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[sluissa]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/milo-yiannopoulos-defends-gunning-journalists-down-annapolis-shooting-215613240.html

Funnily enough, he said it only privately. It was his media opponents who were responsible for making it a widespread publicized comment.

[smjjames]

There's far more of a link to Trump agitating people over the media than Milo, IMO. While what he said was staggeringly dumb, even as a sarcastic joke, theres no link to what Milo said vs the shooter.

[Folly]

Also, letting things get worse before they get better is the accelerationist position, though I know that's not what you mean.

Accelerationism is exactly what I was referring to. Though I should note that it's not a stance I intended to promote, merely a concept I feel is worthy of conversation. If a small number of sacrifices in the short-term can save a significantly larger number of lives in the long-term, then isn't the lesser evil the only ethically justifiable path?

[smjjames]

Good luck convincing gun nuts 5th amendment advocates of that.

[redwallzyl]

Also, letting things get worse before they get better is the accelerationist position, though I know that's not what you mean.

Accelerationism is exactly what I was referring to. Though I should note that it's not a stance I intended to promote, merely a concept I feel is worthy of conversation. If a small number of sacrifices in the short-term can save a significantly larger number of lives in the long-term, then isn't the lesser evil the only ethically justifiable path?

The big problem with ends justify the means is that often the ends never happen and you are left with the terrible means. This is how good people do horrible things.

[smjjames]

Or as the saying goes 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions'.

Turns out that the attack was a targeted one and that there were threats over social media at the newspaper, some even today, no details though. While it may or may not be justified to jump to the conclusion, it should be carefully scruitinized for any hints that Trump's rhetoric may be behind this.

[Folly]

Also, letting things get worse before they get better is the accelerationist position, though I know that's not what you mean.

Accelerationism is exactly what I was referring to. Though I should note that it's not a stance I intended to promote, merely a concept I feel is worthy of conversation. If a small number of sacrifices in the short-term can save a significantly larger number of lives in the long-term, then isn't the lesser evil the only ethically justifiable path?

The big problem with ends justify the means is that often the ends never happen and you are left with the terrible means. This is how good people do horrible things.

Yeah...I'd say definitely consult with a panel of learned and reputable social analysts and informed statistical researchers before committing to any course of action that involves allowing human deaths to occur with the intent of using them as a deterrent against that same course of action.

[EnigmaticHat]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/milo-yiannopoulos-defends-gunning-journalists-down-annapolis-shooting-215613240.html

Funnily enough, he said it only privately. It was his media opponents who were responsible for making it a widespread publicized comment.

I can't think of a single reason journalists would be upset right now.

[SalmonGod]

Remember the Unite the Right rally, where that guy plowed into a group of counter-protesters with his car and killed Heather Heyer?

The same guy who organized the first one is trying to arrange an anniversary event.  Have a few month's worth of leaked Facebook chat logs wherein they discuss plans.

[Reelya]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/milo-yiannopoulos-defends-gunning-journalists-down-annapolis-shooting-215613240.html

Funnily enough, he said it only privately. It was his media opponents who were responsible for making it a widespread publicized comment.

I can't think of a single reason journalists would be upset right now.

Milo musn't have a book coming out soon, or he'd completely own responsibility for the shooting. Milo hasn't done enough repulsive newsworthy stuff recently, so he's clearly not shilling anything at the moment.

[Dunamisdeos]

I'd like to start off 6.30.18 with this edifying article. I was unaware of it until just now.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- NASA engineers and mathematicians in this high-tech city are stunned and infuriated after the Alabama state legislature narrowly passed a law yesterday [June 29, 2018] redefining pi, a mathematical constant used in the aerospace industry. The bill to change the value of pi to exactly three was introduced without fanfare by Richard Shelby (R), and rapidly gained support after a letter-writing campaign by members of the Solomon Society, a traditional values group. Governor Kay Ivey says she will sign it into law on Wednesday.

The law took the state's engineering community by surprise. "It would have been nice if they had consulted with someone who actually uses pi," said Marshall Bergman, a manager at the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. According to Bergman, pi (p) is a Greek letter that signifies the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. It is often used by engineers to calculate missile trajectories.

