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Joined 3 years ago
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Cake day: June 10th, 2023

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  • It’s been a while so bits of this might be wrong. Manifolds give me PTSD.

    A euclidean space is one where pythagoras’ theorem is true, like on a piece of paper. Even if you roll up the paper, everything still works the same. The angles of a triangle still add to 180 etc

    But the surface of a sphere doesn’t work like that. You can’t fold up the paper into a sphere, it’s fundamentally different. Geometry changes a bit on the surface too, and you have to modify pythagoras theorem for it to describe triangles in one of these spaces. And the internal angles don’t add to 180 anymore.

    These are non-euclidean spaces, aka Riemannian spaces.

    So the meme is saying “ha ha you’re in a non-Euclidean space, it just looks like that because you’re small, dumb dumb! Why don’t you draw a big triangle, measure the angles and then cry yourself to sleep?”


  • The meme is funny, this isn’t criticism of that.

    BUT this general point always rubs me the wrong way. Do people realise how fucking big space is? The observable universe contains so many fucking planets that we don’t even know exist, some of which have their own oceans we know absolutely nothing about. We have literally no idea what like 95% of the stuff out there even is (dark matter, dark energy).

    And that’s just the observable universe. The rest of it likely comprises even more space than the observable universe. And that isn’t “stuff we don’t know yet,” it’s literally “stuff we could probably never know based on the laws of physics.”

    Like we know surprisingly little about the ocean. That is shocking. But there is no need to make such a bizarre claim to get that across.

    OK, rant over.





  • I don’t think they procreate. If they were interested in continuing humanity they wouldn’t be so strict about their philosophy. They would “pick the fucking apple” as Carol puts it. It’s a feature, not a bug.

    IMO all they want is enough time and bodies to send a new signal before humanity goes extinct.

    Whether it’s a prelude to invasion or just a rogue virus still trying to spread itself is anyone’s guess.




  • Trump just seems to repeat the thoughts of the last person he spoke to that actually got through to him somehow. Why Putin seems to be so good at doing that is anyone’s guess.

    In any case, this will continue until he meets some European leaders again. I think the person who flipped him last time seems to have been King Charles?

    But this all just shows it doesn’t even matter. As Orwell said:

    “The enemy is the gramophone mind, whether or not one agrees with the record that is being played at the moment.”

    He is too dumb to do anything else. The record will be changed and changed back again and again.



  • British here. You’re right. It’s the culmination of decades of intentional misinformation and stoking the fears of the racist and stupid. Appealing to the politicians spreading this (e.g. Farage) is useless. Appealing to the public is useless.

    I heard a story about a friend of a friend who thought that one million immigrants entered Britain every day. As in, the population would literally double in two months if this was true. But not only did he not realise that, he repeated the “fact” to other people.

    Obviously a lot of us are fine. But Reform is leading in the polls and people believe shit like that so the reality is most of us are not.





  • And this from the press release:

    In its long history, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has honoured brave women and men who have stood up to repression, who have carried the hope of freedom in prison cells, on the streets and in public squares, and who have shown by their actions that peaceful resistance can change the world. […]

    When authoritarians seize power, it is crucial to recognise courageous defenders of freedom who rise and resist. Democracy depends on people who refuse to stay silent, who dare to step forward despite grave risk, and who remind us that freedom must never be taken for granted, but must always be defended – with words, with courage and with determination.






  • Yes, but people also misuse the idea that’s it’s misused to shut people up.

    E.g.: hey maybe we shouldn’t starve children to death?

    Zionist: wow why do you only criticise Israel like this, you anti-semite!

    Point goes unanswered, OP probably feels the need to defend themselves instead of pursuing their valid point.

    Alternatively…

    Racist: some groups are just not compatible with western culture

    Someone: you can’t make assumptions about massive groups of people. Many people come to the west because they don’t agree with their culture. To assume everyone from one place is the same is racist.

    Racist: wow there you go! Don’t engage just scream “racist” at everyone you don’t like.

    Again, point goes unanswered. The person probably feels the need to defend this accusation again