Disqus - Latest Comments for Eric_Herboso

Re: All Night Laundry - In which Bina does stuff...

Eric Herboso — Sun, 14 Mar 2021 09:18:30 -0000

I just started reading this last week. Today (March 14, 2021) I get to this page and am taken aback. Has it always said 3-14-21 on this page? While it makes sense that code could update the text to say different numbers for every date that someone is reading, could that also be the case with these pictures? I notice that I am confused.

Re: State of EA organizations

Eric Herboso — Wed, 30 Apr 2014 19:37:47 -0000

Animal Charity Evaluators now runs out of San Diego, CA.

Re: Welcome to the site!

Eric Herboso — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 14:53:51 -0000

I'd subscribe to your blog posts via RSS, but I see no link to a feed. Any chance you can add one?

Re: Charity Explosion: Maximizing Charitable Giving

Eric Herboso — Sat, 16 Mar 2013 13:04:13 -0000

I just realized I accidentally posted my comment on your facebook feed instead of on the blog itself. Reposting below:

"Cute, but most of those higher order charities don't yet exist. If they did, then a good meta-charity would probably recommend them, meaning that you could effectively fund a level VII charity by following what a level II charity directs you to donate to.

"Incidentally, while the first four levels you mentioned are ones I take seriously, level V through VII seem like poor candidates for actual funding. If you presented me with a level V, VI, or VII charity right now, I'd probably give my donation to the level IV instead.

"Possibly, this means that I'm not being fully rational in how I allocate my donations, but it also might say something important about levels V-VII."

Re: The Singularity Institute: How They Convince You

Eric Herboso — Thu, 10 Jan 2013 12:44:37 -0000

I get your criticism via methods 1 and 2, but the way you wrote method 3 seems to have the SI win the argument against the skeptic. Perhaps your Iron Man caricature of SI is so effective that it even seems to defeat your skeptic in your own blog post?

Re: Viewing order of the Babylon 5 episodes

Eric Herboso — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 19:46:26 -0000

Thank you for this list. I'll be following your guide as I watch the series.

Re: All Talk, No Walk

Eric Herboso — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 23:10:45 -0000

As far as I'm aware, M-theory (the grown-up version of string theory) is still not testable. It looks really nice, and *feels* right to many physicists, but as a theory, I don't see why it's justified to prefer it to its competitors. Maybe you wouldn't call this "bullshit", but some people do, especially since people working on M-theory tend to get promoted in academia faster than those working on alternative theories.

Re: Cognitive Dissonance

Eric Herboso — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 22:14:57 -0000

Did you honestly forget to add this, or did you make it a separate post so you could more easily delete it later on if you decide this isn't worth talking about openly?

Re: Robin Raven's blog | Observations from a Dreamer - Robin Raven's Blog - I Pity The Fool

Eric Herboso — Sun, 01 Jul 2012 20:28:12 -0000

The word "fool" in this verse was originally written as "μωρε" (pronounced "mo ray").

In the Greek of the time, the word μωρε had two meanings. It meant firstly that a person was an atheist, and had a secondary meaning that a person was a homosexual (μωρος).

This verse seems to be saying (at the very least) that it is extremely wrong to use offensive language to make fun of atheists -- and if the second definition also applies (a debated point among scholars), that it is also extremely wrong to use offensive language against gays.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wik....

Re: Robin Raven's blog | Observations from a Dreamer - Robin Raven's Blog - Kmart, Chocolate, and Suicide

Eric Herboso — Wed, 23 May 2012 05:23:32 -0000

Please know that you are loved by many people.

I don't mean this in a trite way. You really and truly are.

Re: My Business Cards Have Arrived! | Blog

Eric Herboso — Thu, 03 May 2012 22:04:33 -0000

Excellent review. I ordered one of their sample packs as well, and was extremely impressed. They've definitely earned another customer in me.

I'll also be recommending them to my dad's real estate company, which is another ten people. Moo should be paying you for the business this review has drummed up.

BTW, Jan Richards sent me here. (c:

Re: GOMTV bans foreigners from tournaments

Eric Herboso — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 18:29:51 -0000

And he, in turn, successfully trolled you.

Re: http://vegansaurus.com/post/20136891035

Eric Herboso — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 18:51:48 -0000

I agree completely. The first time I just assumed they'd learn their lesson from the backlash, even though that first campaign came suspiciously immediately after the Daiya fat-shaming incident. Yet now PCRM has done it again. It looks as though they don't care about being ethical in order to further the cause. Very disappointing.