Prof. Kim Johanson, a mathematician from University of Alabama, said that pi is a universal constant, and cannot arbitrarily be changed by lawmakers. Johanson explained that pi is an irrational number, which means that it has an infinite number of digits after the decimal point and can never be known exactly. Nevertheless, she said, pi is precisely defined by mathematics to be "3.14159, plus as many more digits as you have time to calculate".

"I think that it is the mathematicians that are being irrational, and it is time for them to admit it," said Shelby. "The Bible very clearly says in I Kings 7:23 that the altar font of Solomon's Temple was ten cubits across and thirty cubits in diameter, and that it was round in compass."

Shelby called into question the usefulness of any number that cannot be calculated exactly, and suggested that never knowing the exact answer could harm students' self-esteem. "We need to return to some absolutes in our society," he said, "the Bible does not say that the font was thirty-something cubits. Plain reading says thirty cubits. Period."

[MrRoboto75]

Knowing pi is what murdered those nanobots in Jimmy Neutron.

[Culise]

I'd like to start off 6.30.18 with this edifying article. I was unaware of it until just now.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- NASA engineers and mathematicians in this high-tech city are stunned and infuriated after the Alabama state legislature narrowly passed a law yesterday [June 29, 2018] redefining pi, a mathematical constant used in the aerospace industry. The bill to change the value of pi to exactly three was introduced without fanfare by Richard Shelby (R), and rapidly gained support after a letter-writing campaign by members of the Solomon Society, a traditional values group. Governor Kay Ivey says she will sign it into law on Wednesday.

The law took the state's engineering community by surprise. "It would have been nice if they had consulted with someone who actually uses pi," said Marshall Bergman, a manager at the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. According to Bergman, pi (p) is a Greek letter that signifies the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. It is often used by engineers to calculate missile trajectories.

Prof. Kim Johanson, a mathematician from University of Alabama, said that pi is a universal constant, and cannot arbitrarily be changed by lawmakers. Johanson explained that pi is an irrational number, which means that it has an infinite number of digits after the decimal point and can never be known exactly. Nevertheless, she said, pi is precisely defined by mathematics to be "3.14159, plus as many more digits as you have time to calculate".

"I think that it is the mathematicians that are being irrational, and it is time for them to admit it," said Shelby. "The Bible very clearly says in I Kings 7:23 that the altar font of Solomon's Temple was ten cubits across and thirty cubits in diameter, and that it was round in compass."

Shelby called into question the usefulness of any number that cannot be calculated exactly, and suggested that never knowing the exact answer could harm students' self-esteem. "We need to return to some absolutes in our society," he said, "the Bible does not say that the font was thirty-something cubits. Plain reading says thirty cubits. Period."

Spoiler: Spoilsport alert within (click to show/hide)

Just to clarify for those willing to believe the worst in this post-Trump America, this is a joke that dates back to April 1, 1998, parodying anti-evolution sentiment of the time. It's in the same vein as "Babelism versus godless linguistics" (God created all languages! Root words are only a theory! Teach the controversy!).

That's not to say that attempts to redefine pi haven't happened, though the most famous example was actually a huckster trying to get his method of squaring the circle written into state law. I don't know of any examples where it was actually done based on "Biblical truth."

[Dunamisdeos]

I'd like to start off 6.30.18 with this edifying article. I was unaware of it until just now.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- NASA engineers and mathematicians in this high-tech city are stunned and infuriated after the Alabama state legislature narrowly passed a law yesterday [June 29, 2018] redefining pi, a mathematical constant used in the aerospace industry. The bill to change the value of pi to exactly three was introduced without fanfare by Richard Shelby (R), and rapidly gained support after a letter-writing campaign by members of the Solomon Society, a traditional values group. Governor Kay Ivey says she will sign it into law on Wednesday.

The law took the state's engineering community by surprise. "It would have been nice if they had consulted with someone who actually uses pi," said Marshall Bergman, a manager at the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. According to Bergman, pi (p) is a Greek letter that signifies the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. It is often used by engineers to calculate missile trajectories.

Prof. Kim Johanson, a mathematician from University of Alabama, said that pi is a universal constant, and cannot arbitrarily be changed by lawmakers. Johanson explained that pi is an irrational number, which means that it has an infinite number of digits after the decimal point and can never be known exactly. Nevertheless, she said, pi is precisely defined by mathematics to be "3.14159, plus as many more digits as you have time to calculate".

