March 27, 2019

In a simulation....

57 comments:

rhhardin said...

It can't be a simulation. Matter has no inwards. You can have a simulation but you wouldn't be in it.

Levi Starks said...

The vacant look in his eyes tells you all you need to know.
There’s nobody home.

Lucid-Ideas said...

Agent Smith: What would you like Adam?

Shiff: Look look when you put me back in I don't want to remember nothing. NOTHING. I want to live well, you know be somebody important. Maybe a politician. Do that and I'll get you Trump.

Agent Smith: The codes to 'Zion'...

Shiff: No no no like I said I don't have them. Trump does. I'll get you him. Well...I'll try my best anyway.

Bay Area Guy said...

Adam Schiff!

Collusion now and forever!

Emoluments!

Give us your tax returns!

Papadopoulos!

These fuckheads are like those handful of 95-year old Japenese soldiers on some obscure Atoll in the Pacific, guarding their posts, because superior officer has given orders to relieve them.

Curious George said...

Scott Adams is a gem. Hahaha

Maillard Reactionary said...

I've heard about this "we live in a simulation" idea for years. In some of the earliest mentions, the writer seems to have convinced himself that it was practically certain. It has a whiff of the late-night college dorm conversation to me.

I don't know about the code reuse metaphor either. In reality, a software engineer would rather reuse a colleague's second-hand condom than his code. And there's always a really good reason for having to re-invent it.

This is a big reason, I think, for why software never seems to become more reliable. It becomes larger and more richly functional--when it functions, that is--but rarely more predictable and dependable.

If this all makes you feel a little bit queasy the next time you board a Boeing 737 MAX aircraft, I can't blame you.

Software engineers have to be watched carefully. Very carefully. And kept away from sharp objects.

Fen said...

Unfair comparison.

That soldier kept faith with his people and country for 3 decades, at great sacrifice.

Schiff would betray his own mother for a free blowjob.

Birkel said...

The juxtaposition works because everybody can see how obvious it is. Schiff is fighting a lost war. He knows his plan to attack Trump cannot work because he lost aerial cover (MSM) and artillery (Mueller) support.

Trump works best as a counterpuncher. And Schiff is going to get pummeled. Trump will make the documents the Democratics don't want released available. He controls the process from here.

The coup failed.

Chuck said...

Fen said...
Unfair comparison.

That soldier kept faith with his people and country for 3 decades, at great sacrifice.

Schiff would betray his own mother for a free blowjob.


Hmm. Would you say that"he would move on her like a bitch"?

daskol said...

I'd like to see Adam Schiff punished: as an elected official, he pretended he had access to persuasive evidence we did not, and did enormous damage to the country. But maybe it's politically better to have him hang on to his appointments and fester publicly as the face of the Dems a while longer.

Michael K said...

I agree with Max Boot. This is the most successful operation in KGB/FSB/GRU history except it was the Clinton operation, not Trump's.

She got $154 million and Trump just got a MAGA hat.

Of course, she will never be president but we all knew that.

Fernandinande said...

Schiff is hiding in Guam? Colluding with the Japanese? I don't get it.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Adam Schiff should be removed from congress. He is a con artist and a fraud.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The corrupt liar leftwing press and the corrupt democratics like Schiff must double down. They have no choice. They've made utter fools of themselves.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

rhhardin said...

It can't be a simulation. Matter has no inwards.

And you know this how?

trumpintroublenow said...

Exam time. Your daughter has a final exam, one true or false question, open book, in her logic 101 course in high school. The exam is worth 100% of the grade. She gets it right she is off to Harvard on a full scholarship. She gets it wrong and she will be waiting tables at the local all-nude strip club (in the heart of the liberal part of town), with an opportunity to move on to a dancer position if she does a good job. If her answer is more than one word she automatically fails. And, she can ask one,and only one, person for help, and you are the one she picks. It's a one-hour exam. Because she worships you and because you are a Logic instructor at the local community college, she has absolute faith that you know the right answer.

Question - True or False:

The following statements mean the same thing.

Statement 1 - "The investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

Statement 2 -- "The investigation established that no members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

Remember, if her answer is more than one word she automatically fails.

cubanbob said...

