Nestor

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• Commented on Minor hiccup
  >(I suspect you misapprehend just how bleak those two stories are.) Nnnoo, it's more an unwillingness to part with such wonderful settings. The adventures of Yuri Gagarin sailing the endless seas with his trusted crew of Spetsnaz is just too...
• Commented on Minor hiccup
  >For example, there's no way to write a sequel to "A Colder War" or "Missile Gap". Regarding this, how much supplies did the remnants of the US government who crossed to the dead world have? Were they doomed to languish...
• Commented on Crib sheet: Singularity Sky
  I am happy to conclude that me being confused by Palimpsest is a feature and not a bug (In me) Yup, that's why the Resistance use it (in some palimpsests) as a route to galactic colonization. Now that's an awesome...
• Commented on Crib sheet: Singularity Sky
  Nope...
• Commented on Crib sheet: Singularity Sky
  Oh I can handle suspension of disbelief, the one lie you swallow to enjoy the story, no problem. Hell, give me half a dozen, I read comic books for entertainment. What confuses me about Palimpsest is that I'm trying to...
• Commented on Crib sheet: Singularity Sky
  >But that universe was broken, like a car with a cracked chassis; not obvious to the uninformed outside observer. I have to say, this can be a problem when the author is much smarter than his readers, because I'd happily...
• Commented on Crib sheet: Singularity Sky
  The big bad in the Star Trek reboot was essentially that, a mining ship from 100 years in the future. Bujold's Barrayar was a 19th century style monarchy when the advanced Cetagandans discovered and invaded them, they had to fight...
• Commented on Grand Guignol Tropes
  Never read him, but I'm not surprised something along those lines has been done before. Guess I'll put that book on my to read list. Being a non author is very relaxing, you can have an idea, and then just...
• Commented on Grand Guignol Tropes
  Reminds me of these new sneakers ads all through town are peddling, they're supposed to be form fitting once you apply heat to make them melt onto the shape of your feet. As someone who does barefoot running, it sounds...
• Commented on Grand Guignol Tropes
  He already wrote at least one short story sequel that sort of followed those lines...
• Commented on A message from our UK sponsors (again)
  Preordered on google books, it'll be available on the 9th. Rude of them to reccomend the older editions, though I guess it's too much to ask of the googleplex to know they're trying to sell me the same books with...
• Commented on Grand Guignol Tropes
  I had a similar idea for a series based around the misadventures of the instances of a foolishly idealistic research assistant who decides to open source himself after participating in early mind scanning trials....
• Commented on Changing my mind on nuclear disarmament
  If only the US is capable of force projection nowadays, what would you call what France is doing in Mali? IIRC Matthias Rust was buzzed by at least one MIG which had to almost stall in order to get a...
• Commented on Changing my mind on nuclear disarmament
  Came to post that, asteroids can probably be better deflected with paintballs to alter their albedo if you get sufficiently advanced warning, but it sure sounds good. Alien invasions too! I bet those pesky aliens are just waiting for us...
• Commented on The Curious Experience of Middle Age
  It depends what you call a scam, according to a professor in the relevant sciences I asked, cutting your brain into fine slices and plastifying it is probably the best archival method for your headmeats we have with current technology....
• Commented on Forthcoming UK Audio Books
  Coincindentally I was just playing with the google play books reader's "Read aloud" function on "the Bloodline feud". The "high quality voice" seems to stall but works fairly well otherwise. It can't compare with a voice actor who can emote...
• Commented on PSA: Ignore the news
  This all seems, from my distant perspective, to have been a lot of fuss over a relatively small affair. Is shutting down whole cities every time a teenager goes postal a proportionate response?...
• Commented on PSA: Ignore the news
  The War nerd speculates it may be a Pakistani group but it's only a guess. (Link is a temporarily unlocked link to a subscriber only article, will be valid for 48 hours)...
• Commented on No. Words.
  We live in a strange time where we know that high tech medical breakthroughs are just within arm's reach, but not quite there yet. Very frustrating, especially in times like this....
• Commented on Off the Map: Women in Science and Science Fiction
  >much of which is produced and distributed for free by enthusiastic amateurs (the commercial porn industry is also suffering) "Enthusiastically distributed for free" is correct, but produced by amateurs not so much... the distinction was always rather blurred but definitely...
• Commented on The permanent revolution
  I think there's a chance we'll see some kind of "high tech DIY" status quo emerging, with the increasing personal computing power available to the individual, stuff like 3d printing and crucially, if the things emerging from graphene research pan...
• Commented on How I feel this morning
  >That's due to Paypal and other card processors in the US having to plug into Mastercard, who are allegedly run by blue-nosed fundies from the US Deep South. It's true paypal originally got enthusiastically in bed with the porn industry...
• Commented on Mo' holding pattern
  I disagree it was a debacle, or rather, it was a very interesting one. Maybe that project would've benefited from the reality TV approach. But really, isn't it arrogant to assume our first attempt at a self contained biosphere just...
• Commented on Mo' holding pattern
  So wait, the mars mission they have planned is to slingshot around the planet and immediately come back? No landing? No orbit? That seems singularly pointless......
• Commented on Dragged kicking and screaming into the 19th century
  Personally, my only link to the catholic church was my grandmother, who was unreasonably fond of the institution despite the problems it caused her (She could've used some contraception in 1950s Ireland), though she wasn't too keen on the hierarchy,...
• Commented on Wow
  The duke himself figured it was the 6 pack a day habit that did for him, the cancer statistics for that movie crew correspond roughly to average statistics...
• Commented on Roko's Basilisk wants YOU
  Here's how to derive Stalinism out of transhumanism in a couple easy steps. Assume the scenario in accelerando where the AIs instantiate fictional characters for shits and giggles. Now, with a transhumanist government in charge, fiction is tightly controlled since...
• Commented on Roko's Basilisk wants YOU
  The problem with many worlds, is that it's impervious to reductio ad absurdum. If you honestly believe everything that is possible however remotely improbable does in fact happen, I think that can do some odd things to your thought process....
• Commented on Roko's Basilisk wants YOU
  Yeahh, lesswrong... read it occasionally... it has interesting stuff, but it's the best example of how being aware of biases doesn't really stop you from falling into them, as it's clearly devolving into a Yudkowski personality cult. Eliezer's stated goal...
• Commented on The World Shrinks Under The Weight of Madness
  That's a hard one, a lot of fiction is set during "interesting times" so it's not so nice to be an ordinary person. Most fantasy is medieval enough that being ordinary is right out. Some sci fi universes are rather...