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🔗 Philosophy

The teletransportation paradox or teletransport paradox (also known in alternative forms as the duplicates paradox) is a thought experiment on the philosophy of identity that challenges common intuitions on the nature of self and consciousness. It first appeared under this name in full published form presumably in Derek Parfit's 1984 book Reasons and Persons.

The Polish science-fiction writer Stanisław Lem described the same problem in the mid-twentieth century. He put it in writing in his philosophical text "Dialogs", 1957. Similarly, in Lem's Star Diaries ("Fourteenth Voyage") of 1957 the hero visits a planet and he finds himself recreated from a backup record, after his death from a meteorite strike, which on this planet is a very commonplace procedure.

Similar questions of identity have been raised as early as 1775.

I would be glad to know your Lordship's opinion whether when my brain has lost its original structure, and when some hundred years after the same materials are fabricated so curiously as to become an intelligent being, whether, I say that being will be me; or, if, two or three such beings should be formed out of my brain; whether they will all be me, and consequently one and the same intelligent being.

🔗 Australia 🔗 Australia/South Australia

The Marree Man, or Stuart's Giant, is a modern geoglyph the circumstances of whose creation have not been ascertained. It appears to depict an indigenous Australian man hunting with a boomerang or stick. It lies on a plateau at Finnis Springs 60 km (37 mi) west of the township of Marree in central South Australia. It is just outside the 127,000-square-kilometre (49,000 sq mi) Woomera Prohibited Area. The figure is 2.7 km (1.7 mi) tall with a perimeter of 28 km (17 mi), extending over an area of about 2.5 km² (620 acres). Although it is one of the largest geoglyphs in the world (arguably second to the Sajama Lines), its origin remains a mystery, with no one claiming responsibility for its creation nor any eye-witness having been found, notwithstanding the scale of the operation required to form the outline on the plateau floor. The description "Stuart's Giant" was used in anonymous faxes sent to media as "Press Releases" in July 1998, in a reference to the explorer John McDouall Stuart. It was discovered fortuitously by a charter pilot in an overflight on 26 June 1998.

Shortly after its discovery, the site was closed by the South Australian government following legal action taken in late July by native title claimants, but flights over the site were not forbidden as native title fell under federal government jurisdiction.

🔗 Philately 🔗 Czech Republic

The Prague pneumatic post (Czech: Pražská potrubní pošta) is the world's last preserved municipal pneumatic post system. It is an underground system of metal tubes under the wider centre of Prague, totaling about 55 kilometres (34 mi) in length. The system started service in 1889 and remained in use by the government, banks and the media until it was rendered inoperative by the August 2002 European floods.

Sold on by former owner Telefónica O2 Czech Republic after some limited attempts to make repairs, the system now belongs to businessman Zdeněk Dražil, who has announced plans to repair and reopen it as a working tourist attraction. As of 2012, however, it remains closed.

🔗 Biography 🔗 Australia 🔗 Crime 🔗 Australia/Australian crime 🔗 South Africa 🔗 Zimbabwe

Paul Calder Le Roux (born 24 December 1972) is a former programmer, former criminal cartel boss and informant to the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

In 1999, he created E4M, a free and open-source disk encryption software program for Microsoft Windows, and is sometimes credited for open-source TrueCrypt, which is based on E4M's code, though he denies involvement with TrueCrypt.

He was arrested on 26 September 2012 for conspiracy to import narcotics into the United States, and agreed to cooperate with authorities in exchange for a lesser sentence and immunity to any crimes he might admit to afterwards. He subsequently admitted to arranging or participating in seven murders, carried out as part of an extensive illegal business empire.

Le Roux was sentenced to 25 years in prison in June 2020.

🔗 United States 🔗 Biography 🔗 Military history 🔗 Military history/North American military history 🔗 Military history/United States military history 🔗 Science Fiction 🔗 Biography/science and academia 🔗 Military history/Military biography 🔗 Biography/military biography 🔗 Biography/arts and entertainment 🔗 Chicago 🔗 United States/Massachusetts - Cape Cod and the Islands 🔗 United States/Indiana - Indianapolis

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (; November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American writer. In a career spanning over 50 years, Vonnegut published fourteen novels, three short story collections, five plays, and five works of non-fiction, with further collections being published after his death. He is most famous for his darkly satirical, best-selling novel Slaughterhouse-Five (1969).

