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(Back) into the wild

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Images

Published: 30 April 2020

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So far, a nightmare of Ticks, hordes of other as yet unidentified biting insects, and very few finds. A new pegmatite, no gems...anyways, let the pictures tell the tale:

Striated & mineralized schist..

Green gob-spawn of some sort on quartz...

red crystal growths on pegmatite, looks like garnet, shaped like?

Garnets embedded in Schist.

 

Contagion

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 25 April 2020

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This was - in almost every aspect - a terrible movie. Despite the All-Star cast.

But, that said - a little bit ahead of the curve in the prescient foreshadowing of what's now come to pass, from the wet-markets, social distancing, bad actors (definitely not enough of those!!!) reactions, etc.

Where it fails is in the imagined response of the US reacting to the threat. Because nobody could have imagined the Trump. Or - wait - maybe somebody did...

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiS5UO-hIOg

The Trolley Problem

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Ideas & Questions

Published: 09 April 2020

Hits: 1207

This is a classical ethics problem posed to grade school ethics or social studies. Essentially it comes down to this:

Effectively, you see a trolley, or freight train coming down the tracks. If it continues on it's course it will kill a dozen workers ahead. If you take action by moving a switch that trolley or train will shunt to another track and kill only 3 workers.

Do you throw the switch?

Variations of it include - throwing the switch to save the workers but killing your child, etcetera, etcetera. You can go on. Do you make the sacrifice for the greater good?

We're seeing it play out now. This is how it's going. The Orange haired switch master and the freight train is on fire, packed chock full of dynamite heading into the busiest, fullest train station in the world at rush hour. The Switch master has taken the microphone and begun pitching quack cures to the people waiting in the station. 

This is fucking incredible. And signing into existence a "Space Force" and giving out rights to mine on the moon. Wow. This is progress. This is the end. Even "Idiocracy" didn't foresee this...