[Non-political] News that makes you Laugh/Cry/Both...

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Tue Oct 23, 2012 5:16 pm

I know one that got so gun happy he started swearing & shooting skyward in the woods that he was going to hunt down and kill Bigfoot, after hearing it stumble around. He's since started his own branch of the sasquatch community that focuses on the hunting and killing philosophy, haven't really heard from him since.

By the way, I have a relatively well-known Bigfoot researcher as a step-father, so I've met all kinds. The "Bigfoot is a four-dimensional entity" fellow was particularly weird.

ckafrica · Post by **ckafrica** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 9:21 am

FrankTrollman wrote:The "Anthropologist's Veto" is the idea that absolutely any declarative statement you might want to make about human behavior can have a valid counter example brought up by anthropologists who happen to be familiar with some group or another (usually that group is in Southeast Asia or Oceania, but the principle applies universally). True to form: Cambodian Spider Eaters.

-Username17

I used to live in Cambodia but never got around to eating one of those. My friend said the legs were pretty good but the body was like motor oil. The endangered deer I was served once was excellent

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 9:40 am

ckafrica wrote:The endangered deer I was served once was excellent

According to Jeremy Clarkson, whale with grated puffin is delicious. But seal flipper tastes "exactly like a hot Turkish urinal".

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 9:29 am

http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/fil ... lution.pdf
Peak-Oil, a busted Myth?

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 10:05 am

Stahlseele wrote:http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/fil ... lution.pdf
Peak-Oil, a busted Myth?

No.

What the author of that tirade has "discovered" is that as our oil prices got fucking crazy in the mid naughts that people became desperate enough to utilize deeper wells and shittier oil reserves. For fuck's sake, we are literally extracting hydrocarbons by shattering shale and scraping it out of tar sands.

And yet: despite going after hydrocarbon resources that were previously deemed too costly to exploit (and spending trillions of dollars to do it), actual global oil production has stayed static for the last seven years. The linked essay focuses on how the size of the reserves keeps going up as long as you keep adding more crappier things to what counts as an oil reserve - but the important issue as far as peak oil is concerned is the extraction rate. And that hasn't gone up since before Hurricane Katrina.

Peak oil happened. As in: early in Bush's second term, global reserves began getting depleted as fast as new reserves could be brought on line. Yes, many of these newer reserves will last a long time - there is a lot of fucking tar sand in the world. But it's still going to be slower than letting sweet crude bubble out of a well. As we switch to more unconventional oil reserves, the total barrels we get per day are going to fall. And while it is going to take a very long time to actually run out of oil, that's not what peak oil means. Peak oil means that we can't draw oil out of the ground any faster than we are already doing and thus that the world economy cannot increase its oil addiction any more. That already happened.

-Username17

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 10:35 am

Stahlseele wrote:Peak-Oil, a busted Myth?

That sentence makes no sense. Peak oil is absolutely a thing. For peak oil to not be a thing, you would have to argue that production of oil can go up forever towards infinity, which is obviously not true because oil is finite and production of oil at any non-zero pace, let alone an increasing pace, will deplete that finite quantity. Peak oil is just the point at which oil production reaches the highest point it will ever reach on the planet Earth. If the Earth had just exploded, and you had a graph of yearly oil production, peak oil is just the highest point on that graph. The only actual discussion you can have about peak oil is what year that it will turn out to have happened in. If that year is "3013," we don't really care right now. If that year is "2013," we care very much.

Leonardo Maugeri (the author) works for Eni's petrochemical branch, so he's an oil businessman. The study in question was funded by BP. Now, that doesn't necessarily make him wrong, but this paper is actually funded by oil companies and written by an actual oil company executive so... yeah. I went into it expecting a lot of bullshit and deceit. And lo and behold, I was not disappointed: that paper is actually even worse than Frank (who has largely ninja'd me here) thinks it is. I refer you to the first paper shattering error.

Page 1, Figure 1: He is lumping crude oil and NGLs together. NGL stands for natural gas liquid, i.e. methane and shit like that. That diagram deceitfully suggests that production of crude oil is going up, but in reality, the production of NGL's is the only thing going up significantly and is the only thing projected to go up significantly. And that's useless, because natural gases and petroleum are not used for the same things. Increases in the production of natural gases do very little to ease transportation costs (we know that because natural gas production is going up right now, crude oil production is staying flat, and transportation costs are either rising or going up).

This is a reoccurring theme throughout the paper, and it means all of his very impressive data actually uses the growth of natural gas production to hide the absolute shitty future of crude oil that is staring us in the face.

Josh_Kablack · Post by **Josh_Kablack** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 6:34 pm

Not sure if best of craigslist counts as news, but here ya go

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 11:13 pm

I figured I'd be remiss if I didn't post this here for Koumei to find. Bandai Japan is making actual Sailor Moon figures.

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Fri Oct 26, 2012 12:22 am

Prak_Anima wrote:I figured I'd be remiss if I didn't post this here for Koumei to find. Bandai Japan is making actual Sailor Moon figures.

Maybe it's that I'm kind of a toy geek already (as you might guess from Shrapnel's inclusion in my gaming group, and my general familiarity with him) but I'm definitely interested in seeing where this goes.

Might even buy one if they're not fucknuts expensive.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Fri Oct 26, 2012 12:29 am

I can't wait until I get home so I can check that link :D

I had some Sailor Moon dolls/figures when I was in my early teens (all of the Inner Senshi). Then I gave them away to someone younger when I thought I had grown out of it (dohoho), and then around 20-21 I bought a couple more at conventions.

