12 replies on “The Stratosphere Lounge Episode 217”
That audio at the end was classic – that may have made this my favorite TSL ever!
I was really moved by the Star Citizen send off. No finer friends could you find in all the cyberverse.
I just came in to see if the last 2 minutes of audio survived the cutting room floor 🙂
Bill, you still need to relabel the April 25 episode to “Stratosphere Lounge Episode 216”.
The main reason for two warring parties to go at each other is the idea of power over others vs. autonomous self-governance. When one party tries to assert power over another party, that is the impetus for any war let alone civil. The big difference between the first American Civil War and the one that is to come is geographical boundaries. As Bill said, the person sitting next to you at the ball game could be your ideological enemy. And ideas spawn action. It is only a matter of time before you or the other guy draw first blood as one tries to assert power over the other.
Since ideas are bullet-proof, what ideas do some people embrace that others abhor? How about the idea of truth? What is truth? What are its characteristics? Is truth unchanging and eternal or malleable and finite. If there is such a thing as truth then does anti-truth exist as an effect of truth? Does truth impute anti-truth? Why are truth and anti-truth mutually exclusive? How did the idea of mutual exclusivity come about? Is truth self-evident as America’s founders declared in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident…” Was that truth only self-evident to the founders or was the King of Great Britain exempt? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Likewise, which came first, the truth or the lie? The answer to these questions is, “It depends.” It depends on the person’s beliefs. A person’s beliefs inform their interpretation of words. So, the answers to the questions above will not be the same for each person. One person will say truth is absolute and the next will say its not. One person will say the opposite of morality is immorality and the other will say there is no morality (i.e. everything is amoral as long as it doesn’t interfere with their practices).
What standard does society use to divide male from female? Before scientists were able to peer into a cell’s nucleus, we had “male and female created he them.” Thankfully, geneticists confirmed this self-evident truth when they discovered the XY/XX sex chromosomes that separates men from women. This was the standard before it was debased by progressives.
The flaw in Bill’s reparations argument is longevity. Which generation is entitled to reparations? Actually, all generations after the first generation harmed are equally entitled to reparations. Therefore, grievances will never go away as long as the grievers have descendants. Reparations will continue indefinitely because the descendants of the first recipients of reparations will have the same claim to reparations as first, causing a cascading effect. This is the scenario that any progressive would take.
The self-evident truth is that there IS a standard of eternal, unchanging truth and that for civil society to exist peaceably, one standard of truth must be established for all people. Unfortunately, two people will not agree on what that standard is. And this is the impetus for civil war.
For two thousand years, there was a standard established in a book called the Bible. This book has been the bedrock of society. This book claims there is someone who knows the heart of every man. And that person exhibits a standard of truth that no man can match. And anyone who does not match that standard is in rebellion. But this book also has good news for anyone who acknowledges their rebellion.
Truth to insanity! Reality always determines the end result. Only what can happen will happen. The so called progressive “philosophy” is dead BECAUSE it is anti-reality. The really down side is that it can take everyone with it as it goes extinct.
The ultimate fix is to stop feeding them. Otherwise, they will continue to eat us alive. They survive because of human sacrifice until there is no one and nothing else to be sacrificed.
Many thanks for kindly taking my question @ 30:35, Bill! It surprised me a bit that you went to propulsion improvements first, as I’ve wondered if there aren’t other big but maybe less glamorous pieces of the picture we’ve neglected more (off-Earth food production, building radiation-shielded shelter, producing breathable air, etc.). I can certainly see how a substantial leap in propulsion would help (Earth to Mars in hours instead of months would certainly be a game-changer), but if seems like if we have to we can also get to the nearby places via conventional rockets as Musk is proposing. I think of the long trans-Atlantic journey American colonists made, and know that we can endure such things when the future is at stake. That said, it’s indeed a shame that projects like NERVA were abandoned for lack of will. Your “tour of The Lost Future” story about NERVA moved me to hang the accompanying pictures on my office wall alongside some other bits of inspiration from the Apollo and X-plane days. I put them there to remind myself of the great things we can achieve when we put our minds to it. I hope we can rekindle that spirit of indomitable determination. The recent resurgence in rocket development has been encouraging, at least.
What a beautiful and fitting tribute you all put together in Star Citizen. Thank you for sharing that story with us. It’s helped me start to see what you do in the medium, its human dimension and potential cultural importance. It’s also reminded me what a great group of human beings I’ve had the good fortune to fall in with. Ad astra, Bobcat! My loss that I hadn’t had the chance to get to know you yet.
Yeah, I was thinking more about how you could survive one there as well. A big question I had was, what the heck do we do about asteroids? Isn’t it only a matter of time before one comes along and wipes any space settlement we could build off the map?
The african runner Caster Semenya is a genuine intersex person. She/ He does not claim to be a man or woman and that is medically confirmed. The she has multiple X and Y chromosomes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex
“Such variations may involve genital ambiguity, and combinations of chromosomal genotype and sexual phenotype other than XY-male and XX-female.”
“The sex test results were never published officially, but some results were leaked in the press and are widely discussed, resulting in claims about Semenya having an intersex trait.”
Took me only minutes to check it. Not transgender. This is all about getting the Olympic committees and other sporting bodies to figure out what to do when gender is genuinely busted. Intersex is on the rise world wide for reasons not fully know.
Cryogenics has been done successfully in the 1990’s with dogs. Further research was blocked by ethics committees.
12 replies on “The Stratosphere Lounge Episode 217”
That audio at the end was classic – that may have made this my favorite TSL ever!
