Archive for June, 2008
Thursday, June 26th, 2008
Cultural drift and knowledge transmission…. IN SPAAAAACE!
It is the year Eleventy-Billion CE. The last vestiges of humanity have boarded the spaceship that soon will take flight toward what we hope is a habitable star system (Glorb-32, if you’re curious) some 10000 light years away. The ship can only move at half the speed of light, so the journey will take approximately […]
7 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, culture, scifi by BitterOldPunk
Wednesday, June 25th, 2008
Why are cars shiny?
Automotive paint jobs seem to come in two flavors: high-gloss shiny finish, and then even shinier. But why? Is it market momentum (cars are shiny, so a non-shiny car is weird, so manufacturers don’t want to try selling non-shiny cars, ergo cars are shiny)? Is it just plain dazzle-and-flash? Is shininess inherent in a sufficiently […]
6 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, fashion by Josh Millard
Wednesday, June 25th, 2008
Air Conditioning on the London Underground
I read yesterday in the Metro that new cooling fans were being placed at a number of underground stations. Took them long enough! The article also stated that Mayor Boris was looking at ways of implementing Air conditioning onto the underground.Within the article it stated that there were issues getting air con onto underground trains. […]
2 Comments » - Posted in Uncategorized by PC-Clene
Tuesday, June 24th, 2008
Are spammers dumb, lazy, or incompetent?
Take spammer Stephen Sanchez, iProfile shill, who (round of applause here) is the first person to try sockpuppet spam on the Big Big Question.
Steve-o posted a (bizarrely practical!) question about resumes and then thoughtfully answered it himself under a different account, couched in a fictional happy discovery of a great new resource blah […]
8 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, culture, ethics, identity, meta, sociology, spam by Josh Millard
Friday, June 20th, 2008
What lessons have you learned the hard way?
What life lessons, or even small things, have you found yourself learning the hard way? What were the outcomes?
4 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, memory by IndigoRain
Wednesday, June 18th, 2008
Superstitions
What superstitions do you have? What little things do you do, or not do, even if you think/know it probably won’t hurt you?
2 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, metaphysics by IndigoRain
Wednesday, June 18th, 2008
What advancement has spoiled you?
As the world changes around us, we tend to get used to the “new”; this is especially true of those who are younger, and never really knew the “old”. Over time, this leads to a situation where it may be difficult to imagine having to live in a world without the things we today take […]
8 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, culture, sociology, technology by dyslexia
Wednesday, June 18th, 2008
What were you never gonna do?
One of the unavoidable constants of growing older is looking back and realizing how wrong you were about some things when you were younger. Big things and little things; stances taken on ethics, aesthetics, and so on.
In that spirit, what are you doing now that your younger self was never going to do? […]
9 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, identity, priorities by Josh Millard
Monday, June 16th, 2008
Do you read the obit pages?
If you’re a newspaper reader, are the obits a part of the paper you read daily? Occassionally? Never?
If you read them, why?
If you don’t read them, why not? Does it simply not occur to you to bother, or do you actively avoid them?
And, given that Netcraft has confirmed the imminent […]
8 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, communication, death by Josh Millard
Wednesday, June 11th, 2008
Breaking the curse of the couch
My friend’s couch is cursed, but only one side of it. The first time I laid with my head on the right side of the couch, a spider crawled along the back of the couch. The second time I laid there, a 2-inch-long moth was hanging out from behind the mirror above the […]
7 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, metaphysics by IndigoRain
Wednesday, June 11th, 2008
What should you do that you don’t?
If you’ll allow an overwrought metaphor, the gap between idealism and pragmatism is often wide and littered with the broken, sun-bleached bones of righteous convictions.
What are the things that you feel like you should be doing but which you just aren’t, for whatever reasons? What’s the thing that bugs you most? What’s the […]
5 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, priorities by Josh Millard
Sunday, June 8th, 2008
A two party system where you had to vote for the other party in the primary?
Election-as-human-nature-barometer: Imagine a two-party system where, during the primaries, you had to vote for the party that you were NOT a registered member of. So, if you’re a republican, you get to pick the democratic candidate.
Assume that people are actually registered in the party that most closely aligns with their values. Now, would this cross-party […]
2 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, politics by James Bickers
Friday, June 6th, 2008
Are you getting enough sleep?
If not, did you used to get enough sleep? What do you do instead of getting enough sleep?
Or are you getting too much sleep?
And where does your sense of what’s enough and whether you’re getting it come from? Your doctor? Folk wisdom? Self-assessment?
8 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, medicine by Josh Millard
Wednesday, June 4th, 2008
What if (a) free will didn’t exist, (b) people knew it didn’t exist, and (c) people had a gut-level feeling that it didn’t exist?
To answer this question, it shouldn’t matter if you actually believe in free will or not. This is a counter-factual (though, personally, I don’t believe in free will).
Let’s say an entire world of people didn’t believe in free will (and that they were right). What would such a world be like?
Let’s say the world […]
23 Comments » - Posted in bigbig, metaphysics, philosophy by grumblebee
Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008
Suicide by inaction?
You discover you have a disease which will eventually kill you if it is left untreated. It could take weeks or years. There are a few treatment options available.
The cost of the treatment is not a factor - you have great health insurance.
The treatments offered to you may have serious side effects, but they […]