Important If True 55: Consider the Water Lobster

[Jake]

Important If True 55:

Consider the Water Lobster
Our time is precious. We all know it. But how precious? It all depends on how much of it we have. Three hundred years? Four hundred? _One hundred thousand years?_ The cosmos stretch out before us, inscrutable and infinite. The only limits are your imagination, and the unstoppable multitudes of self-cloning asexual crayfish threatening to extinguish all galactic mass.

Discussed: dulcet tones, glitter bombs, helping, the hone zone, self-cloning mutant crayfish, human extinction via water lobsters, wax housing the coati, being back, thin-faced fortune-smashing robot arm, charming fortune cookie fortune-writing mom, redacted fortunes, robots making robots making microchips, The Matrix but with crayfish and the point is to get rid of glitter, Twista's extended family line obliterating all stellar mass

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Jake's Endorsement: "My Cow Game Extracted Your Facebook Data" by Ian Bogost

Chris' Endorsement: "Why Silicon Valley billionaires are prepping for the apocalypse in New Zealand by Mark O'Connell

Nick's Cowardly Improvised Endorsement: Watching "Jeopardy!" (or playing The Authentic At Home Jeopardy from Hammacher Schlemmer)

Nick's True Endorsement: Wonder Bread (learn about its racist history!)

Sponsored By: Quip electric toothbrushes (first brush head refill free), Happy Birthday David (from Sarah), Happy Birthday Mike (from James)

 

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[CaptainFish]

I hope you're feeling better after recovering from the norovirus, Nick.

I'm also wondering if there's any substantial or noticeable difference between Canadian Wonder bread by Weston vs American Wonder by whoever bought it after Hostess went under. Maybe a comparison could be made when you're back stateside. I feel like I've heard tons of differences between food here and there, but I dunno how much of it is apocryphal.

[Problem Machine]

I've always rather liked the malapropism "honed in on", and don't hesitate to use it myself. I feel that, just as honing a blade removes spare material and aligns edges to create a sharper edge, honing in on something is removing extraneous material to gain a more incisive perspective.

 

Also, I expect that the number Chris was thinking of as being larger than the amount of atoms in the universe is the googol: " One googol is presumed to be greater than the number of atoms in the observable universe, which has been estimated to be approximately 10^78 "

[Chris]

6 hours ago, Problem Machine said:

I've always rather liked the malapropism "honed in on", and don't hesitate to use it myself. I feel that, just as honing a blade removes spare material and aligns edges to create a sharper edge, honing in on something is removing extraneous material to gain a more incisive perspective.

 

Also, I expect that the number Chris was thinking of as being larger than the amount of atoms in the universe is the googol: " One googol is presumed to be greater than the number of atoms in the observable universe, which has been estimated to be approximately 10^78 "

 

Yeah but you can just "hone" it, you don't have to "hone in on" it. It's already what "hone" means.

[Problem Machine]

True, I think I visualize that as moving through the extraneous material to find the true edge. I find it very evocative.

[WickedCestus]

The Hone Zone was veering dangerously close to Jeff Gone Gold territory, my personal favourite Idle Thumbs bit. Probably for the best that you didn't fully revert. 

 

 

That crawfish story gives me the creepy-crawlies. I was lying in bed with a half-fever imagining my room slowly filling up with water lobsters, and feeling the sensation of them tickling my feet. It reminds me of an old daydream/nightmare I used to have in school about if all bugs suddenly quadrupled in size and drowned the human population. 

 

Anyway, it's amazing how stupidly cohesive this episode ended up being (, using IIT logic of course, not.. actual logic). 

[Travis]

I "got to" learn about foods and glucose levels a couple years ago. It's notable that white bread is basically the measuring stick for glycemic index. My takeaway was that you were better off eating spoonfuls of actual sugar than white bread.

[jennegatron]

you can't put peanut butter between 2 spoonfuls of sugar

[Travis]

19 hours ago, jennegatron said:

you can't put peanut butter between 2 spoonfuls of sugar

 

Not quite, but that is pretty close to a Reese's peanut butter cup, which has pretty low glycemic index! It's a weird thing.

 

[Ben X]

On 4/1/2018 at 11:23 AM, Problem Machine said:

Also, I expect that the number Chris was thinking of as being larger than the amount of atoms in the universe is the googol: " One googol is presumed to be greater than the number of atoms in the observable universe, which has been estimated to be approximately 10^78 "

 

I think he may have been trying to get to "there are more stars in the universe than grains of sand in all Earth's beaches and deserts".

[DocRandal]

No Gods

or Kings

only Water Lobsters

[Urthman]

Every time Jake said "marbled crayfish," I couldn't stop my brain from hearing it as "Marvel Crayfish," which made it sound like the Important If Crew were bullshitting hypothetical plots for Ant-Man 3: Ant-Man and The Wasp 2: The Insect/Crustacean War or something.

 

(You know, like Star Wars: Dark Forces III: Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast)