None of them do what I want, which is to check my blood sugar via UV light. They’ve been talking about it for at least 15 years. I know why too. They want to be able to sell all our info, and medical stuff is protected by HIPPA.

Yeah maybe, but we’re 40 now.

Oh, it’s certainly my thoughts. I’m just saying I don’t decide what to think before I think, you know? And I think in that voice, so I really can’t identify anything prior. It’s just me in here, but it’s a funny way to think about consciousness.

It’s my own voice in my head. Its difficult to determine on what level I control it. It doesn’t “make” me do things, but it’s not like I decide what it says before it speaks. I often wonder if it’s the other half of my brain. I speak differently in person than I do inside my head, or type, for that matter.

Regardless whether it’s a kind of supplemental personality inside my head, one thing I’m convinced of is that many people mistake their internal monologue for the Voice of God.

I can’t, but this astrophysicist is the one who proposed the idea. Both techniques use compatible tech. https://youtu.be/rFqL9CkNxXw?si=WkbEiTM6usQnSgyy

I’m not convinced they’re visiting us. None of the reports I’ve seen appear credible. But non-interference is often critical to scientific study. They could just be doing a decent job at hiding from us.

If they’re out there, I’d be shocked if they wouldn’t visit. Our solar system has been showing life signs for 3.5B years, and technological signs for about a century or so. There aren’t apparently many planets like ours around. We are a very tempting target for study.

It appears to be quite difficult to develop a spacefarring civilization. But there are credible models for sailing light beamed from stars, and even gravity surfing orbiting black hole pairs. The vast energies required for interstellar travel should be impossible to conceal. We ought to already be able to see them out there, if they’re close.

13.5B years is an eyeblink in the potential age of the Universe. We developed early. Perhaps not first, but very early. Intelligence and technology are difficult and expensive to develop. Our hubris may destroy us. We might easily be alone in our local neighborhood. Technological civilizations may still be rare. But once they go interplanetary, there are few ways for such a civilization to go extinct.

I’m fairly confident they’re out there somewhere. I’m sceptical that they’re close. We may be the first in our galaxy, or even the Local Group. Who can say? I don’t know.

Work exposure to extreme heat and cold usually kills mine every year. I’m looking seriously at repairability.

I’d like to support solarpunk development. I just want to live a simple life, with high tech in cooperation with the environment. We need it badly. I would fund so many community libraries. Don’t misunderstand me though. I still want space travel, but I no longer trust capitalists with it.

The vampire murders.

https://www.dailycommercial.com/story/news/local/eustis/2020/04/11/vampire-killer-keeps-his-life-sentence/1367922007/

Well, those who most benefit from the status quo also understand those concepts quite well, but oppose them.

I have heard they share it freely.

Ha! As if real girlfriends don’t harvest personal data!

Thank goodness you were here to clear up the confusion.

The Hubble Deep Field image struck the first major blow against my childhood indoctrination in young earth creationism.

I’m working all the way through all the holidays in a remote location in what ought to be the frozen north, but is now discomfortingly comfy.

To get more specific, I think it would be fun to build out a single O’Neill Cylinder within a Dyson Swarm. For multiplayer, just give everybody their own cylinder. But I definitely don’t just want an overhead view. I want to build a little world that can fully explore in first person. And no damn microtransactions! The only exception I’d accept would be paying for other people’s models.

I want to build various types of orbital and planetary megastructures like Isaac Arthur describes. Ixion has been the closest fix for me, but I want much larger structures than just a Stanford Torus. No idea how Ixion ends yet. But I’d like to see a lot more interior space available, vastly more green spaces, and experimentation with other styles of governance than capitalism. I want to walk and fly around whatever I build, preferably in VR. And while I wouldn’t object to the option, I don’t really care about fighting in this setting. I just want to build out a Dyson Sphere.

It’s not there for you to save the house. It’s a tool for you to save yourself by preventing it getting larger, or by clearing a temporary path.

Are you suggesting that improvement is impossible? If it can only get worse, then it is imperative to push back in defense.

How can we do nothing and still look our children in the eyes?

No, I want to fix my own country.