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One of my cats clearly shows signs of secure attachment to my dog!

When that cat is very stressed out, we can't do anything to calm it. However, the simple presence of my dog in the area is enough to calm down the cat. It's so effective that we bring our dog to the vet when that cat is the one actually being examined!

i_love_FFTs  ·  3358 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Newton's Flaming Laser Sword

After studying a lot of science, then some epistemology, I can say that science doesn't claim to be empirism, it's the other way around.

A lot of philosophers tend to compare science to other philosophical movements, but it should not be.

Science is what happens when you blindly choose to follow the path of empirism. It doesn't justify this choice, it just notices all the working predictions it can make.

The general population tend to rely on science because of its past success, not because of its philosophical validity.

You can discuss and compare empirism to, say, constructivism, but it won't affect science itself because it's mostly disconnected from this debate.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3384 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Gravity’s Oldest Puzzles.

The article is mildly interesting to someone with an astrophysics background, as it reveals nothing new. It's a nice recap of the progress made by looking at astrophysical bodies.

The flyby anomaly it the real puzzle right now!

i_love_FFTs  ·  3390 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Hubski Challenge. Post the weirdest cover song you can find.

Les Claypool and Gogol Bordello doing Tom Waits covers instantly can't to my mind. A full show can be found on the internet archive.

It's not weird as in "they took one style and turned it into another", it's just weird in general.

Edit: link here https://archive.org/details/superjam2008-06-13.mk4

i_love_FFTs  ·  3396 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Lexus Hoverboard

Trains can be built using this tech. I think there already is one in Japan.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3398 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil

Very good! Except for the last paragraph where he says that Tom Bombadil is older than Morgoth, because Morgoth is the origin of chaos in the Silmarilion. Instead, it could be that Tom is a rival to Sauron, another servant to Morgoth, or to another valar...

i_love_FFTs  ·  3406 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Who is doing this to my internet?

Yeah, so I just learned there's already Freenet and GNUnet. What we really need, then, is a GNUnet-powered SoundCloud clone...

i_love_FFTs  ·  3406 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Who is doing this to my internet?

How long untill there exist a universal peer hosted webserver? Something like TOR hidden service, but for something else than drugs. I would gladly share all of my unused bandwidth to help host ad-free websites.

Anyone wants to help developing it?

i_love_FFTs  ·  3409 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: No, It’s Not Your Opinion. You’re Just Wrong

In my opinion, when there's mist or very light droplets falling from the sky, it's not raining. It's raining when I need to wear a rain jacket to go from my house to my car. In my opinion, it only rained once this summer, where I live.

Also, I'm allergic to nuts, so in my opinion, nuts are awful.

These opinions are obviously false from the consensus point of view, but they are still true from my point of view... That's the core of the problem.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3413 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The Pixar Theory of Labor

Well there's another way to look at it. Coming from a more socialist place than America, I was often told that it is always possible for an American to make a living out of whatever he or she likes (and finds fulfilling). For example, Elon Musk's meaning of life is to lead humanity to Mars, and the best place to make a living out of that dream was in America. This fact (whether it's true or not) leads to the conclusion that if you have a job, it's because you like doing this thing and you find it fulfilling.

Meanwhile, in my immediate surroundings, I usually meet people doing a job they don't dislike to much and finding meaning in their hobbies.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3414 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The Pixar Theory of Labor

It's an interesting and we'll documented theory, but I still had the feeling the author was confusing two concepts, that is "one's place in a company" and "one's place in the world". To put it in another way, it's like the author confused the personal search for meaning with the search for a job.

If I read the article and substitute the concept of a job with the concept of one's personal meaning of life, the article makes a lot of sense. There is no need for cynism regarding the whole Pixar theory.

That being said, I still skimmed over the last part of the article, so I may have missed an additional argument.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3423 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Is Space Junk Causing Global Warming?

I'm pretty sure it doesn't. The lowest stable (many years) orbits are about as low as 400 km (like the ISS). They can be lower, but then they decrease rapidly due to atmospheric drag. The high number of objects in low orbit is still very small compared to the vast empty volume of space! The simulations showing orbital trash give a bad sense of the area covered by it... I guess less that a fraction of a percent of the total solar power is blocked by the trash.

That being said, I don't know much about Earth science. The only way I can imagine the trash has an affect is when a decaying object falls to Earth. It could have an effect similar to a plane's vapor trails, maybe.

Keep in mind I am not an expert of this topic, and it's so hard to predict anything in the chaotic world of climate science... If we can find a source on the topic, it would be better.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3429 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What is with the 505 image?

You should check the 404, it links to somewhere that looks like an HTML version of myst.

i_love_FFTs  ·  3429 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are your favorite Windows 95/98 era video games?

Skifree was a good way to waste time. I think I even got away from the sasquatch once!

Tue most underrated news that I know of is spacesafetymagazine.com. They use the safety theme to talk about everything related to space exploration, and it's not as boring as it seems. They have a great coverage of international stuff, not just NASA.