Eudoxia

A few words on politics on Lesswrong at large - it is true that libertarian posters are a significant minority, and many discussions that stray into politics are often in the purple bit of the Political Compass. But to say that this constitutes cultishness? I think you need to look at the actual data - 36% identify as "liberal", 30% "libertarian", 27.5% "socialist", 3% "conservative", 0.3% "communist". Hardly a stifling atmosphere of Randian conformity. And to say that LW is full of bigots? Yes, there are discussions of race realism and PUAs and all those lovely bits of the neo-reaction, but they are exactly that: discussions. Meaning there are opposing views presented, and in most cases presented very well. Indeed it is the reason for the existence of MoreRight.net in the first place - to (quite rightly) eject the far-right from LW.

I wouldn't say that Yudkowsky specifically is against things like labor unions and social justice and so on. There's a few chapters in HPMoR for example where feminism is discussed (one of the characters actually makes a feminist group and ends up achieving some of her goals (though the group dissolves soon afterwards)). He's a libertarian by upbringing but compared to other contributors to the site it isn't mentioned so often. The part about "the world is stratified by competence" was only touched on in a few posts early on in the Sequences, and he explicitly warned that people might want to skip it because it was politics, and IIRC there was a vigorous discussion about it in the comments. Besides I don't see anything wrong with that idea in itself, the world is stratified by competence, I don't know how someone like you can deny it.

thanks for the laugh

Exodia

the Sagan Saga

you don't believe in the NWO? you blind drone! the gummy bear reptilians are everywhere!

You seem to be very intelligent. At the very least, more educated than the average person I come into contact with. I, too, find myself drawn to the illustrious and comforting embrace of science. It's like a whole new outlook on the world and how the universe works. Hopefully I'll get scholarships and be able to pursue a major in astronomy and astrophysics, if not, I'll hopefully be able to head up to Canada and utilize the schooling system there to my advantage.

Hey, what's Sagan, baby?

"A few centimeters down, organisms would be adequately shielded by the ice from deadly radiation damage. Nevertheless, sunlight adequate for photosynthesis could penetrate that far and more, down a few meters below the surface. Thus, as long as some part of the ecosystem of the crack occupies the appropriate depth, deep enough to be safe from damaging radiation but shallow enough to catch the light, it may be able to exploit photosynthesis. " - Europa: The Ocean Moon (Richard Greenberg). What you want is in the first sentence, I included the rest since you were writing this report about life. Mind you, I just looked it up right now. I would've guessed ice is dense enough for radiation protection, especially when you consider the (Presumed) thickness. No way anything will reach the hidden ocean, I'd bet there's a lot of radiation coming up from the mantle and core, though.

Since you probably understand the topic more than me or read about it, is the amount of REM's (540) that are introduced to Europa by Jupiter's radiation field enough to penetrate the theorized ice sheet and into the crust if it is about 100km? I can't find any information on the REM's penetrating ice, and i'm trying to write a report about life. Since you are Sagan you should know