Born and raised in Indianapolis, Indiana, Vonnegut attended Cornell University but dropped out in January 1943 and enlisted in the United States Army. As part of his training, he studied mechanical engineering at Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) and the University of Tennessee. He was then deployed to Europe to fight in World War II and was captured by the Germans during the Battle of the Bulge. He was interned in Dresden and survived the Allied bombing of the city by taking refuge in a meat locker of the slaughterhouse where he was imprisoned. After the war, Vonnegut married Jane Marie Cox, with whom he had three children. He later adopted his sister's three sons, after she died of cancer and her husband was killed in a train accident.

Vonnegut published his first novel, Player Piano, in 1952. The novel was reviewed positively but was not commercially successful. In the nearly 20 years that followed, Vonnegut published several novels that were only marginally successful, such as Cat's Cradle (1963) and God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1964). Vonnegut's breakthrough was his commercially and critically successful sixth novel, Slaughterhouse-Five. The book's anti-war sentiment resonated with its readers amidst the ongoing Vietnam War and its reviews were generally positive. After its release, Slaughterhouse-Five went to the top of The New York Times Best Seller list, thrusting Vonnegut into fame. He was invited to give speeches, lectures and commencement addresses around the country and received many awards and honors.

Later in his career, Vonnegut published several autobiographical essays and short-story collections, including Fates Worse Than Death (1991), and A Man Without a Country (2005). After his death, he was hailed as a morbidly comical commentator on the society in which he lived and as one of the most important contemporary writers. Vonnegut's son Mark published a compilation of his father's unpublished compositions, titled Armageddon in Retrospect. In 2017, Seven Stories Press published Complete Stories, a collection of Vonnegut's short fiction including five previously unpublished stories. Complete Stories was collected and introduced by Vonnegut friends and scholars Jerome Klinkowitz and Dan Wakefield. Numerous scholarly works have examined Vonnegut's writing and humor.

🔗 Film 🔗 Television 🔗 Novels 🔗 Screenwriters

In fiction, a MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin) is an object, device, or event that is necessary to the plot and the motivation of the characters, but insignificant, unimportant, or irrelevant in itself. The term was originated by Angus MacPhail for film, adopted by Alfred Hitchcock, and later extended to a similar device in other fiction.

The MacGuffin technique is common in films, especially thrillers. Usually, the MacGuffin is revealed in the first act, and thereafter declines in importance. It can reappear at the climax of the story but may actually be forgotten by the end of the story. Multiple MacGuffins are sometimes derisively identified as plot coupons.

🔗 Computer science 🔗 Mathematics

Tupper's self-referential formula is a formula that visually represents itself when graphed at a specific location in the (x, y) plane.

🔗 Biography 🔗 Biography/science and academia 🔗 Ireland

Percy Edwin Ludgate (2 August 1883 – 16 October 1922) was an Irish amateur scientist who designed the second analytical engine (general-purpose Turing-complete computer) in history.

🔗 Video games 🔗 Role-playing games 🔗 Department of Fun

One theory that explains the addictive nature of Wikipedia and its tendency to produce Wikipediholics is that Wikipedia is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). The following article explains how Wikipedia shares many characteristics with MMORPGs.

Wikipedia is a sequel to the game Nupedia, an encyclopedia-themed MMORPG in a hack and slash and "article roaming" style. It was released for the World Wide Web by the Wikimedia Foundation, and was developed by the community.

🔗 United States 🔗 Soviet Union 🔗 Russia 🔗 Russia/technology and engineering in Russia 🔗 Spaceflight 🔗 China

Docking and berthing of spacecraft is the joining of two space vehicles. This connection can be temporary, or partially permanent such as for space station modules.

Docking specifically refers to joining of two separate free-flying space vehicles. Berthing refers to mating operations where an inactive module/vehicle is placed into the mating interface of another space vehicle by using a robotic arm. Because the modern process of un-berthing needs more labor and is time-consuming, berthing operations are unsuited for rapid crew evacuations in the event of an emergency.