Hakan

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• Commented on Pushing it back
  ... Or we found the first evidence of time travel. We will clinch it when we find the first 470k year old Dodge buried in a past desert....
• Commented on I can't even
  As a bonus the Tory party faces annihilation. I would welcome this but during the process our lives, investments and incomes will also face annihilation. Thousands, if not tens of thousands will die this winter due to hunger and...
• Commented on COVID-19
  Talking about social change, 15% fatality among the elderly will seriously change the Tories' slice of voting populace....
• Commented on CASE NIGHTMARE BLONDE
  This was a right-wing coup, proper. Most of the public is not even aware it has happened....
• Commented on Whoops Apocalypse!
  Anyone remembering the dissolution of the Yugoslavia will say you're wildly optimistic. It's going to be a lot worse....
• Commented on Whoops Apocalypse!
  Ah - Peter Cook was perfect in the film....
• Commented on Someone please cancel 2019 already?
  ID card scare is overblown. Even the dictatorial hard-right fascist state of Sweden has them... If UK had an ID card system, then they could have enforced EU-provided immigration rules, and pretty much 90% of the objection to the EU...
• Commented on Crawling from the wreckage
  Most of "all of the world". 2018 was the year when the threat of a global Nuclear War came back, especially for the USians, but a conflict with NK will eventually involve China and/or Russia, and after that it's bad...
• Commented on Crawling from the wreckage
  Most of us are alive. I count that as a positive....
• Commented on The sudden eruption of news
  As a dual-national (Anglo-Turk) briton, with an immigrant partner, these are scary days to be alive. From where I stand, May had a look at the Turkish referendum results and went "I want some of that too". Of course it...
• Commented on I can't keep up
  It is not a bad thing, for years we have been living in Orwell and PK Dick novels, for once I don't mind living in a Stross novel. It is exciting. Talking about Brunner, last weekend at Picocon 34 I...
• Commented on Things Can Only Get Better! (Part 1)
  Please stop being such an optimist....
• Commented on Three Unexpectedly Good Things VR Will Probably Cause
  When İ, was a kid, İ used to walk to school while listening tona Sony Walkman with an (invariably SF) book in my hand. I am sure a lot of people thought I was a sad geek. :) Meanwhile, that...
• Commented on Towards a taxonomy of cliches in Space Opera
  Most people are not interested on new things but old and comfortable things that make them warm and happy. I love Hannu's books but they take some effort to take in if you are not adventurous. The Quantum Thief will...
• Commented on Towards a taxonomy of cliches in Space Opera
  Last couple of days I have been rewatching Double Zeta Gundam - it is very good fun space opera anime, although not as good as Legends of Galactic Heroes, Gundams are much more approachable and fun. Although not in written...
• Commented on Bombing Syria Considered Stupid
  @El, You can argue that Major's inaction Bosnia caused endless suffering. Siege of Sarajevo happened completely during Major's tenure, and could have been prevented. IMHO, sometimes you have to act....
• Commented on Bombing Syria Considered Stupid
  The assassination of Tahir Elci is so recent and such a farce, I guess it's possible that it was a cross-fire event. As one of my friends noted 'Surely if it was planned, no sane person would have planned like...
• Commented on The sky's gone dark
  Re: US losing its frontier: You can have a look at how UK views itself, a small country which was a former empire, still thinking it is one and acts like it, or more realistically Russia today, a former empire...
• Commented on The sky's gone dark
  The very-LEO will possibly stay relatively clean due to very high atmospheric drag where anything will quickly decay back into the atmosphere and burn. This means if you're skirting the top layers of the atmosphere, you have a chance to...
• Commented on The sky's gone dark
  On the science front, ultra-violet astronomy will be gone, most of the infra-red astronomy will be wiped out, large telescopes will have major funding, very large optic interferometer telescopes will have a major comeback (there's only a couple of such...
• Commented on Tanks! Why tank stories make great tech myths
  Arthur C. Clarke has a short but classic story called Superiority about this topic....
• Commented on Second childhood?
  Hi Frank, Re: Goblins, I had stopped reading it after the illustrator had gone through a nervous breakdown and stopped working on it. Glad he's back working on it....
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  Sorry Ken, it has been such a long time! I must find time to re-read that, I had enjoyed it immensely....
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  Scotland is perfect for wind power. Note to self: Get into your Tardis and go back to February and tell yourself this: "Do not plan for a motorbike trip to Skye in early March. You won't make it, there will...
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  Indeed, recently I was listening to the BBC Radio 4 series A Short History of Ireland - a stark reminder of humanity's depressing tendencies, full of blood and misery, 120 episodes of invasions, betrayals, murders and massacres....
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  Dapper@41, I presume your look at history is different than mine. Having one side of my extended family in NI, my take is the conflict has never ended since the Easter Rising. These things can take a significantly long time...
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  This brings an other singularity in to mind: If Tories and UKIP have a magical landslide and get England out of EU by the next election, will Wales and Scotland accept that willingly? AFAIK, Scotland is significantly more pro-EU than...
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  I have to say, with the current poll arithmetics, I don't trust any of the party leaders. Come the 8th, they will face a different reality and will happily turn back on election promises. Labour-SNP coalition can still happen and...
• Commented on The Scottish Political Singularity, Act Two
  Re: Scotland's oil... The oil revenues will be there in the future as long as oil is a finite resource and there's still some left. The current low price hence the glut of oil is a geopolitical ploy of Saudis...
• Commented on The morning after
  Turkish father, (Northern) Irish mother with Scottish and English heritage. I am in the same boat and thinking of applying for an Irish passport at the moment to be ready when the inevitable racist backlash kicks me out of this...