(noun) The doctrine that, since zero is an even number, one ought to shoot oneself in an even number of feet.

• Infinite length music (pdf)
• The Exponentialist
• Scientists Abandon AI Project After Seeing The Matrix
• Polymath list archives
• The future of evolution, in pictures

• Judgment misguided: Intuition and error in public decision making
• Amusing sea level blooper
• Conspiracy theories, where they come from, and how to undermine them
• ASDF
• Deadweight Loss of Christmas (pdf)
  

• How much faith can we have in the multiverse?
• Some good old-fashioned atheist apologetics
• An unethical means of intelligence enhancement
• Hans-Georg Michna on the Singularity
• When Robot Lawyers Attack
  

If nobody complains I’m going to be doing these regularly.

Arguments from authority can be valid or invalid. Click here for a good example of a valid argument from authority.

If it happens in the universe, it’s my problem.

– unknown

To err is human … do you want to err forever?

– Frank Prengel

It has been stated that we are wrong to give the credit for building a great cathedral or palace to the architect. It belongs instead to the stonemasons and bricklayers whose labours raised the edifice. In my opinion, this insight has been rather hastily attributed to Bertolt Brecht, who is usually given as the author of it. Not enough credit has been given to the typesetters and printers not to mention paper-mill workers and lumberjacks of this world for this observation.

– Guernsey McPearson

As long as you’re ready to face the possibility that everything that makes your spirits soar, everything that lifts you up and fills your heart with joy, everything that makes your life worth living … is a lie, is corruption, is meaningless — then you can never be enslaved.

– a Greg Egan character

[W]hereas ordinary politics wears a suit, religion wears a dress — and nobody wants to hit a girl.

– the Raving Atheist

I am a Norman, and the tradition of my people is to invade the neighbours, suppress their culture, sequester their land, and impose an aristocratic rule. By the principle of cultural relativity this is no less valid a way of life than any other.

– Brett Evill

A hypocrite is one who claims virtue beyond what he possesses, not one who recommends virtue beyond what he claims. If a man’s principles are no better than his character, it is less likely to be a sign of an exemplary character than a sign of debased principles.

– Mark Thompson

Many people equate tolerance with the attitude that every belief is equally true, and that we should all simply accept this fact and go our separate ways. But I view tolerance as the willingness to come together, to face one another in the same room and hack at each other with claw hammers until the truth finally trickles out from the blood and the tears.

– the Raving Atheist