ilya187

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• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  IF any government seizes power by force you've still lost democracy, even if it prevents an authoritarian Trump from taking office. I'm not so concerned with staying on the right side of the law as I am with staying on...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Madonna's book "Sex" was released in 1992 with $50 price tag, which is the equivalent of $128 today. As I recall, I wanted to read it back then, but not badly enough to spend that much money. I suspect this...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Then I actually won a Hugo and had a break-out novel (it earned out its advance then made about another 100% in royalties within its first month out the gate in hardcover: it went into three hardcover reprints in rapid...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  I sometimes think that America as a society is designed to produce a small set of global alpha predators, loose them on the world, and then reap the spoils. It is willing to make a lot of sacrifices to achieve...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Perhaps the UK would invoke Article 5 of NATO - "An attack on one is an attack on all". Why did UK not invoke Article 5 back in 1982?...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Well, at least he is not threatening to go to war over "Las Malvinas"...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  I think there's a non-zero chance that Trump will end his years in a Russian dacha and be eulogized as the rightful president of the US, who was twice robbed of his office by evil democrats and forced into exile...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  @ 1834: My wife's immediate response when she saw it: "Store an MP3 of a gunshot on your smartphone, and play it"...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  "Ninety minutes from New York to Paris, eternally free and eternally young, a just machine to make big decisions, programmed by those with compassion and vision" I never heard of this song until now, but the moment I read your...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Fewer citizens carry coins these days and very few carry enough for a day's parking at a station Raises hand. I do not carry coins around in my pocket, but my car has a stash of coins specifically for parking....
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  If they're billionaires, then they must be smart, they must be doing what I an ordinary person/non-billionaire consider weird for a 'good reason', etc. So, good luck getting the 'unhinged' label to stick on any billionaire Famous quote, although I...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  No, it is not a smartphone. You are correct....
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Maybe there is a good case for a large screen, disability adapted smartphone? They already exist. Here are some examples: https://www.alzstore.com/RAZ-Memory-Cell-Phone-for-Seniors-Verizon-AT-T-p/0039-v.htm...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  I am surprised. I would definitely prefer to live in most of Alastair Reynolds' or Peter Hamilton's futures than in 2023 -- even as an average nobody, let alone an aristocrat. I would not want to live as a Belter...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  I suspect a lot of such novels and stories impact people in various ways due to the life they have lived up to the point of reading. Didn't you spend some of your youth digging up bomb fragments in your...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  If you disliked the original (as I did - partly on it being too long) you are unlikely to enjoy the "ginny" version. I tried to read "Stranger in a Strange Land" when I was 17, and found it so...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  I'm not convinced that the creation of new ideas is a counter-argument to human being at least in a large pat stochastic parrots. It may be a case of survivor's bias -- we remember new ideas which turned out to...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  Where DID you get the assumption from that superior means 'more brainpower'? From your post #28: PSI is no different from any other purported human ability, and basic evolution shows that a 'superior' race will necessarily emerge at some stage....
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  A telepath is assumed to be superior to a mundane, because obviously having a superpower is better than not having it. Can't remember the name, but I once read a SF novella where being a telepath was very much a...
• Commented on We're sorry we created the Torment Nexus
  which are necessarily 'superior' because they replace the original Sorry, but that's an absolute BS. A new species replaces the original because it is better at surviving. That is all. Sometimes it happens because the new species is faster or...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Are the US THAT hung up on skin tones? It has almost nothing to do with skin tone and everything to do with ancestry. If American racial divisions were purely about skin tone, there would be no such thing as...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Good news: You are living in a science fiction novel Bad news: It is by Jerry Pournelle https://gizmodo.com/israel-houthi-missile-first-battle-in-space-1850999081...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Good news: You are living in a science fiction novel Bad news: It is by Jerry Pournelle https://gizmodo.com/israel-houthi-missile-first-battle-in-space-1850999081...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  I thought it was supposed to be a cow, not a bull. But I may be wrong....
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  As I recall, it was Meals Rejected by Ethiopians. Kind of specific to mid-80's....
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  No transcripts that I can find. If you open a video on an iPhone YouTube app, you will see underneath it the video's title, and under it the number of views, when it was posted, and "...more". Like this: Colonizing...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Still pretending to be an all-knowing non-human? Looks like it. I did not spend much effort deciphering her ravings....
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Read two Seagull's posts. No, not reformed. Maybe toned down the offensiveness, but still effectively information-free. Hushed....
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Thank you! I installed Dark Reader, and it works very well!...
• Commented on I should blog more, but ...
  Is there a way to make Firefox browser windows white-on-black instead of black-on-white?...