Of course we are in a simulation. This level of stupid doesn't exist in reality.

narciso said...

Schiff is like the shifty Charles Logan from 24.

stlcdr said...

The Japanese soldier story seems to stand out more than their headline story with a generic looking picture.

It’s also more interesting.

Carter Wood said...

A relevant Ruben Bolling contribution, Life in the Matrix.

Nonapod said...

Scott Adams might like the idea presented in this article. Basically in very specific sets of circumstances, an observation of an observation of an event and the observation itself can yield opposing results. Because of the weird uncertain nature of quantumn super postitions, two different observers can observe the same particle and see opposite results... and both be correct.

The weirdness of quantum mechanics in general seems like a good argument for simulation theory.

StephenFearby said...

WaPo
By Karoun Demirjian March 26 at 9:31 PM

‘Undoubtedly there is collusion’: Trump antagonist Adam Schiff doubles down after Mueller finds no conspiracy

'...Though Barr’s summary has cast doubt on the premise of the Intelligence Committee’s Russia probe, at least among Republicans, Democrats maintain that Schiff is not wrong in saying there was evidence of collusion even if Mueller determined that the matter did not rise to a level that warranted prosecution.

“It doesn’t mean there wasn’t an enormous amount of smoke there,” said Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.), a member of the Intelligence Committee. “This was a fine legal distinction Mr. Mueller had to make.”'

https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/undoubtedly-there-is-collusion-trump-antagonist-adam-schiff-doubles-down-after-mueller-finds-no-conspiracy/2019/03/26/e972d9e8-4fdd-11e9-a3f7-78b7525a8d5f_story.html?utm_term=.44610f123324

At this time, about 5.K comments and climbing, most of which are of the creten variety.

A succinct exception:

What’s hilarious is pencil neck Adam was recorded by some Russian comedians willing to collude with Russian agents to get dirt on Trump.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2018/02/06/russian_comedians_prank_call_rep_adam_schiff_promise_him_naked_photos_of_trump_from_fsb.html

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Skip ahead to 5:30 - and you get the why the left are doubling down on the conspiracy.

Michael K said...

Conrad Black pretty much nails it here.

I cannot resist offering, however, the two stupidest comments I heard from the bloated dunciad of Democratic presidential candidates. Naturally, the grand prize goes to the vapidest person ever touted as a presidential candidate in my 63 years as an observer of American politics, Beto O’Rourke. Just before the revelation that there would be no further indictments, Beto asserted his knowledge “beyond the slightest doubt” that the president was guilty, in effect, of high treason—that he would only escape the death penalty because the United States and Russia were not at war. (But neither were they when Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed in 1953.) And the day Trump was completely cleared of the collusion suspicion, O’Rourke declared that the investigation of Trump must continue.


Close at Beto’s heels is the almost equally simple-minded and even more pretentious straw-haired airhead, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.). Standing in front of the Trump Hotel in Washington on Sunday, she called the president “a coward” and then Gillibrand (“I chose to be brave”) said he was still a prime suspect of collusion with Russia, 90 minutes before the release of the attorney general’s letter to the leaders of the Senate and House judiciary committees. I stop here, but not for any lack of other worthy contestants to win the sweepstakes for malice and foolishness.


Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The FRESH new conspiracy on the hivemind corrupt liar left is that Barr and Rosenstein are LYING about what is in the report - and Mueller and his entire team -they are letting them lie.

LOL. Really. It's that desperate.

rehajm said...

My own policy would be,,,

Where's the link to your blog?

Drago said...

"Hmm. Would you say that"he would move on her like a bitch"?"

No.

I would say there isnt a LLR alive who wouldnt happily serve as Schiff-tys cuckholster, as long as Durbin's and Blumenthals didnt suffer a signicant drop in their service levels.

Drago said...

BTW, who else is looking forward to the next National Review column titled "The Conservative Case for (insert lefty dream policy here)"?

i.e. "The Conservative Case For Compkete Democrat Domination".

Things you will find all LLR's advocating strongly for.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Steve Uhr said...

