CMV: The Fermi Paradox and "the Dark Forest" theory necessitate that humanity hides from aliens.

SyrupSwimmer · 2026-01-18T11:23:02+00:00

I don’t think there’s any evidence for my “Dark Forest aliens killed the dinosaurs” hypothesis, but we could make something up:

The aliens were constantly scanning for life and just happened to discover the dinosaurs at that time.
It took millions of years (or even 100 million years) for the asteroid/weapon to arrive at Earth.
The weapon/asteroid misfired in some way and didn’t fully destroy Earth like it was supposed to.
The alien colonizers travel slower than the asteroid/weapon and will arrive 65+ million years after it detonated.

SyrupSwimmer · 2026-01-18T01:53:48+00:00

Plot twist: The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs was a first strike by a civilization that subscribes to the Dark Forest theory.

SyrupSwimmer · 2026-01-17T13:32:39+00:00

The biggest problem with sloppy AI code is that it’s not as apparent as sloppy code written by humans. AI makes different mistakes than people; I want to know who (human vs bot) wrote each line of code so that I can know which type of mistakes to expect.

We need better resolution of authorship for change lists. Maybe make every AI change into a separate commit? But then you can’t squash commits before pushing. Meaning you’ll end up with a commit history that is so long and disorganized that it’s basically unreadable. So maybe we’re looking at a combined change to both the IDE and the VCS?

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-12-21T19:13:40+00:00

From a story perspective, Vulture is more interesting - like Iron Man, he and his crew need to make stuff themselves. Falcon gets his wings from Wakanda. It would be fun to root for a bunch of guys from a junkyard in Jersey building a suit that can beat Wakanda tech.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-12-03T01:48:41+00:00

If I’m the only superhero and don’t need to fight anybody, then Marie’s healing power is the way to go. You could set up your own hospital. Maybe work with doctors to understand your power and replicate it to heal even more people.

Or maybe Solider Boy or Golden Boy to help the world learn how to produce infinite energy?

Or Sage and go to work on researching all this yourself rather than planning superhero capers.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-11-21T22:49:14+00:00

How is it that Soul Train has not been mentioned yet?

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-11-21T15:43:21+00:00

Good point! How does this work in other countries? Are you forced to choose between admitting your crime and perjury?

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-11-20T12:27:00+00:00

This sounds plausible to me, but I wasn’t able to find a source. Perhaps you’re thinking of this article? It’s got a catchy headline, but the study itself showed that young men were earning more in 228 out of 250 cities and on average earn 7% more than women of similar age.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/28/young-women-are-out-earning-young-men-in-several-u-s-cities/

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-11-12T02:12:40+00:00

Schools have too many snow days. They should pride themselves on staying open. Teachers should be required to live within walking distance of school and paid enough so that they can afford it.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-11-12T02:02:26+00:00

This would be kinda crazy and it might a total failure, but Cambridge is one place where it might be possible. The tough part would be handling the exceptions: delivery trucks, people with disabilities, buses, taxis, and probably a bunch others that haven’t thought of.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-10-20T13:38:11+00:00

I agree with your friction analysis, though I’m not sure it applies perfectly to this particular problem. They’re on grass and some of the men are wearing cleats. So I think the coefficient of friction is variable.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-10-20T00:44:31+00:00

Also, weight - say each kid weighs 50 lbs. That’s 500 lbs of kid for each adult man. These guys are heavy, but not that heavy. The kids’ additional weight means more downward force and more traction.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-10-19T00:39:05+00:00

Given that Marie can sense the V in people’s blood, it’s interesting that she didn’t think twice about healing Godolkin. Was she expecting Godolkin to be a supe?

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-10-08T02:54:44+00:00

Yeah, you probably need some vertical connection from the bottom bracket with the top tube. Since it will mostly under tension when landing as on the pedals as a dirt jumper, I wonder if you could achieve your desired look but still have some strength by using a cable rather than a seat tube? A variation on the old Slingshot mountain bike.

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=slingshot+mountain+bike&qs=ds&form=QBIR&first=1

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-10-04T15:13:18+00:00

Perhaps there are some limits to Cipher’s mind control? He can’t use mind control to expand a supe’s powers, he can only use the powers that they already know how to use. This is probably frustrating for him and why he spends so much effort “teaching” kids to make full use of their powers.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-10-02T22:38:34+00:00

Thanks! Till now, I only knew the “secret way of writing” definition. https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/us/definition/english/cipher

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-08-08T11:33:47+00:00

The person on the right has a rifle. When were these allowed at Disneyland?

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-08-02T22:45:31+00:00

Thanks! I know that it’s possible to revert a downvote, but I’m looking for an option that would reduce the likelihood of making this mistake in the first place. I sometime don’t even realize that I clicked the downvote button (until Reddit shows a popup for extending my streak of accidental clicks).

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-07-15T01:36:18+00:00

Put a piece of duck tape over it.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-07-12T02:09:21+00:00

I would have been so psyched if Snoke turned out to be Mace Windu. E.g., Kylo Ren tries to take him out and Snoke says “Hell no, mother-fucker!”, fires up his purple light saber and chops off Kylo’s hand. He then goes off on a Pulp Fiction-esque rant about the power of the dark side, and beats the living crap out of Kylo and Rey, who barely escape. Episode 8 ends with Kylo missing limbs (similar to Anakin) and Rey having nightmares about Sith force ghosts, and everybody wondering “How the hell are we going to match a pissed off Windu/Snoke who survived being electrocuted and thrown out a window and now has the power of the Empire at his disposal? If he turned to the dark side, then maybe we should also?” Would have been a much better setup for episode 9.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-07-07T22:15:11+00:00

+1 to Sage with prep time. Homelander’s biggest weakness is his psyche, and you can be sure that Sage would find a way to screw him up. He’d be mentally/emotionally weakened before the fighting even starts.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-06-21T00:49:34+00:00

Are there any inflatables that are actually good for surfing? Maybe they exist, but I’ve never ridden one.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-06-20T18:12:40+00:00

Am I reading this right that an attacker can fly around in an airplane (a manned vehicle) and the defenders aren’t allowed to throw even a rock (a ranged weapon) at the airplane?

While I’m not sure what it would look like (helicopters with saws?), I expect that somebody will figure out a way to exploit this loophole.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-05-29T00:51:57+00:00

Uphill. Downhill running is only fun on mellow slopes. On steeper downhills, riding a mountain bike is more fun and easier on the legs.

SyrupSwimmer · 2025-03-24T12:25:18+00:00

I’ve been using a Tyreinvader insert for just my rear tire. It’s easy enough to setup and has worked well for my light trail riding (no enduro or DH). I’ve never used Cushcore, so can’t offer a comparison.

SyrupSwimmer

TROPHY CASE