Monthly Archives: April 2016

Why Were Early Psychedelicists So Weird?

[Epistemic status: very speculative, asserted with only ~30% confidence. On the other hand, even though psychiatrists don’t really talk about this it’s possible other groups know this all already] A few weeks ago I gave a presentation on the history … Continue reading

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Book Review: Albion’s Seed

I. Albion’s Seed by David Fischer is a history professor’s nine-hundred-page treatise on patterns of early immigration to the Eastern United States. It’s not light reading and not the sort of thing I would normally pick up. I read it … Continue reading

OT48: Open Your Heart

This is the bi-weekly open thread. Post about anything you want, ask random questions, whatever. Also: 1. Thanks to everyone who attended the SSC meetups in California. A few people have asked about doing something like that more regularly even … Continue reading

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Links 4/16: They Can’t Link Our Dick

[Disclaimer: None of these immediately set off alarms, but I have not double-checked all of them to make sure they are accurate. Please correct me if any are false or misleading] Zerão is a Brazilian football stadium with the dividing … Continue reading

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SSC Bay Area Meetups 2016

The following Slate Star Codex meetups are planned for the next week or so: Berkeley, Sunday 4/17 at 2:00 PM at CFAR office, 2030 Addison, 7th floor, Berkeley San Jose, Monday 4/18 at 7:00 PM at a private house, 3806 … Continue reading

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OT47: OpenAI

This is the bi-weekly open thread. Post about anything you want, ask random questions, whatever. Also: 1. There’s a new ad on the sidebar for Signal Data Science. This is a rare ad I can (sort of) testify for – … Continue reading

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A Theory About Religion

Related to Monday’s post but spun off for length reasons: my crazy theory about where religion comes from. The near-universal existence of religion across cultures is surprising. Many people have speculated on what makes tribes around the world so fixated … Continue reading

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The Ideology Is Not The Movement

I. Why is there such a strong Sunni/Shia divide? I know the Comparative Religion 101 answer. The early Muslims were debating who was the rightful caliph. Some of them said Abu Bakr, others said Ali, and the dispute has been … Continue reading

Beware Regional Scatterplots

[Epistemic status: Not original, but worth mentioning] I’ve been using scatterplots of different states and countries a lot here lately. For example, this one in the discussion about guns: And this one in the discussion about national happiness: Hopefully we … Continue reading

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