{"id":3592,"date":"2009-10-02T18:30:48","date_gmt":"2009-10-02T22:30:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=3592"},"modified":"2009-09-30T15:46:18","modified_gmt":"2009-09-30T19:46:18","slug":"friday-various-13","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=3592","title":{"rendered":"Friday various"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"> <\/font><\/p>\n<ul>  <font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/p>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.newsfromme.com\/archives\/2009_09_22.html#017766\">Mark Evanier<\/a> on skepticism:<br \/>\n<blockquote><p>I just like skepticism and wish we had more of it in the media. In fact, I wish we had more skepticism of the skeptics since despite what some skeptics seem to think, going against the Conventional Wisdom doesn&#8217;t automatically mean your wisdom is correct.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\">I was very briefly a member of the (I think now defunct) <a href=\"http:\/\/www.clubs.psu.edu\/skeptics\/\">Penn State Skeptics Society<\/a>. I attended a meeting or two, and later went to hear <a href=\"http:\/\/www.randi.org\/\">James Randi<\/a> speak when they brought him to campus. But the fervor with which some people embrace skepticism &#8212; or maybe more accurately angry cynicism &#8212; has never sat well with me. I think agnosticism and atheism are defensible positions, but some people approach them like True Believers and dismiss all other arguments out of hand. Which, it seems to me, is usually what they accuse the <em>other<\/em> side of doing. <\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"> <\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/li>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/p>\n<li>Tomorrow morning, beginning at at 9 AM EST (and for the next 24 hours), Netflix will be <a href=\"http:\/\/www.netflix.com\/wizardofoz\/\">streaming <em>The Wizard of Oz<\/em><\/a> for free to anyone (with or without a subscription), in honor of the film&#8217;s 70th anniversary. I&#8217;m not sure why 70 years is a particularly significant milestone, but the film holds up remarkably well, I think. [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.hackingnetflix.com\/\" title=\"Hacking Netflix\">via<\/a>]<\/li>\n<p><\/font><\/font><\/font><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/p>\n<li>Barack Obama has one <a href=\"http:\/\/whatever.scalzi.com\/2009\/09\/26\/you-can-tell-he-does-this-a-lot\/\">amazingly consistent smile<\/a>.<\/li>\n<p><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/p>\n<li>What do you buy for the Elder God who has everything? Why not <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blackphoenixalchemylab.com\/poetry.html\">Cthulhu Cologne<\/a>, &#8220;Scents inspired by the works of H.P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos&#8221;? [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cynical-c.com\/\" title=\"Cynical-C\">via<\/a>]<\/li>\n<p><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/p>\n<li>A finally, thinking about <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cartridgesave.co.uk\/news\/if-you-printed-the-internet\/\">printing the internet<\/a>? Um, don&#8217;t. [<a href=\"http:\/\/www.bookninja.com\/\" title=\"Bookninja\">via<\/a>]<\/li>\n<p><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><font size=\"2\" face=\"Verdana\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/images\/Printing-the-internet-long-island.jpg\" \/> <\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font> <\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mark Evanier on skepticism: I just like skepticism and wish we had more of it in the media. In fact, I wish we had more skepticism of the skeptics since despite what some skeptics seem to think, going against the Conventional Wisdom doesn&#8217;t automatically mean your wisdom is correct. I was very briefly a member &#8230; <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=3592\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[50,70,27,14,54,6,38,74,10,39],"class_list":["post-3592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-funny","tag-horror","tag-internet","tag-movies","tag-new-york","tag-politics","tag-science","tag-skepticism","tag-various","tag-weird"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3592"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3592\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}