« first day (3472 days earlier)      last day (1744 days later) » 

ab2
ab2
00:32
HELP! Quora has started sending me posts -- don't know how that happened. Don't see how to get rid of them. How can I tell them to f-off?
Robusto
Robusto
00:59
@Cerberus You are such a traditionalist. We should call you Tevya.
Fiddler on the roof - Tradition ( with subtitles )
►
Xanne
Xanne
01:52
@ab2 There’s nothing at the beginning or end that says “unsubscribe”?
 
2 hours later…
Cerberus
Cerberus
03:24
@Mitch I approve!
@Robusto Yes, tradition is important.
 
10 hours later…
Robusto
Robusto
13:40
@Cerberus Blind tradition is the enemy of progress.
Captain Bohemian
Captain Bohemian
13:52
I am very sleepy.
Jasper
Jasper
14:21
@Robusto To progress, humanity must reexamine its commonly held beliefs and start from first principles again.
Matt E. Эллен
Matt E. Эллен
change is bad. everything must stay the same forever. freeze time right here so nothing gets messed up
Robusto
Robusto
@MattE.Эллен Too late.
Too late again.
And again!
Ad infinitum.
Matt E. Эллен
Matt E. Эллен
it's all ruined!
Robusto
Robusto
This is another fine mess we've gotten ourselves into.
Matt E. Эллен
Matt E. Эллен
pulls bowler hat down
Robusto
Robusto
14:27
I never saw an orc wearing a bowler hat. Looks good on you.
Captain Bohemian
Captain Bohemian
Is there a way to remove sleepiness without sleeping?
Robusto
Robusto
Coffee is what I use. But YMMV. FWIW, sleep is the one thing we can't live without. Well, also air. Sleep and air are the two things we can't live without. Ok, food too. Sleep and air and food are the three things we can't live without. And companionship. The four things we can't live without ...
SmokeDetector
SmokeDetector
14:51
[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Mostly non-latin answer (49): "Reset" or "re-set"? by Hasan Ahmed on english.SE
Robusto
Robusto
0
A: "Reset" or "re-set"?

Hasan Ahmedনতুন করে একাউন্ট খুলতে পারছি না এটার কারন কি??? কিভাবে নিজেই নিজের একাউন্ট খুলতে পারবো কালকের মধ্যে সেইটা জানতে চাই

@MattE.Эллен ^
Matt E. Эллен
Matt E. Эллен
thanks :D
google translate says they're having trouble creating an account
Robusto
Robusto
15:10
What better place to complain about that? ^_^
Matt E. Эллен
Matt E. Эллен
15:20
:D
Cerberus
Cerberus
15:59
@Robusto Yes, but blind progress is the enemy of culture and even life itself.
Conclusion: progress and tradition must visit an ophthalmologist.
@Robusto And Latin.
 