Granted, for convention purchases, I have like 3 different Ikkitousen sets, which shoulders Sailor Moon out just on numbers there.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Fri Oct 26, 2012 12:54 am

(Assuming this works) they look pretty good:

Ted the Flayer · Post by **Ted the Flayer** » Fri Oct 26, 2012 5:04 am

Pssht. Sailor Moon is for girls.

On an unrelated note, season 3 of My Little Pony will be up on the 10th of next month (assuming no more delays). I'm stoked.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Fri Oct 26, 2012 7:22 am

*snickers* ^^
i will probably see some of these action figures on my buddies shelves sooner or later i guess.

Hmm, wonder how a sailor moon/MLP crossover would work out . .
Technically, Twilight Sparkle would have to be sailor moon, because they are the main characters . . but i'd have twili more pegged as mercury myself . . derpy would make a good sailor moon i guess O.o
applejack might be blonde, but she's more of a jupiter i think.
pinkie pie could maybe work as moon too, but probably better as venus.
rarity is mars, hooves down . .
fluttershy is making this a bit more complicated, because there are 6 ponies and only 5 inner circle senshi . . but she could, maybe, be Neptune.
Rainbow Dash would be Uranus.
Zecora would be Pluto.
Luna is Saturn.
Celestia is Galaxia?

Big Mac or Shining Armor gets to be Motoki and Prince Blueblood would have to do Mamoru.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Tue Oct 30, 2012 8:41 pm

Disney announces plans to purchase Lucasfilms, release episode VII in 2015.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Tue Oct 30, 2012 9:34 pm

wat.

also:
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=29056
WIFI LAMPS!

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 1:24 am

Prak_Anima wrote:(Assuming this works) they look pretty good:

I would totally buy that chick holding the Sailor Moon figure.

Ted the Flayer wrote:Pssht. Sailor Moon is for girls.

On an unrelated note, season 3 of My Little Pony will be up on the 10th of next month (assuming no more delays). I'm stoked.

I hope to dear Primus that that is intentional irony.

Prak_Anima wrote:Disney announces plans to purchase Lucasfilms, release episode VII in 2015.

AARRGGHH!! NURDRAGE AGAINST DISNEY AAAAHHHHAAGGGHH!!

Ted the Flayer · Post by **Ted the Flayer** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 2:17 am

In star wars canon, there's a species of all female bisexual space nymphos. I'm thinking Disney could make the REAL happiest place on earth!

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 2:18 am

Hey, Marvel was bought by Disney, and look how awesome it's recent movies have been.

erik · Post by **erik** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 2:32 am

Shrapnel wrote:
Prak_Anima wrote:Disney announces plans to purchase Lucasfilms, release episode VII in 2015.
AARRGGHH!! NURDRAGE AGAINST DISNEY AAAAHHHHAAGGGHH!!

Really? I was thinking, damn, they'll do a damn sight better than Lucas did with his last 3.

I'm not saying they'll be good. But I might actually be able to watch them without using fast forward past everything that doesn't involve a lightsaber (this was before I could just go to youtube and find just the lightsaber scenes, thankyou internet).

Ted the Flayer · Post by **Ted the Flayer** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 2:51 am

George Lucas writes a massive amount of stuff. Most of it is shit, but some of it is very good. And if you have someone that can pick through the shit to find the gems you might have a pretty good movie. I think having all the money and time in the world killed episodes 1-3; if Lucas had similar restraints like he did in 4-6 they would have been much better movies.

Taishan · Post by **Taishan** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:06 am

I hear the former heads of Bioware are looking for jobs, O Disney Overlords.

Voss · Post by **Voss** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:13 am

Ted the Flayer wrote:George Lucas writes a massive amount of stuff. Most of it is shit, but some of it is very good. And if you have someone that can pick through the shit to find the gems you might have a pretty good movie. I think having all the money and time in the world killed episodes 1-3; if Lucas had similar restraints like he did in 4-6 they would have been much better movies.

If he had remembered some of the things he had said while filming 4-6 they would have been better. His comments during some of the 'behind the scenes' footage from the originals talked about not forgetting the story behind the special effects a lot. Then, well... apparently he forgot.

Script and intent will matter a lot with this. If its just marketing and branding to cycle some monies around, then it will be shit. If there is an actual attempt to tap into some of the themes behind the originals (as old and rehashed as some of the themes are, some do actually resonate) in addition to brand monies, it could be not bad. But it needs to be more than talking heads interspersed with pure special effects shots.

Hopefully though, they won't let Lucas near the director's chair at all.

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:37 am

Eh, Episode 3 produced so much unintentional hilarity I can't be mad at it (although by any actual merit it's terrible;) the other two, though, were not even ironically entertaining, just a blight on the world.

Disney can produce good shit (even ignoring the Marvel stuff recently, Disney made a lot of good movies in the 80s-90s,) so coupled with the awfulness of the prequel trilogy I'm guessing that there's no where to go but up; Darths and Droids has vowed to cover Episodes VII-IX so worst case scenario we get good fodder for that comic.

The amusing part to me is that Lucas says that he's "always believed that 'Star Wars' could live beyond [him], and [he] thought it was important to set up the transition during [his] lifetime" despite him being a control freak and all (not that I'm surprised that sacks of money can make people say and do things they normally wouldn't.)

K · Post by K » Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:43 am

Disney has a winning formula of of tossing mad stacks of cash at talented script-writers, so it's hard to see how worse Star Wars can be made now that Lucas has finally got his death-grip off the franchise.

I mean, even if the only improvement they make is avoiding the casual racism, joke characters, and the lamest of plot holes, it's going to be a much better series than 1-3.

Blasted · Post by **Blasted** » Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:47 am

I'd actually like to see Lasseter take a swing at redoing eps. 1-3,
Starwars Episode 2: New Script Edition

There would be a lot to like there, especially if they could just redo the dialogue and CGI the lip syncing. Or something.