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After a while I noticed that the sun and all the stars in his neighborhood were ruddy. Those at the opposite pole of the heaven were of an icy blue. The explanation of this strange phenomenon flashed upon me. I was still traveling, and traveling so fast that light itself was not wholly indifferent to my passage. The…
Now we get to the core of the simulation argument. This does not purport to demonstrate that you are in a simulation. Instead, it shows that we should accept as true at least one of the following three propositions: (1) The chances that a species at our current level of development can avoid going extinct before…
There is great truth in the oft-quoted riddle of the lily pads. A pond (a lake, an ocean, all apply) starts with a single lily pad. Each pad doubles per day; the pond will be full in thirty days. When is the pond only half full? On the twenty-ninth day. After the next day, the thirtieth, further growth is so fast it…
Consider the eighth category, which deals with stones. Wilkins divides them into the following classifications: ordinary (flint, gravel, slate); intermediate (marble, amber, coral); precious (pearl, opal); transparent (amethyst, sapphire); and insoluble (coal, clay, and arsenic). The ninth category is almost as…
To the natural philosopher there is no natural object unimportant or trifling … A mind that has once imbibed a taste for scientific enquiry has within itself an inexhaustible source of pure and exciting contemplations. One would think that Shakespeare had such a mind in view when he describes a contemplative man…
In the World of the Blind / the one-eyed man is an hallucinated idiot