311–320 of 321 posts
Shouldn't the guy who runs this site be concerned about copyright infringement? Not sure to what extent the Asimov estate cracks down on unauthorized copies but he should be cautious.
It would be borderline insanity for the Asimov estate to enforce rights in a case like this. You couldn't buy better publicity than this thread.
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The Wager doesn't attempt to prove God, it merely states that you might as well worship, because the cost is small and the potential payoff is huge. It falls apart because, based on what's actually known, there's no reason to think worshipping might be the thing that condemns you to hell, and not doing so gets you into heaven, rather than the other way around.
Not to mention that "the cost is small" is in the eye of the beholder. I've known people who spend a significant part of their week on religious activities, and that's a huge opportunity cost. Granted, if your belief is based on Pascal's Wager, and is only to hedge your bets, presumably you wouldn't spend much time on religion. But that also raises the question of whether that style of "belief" would be good enough f…
Pascal did actually consider other religions. He just concluded that they were definitely wrong. In his view, either (his brand of) Christianity was correct, or god doesn’t exist.
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According to HN, every employer, and general social chatter, apparently yes.
Well, speaking from what I hear and see, employers want you to start using it so that you can be more productive. They've been sold this tool and want you to learn it so that your output will grow. That's not an unfair take, I think. Again, just IME, they expect too much because the tool is oversold: it does not deliver that well. And we always hear, this new model is so much better, it's tiring. I think we should al…
I know I'm shouting into the void, but seriously.
I remember the first time I heard this story. I was maybe 7 at a planetarium and they animated it with music little hand drawn starships and retro computers floating among the stars. They turned the stars all out for the final scene.
This is one of those stories, just like the SR-71 "ground speed check" story, that every single time I see it posted I just have to read the entire thing again. I love it.
You better watch out. When my evil twin feels y'all aren't upvoting my posts enough he thinks "let's do a search for articles that have gotten 200+ votes at least 5 times in different years" [1] It's a highly effective strategy that I know dang doesn't like! So I'll post another article about robot grippers which you should upvote instead of the breathless "AI will give us more Nobel Prize winning research" posts bec…
An absolute classic! Was just telling a buddy about this one the other day while talking about The Egg by Andy Weir (another short story I really enjoy). Every time I read this one, I get chills at the end. Asimov really was a master.
This is one of those stories, just like the SR-71 "ground speed check" story, that every single time I see it posted I just have to read the entire thing again. I love it.
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> he was working as an instructor (not a professor) No he eventually became a full professor too. "He began work in 1949 with a $5,000 salary(equivalent to $68,000 in 2025), maintaining this position for several years. By 1952, however, he was making more money as a writer than from the university, and he eventually stopped doing research, confining his university role to lecturing students.[g] In 1955, he was promot…
> In 1955, he was promoted to tenured associate professor. In December 1957, Asimov was dismissed from his teaching post, with effect from June 30, 1958, due to his lack of research. I thought the whole point of getting tenure is that you can't get fired.
For a while I thought I really liked sci fi novels and short stories, and maybe that's somewhat true. But I've started wondering if maybe I just liked Asimov's writing in particular. Other writers in the genre are more hit or miss. Can anyone recommend other writers that are on his level?
Ted Chiang is the greatest living science fiction short story writer I'm aware of, and ranks highly on my all time list.