I was really moved by the Star Citizen send off. No finer friends could you find in all the cyberverse.
I just came in to see if the last 2 minutes of audio survived the cutting room floor 🙂
Bill, you still need to relabel the April 25 episode to “Stratosphere Lounge Episode 216”.
The main reason for two warring parties to go at each other is the idea of power over others vs. autonomous self-governance. When one party tries to assert power over another party, that is the impetus for any war let alone civil. The big difference between the first American Civil War and the one that is to come is geographical boundaries. As Bill said, the person sitting next to you at the ball game could be your ideological enemy. And ideas spawn action. It is only a matter of time before you or the other guy draw first blood as one tries to assert power over the other.
Since ideas are bullet-proof, what ideas do some people embrace that others abhor? How about the idea of truth? What is truth? What are its characteristics? Is truth unchanging and eternal or malleable and finite. If there is such a thing as truth then does anti-truth exist as an effect of truth? Does truth impute anti-truth? Why are truth and anti-truth mutually exclusive? How did the idea of mutual exclusivity come about? Is truth self-evident as America’s founders declared in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident…” Was that truth only self-evident to the founders or was the King of Great Britain exempt? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Likewise, which came first, the truth or the lie? The answer to these questions is, “It depends.” It depends on the person’s beliefs. A person’s beliefs inform their interpretation of words. So, the answers to the questions above will not be the same for each person. One person will say truth is absolute and the next will say its not. One person will say the opposite of morality is immorality and the other will say there is no morality (i.e. everything is amoral as long as it doesn’t interfere with their practices).
What standard does society use to divide male from female? Before scientists were able to peer into a cell’s nucleus, we had “male and female created he them.” Thankfully, geneticists confirmed this self-evident truth when they discovered the XY/XX sex chromosomes that separates men from women. This was the standard before it was debased by progressives.
The flaw in Bill’s reparations argument is longevity. Which generation is entitled to reparations? Actually, all generations after the first generation harmed are equally entitled to reparations. Therefore, grievances will never go away as long as the grievers have descendants. Reparations will continue indefinitely because the descendants of the first recipients of reparations will have the same claim to reparations as first, causing a cascading effect. This is the scenario that any progressive would take.
The self-evident truth is that there IS a standard of eternal, unchanging truth and that for civil society to exist peaceably, one standard of truth must be established for all people. Unfortunately, two people will not agree on what that standard is. And this is the impetus for civil war.
For two thousand years, there was a standard established in a book called the Bible. This book has been the bedrock of society. This book claims there is someone who knows the heart of every man. And that person exhibits a standard of truth that no man can match. And anyone who does not match that standard is in rebellion. But this book also has good news for anyone who acknowledges their rebellion.
Truth to insanity! Reality always determines the end result. Only what can happen will happen. The so called progressive “philosophy” is dead BECAUSE it is anti-reality. The really down side is that it can take everyone with it as it goes extinct.
The ultimate fix is to stop feeding them. Otherwise, they will continue to eat us alive. They survive because of human sacrifice until there is no one and nothing else to be sacrificed.
Many thanks for kindly taking my question @ 30:35, Bill! It surprised me a bit that you went to propulsion improvements first, as I’ve wondered if there aren’t other big but maybe less glamorous pieces of the picture we’ve neglected more (off-Earth food production, building radiation-shielded shelter, producing breathable air, etc.). I can certainly see how a substantial leap in propulsion would help (Earth to Mars in hours instead of months would certainly be a game-changer), but if seems like if we have to we can also get to the nearby places via conventional rockets as Musk is proposing. I think of the long trans-Atlantic journey American colonists made, and know that we can endure such things when the future is at stake. That said, it’s indeed a shame that projects like NERVA were abandoned for lack of will. Your “tour of The Lost Future” story about NERVA moved me to hang the accompanying pictures on my office wall alongside some other bits of inspiration from the Apollo and X-plane days. I put them there to remind myself of the great things we can achieve when we put our minds to it. I hope we can rekindle that spirit of indomitable determination. The recent resurgence in rocket development has been encouraging, at least.
What a beautiful and fitting tribute you all put together in Star Citizen. Thank you for sharing that story with us. It’s helped me start to see what you do in the medium, its human dimension and potential cultural importance. It’s also reminded me what a great group of human beings I’ve had the good fortune to fall in with. Ad astra, Bobcat! My loss that I hadn’t had the chance to get to know you yet.
Yeah, I was thinking more about how you could survive one there as well. A big question I had was, what the heck do we do about asteroids? Isn’t it only a matter of time before one comes along and wipes any space settlement we could build off the map?
The african runner Caster Semenya is a genuine intersex person. She/ He does not claim to be a man or woman and that is medically confirmed. The she has multiple X and Y chromosomes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex
“Such variations may involve genital ambiguity, and combinations of chromosomal genotype and sexual phenotype other than XY-male and XX-female.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caster_Semenya
“The sex test results were never published officially, but some results were leaked in the press and are widely discussed, resulting in claims about Semenya having an intersex trait.”
Took me only minutes to check it. Not transgender. This is all about getting the Olympic committees and other sporting bodies to figure out what to do when gender is genuinely busted. Intersex is on the rise world wide for reasons not fully know.
Cryogenics has been done successfully in the 1990’s with dogs. Further research was blocked by ethics committees.
i mean, can you blame them?
I had the honour of falling though the mountain.
Oh if Olermir is playing with grenades, RUN!