2 hours later…
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
18:25
Wow! @Robusto these unenemployment numbers are huge.
user image
Cerberus
Cerberus
18:43
In Holland, the government has been paying companies not to fire people.
So that there should be as little disruption as possible once things start up again.
And as few financial problems as possible for all working citizens.
But I suppose people in America are more used to being fired on a whim anyway.
Robusto
Robusto
@skullpatrol No doubt about it.
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
The thing is the unemployed are much more likely to vote for an all out war against China.
Robusto
Robusto
I don't think that will be on the ballot this fall.
But you never know.
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
19:01
I see the Dutch government is holding firm to its refusal to make the wearing of face masks compulsory.. @Cerberus
Cerberus
Cerberus
19:11
@skullpatrol Yes.
Well, in public transport, they are now compulsory.
But not for barbers, which is rather odd.
Barber shops have reopened a few days ago.
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
Have you heard the barber of seville paradox?
Cerberus
Cerberus
No?
I only know the opera.
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
The barber of Seville is the "one who shaves all those, and those only, who do not shave themselves". The question is, does the barber shave himself?
Cerberus
Cerberus
19:28
Ah, yes, a circular reference.
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
Hmm, I can't find out why they chose Seville for the barber?
skullpatrol
skullpatrol
19:46
The troll armies are coming
meta.stackexchange.com/questions/347913/…
I object to their use of the word "patrol."
Robusto
Robusto
20:15
Apr 20 at 22:03, by Robusto
5 hours ago, by Gigili
Nov 9 '18 at 14:48, by Robusto
Apr 29 at 2:45, by RegDwigнt
Sep 15 '16 at 12:55, by RegDwigнt
Mar 24 at 23:08, by RegDwigнt
Mar 2 '11 at 13:43, by Robusto
2 hours ago, by RegDwight
Feb 18 at 10:59, by Robusto
13 hours ago, by Robusto
27 secs ago, by RegDwight
2 hours ago, by RegDwight
yesterday, by RegDwight
Feb 7 at 15:38, by RegDwight
Russell's paradox
In the foundations of mathematics, Russell's paradox (also known as Russell's antinomy), discovered by Bertrand Russell in 1901, showed that the naive set theory created by Georg Cantor leads to a contradiction. The same paradox had been discovered a year before by Ernst Zermelo but he did not publish the idea, which remained known only to Hilbert, Husserl and other members of the University of Göttingen. Let R be the set of all sets that are not members of themselves. If R qualifies as a member of itself, it would contradict its own definition as a set containing sets that are not member...
Captain Bohemian
Captain Bohemian
@Cerberus that's a problem. If you don't have a mask, how can you take mass transport?
Robusto
Robusto
@CaptainBohemian It's called "mask" transport now.
Captain Bohemian
Captain Bohemian
You can walk if you are forbidden to board the bus. The supermarket which used to give me a mask now would turn down my entering if I don't carry a mask on my own.
@Robusto coffee is not what we need to live. I actually hate drinking coffee because it's too bitter.
Robusto
Robusto
I looooooove it. I drink hot coffee even on breaks during hot summer rides. Nothing else has that slightly bitter, but overarching boost when you're kicking it hard.
Cerberus
Cerberus
20:42
@CaptainBohemian You can make your own.
From a bit of fabric.
I haven't tried, though.
> Spreek bijvoorbeeld met eenzelfde persoon af om lichamelijk of seksueel contact te hebben (bijvoorbeeld een knuffelmaatje of ‘seksbuddy’), mits u klachtenvrij bent.
The National Institute for Health and the Environment: if you are single, you are advised to have a steady "hugging mate" or "sex buddy".
Terran Swett
Terran Swett
english.stackexchange.com/questions/534320/… – The question is off topic, but interesting.
Is Formula One racing a game?
Are the participants players?
Most games are commonly referred to as games in one context or another.
The "units of play" of blackjack aren't called games (there are shoes and there are hands), but everyone says that blackjack is "a table game" (as opposed to a slot machine).
Robusto
Robusto
@Cerberus A wise policy.
Terran Swett
Terran Swett
Conversely, people rarely actually say that tennis is a game, but one of the "units of play" of tennis is called a game.
Auto racing, on the other hand, is usually called a sport, or at least a contest, and the "units of play" are laps and races. The word "game" isn't commonly used.
But that doesn't mean that F1 isn't a game.
Just like nobody calls a Boeing 747 a cantilever monoplane, even though it is.
F1 is certainly at least a contest. Are all contests games?
Robusto
Robusto
20:59
@TerranSwett F1 is Help on my keyboard.
Terran Swett
Terran Swett
I have no idea what would happen if I pressed F1 right now.
I pressed it. Nothing seems to have happened.
Robusto
Robusto
Get a new keyboard /nod.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@TerranSwett Wittgenstein stumbled the question what a game is.
In his earlier work, he tried to define it by using criteria.
In his later work, he felt that such an approach was inadequate, and he switched to the 'family' model.
Where some groups of games satisfy a set of criteria, but other games strongly resembling some of the games in a group are still considered games even though they do not satisfy all criteria.
Something like that.
I for one have attempted a definition:
> A game is an activity in which participants try to achieve certain goals by playing according to certain rules, where some of the rules or some of the goals are different from those in real life.
Robusto
Robusto
@Cerberus I think this all depends on custom. Some things we call games, some we call sports, some both. We go to football games, but football is a sport. We go to tennis matches, and tennis is definitely a sport. We might play a game of golf, but it's still a sport. Chess might make it into the Olympics, but it's still a game, not a sport—even though the physical demands are consistent with a physical workout.
And by custom I mean tradition. So you oughta be all over that.
Cerberus
Cerberus
21:16
@Robusto With respect to common parlance, you are correct.
But I would say sports are games.
Robusto
Robusto
@Cerberus Well ... but are all competitions games then? I think there's a difference between, say, running a marathon competitively vs. doing (playing?) curling, which is like shuffleboard on ice and can be accomplished between slices of pizza.
Cerberus
Cerberus
21:43
@Robusto I would say both are games.
But not all competitions.
There have to be rules and/or goals that are different from normal life.
If you compete for funding as a scientist, that isn't a game.
Robusto
Robusto
21:59
@Cerberus Well, you should ask a scientist about that. My son is a scientist and he has some interesting things to say on the subject.
Cerberus
Cerberus
22:27
@Robusto It is OK for things to be like games in some respects.
Like the Game of Thrones.
It isn't really a game: it is a deadly war.
But it has some game-like aspects that make the metaphor apt.
Languages has many layers.
Færd
Færd
If you want to introduce a participial clause with words like if, when, once, and until, should the subjects of the main and the subordinate clauses match?
I feel as though there are some preferences sometimes, but I can't work out a rule.
Here, for example, the subjects are different, but it sounds okay:
> Keep stirring until browned.
([YOU] keep stirring until [IT is] browned)
But maybe not here?:
> Once arrested, take him to jail.
Compare:
> Once arrested, he should be taken to jail.
Maybe the subjects should be the same and disagreements are exceptional.

« first day (3472 days earlier)      last day (1744 days later) »