2014 Failed and Forgotten Psychic Predictions

Unsurprisingly, psychic predictions were approximately as accurate as usual in 2014, which is to say, not very. Another year has come and gone and so we have the opportunity to review how the world’s leading psychics fared in their predictions for the year 2014. Before we take a look at some of the predictions, let … Read more

Villagers in Kazakhstan Are Falling Asleep En Masse for No Apparent Reason | VICE | United States

“Rudolf Boyarinos cannot remember his visions, but four people had to calm and subdue him as he screamed ‘monsters!’” Classified as an encephalopathy of unclear origin—the highfalutin term for a weird brain disorder we can’t figure out—villagers who do not simply keel over while moving or working report feeling weakness, dizziness, and memory and motor … Read more

Ayn Rand Reviews Children’s Movies

“Babe” Another pig farmer fails to do his job. —No stars. “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory” An excellent film. The obviously unfit individuals are winnowed out, and an enterprising young boy receives a… Click here for the full article Posted from Facebook

Fan Death • Tommy Nicholas

“This is one of my favorite phenomena because it underscores a basic human emotion: being 100% confident that something is not true, yet simultaneously unable to escape the feeling that is can’t be completely untrue. Fan death is such a beautiful illustration of this phenomenon, because unlike other popularly cited examples of this phenomenon (aliens, … Read more

When Nerds Collide

“Many geeks can tell you stories of how they and a few like-minded companions formed a small community that achieved something great, only to have it taken over by popular loudmouths who considered that greatness theirs by right of social station and kicked the geeks out by enforcing weirdo-hostile social norms. (Consider how many hackerspaces … Read more

The Kuleshov Effect

“In Kuleshov’s view, the cinema consists of fragments and the assembly of those fragments, the assembly of elements which in reality are distinct. It is therefore not the content of the images in a film which is important, but their combination. The raw materials of such an art work need not be original, but are … Read more

The nice thing about the “Rule of Law” framing for an argument …

… is that it’s a really easy way to get people to ignore thinking about the ramifications and consequences of the particular situation, focusing their attention instead on the general opprobrium for the principle of order. The mind gets caught thinking about whether laws, in theory, are good on the whole, and forget to think … Read more