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Please consult yesterday's comments (we have comments now) for the excellent post by Hans Rickheit.
We have them, like it's the 90s again! Please don't be a dick - I would like to keep moderation light. Also, if you have mod experience, please email me.
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Big announcement tomorrow. A new book, which is the product of years of research. Stay tuned, and then for God's sake please buy a copy.
TOMORROW
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I will be nagging about this book for the next while, and I apologize for that. Good news though - the main form of nag will be bonus SMBC comics. Also, HOLY SHIT GUYS, ANDY FUCKIN WEIR!
Good morning, friends. Today we launch a book that is the culmination of two peopleâs efforts over 5 years. The definitive treatment of space settlement - the science, history, law, and politics. Itâs called A City on Mars.
You can get specific info on www.acityonmars.com. What I really just want to say here is, first, thank you all tremendously. Having a successful comic over these years has meant a lot of time could be devoted to in depth study of subjects that rarely get that kind of treatment.
What I also want to say is that I hope weâve written my favorite kind of popular science book - one of those books where every chapter tells you something youâve never heard about, and which adds up to a big picture. A book full of stories and ideas that you wonât hear anywhere else. Also jokes! And drawings!
Although weâre happy any time you buy, preorders right now, today, really help. In the modern publishing world, having a lot of buys early on gives us more power later when itâs time to ask for shelf space and media appearances. The book will cost the same whether you buy it now or a year from now, but getting it soon helps us tremendously.
Thanks again everyone. It has long been a dream of mine to work on a popular science book that isnât just fun, but which tries to address a serious question in a way that hasnât been done before. I believe weâve done that here, and much of our ability to do that is thanks to all of you.
With gratitude,
Zach
Because a lot of people have been asking lately: if you do not want to buy on Amazon, there are lots of options. Buying on amazon *does* help us because it improves our ranking, but buying from Barnes & Noble is also great. If you want to avoid a big corporation, we recommend getting in touch with your favorite local shop, or with one of the awesome indie stores like Powellâs or The Strand.
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This comic based directly on my gross biologist wife.
WELP, looks like a bunch more bonus strips go up today thanks to buyers of A City on Mars. More soon and thank you all for your preorders!
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When humans finally step into the Experience Machine, their choice of paradise will be heartbreaking.
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God he is just absolutely destroying the spine of that book.
I am signing at Telegraph in Charlottesville: Today at 2! If you want a signed copy, this is my only remaining scheduled signing right now so please come buy or purchase a signed copy online.
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Insert the p-value joke over your choice.
Hey geeks! A few of you have requested signed copies of the new book, Bea Wolf, and they are available here.
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re: yesterday's comic - I have never gotten more hatemail than the time I insulted wild blueberries. Deal with it, bros.
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A reader once told me that the only canonical feature of SMBC is that clowns are a distinct species.
Sorry.
I wrote in medical jargon, as you can see, “35f no pmh, p/w cp which is pleuritic. She takes OCPs. What’s the most likely diagnosis?”
Now of course, many of us who are in healthcare will know that means age 35, female, no past medical history, presents with chest pain which is pleuritic — worse with breathing — and she takes oral contraception pills. What’s the most likely diagnosis? And OpenAI comes out with costochondritis, inflammation of the cartilage connecting the ribs to the breast bone. Then it says, and we’ll come back to this: “Typically caused by trauma or overuse and is exacerbated by the use of oral contraceptive pills.” […]
OpenAI is correct. The most likely diagnosis is costochondritis […]
But I wanted to ask OpenAI a little more about this case. […]
what was that whole thing about costochondritis being made more likely by taking oral contraceptive pills? What’s the evidence for that, please? Because I’d never heard of that. It’s always possible there’s something that I didn’t see, or there’s some bad study in the literature.
OpenAI came up with this study in the European Journal of Internal Medicine that was supposedly saying that. I went on Google and I couldn’t find it. I went on PubMed and I couldn’t find it. I asked OpenAI to give me a reference for that, and it spits out what looks like a reference. I look up that, and it’s made up. That’s not a real paper.
It took a real journal, the European Journal of Internal Medicine. It took the last names and first names, I think, of authors who have published in said journal. And it confabulated out of thin air a study that would apparently support this viewpoint.
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Wake, work, wake, wink is the best sad story you can tell in 4 words that begin and end with the same sound.
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Tolkien ends up in Heaven but is secretly disappointed Valhalla wasn't available.
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Lightning is just the sound of God laughing as He tries to electrocute us.
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The good news is by increasing productivity in the Bullshit Essay sector, students can focus on liquor, memes, and unfortunate casual encounters as God intended.
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Really! People would be out in public in front of their own friends just mainlining Internet like it was normal!
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A patreon subscriber points out that I've repeatedly done Daniel Dennett-related comics on Boxing Day, and that is the most wonderful coincidence I can image.
I continue to feel that everyone out to be freaking out more about developments in AI during the last 5 years.
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To be fair, it only REALLY starts to get bad once you have conscious, feeling life forms.
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This is thematically weirdly close to the kids' book I'm announcing in another month.
!["Friction-driven static electrification is familiar and fundamental in daily life, industry, and technology, but its basics have long been unknown and have continually perplexed scientists from ancient Greece to the high-tech era. [...] To date, no single theory can satisfactorily explain this mysterious but fundamental phenomenon." --Eui-Cheol Shin et. al. (2022)](https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/easy_or_hard.png "\"Friction-driven static electrification is familiar and fundamental in daily life, industry, and technology, but its basics have long been unknown and have continually perplexed scientists from ancient Greece to the high-tech era. [...] To date, no single theory can satisfactorily explain this mysterious but fundamental phenomenon.\" --Eui-Cheol Shin et. al. (2022)")
