SergeantMatt

I recently spent a while chatting to colleagues during a road trip, and was reminded that my training makes my thought a bit odd.
I think evolutionary biologists and geneticists become kind of comfortable with the idea that life on earth is both wonderful (in the original sense) and spectacularly cruel. Add to that the knowledge that the universe is slowly winding down and that life appeared on earth pretty much the moment the planet ceased to be molten and its hard to escape the idea that life itself is in some way an ongoing struggle against the very grain of the universe. In this framework, mankind's achievements in eliminating human predators, beating back disease, rolling back starvation and generally holding off the ghost of Malthus (however temporarily) seem like fairly audacious acts of rebellion.
In biotechnology (along with things like physics), we finally have the tools to really start fighting back. And in this most hopeful version of our future the marvels of the industrial revolution and the nuclear age might simply be the point where mankind got up, had a good stretch and took the first few proper jabs against the order of the universe.
This is what this topic is supposed to celebrate - the latest round of blows launched by the best rebels nature has yet produced.
May we live to produce more.

If the Martians didn't want to get genocided and colonized, they shouldn't have lived on our backup planet.

If the Martians didn't want to get genocided and colonized, they shouldn't have lived on our backup planet.

No, this isn't how it works at all.

T-72 autoloaders have eaten the arms of enough Soviet tank crewmen that the Russian Army was able to form an entire battalion of slavic Def Leppard tribute bands. 

I knew a guy who knew a guy that was the janitor at his middle school who, during World War 2, was a Tiger tank commander. This one time he stood in the turret of his tank, laughing maniacally, while American Sherman tanks futilely bounced shells off the impenetrable KRUPP STAHL. Did I mention that he was laughing maniacally? Yep. He laughed maniacally while his gunner one-shotted every Sherman with ease. That was until the last Sherman treacherously used a ditch to sneak around him and fired a shot into the rear of the Tiger at point blank range, blowing him in half.
...
...
He got better.

A few things about rich people:
 
In my experience there are different basic strata of richness, which can be easily determined by asking a putative rich person about taxes. If you get a complaint about paying the top tax rate, then that person is not rich but upper-middle class. If that person goes on at length about the accountant they use to shuffle money between tax havens while they carefully plan their lives around maintaining their status as non-tax residents, that person is rich. If you get a blank stare, followed by something along the lines of 'oh, but so-and-so handles it' then there is a good chance that that person is phenomenally rich. This is especially true when 'so-and-so' turns out to be a person in the first category who is a senior person at a well-established financial or law firm.
 
Even within these strata, however, there are an infinite number of ladders. The person with a yacht and a villa on a nice island feels himself to be a working stiff compared to a person with a fleet of planes who owns an island. And that person, in turn, is jealous of the person who owns a fleet of ships, an entire airport and a small country.
 
Finally; there is a difference between the type of rich where your parents were wealthy and you used the advantages they provided to join the ultra-rich, and the type where your great-great-granddad did something unspeakable to an entire people and you've never so much as had to think about money in your life. The latter are interesting, because they end up approaching dole poverty from the other direction. They never pay for anything, because it was all bought long ago and the trust will provide at the appropriate time. And they do pretty much what they want in terms of employment (often not bothering with much more than odd jobs or dabbling) because money is the sort of thing you buy groceries with; while the house, car, education, medical care, travel and holiday home just are.

Thunderf00t has been doing God's work lately:
 
 
 
 
 
All three videos are good, but the last is the best.  It is a brief glimpse of horrifying clarity into the minds of science fetishists.
 
A science fetishist is someone who has come to believe (correctly, as it turns out) that the systematic approach towards understanding the universe (often called "science") is the best, and it will be the means by which all the clean, shiny and beautiful people of the future will lord it over the sticky, sickly, filthy peasant scum of the future.  Having further reasoned (again, correctly) that they wish to be in the former, rather than the latter camp, science fetishists have decided that they will do anything to get on top of the most important trends of the future.  They'll upvote shit on Facebook.  They'll make viral videos on Youtube.  They'll evangelize.  They'll worship new gods and heroes.  They'll throw money at visionaries.  They will do anything short of actually making any effort to understand science.
 
Just because Elon Musk is throwing money at something does not make it a good idea.  Elon Musk is rich, and you are poor.  Rich people have the luxury of throwing money at dumb ideas and not starving.  Again, this is because they are rich.  Every once in a while one of these dumb ideas turns out to be a fantastically profitable idea masquerading as a dumb idea, and the rich person makes their money back plus something.  If the breaks are right this is sustainable, and thus it has turned into something of a sport for rich people, who call it venture capitalism.  They like it even more than polo, camel racing or even competitive spitting on poor people because, in addition to being fun, it helps them feel smart and responsible.  Feeling smart and responsible is a critical part of building up a rich person's confidence, which they need in order to establish social superiority over their most fearsome adversaries; other rich people.  I'm sorry; did you think I was going to say poor people?  No; rich people are not worried about poor people.  Poor people like you don't matter.
 
