Great Quotes III: Source and Context are Key
- Thread starter Borachio
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Phrossack
Armored Fish and Armored Men
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"English won’t change itself. Evolution doesn’t mean that everything gets better and better and better. It just means stubborn things survive. Indeed, an evolved thing is merely the sum of the maximum possible number of mistakes that could be made while still perpetuating it. Humans have stupid little toes and an appendix that sometimes explodes for no reason. English has its spelling."
--Excerpt from Denglisch for Better Knowers: Fun Birds, Smart [Poop]ers, Hand Shoes, and more craziness with the amazing German language
--Excerpt from Denglisch for Better Knowers: Fun Birds, Smart [Poop]ers, Hand Shoes, and more craziness with the amazing German language
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Once self-digestion is under way and bacteria have started to escape from the gastrointestinal tract, putrefaction begins. This is molecular death—the breakdown of soft tissues even further, into gases, liquids, and salts. It is already under way at the earlier stages of decomposition but really gets going when anaerobic bacteria get in on the act.
Putrefaction is associated with a marked shift from aerobic bacterial species, which require oxygen to grow, to anaerobic ones, which do not. These then feed on the body’s tissues, fermenting the sugars in them to produce gaseous by-products such as methane, hydrogen sulphide, and ammonia, which accumulate within the body, inflating (or ‘bloating’the abdomen and sometimes other body parts.
This causes further discoloration of the body. As damaged blood cells continue to leak from disintegrating vessels, anaerobic bacteria convert hemoglobin molecules, which once carried oxygen around the body, into sulfhaemoglobin. The presence of this molecule in settled blood gives skin the marbled, greenish-black appearance characteristic of a body undergoing active decomposition.
As the gas pressure continues to build up inside the body, it causes blisters to appear all over the skin surface. This is followed by loosening, and then "slippage," of large sheets of skin, which remain barely attached to the deteriorating frame underneath. Eventually, the gases and liquefied tissues purge from the body, usually leaking from the anus and other orifices and frequently also leaking from ripped skin in other parts of the body. Sometimes, the pressure is so great that the abdomen bursts open.
Bloating is often used as a marker for the transition between early and later stages of decomposition, and another recent study shows that this transition is characterized by a distinct shift in the composition of cadaveric bacteria.
What happens after you die.
SS-18 ICBM
Oscillator
"Across the world, many cities are likely to lose inhabitants faster than buildings. To plan for shrinkage is to admit that people will not come back, which sounds like an admission of failure. But it may be a greater failure to seek fruitlessly to hold on to the past. Cities rise and fall, sometimes several times, changing shape as they go. It is part of their magic."
-"Rus in urbe redux", The Economist
-"Rus in urbe redux", The Economist
Thorvald of Lym
A Little Sketchy
"[T]his means, let's recap, that within the last twelve months, we were in a situation where in the event of us launching a nuclear strike, the President's command would theoretically have gone through a man gambling with fake poker chips, who would have then tried to call a drunk guy wrestling with a Russian George Harrison, who would have then needed to send someone with a bag full of burritos, to wake up an officer, and tell him to go grab an LP-sized floppy disk, and begin the solemn process of ending the world as we know it."
- John Oliver, "Nuclear Weapons", Last Week Tonight
- John Oliver, "Nuclear Weapons", Last Week Tonight
GreekAnalyzer
Back from the Dead
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John Oliver for Prez 2016. I love him so much (no homo)
madviking
north american scum
he's not perfect. he does some sketchy things, such as overly simplifying a lot of things and blows up a few isolated incidents.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
His material is okay but I feel like he shouts too much and tries too hard to be funny.
SS-18 ICBM
Oscillator
Social interactions should never be done in a token manner.
