Viewing profile — madeofmeat

Sure, the view that volition is an illusion is not self-contradictory. And I get that this is a very useful view, because it lets us set aside "conscious inner experiences" and jus…

"Consciousness is an illusion" I take the word "illusion" to mean, some type of experience which misleads one about reality. And "consciousness" to mean, the experience of having e…

"Everyone" doesn't vote all-red or all-blue. 30% vote all red, 30% all blue, and 40% stay home because there is never a sensible centrist candidate. Each of the 30% active voters t…

They have a public domain English translation free at gutenberg.org

A municipal government doesn't have a way to impact anything China does. They're stuck between either doing ineffective things like drinking straw bans, or just admitting their hel…

The Pinkertons have been corporate mercenaries for the railroad corporations in western genre novels, since I was old enough to read. The only new thing here is it's a top-selling …

> we cannot enforce decentralization Sure we can, it's called antitrust law.

They wouldn't, and that was intended. It's obvious this law would restrict economic development, but the Hebrews made that tradeoff for social stability. The main feature of the Ju…

Simple, they just stamp their hooves the right number of times.

But trade was a tiny percentage of either country's economy: these countries had total annual exports something close to 5% of their GDPs. In contrast, for example the USA now expo…

Population density of Taiwan: 650/square km. Canada: 4/square km. Naturally there will be huge differences in what is cost-effective for these two very different countries.

Seconding "A Fire Upon the Deep": a fast-paced, high-stakes action adventure in a zany, 5th Element-esque space opera universe. Explores the idea of strong AI in a unique and inter…