But you have to understand that venture capitalism is strictly a rich people sport.  Speculation and investment of any sort is a rich people sport; you need the enormous thermal mass provided by enormous piles of money in order to stay on the good side of the law of large numbers.  Oh yeah, sure, in theory a bunch of poor people could pool together their meager, filthy peasant money into some sort of serf penny pile and appoint a known expert to manage and diversify it for them and pay them pro rata.  In some far off time and place with different pass-through taxation laws, different real economic growth and different trade commission regulations this probably could theoretically even have worked.  Obviously, it would have worked even better for rich people, because everything works better for rich people because God loves them more.  That's why they're rich.
 
Or maybe you believe that rich people are that way because they know certain spells and incantations, or that they're all actually lizard people who have saved money on groceries by being ectothermic and have compounded those savings over centuries, or that they're all really devil worshippers who have exchanged their souls for worldly prosperity.  Whatever; it doesn't matter.  The bottom line is that superficially copying the habits of rich people will not make unwashed poor people such as yourself rich.  If you want to become rich, you have two options.  If think that you don't want to become rich you need to stop lying to yourself and realize that you really do want to become rich.  Option one is to be lucky.  I can offer no useful advice on that.  Option two is to work hard and actually understand how in the fuck the world works, and then try to manipulate it into diverting some of its delicious, glorious money to you.  On that I have little advice, save that throwing your money at obvious science fetishist bullshit is not going to help.

Especially epic historical war movies like Waterloo, that was great. And none of that CGI crap, actually get tens of thousands of extras for the war scenes.

I've been meditating a lot lately on humans that I hate.  I would say "people I hate," but once I take to hating a someone enough I de-classify them as a person.
 
I've been focusing on hate more because I've realized that there is no point in marinating in negative emotions.  What I had mistaken for righteous indignation was really jealousy.  I'm not angry at the fraudulent because I hate fraud; I'm angry because they're talentless hacks and I could do a far better job.  But I'm lazy, so you, my talented reader, you must do a better job, and become a more ravenous, vicious, and unstoppable leech than ever these mediocre reprobates could dream.
 
I got the idea when I was reading the latest drivel from our favorite poly sci majors, and I realized that the authors are fundamentally parasitic con artists, and, more to the point, half-assed ones.
 
The article is only worth reading if you want to heckle it.  It has no factual content.  The funniest part is probably where they're talking up the threat of firearms made on 3D printers, and then bring up the Ghost Gunner, which isn't a 3D printer.  It's a fucking mill.  You know, an example of that old-fashioned subtractive manufacture that's supposed to be obsolete now.  This is as intellectually honest as hyping the threat of being stung to death by zebras in the streets, and pointing out that tapirs will bite your fucking arm off as evidence of the severity of the threat.  I am, of course, heartened to see that these worms have doubled down on their claim that 3D printing is somehow applicable to clandestine manufacture of nuclear weapons, and are, as before, aggressively misunderstanding fundamental facts about isotope enrichment.  If there's anything that these scum are good at, it's ignoring basic fucking nuclear physics.
 
But other than that, it's not a particularly slick attempt to sew panic and profit thereby.  The best possible result from this sort of scaremongering is that some useless government regulatory agency will be set up to strangle 3D printing with useless regulations.  This useless agency will have some number of jobs that will be filled with poly sci majors and other unemployable refuse.  Anyone employed in this hypothetical useless agency would work nine to five in a cubicle, watching whatever their favorite deviant sort of porn is, calling in sick about a third of the time, and occasionally writing internal correspondence that will be beautifully devoid of meaning.  Is this sort of soul-raping mediocrity anyone's idea of a big steal?  Because if getting a fake job at a fake agency to police a fake threat is your notion of making it, please enclose yourself in a running incinerator.  You have some sort of pathogen that causes you to aspire to being a moderate nuisance, and that sort of plague needs to stop now.
 
The problem with these people is that their lies are small.  As we all know, big lies are better than little ones.  Don't stretch the truth; snap it right the fuck off.  The only thing standing between you and gigantic yachts made of cocaine is a sentimental attachment to the truth.  The lord of this world will only reward you fully if you embrace him fully.  Highly successful liars don't embroider the truth, they dispense with it entirely.  Consummate your marriage to darkness and falsity, and receive glorious rewards.  Don't say that the Eisenhower administration should have been more aggressive in defense spending and research.  Say that the Soviets have more bombers and more missiles.  You'll get to be president of Camelot, fuck Marilyn Monroe and will be spared the indignity of old age.  Don't say that 3D printing could change the way nuclear weapons are made in the future.  Claim that the Iranians and North Koreans, and hell, that the South Africans all made their nuclear weapons by using 3D printers.  When asked for evidence of your nonsense, point to the South African invasion of Sudan.  Say so with absolute arrogance and an unshakable air of moral superiority.  If you are loud and persistent enough, and lie outrageously enough, Satan will come through.
 
