Monthly Archives: September 2014

I Can Tolerate Anything Except The Outgroup

[Content warning: Politics, religion, social justice, spoilers for “The Secret of Father Brown”. This isn’t especially original to me and I don’t claim anything more than to be explaining and rewording things I have heard from a bunch of other … Continue reading

Even More Links For September 2014

Data science divides the music world into 1264 genres, and the Guardian wants to show us all of them. Okay, ten of them. Including “charred death”, “deep filthstep”, and “skweee”. This is a joke: Five Ways ISIS Can Reduce Its … Continue reading

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Bottomless Pits Of Suffering

I. A friend on Facebook recently posted the following dilemma, which of course I cannot find right now so I have to vaguely quote my recollection of it: Would you rather the medieval Church had spent all of its money … Continue reading

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Cuddle Culture

[Content warning: TMI, polyamory.] I. Another one of those times three very different people writing three very different things all remind me of each other. Ozy got very excited recently because Heartiste wrote a post attacking polyamory (Ozy reminds me … Continue reading

Why No Science Of Nerds?

Different groups navel-gaze in different ways. Broadway musical writers write a bunch of musicals about what it’s like to be on Broadway. Poets write a bunch of poems about writing poetry. Philosophers speculate on how philosophy may be the most … Continue reading

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Streetlight Psychology

Recent article on Vox: Do Violent Video Games Actually Make People More Violent? It’s a good and even-handed article which concludes: The short answer [is] we don’t really know. Some studies have indeed found that, in lab settings, people can … Continue reading

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Book Review: Red Plenty

I. I decided to read Red Plenty because my biggest gripe after reading Singer’s book on Marx was that Marx refused to plan how communism would actually work, instead preferring to leave the entire matter for the World-Spirit to sort … Continue reading

SSC Gives A Wedding Speech

[I gave a speech at Mike Blume and Hannah “Alicorn” Blume’s wedding on Sunday. Some of the guests suggested I post it here for more general consumption. Content warning: polyamory.] I’ve been asked to give an impromptu speech. Specifically, I … Continue reading

Open Thread 5: My Best Friend’s Threadding

I’m off to California for the weekend to attend Alicorn and Mike’s wedding, so don’t expect much SSC for a few days. Here’s an Open Thread to keep you occupied till then. 1. Comments of the “month” are Robby on … Continue reading

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More Links For September 2014

Jeff Kaufman wades through conflicting claims about the effectiveness of SAT coaching. And speaking of which: Scott Aaronson endorses Steven Pinker’s critique of the college admissions process, which you might remember from the last links post here. Yet another very … Continue reading

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