Exam time.

I see Steve Uhr is helping Schiff carve survival tools...

n.n said...

Finite degrees of freedom... to the edge of our solar system, and a universe inferred from signals of unknown degrees of fidelity based on assumptions/assertions outside of the near-frame.

Birkel said...

Steve Uhr:
The appropriate answer to your question is: Irrelevant*.

My daughter is going to pass on Harvard and will get a free degree in a real subject for free at the land grant state institution, after attending community college and working a job to graduate without debt.

The question is irrelevant because the job of the state is to establish guilt. Any question that ignores the basic premise that we cannot establish a negative (The Mike Nifong / Duke LAX case notwithstanding.) is irrelevant and rests on an illogical premise. Any good student of logic immediately recognizes the flaw in your hypothetical. You fail. -insert Adam Sandler clip here-

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=adam+sandler+no+points+god+have+mercy+soul&view=detail&mid=D280C5C6E5F6291A6F5FD280C5C6E5F6291A6F5F&FORM=VIRE

Fen said...

Question - True or False: The following statements mean the same thing.|

False. And quit fantasizing about my daughter you perv.

Statement 1 - "The investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

We were unable to prove that Fen was in the vicinity when Steve got his teeth kicked in.

Statement 2 -- "The investigation established that no members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

We were able to prove than Fen was in another country when Steve got his teeth kicked in.

Ray - SoCal said...

Conrad Black has amazing analysis...

And has person experience with being a prosecution target...

narayanan said...

"we live in a simulation" idea is intentionally phrased confusingly.

choose and discuss

"we all live in same single simulation"
"we each of us live in a simulation of each one's making"

Big Mike said...

I think if I saw pictures of all 435 members of the House of Representatives, I would still rate Schiff as having the most punchable face.

Danno said...

I see Scott Adams has adopted my Japanese soldier example. I usually bring it up when people challenge the ISIS is defeated theme, but it fits Adam Schiff too.

cubanbob said...

BleachBit-and-Hammers said...
Adam Schiff should be removed from congress. He is a con artist and a fraud."

You do realize that standard would remove most Democrats from Congress and disqualify every Democrat currently running for President. It would also justify prosecuting a lot of the senior level and cabinet level members of the Obama Administration.

Michael McNeil said...

Czech physicist Luboš Motl discusses the issue of whether we live in a simulation in a couple of fascinating blog posts….

Rebooting the cosmos?

We don't live in a sumulation

The upshot is that it's contrary to known physics.

Yancey Ward said...

I had a really weird coincidence this weekend. I like to do NYTimes Sunday crossword puzzles, and I have been doing the weekly puzzle in the local paper every Sunday for the last 4-5 years. In addition, I have been purchasing and working through the collections of past Sunday puzzles that start in the early 1970s and working my way forward over many years now. I am up to the puzzles that date from the mid to late 1980s in the collection series. This past Sunday I was working the puzzle from March 17 2019 (it appears a week later in syndication) and it had a clue/answer I had never seen in any previous puzzle- the clue was roughly along the lines of "price increases" and the answer was "steepens". After I had finished the puzzle, I picked the next puzzle from the collection series that first appeared in the late 1980s, and that puzzle had almost exactly the same clue and the exact same answer.

I vote simulation.

Not Sure said...

@Steve Uhr: I was hoping your elaborate story was going to give me a better payoff than "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

Gotta work on reining in my hopes .

Bay Area Guy said...

In a simulated, parallel universe, Adam Schiff does get that badly needed blow job in high school -- and we are forever spared his public grandstanding and unending stupidity as an adult.

Chuck said...

Drago said...
"Hmm. Would you say that"he would move on her like a bitch"?"

No.

I would say there isnt a LLR alive who wouldnt happily serve as Schiff-tys cuckholster, as long as Durbin's and Blumenthals didnt suffer a signicant drop in their service levels.


I would have thought that this was precisely the sort of comment that the new moderation policy was intended to eliminate.

Yancey Ward said...

True or false, Steve:

Steve Uhr can't prove he isn't a pedophile.

steve uhr said...