"Well, that's your idea of the meaning of 'thank you', mine is different. I am an immigrant as well (Eastern European) and in the country where I come from we do say 'thank you' in pretty much all circumstances you've described in your article, so your 'only in America' assertion is not true. It's also not true that casual 'thank you's are meaningless. If anything, they are very meaningful - their purpose is one of acknowledgment of service, of humanizing the person behind the counter, of letting your spouse/child know/parent know they've done some positive for you, of flattening family hierarchy if there's one. It's also a way for the person who murmurs 'thank you' to advertise they're brought up to humanize those they come in contact with - one of the main goals of informal education in the US."
-Heliana Sand, comment on "'I've Never Thanked My Parents for Anything'", The Atlantic
Overheard snippet of conversation from a lady I passed by on the street talking on her phone. I'm sure it makes sense in context.
"six inches, Sarah! Six inches!"
Pride at the achievements in your history must be tempered with shame for the injustices in it.
"But those ancestors are exactly as close to us as the others are, those who created evil. If it was we who discovered the expansion of the universe through the redshifts of galaxies, then it was we who stole Ahnighoto. If it was we who understood the nature of the atom, then it was we who bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If it was we who cured smallpox, then it was we who ran the experiment at Tuskegee. We cant choose our heritage, but we can choose how we live with it. In that respect, I think that we cannot in good faith take pride in the light if we do not also take responsibility for the dark."
-Ben Lillie, "Science Needs a New Ritual", Slate
"Well, that's your idea of the meaning of 'thank you', mine is different. I am an immigrant as well (Eastern European) and in the country where I come from we do say 'thank you' in pretty much all circumstances you've described in your article, so your 'only in America' assertion is not true. It's also not true that casual 'thank you's are meaningless. If anything, they are very meaningful - their purpose is one of acknowledgment of service, of humanizing the person behind the counter, of letting your spouse/child know/parent know they've done some positive for you, of flattening family hierarchy if there's one. It's also a way for the person who murmurs 'thank you' to advertise they're brought up to humanize those they come in contact with - one of the main goals of informal education in the US."
-Heliana Sand, comment on "'I've Never Thanked My Parents for Anything'", The Atlantic
Overheard snippet of conversation from a lady I passed by on the street talking on her phone. I'm sure it makes sense in context.
"six inches, Sarah! Six inches!"
Pride at the achievements in your history must be tempered with shame for the injustices in it.
"But those ancestors are exactly as close to us as the others are, those who created evil. If it was we who discovered the expansion of the universe through the redshifts of galaxies, then it was we who stole Ahnighoto. If it was we who understood the nature of the atom, then it was we who bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If it was we who cured smallpox, then it was we who ran the experiment at Tuskegee. We cant choose our heritage, but we can choose how we live with it. In that respect, I think that we cannot in good faith take pride in the light if we do not also take responsibility for the dark."
-Ben Lillie, "Science Needs a New Ritual", Slate
SS-18 ICBM
Oscillator
Yes, my sentiments exactly.
"I presume, from the photo chosen to accompany the article, that "playing video games" is being used as shorthand for "non-adultness." If so, that's disappointing: it's a tired cliche that, as far as I know, isn't backed up by the actual demographics of gaming and gamers. You can do better, Atlantic."
-Alberto Medina, comment on "When Does Adulthood Really Begin?", The Atlantic
"I presume, from the photo chosen to accompany the article, that "playing video games" is being used as shorthand for "non-adultness." If so, that's disappointing: it's a tired cliche that, as far as I know, isn't backed up by the actual demographics of gaming and gamers. You can do better, Atlantic."
-Alberto Medina, comment on "When Does Adulthood Really Begin?", The Atlantic
Cheezy the Wiz
Socialist In A Hurry
I think that's more the writers than it is him. By inserting jokes after every serious point, they can continue to hide behind the facade of Court Jester instead of being called a "serious" investigative journalist, despite that being essentially what they're doing. It's a bit cowardly, but it's also probably the best bet for continuing to get this stuff mainstream anymore.
Thorvald of Lym
A Little Sketchy
To quote Voltaire: "It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."
