Clayton

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• Commented on $50k novel advance == "almost qualify for foodstamps"
  The fact is, most truly good novels skirt the zeitgeist by default and never make it to the kinds of sales numbers required for NYtimes lists. Your "most artists" includes most novelists of intellectual merit for at least most of...
• Commented on Spurning the "false god of coffee"
  Staring at bright lights has physical side effects. Does that make staring at bright lights addictive? Just because something effects the body physically does not mean it's physically addictive. Perhaps you don't understand addiction; regardless, check the science with a...
• Commented on Spurning the "false god of coffee"
  japroach, stimulants are used legally to great benefit for millions of people daily. Caffeine is one of the safest available, but it is one of many. It's also not physically addictive. It is to a degree or another psychologically addictive...
• Commented on Spurning the "false god of coffee"
  Pretty much all of the research I've encountered shows that caffeine increases concentration, intelligence, recall and alertness, among other things, but only in the right doses and only in people without a high tolerance and obviously with exceptions. Just search...
• Commented on Smart Bombs: Mark Dery, Steven Pinker on the Nature-Nurture Wars and the Politics of IQ
  There are very few scientists who aren't evolutionary psychologists who take evolutionary psychology as serious science....
• Commented on Burk Uzzle's photos of Woodstock
  Heh. Mr Brown, I wasn't calling you a tool. Just saying that tools (like the internet) change. You can't just assume that we (young people) are all helpless, joyless and glued to our computer simply because we grew up with...
• Commented on Race and book covers: why is there a white girl on the cover of this book about a black girl? -- UPDATED
  I think Jewels Vern was trying to say, perhaps poorly, that for many/most white Americans, "white" is race neutral. It's tough to argue otherwise. Regardless, this comments thread is proof that the worst people on earth with which to have...
• Commented on Burk Uzzle's photos of Woodstock
  #51, the first part of your response is hilarious and more than I could have hoped when I posted my initial statement. The second part is hilarious because, uh, it kinda proves my point. When was the last time you...
• Commented on Burk Uzzle's photos of Woodstock
  While you guys are here with your rose-tinted glasses and youth-hating, there are some teens on your lawn in need of fist waving and yelling. You better get at them before they trample your expensive perennial beds....
• Commented on Autism as an academic advantage
  #39 Ravenword: Heck, one doesn't even need to go that far into the spectrum to discount Cowen's thesis. The fact that he uses exceptions to the norms of even high-functioning autistics as the foundation of his argument is sufficient reason...
• Commented on Autism as an academic advantage
  The fact of the matter remains that a great many (a majority, I'd wager) of so called high-functioning autistics struggle a great deal through school from start to finish. Mr. Cowen also treads the line of false dichotomy when he...
• Commented on Myth of the Rational Market: the rise and fall of the idea of market rationality
  #28 Brainspore: I was wondering the same thing....
• Commented on Richard Metzger's Tell It Like It Is Review of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince"
  #3 Demidian: Just to clarify, many Spaghetti Western's had fantastically complex and well executed plots, and in general were much better films than Western Westerns. I'm not sure where your stereotype came from, but there are a number of Spaghetti...
• Commented on Hmm. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all.
  Xopher, please see Shannon's comment at #76. Also, how self-centered, solipsistic and generally selfish do all the name-callers have to be to say things like "I think this sport is barbaric and I do not like it, therefore it should...
• Commented on Hmm. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all.
  #62 LOCOBOT: Are you actually some AI bot that can complete sentences but not make attempts at logical argument without non sequitur? In spite of what you say, there's nto a 1:1 correlation between pay and athleticism, and again, MMA...
• Commented on Hmm. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all.
  Takuan: Lol. Good point. Think of all the knee surgeries downhill skiers have! Those savages!...
• Commented on Hmm. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all.
  #16: Your argument doesn't follow, but regardless, It was a sport-medicine physician who has worked with athletes from every sport that famously said sometime last year "MMA fighters are the best athletes in the world". It's hyperbolic, sure, and who...
• Commented on Hmm. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all.
  #6: Among the top tier fighters in MMA are countless Olympic gold medalists and world champions in a variety of martial arts, including Judo, Jujitsu, Muay Thai, Karate, Sambo, Wrestling and others. But what's more, these best-in-class fighters can't make...
• Commented on Visualization of US consumer spending
  It's impressive watching progressive Americans unwittingly align themselves with the Frankfurt school after so many years of being duped. We're such suckers....
• Commented on Visualization of US consumer spending
  Oh come on. I've read more books than I can recall in the last year and spent at most $100 on reading. That $100 went to rare, obscure or out of print books, or in a few instances, must have...
• Commented on Heather McDougal on black widow spiders
  Fortunately for her, she will never have to worry about brown recluses, as they do not live in CA. Also, most Brown Recluse bites never become necrotic. I think it's under 1%, , with most of that 1% being minor,...
• Commented on Viacom uses copyright to censor racism protest
  The most frustrating thing about issues of race and racism in internet threads is that you realize how many people are hopelessly racist but completely unaware of their racism. Even here on Boing Boing, , when these issues come up,...
• Commented on A Nigerian Dictator Bought My Sofa
  I think this type of scam actually pre-dates Nigerian scammers. Either ebay or CL TOS mentions this sort of payment scam explicitly....
• Commented on Deadly spider at grocery store
  I'd heard of this happening but thought it was mostly B.S. Scary that it's true....
• Commented on Urban chickens of the Bronx
  When I lived in Bed-Stuy, my bedroom window overlooked a yard full of hundreds of chickens, roosters and at least half a dozen species of unidentifiable fowl. I heard fights once or twice a day. Good times!...
• Commented on Times online lists of "10 Spectacular second novels," "10 Cursed second novels," and "10 Literary one-hit wonders"
  They clearly need a better word in place of "literary" in one hit wonder. Several of those authors were not only prolific, but composed masses of canonized works....
• Commented on Demolition of a handsome 100-year-old Seattle house video
  100 years old! That like prehistory for West Coast homes....
• Commented on Secret message hidden in Lincoln's pocketwatch
  Katerade: I believe Cory added the word "apocryphal" after he originally posted the article, but that addition in no way helps clarify that the anti-slavery exists only in the memories of a dead man and not on any watch. If...
• Commented on Wine-cellar encapsulated in a staircase
  Better make sure you can control the temp. and humidity in that staircase or you'll risk ruining a whole lot of wine....
• Commented on Secret message hidden in Lincoln's pocketwatch
  neon: Most historians would agree with your former point. The "Jeff. Davis" inscription was made by another repairer, according to the sources I read....