So, who's bringing the hot cocoa?

Your brain’s special faculties: music, humor, spirituality, mathematics, eroticism, art, nurturing, narration, gossip! These are fine spirits to pour into the cup of life. Blessed you are if you have a vintage bottle of any of these. Better yet, a cask! Better yet, a vineyard!

Be not afraid to grow. The mind’s cellars have no ceilings!

What other capacities are possible? Imagine a world with all the music dried up: what poverty, what loss. Give your thanks, not to the lyre, but to your ears for the music. And ask yourself, what other harmonies are there in the air, that you lack the ears to hear? What vaults of value are you witlessly debarred from, lacking the key sensibility?

Had you but an inkling, your nails would be clawing at the padlock.

--Nick Bostrom, Letter From Utopia

Katja Grace explains why we all must 'follow our hearts'.

“Just because money doesn’t buy happiness doesn’t mean money cannot buy happiness,” says Elizabeth Dunn, a social psychologist and assistant professor at the University of British Columbia. “People just might be using it wrong.”

Happiness: A Buyer's Guide

Katja: cynicism is wonderful! it's like sunshine and birds singing!
Mike: you don't sound very cynical...
Katja: that’s because I'm explaining how wonderful cynicism is! You just don't understand it properly.

Can you beat two eggs with some cream and nutmeg?
Can you find some random tasty leftovers in your fridge?
Can you locate a frozen pie crust in your local supermarket?
Can you operate an oven without causing injury and/or property damage?

Then congratulations, you too can make delicious quiche!

Two eggs, cup of cream, nutmeg, beat together

Put some food in a pie crust. Cheddar and brocolli. Chicken, goat cheese, and sundried tomatoes. Smoked salmon and gouda. Jack cheese, mixed stir fried vegetables, and almonds.

(Quiches are like pizza -- try whatever you like and see what happens)

Pour in the eggs and cream

Put it in the oven at 350 for 45 minutes, then let it sit out for another 15.

Slice and serve like a pie.

You're welcome.

Do you think the media, in general, is too conservative, too liberal, or actually pretty impartial?

• Too conservative
• Too liberal
• Impartial

The media is not too conservative, too liberal, or impartial. The media is concerned with what will excite people and sell ads. This goal is not congruent with a concern for what will best inform people and enable them to participate in a democracy.

Might you support, as a parent, washing your child's mouth out with soap or applying a dab of hot sauce to the tongue of a child who's using inappropriate language?

• yes
• no

 

The more I think about this practice, the more it offends and disgusts me. Follow me for a moment:

A child is born essentially powerless. No money, no political power, but first and foremost, a child is physically small, and thus can be physically overpowered at any time. I think you'll find that most children are pretty keenly aware of this fact.

Cursing, then, is an infantile way of playing with the idea that *words* can have power. It's simple, it's easy, and yet it carries the power to shock any adult within earshot. Eventually, most children are going to want to experiment with it.

Of course, cursing is a pretty cheap form of verbal power, compared with a logical argument, or even emotional rhetoric. A smart parent can try to explain that to a child -- that there are better, *more potent* ways to use words for power. Ways that intelligent adults will actually take note of.

Washing the mouth out with soap, on the other hand, sends almost exactly the wrong message. It essentially says no, you are not allowed to take power in that way -- I can still overpower you physically, and can still cause you pain. Until that changes, you will remain powerless.

It teaches them that in the end, physical power is what counts. It's a horribly perverse form of education, and were I to become a parent, I would not consider it for a moment

Have you ever been described as "fidgety"?

• Yes
• No
• Once or twice

I don't think this question has a response that's worded strongly enough for me. People occasionally *describe* me as fidgety. But usually they just jump straight to "Mike, for the love of God will you please stop tapping on that table."

"Life is a tragedy for those who feel, but a comedy to those who think." Generally speaking, are you a feeler or a thinker?

• It's a cold, cold, sad tragedy of a world.
• It's all a vast comedy to me.
• I disagree with the quote; it's so simplistic.

I agree wholeheartedly with this quote, and in fact have experienced both quite strongly.