We were at Disney recently, and Dad said that we could do whatever we wanted. He commented that we could even stand around all day, although that would be a waste of money. So I started wondering, where (on Earth) is the most expensive place to stand? To qualify, it must be a place where people have gone (and survived). The bottom of the ocean wouldn’t count, but the top of Mount Everest would.
~ George
Having participated in a discussion about social norms recently, I realized something that I don’t think anyone else there picked up on.
There are way more social norms than we usually think there are. Many things are social norms, even if we wouldn’t think they are. To help identify a few, here’s the definition which I’ll use:
A social norm is something the majority of society does/finds normal
Using that definition, you can find more social norms by realizing a few things about them:
The last one is the most interesting to think about. There are so many things which are “yeah duh, of course we don’t do that”, which I hadn’t even thought of as social norms. Of course we don’t randomly set fire to forests. Yes, it’s common sense. Yes, it’s the right thing to do. Yes, it seems crazy to even think about doing on purpose. And yes, it’s a social norm.
~ George
If you “waste” your time, where does all the “garbage” go, and could you (theoretically) go and collect it? Not a very serious question, but still interesting to think about.
~ George
If you think of another way to tell this joke, please post in the comments
Imagine… you’ve somehow managed to go back in time with your friend, you’re talking to George Washington (your childhood hero), thinking this is the most exciting moment of your life, and suddenly your friend pulls out two bottles of soft drink and hands them to your idle, saying, “Let’s settle this once and for all. Which is better, Mr. Washington, Coke, or Pepsi?”
~ George
(The first paragraph describes what would probably be a child’s game, meanwhile the second would more likely be a teen/adult game. Both could be used either way, though)
I think it would be interesting to have a game which starts out extremely “buggy”, and the goal is to fix the bugs, so that you can play the “real” game. This can involve quests to do something like “Plug-in so and so’s computer” or “Battle the villain until he gives you the code you need to fix the bug”. Another possibility would be to have the bugs be real monsters, like ants or beetle, which you have to fight. Then, when you destroy the boss bug, you’ll stop glitching.
Or, perhaps you can have the reverse: you start with a bug free game, and through ‘hacking” (real or fake) you make the game more buggy, in ways that allow you to continue the game. For instance, you might create a “bug” which makes you to glitch through walls, enabling you to be able to get through a locked door and continue the quest. Maybe you need two coins to bribe a guard with, but you’ve only got one. So you create a “bug” which if you use it right lets you duplicate the coins. A possible concept is that you could have a room with a bunch of buttons which turn on and off “bugs”, and the player has to figure out how to use the bugs.
~ George
What if you had a game which you could only play at certain times a day? Like a game of tag in which you can only tag someone when the last digit of the digital clock (you’d need an official clock) is 7, or perhaps have the game go on for days and you can only tag someone if it’s 8 o’clock (not too early or too late). Or, maybe you don’t even need it to be time based. Perhaps you can only tag someone if you’re outside, or if you’re in the shade, or maybe you can only be tagged if someone around you is wearing a blue shirt! Other games you might be able to play could be the Dart Game, Ninja, or any other similar game.
~ George
It’s possible for something to be “proven beyond doubt” without actually being true. After all, for a long time entire countries believed that the Earth was the center of the solar system, and it didn’t even occur to them to doubt. This is obviously false today, but in that time and in that place an Earth-centered universe was “proven beyond doubt”. Along similar lines is the phrase “That many people can’t be wrong!”, which, when you think about it and how often that isn’t true, sounds too foolish even to argue against.
~ George
I was reading my description of Idea Polish Level: 3 when I noticed the last sentence. To quote the description, “This is for ideas which I’ve thought a lot about, and might only need a bit more work to get them fully polished. This is probably where some of the more interesting posts will be because often the best ideas are rarely finished.” After rereading the phrase I realized how true it was.
What are some of the best ideas that you can think of? Some that come to my mind are the computer, Einstein’s relativity, the automobile, medicine, etc. Imagine if one of these “best” ideas somehow was finished, done, never going to be improved upon again. If the computer was finished when it was invented we would never have gotten the internet. If relativity was finished when it was invented we would still not understand gravity. If the automobile was finished when it was invented we’d still be “crawling” around at < 10 mph. If any of those were finished now, how much would we miss out in the future?
The best ideas are never finished, but that doesn’t mean they always start. While the first thinker of a truly “best” idea may fail, the idea will continue.
What are some of the “best” ideas that we couldn’t live without, and what would happen if they stopped?
~ George
I have a notebook from the company Infoblox. What would a block of pure information look like? For some reason I picture it as electric blue with blue smoke and light all around it.
~ George