Category Archives: humanities

alchemists

I had not heard of Nicholas Flamel before Harry Potter. Here is an article about him from Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness Of Crowds.

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forsooth thy knockers be bounteous

a chuckle from John and Antonio: We once knew a woman who got a job translating three porn flicks from Italian to Spanish. Why did they bother, you ask. Because they were done in (well, mostly out of) Renaissance dress … Continue reading

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get the Kryptonite!

Cintra Wilson raises the alarm: I must warn the world about Tom Cruise. I feel he is an utterly terrifying Superior Life Form, with the power to melt heads and braid spines. His eyes are as hard, shiny and brutally … Continue reading

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counting the unseen

politechbot.com: AAAS statistician testifies at Milosevic trial in The Hague

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Schelling points

New Scientist: Neural network ‘in-jokes’ could pass secrets This reminds me of a discussion, years ago on Extropians, of “Schelling points”: for under-constrained problems there may be a cultural preference for particular solutions. For example, if I ask you to … Continue reading

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found poetry

If I were given to clichés, I might suggest that if you were to look in the dictionary under “you cannot make this shit up” you’d find a picture of www.We Made Out in a Tree and This Old Guy … Continue reading

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Anton ‘Mr.’ Sherwood wants to know

How old is the convention of writing nicknames as middle names, e.g. (taking a handy fictional example) “Tim ‘Curly’ Beamish”? Why do you see even “Tim ‘Curly Tim’ Beamish” (gordelpus) rather than “‘Curly’ Tim Beamish”? What is the convention (if … Continue reading

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