[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: The quote is “Science is magic that works” - Kurt Vonnegut. Rick Rosner: That reminds me of the Arthur C. Clark quote that the technology of a sufficiently advanced civilization will be indistinguishable from magic [“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”] that is, if aliens came to earth …
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Ask A Genius 747: Mencken Quote
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: “A man's women folk, whatever their outward show of respect for his merit and authority, always regard him secretly as an ass” - H.L. Mencken. Rick Rosner: Yeah I buy that. It reminds me of another quote, “No matter how famous or sexy the man, there's somebody who's tired of …
Ask A Genius 746: Voltaire Quote
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: “Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd, and bloody religion that has ever infected the world.” - Voltaire Rick Rosner: Well, Christianity, I don't know how you figure, like we're in the middle of a Covid pandemic and people argue about whether people have died with Covid or from …
Ask A Genius 745:Addendum to 744
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Addendum to Mencken. Rick Rosner: The 1930s, when Mencken was working weren't a nice era because it was deep in the depression. But it would be nice besides the misery of living in the depression to live in an era in which Puritans actually walked the walk. The people who …
Ask A Genius 744: Mitch and Mencken
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: “I don't have a girlfriend, but I do know a woman who’d be mad at me for saying that” - Mitch Hedberg. And the other one, I think, is H.L.Mencken “Puritanism; the haunting fear that someone somewhere may be happy” Rick Rosner: Fucking Mencken, a guy from 90 or 100 …
Ask A Genius 743: Socrates Quote
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: “Once made equal to man, woman becomes his superior” That was obviously not Aristotle; he had very different views to Plato. Rick Rosner: How old is that quote? Well anyway, that brings up all sorts of issues including the issue that got the chancellor of Harvard fired 20 years ago, …
Ask A Genius 742: William Congreve
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: The quote – “Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.” - William Congreve. Rick Rosner: I'm not super qualified to address this because we just had our 31st wedding anniversary plus we've been in couples counseling for like 27 years …
Ask A Genius 741: Electrons as a Theory We Use
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: The electron is a theory we use. It is so useful in understanding the way nature works that we can almost call it real. Rick Rosner: Is that Feynman again? Jacobsen: Yes. Rosner: So, that's his pragmatism again. As a kid, he would fix people's early radios. So he's a …
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Ask A Genius 740: Feynman Again, Mr., Seriously
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: It’s Feynman again. ““From a long view of the history of mankind, seen from, say, ten thousand years from now, there can be little doubt that the most significant event of the 19th century will be judged as Maxwell's discovery of the laws of electrodynamics. The American Civil War will …
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Ask A Genius 739: Iphigenie auf Tauris from 1787
[Recording Start] Scott Douglas Jacobsen: This is from Goethe; Iphigenie auf Tauris from 1787. Number two; the quote is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe – “Life teaches us to be less harsh with ourselves and with others.” Rick Rosner: Life teaches us to be to be less harsh with ourselves than with others. Jacobsen: And with …
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Rick Rosner 