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Concerning manipulation of diamond by biological molecules, what exactly is this?
(Not trying to make a point here; I am actively deferring to someone with more chemistry mojo than I have to explain this)
In response to
Meetup : Fort Collins, Colorado Meetup Thursday 7pm
Hi! I'm in town from Tucson for the week, and I'm super interested in meeting some new LessWrongers. Unfortunately, I'm busy right at 7; if I drop in later, at 8:30 or 9:00, will people still be there?
Yes, although The Bean Cycle (where it will be held) closes at nine. There will likely be an afterparty-type affair, however.
The human brain uses something like a fifth of the oxygen the body uses. The selective pressure against general intelligence would be formidable indeed.
Is there any comprehensive discussion of the selection pressures against intelligence? I've compiled a couple in http://www.gwern.net/Drug%20heuristics#modafinil but that's only what I've stumbled across and recognized as relevant.
I've seen some rather detailed discussion of the specific case of the enlarged human cranium being a rather tight squeeze through the pelvis, but I don't recall any more general discussion of selective pressures acting against intelligence.
In response to
Meetup : Fort Collins, Colorado Meetup
Was there a sign? I seem to be having trouble finding this meet up group.
In response to
The Cognitive Science of Rationality
The human brain uses something like a fifth of the oxygen the body uses. The selective pressure against general intelligence would be formidable indeed.
Fun to speculate about a different biology where cognition is not so metabolically expensive, or another where it's even dearer.
We know that Hogwarts changes itself and has a mind of its own. We also know that Eliezer had pointed out to him in a completely distinct context that doorknobs were not invented until the second half of the 19th century. (In this thread.) In chapter 71, Eliezer explicitly mentions a door in Hogwarts having a knob. Am I overthinking or has he just given us evidence that Hogwarts is smart enough to adopt new technologies to itself?
This may not be the case since the Wizarding world does on a rare occasion adopt Muggle technology (such as the use of armor by medieval wizards). But either way it suggests that either a) wizards adopted a very late technology or b) Hogwarts has a lot of flexibility in how it behaves and can even upgrade itself. So we either have a useful sociological data point or we have a data point about what Hogwarts is capable of doing.
Doesn't McGonnagall mention that the clocks in Hogwarts were most definitely invented by Muggles? That would be an additional datum in favor of this interpretation.
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Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 8
Perhaps sacrifices are the real source of magic. Not really equivalent exchange, given the trivial uses magic is usually put to, but that's thermodynamics for you - 'you can't win, you can't break even, and you can't quit'.
I'm immediately reminded of discworld where technical improvements in magical theory have gotten to the point where a spell that originally required the sacrifice of a human being can now be performed using a few ccs of mouse blood.
Hmmm, what if the practice of magic is weaker in the present of MoR because ritually sacrificing a few dozen peasants for purely experimental ends is considered in bad taste?
I can see Dumbledore BSODing over the discovery that Hogwarts is actually powered by the hearts of ten thousand orphans somewhere down in the foundations.
A muggle could easily shoot an unprepared wizard. However, shouldn't there be magical protections against firearms?
The most recent update would suggest that fairly standard shielding charms can stop blunt impact.
"Daphne could hardly see the movement as Susan seemed to hit the corridor wall and then bounce off it like she was a rubber ball and her legs smashed into Jugson's face, it didn't go through the shield but the sixth-year went sprawling backward with the impact"
There appears to be conservation of momentum, but the momentum from typical firearms spread out over your entire body isn't even going to leave a bruise, assuming said charms are up to dealing with something with as much sectional density and velocity as a bullet.
IMO a good model for wizard duels vis a vis muggle innovations and creative thinking is the ritualized warfare practiced in the Americas in pre-Columbian times. Lot's of punches pulled, lots of unstated mutual agreements not to escalate, and a general low-intensity level of aggression that doesn't get too many people killed.
I remember the author's comments some time ago to the effect that he was surprised that many readers (myself included) weren't immediately sure that Quirrell is Voldemort. Has anyone considered that this might be a trans-forth-wall version of Bystander Effect?
The (presumably omniscient) narrator isn't pointing out that Quirrell is Voldemort. The (presumably well informed) Professor Dumbledore has disclosed no such suspicions to the reader. (Presumably cunning and logical) Rationalist!Harry hasn't made any connections between the sense of doom, harmonic magic interaction, and the constant encouragement to be evil.
Thus, any doubts the reader has about Quirrell's identity can be easily rationalized away by the apparent lack of concern from the (apparently) intelligent, fictional characters.
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I did a quick little bit of searching and following back of citations, may have time to do so somewhere with easier access to paywalled journals tomorrow and if I misstated anything I will edit.
This protein SP1 (Stable Protein 1, originally from Aspen trees, a 12-part ring that is so stable it goes through boiling intact hence the name) forms hexagonal rings and as long as you don't mess with the parts that hold the hexagon together you an tack on interesting other things to the interior of the rings and the exterior. Keep hydrophobic patches around the exterior and you can get it to arrange itself into regular lattices. Keep the inside hydrophobic and you can get it to grab onto and encircle other hydrophobic particles of the proper size in solution.
Here they mixed the protein with protein-sized diamond particles, the rings grabbed those particles that were the proper size, and arranged themselves into flat extremely regular hexagonal arrays carrying the diamond particles along for the ride.
Ah, thank you. So the structure left at the end was not by any means a solid diamond.