Don't shill for big coal companies by claiming that coal gasification technology will improve atmospheric conditions.  That's only stretching the truth.  You've got to go all the way, and just burn regular coal that you painted with Elmer's glue.  Your enemies will end up under review, and you'll get millions in tax credits.  Satan delivers.  Praise Satan.  But you have to be willing to go all the way with Satan.  Satan despises spineless, cowering wretches who sin a little to get ahead but still consider themselves fundamentally decent people.  Satan came through for the solar roadways bastards.  Satan came through for Leroy Jenkins.  Trust in Satan, and you will excel.  Don't you trust Satan?  Do you think that Satan is ignorant of your duplicity?  You cannot serve two masters.  Drink deep or taste not.

Fucking rad clothing system: 
 

I'm so glad I backed that. God damn. Also they're casually talking about systems I'd been desperately wanting in elder scrolls games.

This thread is for PC gaming, but let's mention that the console industry is basically in the process of imploding:

http://www.techradar.com/us/news/gaming/ps4-5-release-date-news-and-rumors-all-the-latest-on-sony-s-playstation-4-upgrade-1319621

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/xbox-one-scorpio-getting-trade-in-programs-from-re/1100-6441638/

Microsoft and Sony are both slated to release new consoles (which they've couched as "upgrades" - not that that helps the MSRP any) for winter 2016, just three years after the release of the last generation.
Why? No surprise to us PC builders; RAM has gotten way cheaper, graphics cards and processors have zoomed ahead, and SSDs have gotten far, far cheaper. I worked at a video game store in 2014 and it was obvious to me that the XBOX One and PS4 were simply doomed; too little too late. They had been in development too long and by the time they were released didn't represent a very good value.

The console is in its death throes, I think.

https://imgur.com/gallery/nw9TX

I am increasingly convinced that Trump's success is due to his opponents being feckless idiots than his campaign team being particularly clever.  Perhaps they are clever; we may never know because currently he hasn't been campaigning against anyone who has shown unambiguous signs of having a central nervous system.
 
Trump gets it coming and going now.  He is in charge of the OODA loop, to use corporate-appropriated military lingo.  Every single time he opens his mouth he is subsequently loudly denounced for being an evil racist liar.  And then the people doing the denouncing shut up and wait for him to say something else they can excoriate him for.
 
This is idiotic.  It's letting Trump get to say whatever he wants to say about anything.  Nobody contests him for the idea-space.  They think they can just react whenever he says something idiotic and offensive, and that he'll like, I dunno, disembowel himself out of shame or something.  The man obviously does not feel shame; there is no way this can work.  This approach has been failing for the better part of a year now, but nobody seems to have any alternatives whatsoever.
 
The US Government decides not to press charges against Clinton.  Trump can say that the system is rigged; this is just more proof that he needs to be elected so he can clean everything.  If they had pressed charges against Clinton then he would have said that it proves that the system is filled with corruption and criminals and he needs to be elected so he can clean up everything.  The actual events don't matter; it's letting him have the first say in everything and not challenging his hold on center stage.
 
The Clinton campaign site talks about how the US cannot afford to elect Trump as president.  The Trump campaign site talks about how Clinton is an untrustworthy liar.  The Clinton campaign has already ceded the concept of Trump as a candidate.  The Trump campaign doesn't even refer to Clinton like she's a peer.  The Clinton campaign has done nothing, that I am aware of, to redress this sort of posturing.
 
In the minds of everyone who hates Trump, this makes him look like a provocateur and a bully.  But that doesn't hurt him; those people weren't voting for him anyway.  The big question is what this makes him look like to the people who were on the fence.  I have a guess; when people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature, they will like the strong horse.
 
Whether or not that's enough to make him win is an open question.  The current guess is "probably not," but seven months ago the guess would have been "lolwutno," so there's an obvious trend-line there.

Yeah, but the youth vote doesn't usually matter that much because, you know, young people are too apathetic and don't come out to vote.

Also, what problem? It's pretty consistent with what we know about how people vote. And it's also entirely correct to say that younger people have a lot more at stake when it comes to this whole Brexit thing, whatever the consequences may be

Too late, France and Russia aren't in the main release and will be DLCs, even though combined they made up 58% of Allied losses.

Where is "voted for a terrible war that killed hundreds of thousands of people, destablized the entire Middle East, and spawned ISIS?"
 
Or "backed a coup in Honduras that turned Honduras into the murder capital of the world?"

I'm excited to see what they'll add with expansions in a few months. Obviously more events and anomalies with every one, more endgame catastrophes, more techs. Ground combat seems likely to get an overhaul, very bare bones right now.

I'm excited to see what they'll add with expansions in a few months. Obviously more events and anomalies with every one, more endgame catastrophes, more techs. Ground combat seems likely to get an overhaul, very bare bones right now.

Only because it seems by "realistic" people seem to mean "sepia-toned".
Real-life is actually pretty colorful.

It's probably a symptom of them being fucking stupid
 
oh look we have this virtually carbon neutral power source with ridiculous energy density
 
let's not use it