The companion of the survival guide; World War Z, is actually a quite thoughtful look at the world through the lens of zombies. That sentence might come off as a bit of mindless post-modernist thinking but I think there's genuine value in both books despite the apparent triviality of them. Although I certainly agree that a lot of what is published today is useless or vain.

This article would be great without the first seven or so paragraphs. If instead of implying that calories in, calories out isn't important (which it almost certainly is important) and instead went straight to pointing out that diet and obesity are complicated then it wouldn't have been so hard to actually get to the interesting part of the article. Putting your reader's offside might seem like a good strategy but the writer probably lost a lot of interested readers by deciding to try and hook with anger instead of interest. Personally, I'm finding it far more difficult to overcome my own bias simply because the author insisted on attacking instead of using a bit of discretion.

Fantastic article, it feels really easy to follow, I just hope the concepts in this convey to someone who isn't already familiar with them. For those of you with a sci-fi bent, a good story on HERV's is Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear.

I soak up the atmosphere of the empty house. I'll stare at things and stand still listening to the ambiance of the house and watch how the light plays over things, and how the occupants of the house have made their mark, magnets on the fridge, trinkets in the bedroom, the mix of colours, and personal items that tell a million stories about the house and it's people. When I get bored of this or feel I should do something, I'll read. My family has a horrible habit of having the TV on whenever they're present and awake so when it's actually silent I make the most of the distraction free environment.

Occasionally if I get super lucky and have someone else's room to myself I'll do the same, and try and soak up as much of the room's ambiance and emotional content. Few things excite me more than visiting someone's living place for the first time.

Agreed. Having a phone with a camera just means I will have a camera on my person when I stumble onto something interesting and want to remember it in a week.

I already have a small number of friends who will eschew actual socialising in order to tell facebook that they are socialising. It's not that it's wrong to upload a photo to facebook of where you are, the problem is these people will not participate in conversation for several minutes when they do this, I'm not sure if they're checking their newsfeed or waiting for people to respond but somehow it seems like they're saying "I'm talking to people" when they're actually not.

I think making predictions about the future is one of weakest parts of any sci-fi book. Stand on Zanzibar's real strength is that the issues it explores in the 1960's are arguably more relevant today. It presents a world seemingly always on the brink of Malthusian catastrophe that somehow never eventuates and all the insanity and madness inherent in an over-populated world.

I felt she made it quite clear that she was taking offence to a group of people that were misusing the banner of feminism. Sure, from the outside they all look like feminists but if you look a little closer you see the massive divide in fundamental theory and in the practice of advancing women's rights.

The same things can be seen in most movements, like african-american gangs spoiling the name of the anti-discrimination movement or religious/atheist reactionaries making the more level headed individuals look bad.

Definitely not. I've seen similar essays linked on hacker news.

This article is probably wrong in the sense that the 40 hour work week is a conspiracy to keep us short of time, although it is quite open knowledge that large corporations have been engineering our culture for a fair while. To paraphrase a saying; never suspect a conspiracy when idiocy is sufficient explanation.

What he says about the state of consumer culture rings true.