"I think that it is the mathematicians that are being irrational, and it is time for them to admit it," said Shelby. "The Bible very clearly says in I Kings 7:23 that the altar font of Solomon's Temple was ten cubits across and thirty cubits in diameter, and that it was round in compass."

Shelby called into question the usefulness of any number that cannot be calculated exactly, and suggested that never knowing the exact answer could harm students' self-esteem. "We need to return to some absolutes in our society," he said, "the Bible does not say that the font was thirty-something cubits. Plain reading says thirty cubits. Period."

Spoiler: Spoilsport alert within (click to show/hide)

Just to clarify for those willing to believe the worst in this post-Trump America, this is a joke that dates back to April 1, 1998, parodying anti-evolution sentiment of the time. It's in the same vein as "Babelism versus godless linguistics" (God created all languages! Root words are only a theory! Teach the controversy!).

That's not to say that attempts to redefine pi haven't happened, though the most famous example was actually a huckster trying to get his method of squaring the circle written into state law. I don't know of any examples where it was actually done based on "Biblical truth."

Spoiler: For realies! (click to show/hide)

Someone did try to define Pi as 3.2, I think, in Indiana. I can't find the reference tho.

[Culise]

I'd like to start off 6.30.18 with this edifying article. I was unaware of it until just now.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- NASA engineers and mathematicians in this high-tech city are stunned and infuriated after the Alabama state legislature narrowly passed a law yesterday [June 29, 2018] redefining pi, a mathematical constant used in the aerospace industry. The bill to change the value of pi to exactly three was introduced without fanfare by Richard Shelby (R), and rapidly gained support after a letter-writing campaign by members of the Solomon Society, a traditional values group. Governor Kay Ivey says she will sign it into law on Wednesday.

The law took the state's engineering community by surprise. "It would have been nice if they had consulted with someone who actually uses pi," said Marshall Bergman, a manager at the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. According to Bergman, pi (p) is a Greek letter that signifies the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. It is often used by engineers to calculate missile trajectories.

Prof. Kim Johanson, a mathematician from University of Alabama, said that pi is a universal constant, and cannot arbitrarily be changed by lawmakers. Johanson explained that pi is an irrational number, which means that it has an infinite number of digits after the decimal point and can never be known exactly. Nevertheless, she said, pi is precisely defined by mathematics to be "3.14159, plus as many more digits as you have time to calculate".

"I think that it is the mathematicians that are being irrational, and it is time for them to admit it," said Shelby. "The Bible very clearly says in I Kings 7:23 that the altar font of Solomon's Temple was ten cubits across and thirty cubits in diameter, and that it was round in compass."

Shelby called into question the usefulness of any number that cannot be calculated exactly, and suggested that never knowing the exact answer could harm students' self-esteem. "We need to return to some absolutes in our society," he said, "the Bible does not say that the font was thirty-something cubits. Plain reading says thirty cubits. Period."

Spoiler: Spoilsport alert within (click to show/hide)

Just to clarify for those willing to believe the worst in this post-Trump America, this is a joke that dates back to April 1, 1998, parodying anti-evolution sentiment of the time. It's in the same vein as "Babelism versus godless linguistics" (God created all languages! Root words are only a theory! Teach the controversy!).

That's not to say that attempts to redefine pi haven't happened, though the most famous example was actually a huckster trying to get his method of squaring the circle written into state law. I don't know of any examples where it was actually done based on "Biblical truth."

Spoiler: For realies! (click to show/hide)

Someone did try to define Pi as 3.2, I think, in Indiana. I can't find the reference tho.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Yep, that's the huckster in question: the Indiana Pi bill, and the story. Basically, you can't square the circle if pi is transcendental, so two of many errors he made were to assume that approximations of pi as 3.2 and the square root of 2 as 10/7 were exact; passing the bill would have let these sneak in as well.  There were many, many other things wrong with it as well from his very first fundamental understanding of the problem all the way to the idea that he would require the payment of royalties for any use of this "new mathematical truth" if they didn't pass the bill immediately, but "redefining pi" ended up being the most famous.