I don't know if I'd trust Stan. Remember, the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world that he doesn't exist...

I always thought his greatest trick was getting Bush into office. That took finesse.

In Response to stilllwaiting (#2241):

I also believe that was his best trick
how in the hell did bush get into office???

Kaiser Soze exists. He didn't pull any tricks by telling the world who he was (at least he did it in suspenseful movie form, though).
I am not the largest fan of Mr. Bush either. Give me one part cocaine, one part missile and the brain of a chimp and I bet I could clone him.

In Response to Haddie (#2976):

Only the brain? I reckon you could use the face as well. When you seem Bush "deep in thought" (and I use the phrase loosely), he works his mouth like a chimp trying to decide which oriface to pick. You'd just need to shave the face and beat it with a sack of potatoes a little first...

In Response to evilaltor (#2981):

You wha?

Oh, the chimp's face. Dang. I was almost titillated for a minute there.

In Response to Lonely Goatherd (#2969):

bush promised jesus he would give all the orphans ps2 s
AWWW SO SAD!

In Response to Haddie (#2976):

Lol, yes! he does look like a chimp. I thought that was just me....

In Response to Pacific (#3701):

You look like a chimp too?

In Response to daubergoat (#3704):

That might explain the three joints a day. He's trying to mask the smell...

In Response to zamphir (#3705):

Hehe... last time I saw people take such nasty shots at each other, Reagan was in office. Either then or when my family gathered for the holidays.

In Response to daubergoat (#3706):

Nasty shots? That's what the internet's for. It allows us to badmouth each other without fear of physical retaliation. It's probably the only thing that saved the cynist-nerd from extinction.

In Response to Pacific (#3714):

Explain Dennis Miller, then.

Civilization is what allows us to "badmouth each other without fear of physical retaliation", not "The Internet".

The Internet just allows us to badmouth *more* people, spread farther apart. It's a tool that enables communication, without respect for the nature of that communication.

In Response to zamphir (#3715):

Shoddy logic Zamphir. Following your stated maxim, there should be no murders because it's against the idea of "civilization". I could be interpreting it wrong but I think I'm pretty close here.

In Response to Pacific (#3737):

May I? Not so much, there, Pacific. It's a statement, not a rule.

Civilization is what allows us to "badmouth each other without fear of physical retaliation", not "The Internet".

not

Civilization is what allows us to "do anything we want to each other without fear of physical retaliation", not "The Internet".

Basically, if I'm reading it right, Z's saying that because we're civilized (i.e. of a civilization), I can call someone a twit without worrying that said individual will come to my house and beat me about the head and shoulders like a red-headed stepchild.

That's about all I have to say, and I'm sorry I started this mess.

In Response to Pacific (#3737):

Shoddy reading on your part, methinks.

1) As daubergoat pointed out, I wasn't stating a rule

2) My point had nothing to do with the effectiveness of civilization at preventing people from getting hit for being smart-asses

3) I never made any assertions that my claims were based on logic. Attempts to refute them on logic are therefore equally baseless. (and that is logic).

4) The fact remains that "The Internet" is a tool for communications that provides very few constraints about the nature of the communication.

5) Your assertion about "The Internet" is only true to the extent that "The Internet" is a means of communication over physical distances. Your assertion applies equally (that is to say, badly) to all forms of communication over physical distances. There's absolutely nothing about "The Internet" that prevents you from finding me and smacking me about the head with a baseball bat. There's also nothing about "Civilization" that prevents the same. But Civilization at least specifies rules and heuristics to suggest that doing so is a bad idea. "The Internet" doesn't - "netiquette" is a polite fiction.

In Response to zamphir (#3741):

Before luvrhino gets here and pushes his literary leanings upon you all. In Guns Germs and Steel Jared Diamond posits that civilisations consisting of more than a few hundred people have too many dyads which are non related (via marriage blood etc) and so there is literally no reason not to kill a stranger and many reasons to kill that stranger out of hand. This of course weakens that civilisation (no coherency and so attackers are less likely to be fended off).

Hence surviving civilisations (over the long term) have tended towards having a series of judicial and enforcement branches to prevent, where possible, and dissuade pre emptively active murder.

In fact he states that homicide is in fact the most likely way to die in any of the modern (ie recorded history as opposed to pre last ice age (13K yrs ago roughly))

If you made it this far and have not read the book go read it now or luvrhino will come and kill you.

In Response to tor (#3758):

Whoa, huckleberry, bring the wagon back to the stable. First off, the internet is only a civilization, not a society. We exist here in the same time and space, but we don't have any shared purpose, so dyads and other social groups don't enter into the discussion. Secondly, we are strangers, but we're removed from each other. If we were on the subway and I called you a pedantic jackass, you would have a distinct window of opportunity to kill me. However, since we're online and you can't kill me at the moment (I hope), I am able to say all sorts of things, including the following:

Sentence structure.

Vocabulary.

Coherence.

It's cold here, and it's bedtime. Good night...

--
"The doctors say one day I may even be able to feel my face again."
"Yeah, doctors say a lot of things."

In Response to daubergoat (#3764):

Ahem.

The Internet is not a civilization! It's a communications tool.

It's what allows me to tell you that being 'a pedantic jackass' is all in good fun in this place (which isn't really a place, either. A site, sure.).

In Response to zamphir (#3766):

Fair enough.

And as long as it's all in fun, I won't have to sit quietly in the corner and weep.

In Response to zamphir (#3741):

Fair enough, maybe I was oversimplifying.