QED War on Science
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Whenever they do one of those gags with costumes and dancing and singing that's the writers sure, but when he's delivering the jokes I feel like he is trying too hard to emphasize them instead of letting them sink in of their own accord. With Colbert and Stewart it felt a little less on the nose, but it's been a while since I watched either honestly.
Hygro
soundcloud.com/hygro/
He makes those jokes because the part of the audience that doesn't need them already knows the material he's exposing. They're to help the newbies along.
classical_hero
In whom I trust
http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/9486602/roger-scruton-a-prophet-in-his-own-land/
"We live in a time when honours and praise go only to people on the left, essentially because they seem harmless. And what makes them seem harmless is precisely that they’re uttering all the things that have caused so much harm."
"We live in a time when honours and praise go only to people on the left, essentially because they seem harmless. And what makes them seem harmless is precisely that they’re uttering all the things that have caused so much harm."
In honour of the occasion, I thought I'd post something tangentially related which I found amusing. The quote is from here.
Perhaps the most convoluted mix-up of [animal sexes] involves a set of king penguins that was studied at the Edinburgh Zoo from 1915-30. The various permutations and shufflings of mistaken gender identities (on the part of human observers, not the birds) reached Shakespearean complexity. Originally the the penguins's sex was determined on the basis of what was thought to be heterosexual behaviour, and the birds were given (human) names accordingly. Subsequent re-pairings and breeding activity eventually revealed that the sex of all but one of the birds had been misidentified "Andrew" was renamed Ann, "Bertha" turned into Bertrand, "Caroline" became Charles and "Eric" metamorphosed into Erica. Two penguins that had initially been seen engaging in "heterosexual" activity later turned out to be same-sexed, while premature observations of lesbian mating between Bertha and Caroline were confirmed as homosexual - but actually involved the males Bertrand and Charles.
Perhaps the most convoluted mix-up of [animal sexes] involves a set of king penguins that was studied at the Edinburgh Zoo from 1915-30. The various permutations and shufflings of mistaken gender identities (on the part of human observers, not the birds) reached Shakespearean complexity. Originally the the penguins's sex was determined on the basis of what was thought to be heterosexual behaviour, and the birds were given (human) names accordingly. Subsequent re-pairings and breeding activity eventually revealed that the sex of all but one of the birds had been misidentified "Andrew" was renamed Ann, "Bertha" turned into Bertrand, "Caroline" became Charles and "Eric" metamorphosed into Erica. Two penguins that had initially been seen engaging in "heterosexual" activity later turned out to be same-sexed, while premature observations of lesbian mating between Bertha and Caroline were confirmed as homosexual - but actually involved the males Bertrand and Charles.
"And so a heartfelt inner anger always keeps breaking out again against that arrogant little nation which dared to designate for all time everything that was not produced in its own country as “barbaric.” Who were those Greeks, people asked themselves, who, although they had achieved only an ephemeral historical glitter, only ridiculously restricted institutions, only an ambiguous competence in morality, who could even be identified with hateful vices, yet who had nevertheless laid a claim to a dignity and a pre-eminent place among peoples, appropriate to a genius among the masses? Unfortunately people were not lucky enough to find the cup of hemlock which could easily do away with such a being, for all the poisons which envy, slander, and inner rage created were insufficient to destroy that self-satisfied magnificence.
Hence, confronted by the Greeks, people have been ashamed and afraid, unless an individual values the truth above everything else and dares to propose this truth: the notion that the Greeks, as the charioteers of our culture and every other one, hold the reins, but that almost always the wagon and horses are inferior material and do not match the glory of their drivers, who then consider it amusing to whip such a team into the abyss, over which they themselves jump with the leap of Achilles."
F. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy.
Hence, confronted by the Greeks, people have been ashamed and afraid, unless an individual values the truth above everything else and dares to propose this truth: the notion that the Greeks, as the charioteers of our culture and every other one, hold the reins, but that almost always the wagon and horses are inferior material and do not match the glory of their drivers, who then consider it amusing to whip such a team into the abyss, over which they themselves jump with the leap of Achilles."
F. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy.
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