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[MagmaMcFry]

I'm sure our elven hatred and insanity can produce exotic matter. We shall fuel this engine with insanity and hatred to ascend to the stars!

[MATTER_EXOTIC]

Needs to happen.

[Loud Whispers]

Math's just a language, one that allows models that don't neceseraly reflect reality. It's physics you need.

Recently I stumbled upon a definition of maths that changed my perception of it entirely.
Numbers are all vectors, axioms are everything that define how maths works.
The axioms describe how our universe works; if you changed the universe - you change the axioms, and so change the numbers.
So in this regard maths isn't a language, but a description of how the world works investigated by physics.

[ChairmanPoo]

Math's just a language, one that allows models that don't neceseraly reflect reality. It's physics you need.

Recently I stumbled upon a definition of maths that changed my perception of it entirely.
Numbers are all vectors, axioms are everything that define how maths works.
The axioms describe how our universe works; if you changed the universe - you change the axioms, and so change the numbers.
So in this regard maths isn't a language, but a description of how the world works investigated by physics.

Just remember. Yog Sothoth is the Key AND the Gate

[Haspen]

Shameless PTW.

[Helgoland]

And you're assuming at terran-type biochemistry.

It doesn't matter if they are pure energy beings. We WILL find a way to make a profit out of them.

We can power our ships with them!

http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=2050#comic

[werty892]

And you're assuming at terran-type biochemistry.

It doesn't matter if they are pure energy beings. We WILL find a way to make a profit out of them.

We can power our ships with them!

http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=2050#comic

Heh, I lol'ed.

[RedKing]

Math's just a language, one that allows models that don't neceseraly reflect reality. It's physics you need.

Recently I stumbled upon a definition of maths that changed my perception of it entirely.
Numbers are all vectors, axioms are everything that define how maths works.
The axioms describe how our universe works; if you changed the universe - you change the axioms, and so change the numbers.
So in this regard maths isn't a language, but a description of how the world works investigated by physics.

Just remember. Yog Sothoth is the Key AND the Gate

Hmm...well at least the Alcubierre bubble should be free of Hounds of Tindalos, since it doesn't have any angled surfaces.

It is kind of ironic that most of human progress has come from someone trying to find a better way to kill, sell or exploit. Art, music and literature were just kind of side effects created to pass the time (and give somebody something to sell).

[Loud Whispers]

It is kind of ironic that most of human progress has come from someone trying to find a better way to kill, sell or exploit. Art, music and literature were just kind of side effects created to pass the time (and give somebody something to sell).

Kinda unfair generalization, considering how a lot of those things appeared in isolationist societies and societies without monetary values :<

[RedKing]

It is kind of ironic that most of human progress has come from someone trying to find a better way to kill, sell or exploit. Art, music and literature were just kind of side effects created to pass the time (and give somebody something to sell).

Kinda unfair generalization, considering how a lot of those things appeared in isolationist societies and societies without monetary values :<

Maybe the latter part was a tad cynical. But the original assertion stands. Even the most remote tribe in the Amazon eventually advances their technology by finding a better way to kill prey they're hunting, or exploit their resources more efficiently. Selling does take two parties, but as soon as the notion of trade exists, somebody is hard at work finding a way to optimize the system to their benefit. That's what humans do...we're extraordinarily good at gaming the system to our own ends, whether that system be man-made, like economics, or universal like physics. I mean, look at the Alcubierre Drive...it's essentially trying to exploit some quirks in the math of the universe to do things we "shouldn't" be able to.

[Loud Whispers]

Well art, music and literature being side effects is what I'm disagreeing with. The whole thing about technological advances coming about as more ways to kill people good = spot on. But there are always exceptions, much like with industrialism. Or Sparta.

Mmmm... Spartaaa...

[RedWarrior0]

Then what's agriculture? A fluke?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Possibly. It lowered the quality of life of those who engaged in it for a long time, so it may well have been an infectious fluke, if ultimately one that paid off.

[Loud Whispers]

Possibly. It lowered the quality of life of those who engaged in it for a long time, so it may well have been an infectious fluke, if ultimately one that paid off.

Wait, what?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Agriculture was the beginning of social stratification and inequality. It's hard to have that in hunter-gatherer bands since there isn't much to have in the first place, and what there is to have is usually abundant enough.

Furthermore, the hunter-gatherers moved from place to place while the agriculturalists stayed in one place, which created squalor that they had to live in. Not healthy. 

[10ebbor10]

Also, diversity of food* decreased, and food security** became a problem.

* There's a limited number of domesticated plants
**Pests and stuff