agricultural policy. It says that because of the EGalim law, 'French food prices are on average %15 higher than the European average'.

    There is also the impression that sometimes non-French products are being marketed as French products to take the price advantage of the perception of quality/origin. This has been a known concern in the wine industry, where there is a very French label up front on a wine of Spanish origin (or wines of mixed origin). Similar protests and sabotaging Spanish wine is a precedent, and no doubt fuels the mistrust of farmers toward imports for the ongoing crisis.