bevans1

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• Commented on Sitrep
  Mr. Stross: Based on the outpouring of creative juices represented in the above "Dumb Supervillains" medley and your desire to take time off from writing I think you're going to need to put a pressure bolt into your cranium to...
• Commented on The Pivot
  Brad Delong has linked to this site a few times including most recently this "The Pivot" thread. This may pull in a different audience with new commenters and new perspectives. Always better to be talking than shooting. I remember Krugman...
• Commented on Unforeseen Consequences and that 1929 vibe
  A typical definition of libertarian is a believer in free will or an advocate of liberty. Semantic drift certainly occurs but misappropriation by certain groups is more common. In my country Republicans call themselves conservatives for example. There is sometimes...
• Commented on Bread and Circuses (circumlunar version)
  Could we put Donald Trump on the moon? Please? ASAP. 2019 at the latest. Advisors could surely present this to him as the perfect opportunity for him to project himself into the history books. Perhaps his image could be permanently...
• Commented on Houston: what are the long-term consequences?
  I live in New Orleans. Much if not most of the low wage cleanup and construction work after Katrina was performed by illegals from Mexico and the rest of Central America. US currently already has a shortage of construction workers...
• Commented on Trapped in the wrong trouser-leg of time
  Mr Stross: I think there are times when it is healthy to withdraw. The Brexit/Trump debacles are not going to go away anytime soon. There is really no good news to speak of right now. In the case of Trump,...
• Commented on Book day!
  One must pay homage. 2:15AM Got up to finish my Brief. Like you said, starts out funny (very) and then turns dark (very). Fabulous....
• Commented on Crying fire in a crowded theatre for pleasure and profit
  If it bleeds it leads has led to a form of crying fire in the media. By constantly presenting cases of extreme violence culled from an entire country without giving any statistical context the media has led the viewing public...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  This could be Trump's big infrastructure project. The US will convert abandoned mine shafts into luxury hotels, shopping malls, and military bases so that we might preserve a nucleus of human specimens.The real problem might be preserving a nucleus of...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  I started looking at various projections that are available, all of which are slightly different as you would expect. I think the most optimistic one, on many levels, was 80% reduction in emissions by 2020 (this one was done a...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  It might take longer to get back to nine billion without men but we do have the technology to do it. I would volunteer the destruction of the USA and China if I thought it would save humankind. Graydon assures...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  My crude understanding of these projections is that they incorporate continued emissions even at reduced amounts. They nibble around the edges of the problem. What I'm asking is if we have an immediate drop of economic activity and population of,...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  The scenarios seem to fall into basic types: The slowly boiling frog. One hundred years hence we are cooked. The sudden apocalyptic catastrophe. Nuclear, plague, asteroid, etc. Sudden death. The optimistic. Through population control, scientific advances, and unexpected resilience we...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  All comments noted and appreciated. My first scenario looked to me like the victory of the free market and the demise of the social structures that Polanyi would have said could ameliorate the effects of the worst excesses of the...
• Commented on 2117 revisited
  I can see a complete alteration even elimination in family structures. Probably not world universal however. To control population and manage the economy we: Sterilize everyone All reproduction is done ex utero All fetuses are preselected to eliminate defective genes...
• Commented on The light at the end of the tunnel (is not necessarily an oncoming train)
  HMS Insouciant Or perhaps the "What's Up Doc?"...
• Commented on Reality is broken
  Events in America confirm that we are all in an alternate reality now. The divergence became obvious recently but it's not clear at what exact moment it happened or who caused it. An irrational invasion? A hanging chad? An event...
• Commented on A game of consequences
  Lots of variables here: speed of communication, speed of travel, cost of transportation, frequency of contact. AI capabilities, costs. At each location: potential for self sufficiency, density of population, ease of expansion, cost of expansion, local risks external and internal,...
• Commented on A purely theoretical dilemma
  Can one of us join their hive mind and report back to advise us? Presumably that person will be fully informed about the consequences and true motivation behind the demand. Will they really be fully informed. Will we be able...
• Commented on The present in deep history
  A second, more considered pass at it. A The sociological or societals: 1 literacy to media to immersion and loss of privacy 2 demographic explosion 3 environmental impact- extinctions, degradations, eventual shortages 4 evolution of political economy- feudalism to monarchies...
• Commented on The present in deep history
  Nationalism and Globalization Industrialization (includes the Scientific Method) of: War Agriculture Means of production Transportation Communications Public Health and Sanitation Literacy and Media Growth of Popular Governments (Intermittently and incompletely) Environmental degradation...