Not sure— absence of evidence IS evidence of absence It may not be proof but it is evidence, assuming there was some investigation.

Birkel said...

LLR posts an unrelated point then gets mad that another unrelated point is made in response.
Complains to Blog Mama.

At least the Japanese soldier had honor.
The cult of NeverTrump abides but does not grok.

Simulated thought is embarrassing.

Yancey Ward said...

So, lets get a prosecutor to investigate every aspect of your life for the next two years. Better hire a lawyer. And if you are not charged after two years, I don't want hear you proclaiming your innocence. In fact, I don't want you proclaiming your innocence during the investigation either, unless you want to face obstruction investigation, too.

Drago said...

Uhr: "Not sure— absence of evidence IS evidence of absence It may not be proof but it is evidence"

LOL

It just keeps getting better and better.

The more "dots" that are missing, the clearer it is that they are really there. And always have been there, even if they have never been there. In fact, especially if they have never been there. The "never-ness" of their being only points to the "fact" of the "actual-ness" of their existence.

Better yet, we can indict based on that "never-ness"!! In fact, "never-ness in the First Degree" has GOT to be something we take seriously.

And it's about time!!

Plus, all the lefties and their LLR lap poodles have the Sadz, and this will make them feel better.

Drago said...

LLR Chuck: ""Hmm. Would you say that"he would move on her like a bitch"?"

Hmmm, I would have thought that this was precisely the sort of comment that the new moderation policy was intended to eliminate.

Discuss.

Drago said...

I would have thought that certain posters, when asked to leave by the blog moderators, is precisely the sort of direction a poster would follow.

narciso said...

Like this you mean:

http://www.edwardjayepstein.com/archived/anthrax.htm

Drago said...

Besides LLR Chuck, your opinion is of zero merit according to Brand Spankin' New Social Justice Warrior and Destroyer of White Male Culture Li'l Joey Biden.

Biden, btw, the next "big thing" the LLR chattering class will ga-ga over.

Drago said...

Note to self: LLR Chuck takes time out from trashing all Trump supporters as a category to complain that another poster is trashing fake conservative self-described LLR's as a category.

Discuss.

Not Sure said...

steve uhr: It's a common expression in statistics in discussing Type I error, but I concede your point.

Birkel said...

I concede nothing to steve uhr.
When you start from a faulty premise(s) nothing follows logically after.

Bill Peschel said...

The Japanese soldier comparison omits the fact that the soldier was a product of a culture that held fighting and dying for your country a supreme honor. A culture with a rigid hierarchical structure that demanded that you obey orders from your leader.

As a result, the Japanese soldier fought valiantly for what they were trained to believe in. They weren't fools. They were the product of a purpose-built belief system and raised in isolation to what the rest of the world thought.

That's why one Japanese soldier finally surrendered (in his case he was left on an island in the Philippines, and for years launched isolated attacks on the residents, sometimes killing them), when the government found his superior officer, took him from his Tokyo store (he was the manager), sent him down to the island, and formally ordered the soldier to stand down.

Comparing that man of honor -- misguided as he was -- to Schiff is obscene.

Michael McNeil said...

"we live in a simulation" idea is intentionally phrased confusingly.

choose and discuss

"we all live in same single simulation"
"we each of us live in a simulation of each one's making"


Excellent point, narayanan. Though I'm not sure that it was intentionally phrased confusingly, so much as that most people hardly think about the latter kind of simulation, real though it is.

The topic in this posting is the former kind of simulation: where the entire universe as we perceive it is a simulation in somebody else's computer (even potentially producing something of an infinite regress — which, like “it's turtles all the way down,” isn't very satisfying) — with individual minds such as our own individually simulated within that.

According to Motl that scenario is disallowed by the physics we see in operation around us: physics that really couldn't be effectively simulated within any digital computer (read his posting!).

That still leaves the second scenario you mentioned completely untouched, however: where we as (more or less) disjoint individuals separately simulate our own mental existence — within that (non-digital, non-simulated) external reality we find ourselves inside — which appears to be completely true.

Michael McNeil said...

In law “absence of evidence” certainly is “evidence” — evidence that you're innocent.