Re: http://vegansaurus.com/post/20136891035

Eric Herboso — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 18:47:07 -0000

You don't get it. It is unethical to portray fat people like this. Would you be okay with it if the ad was instead about paying $10 to allow you to sit next to a white person, while everyone else was forced to sit with blacks?

Re: http://vegansaurus.com/post/20136891035

Eric Herboso — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 18:44:49 -0000

I agree. If you drive a car, you are necessarily evil. Do you realize how many deaths occur each year through car accidents? And for what: the convenience of getting you to your destination faster without waiting on public transportation?

If the devil came to you and offered to give humanity the ability to teleport wherever they want on Earth, and the only cost is he gets to kill a random human each day for it, would you think it ethical to take that deal? Yet cars cause far more deaths for far less gain. No matter how you look at it, driving, like eating meat is completely unethical.

Re: http://vegansaurus.com/post/20136891035

Eric Herboso — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 18:40:03 -0000

But that would result in people turning AWAY from veganism. Whenyou lose weight, it is because you eat less calories than you expend. It has nothing to do with whether your calories are meat-based or not. Vegans generally weigh less because people who already tend toward lower body weight tend to go vegan, not because going vegan necessarily makes you weigh less.

If we advertise veganism as a weight loss tool, what do you think will happen when society realizes that going vegan does not cause people to magically lose weight? As I point out in my blog entry on this ad, it's false advertising, and it hurts the cause of veganism. It doesn't help it.

Re: http://vegansaurus.com/post/20136891035

Eric Herboso — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 18:34:16 -0000

I'm sorry, but it seems pretty heartless to push veganism by demonizing an entire segment of society. Being fat does not equate to being unhealthy.

I'd understand the PCRM making one mistake. But after all the backlash last time, they've gone the fat-shaming route AGAIN. Seems pretty evil to me.

Re: http://www.philosophynews.com/post.aspx?id=11febd63-fb52-4ac2-a334-4941267e3d19

Eric Herboso — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 16:02:17 -0000

If it is just a question of opaqueness, then how do you account for the fact that we have plenty of experts saying we can directly save the lives of severely malnourished people _right now_, if given an appropriate amount of funds, and yet that funding gap has not been closed?

You argue that closer-to-home issues that you can personally see solutions for justifiably demand your attention. But this ignores the fact that we have experts who are making the case for solutions just as clear (if not even more clear) than local issues. Furthermore, these experts are dealing with problems MUCH more urgent than any home-grown problems you encounter.

It seems to me that referring to the opaqueness of far-off problems as a reason why you are not a moral monster for not giving most of your wealth to charity is a failing proposition. Unless you seriously think all these experts are outright lying when they tell you how much money it would take to specifically save specific people in need.

Re: Pizza cost comparison using mental math

Eric Herboso — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 00:30:11 -0000

But the crust! If you enjoy crust, you'll miss out on so much crust area by getting the medium.

The crust width does not vary between small and medium, so small pizzas have a much higher crust-to-noncrust ratio.

As a crust lover, I feel this MUST be taken into account.

Re: 5 tips for tracking expenses while traveling

Eric Herboso — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 05:08:50 -0000

I love your blog. I really do. But sometimes I get the idea from your writing that you really need to loosen up and stop worrying so much about money. Keeping track of stuff is great as a game theory exercise, but sometimes you just have to let go and forget about math.

Of course, maybe our brains are just wired differently. But I can't imagine constantly thinking about the stuff you describe even while on vacation. My quality of life would drastically decline if I were as vigilant as you seem to be.

Re: http://www.worsethancoleslaw.com/post/11035909151

Eric Herboso — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 19:15:49 -0000

There is only one public library I've been to in the United States that had a similar fee: Red Bank, New Jersey. Getting a card there required oodles of paperwork and an outrageous $30 fee.

Of course, in return for your $30, they gave you access to their indices.

Re: http://bigthink.com/ideas/24440

Eric Herboso — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 13:27:13 -0000

Mr. Champagne:

While I defend abortion in almost every circumstance, my reasons for doing so are nothing like what you ascribe in your first post here. While I cannot speak for other pro-choice advocates, in my own view the reason why abortion is an ethically acceptable course of action to take is because I do not believe it necessarily wrong to kill an innocent life form.

I disagree with your argument because I believe value is something persons place on objects. For example, it is wrong to kill me because I consider my life valuable. It is wrong to destroy my rock statue because I value the form I gave it. But it is not wrong to demolish a rock that has no value instilled within it by a person separate from that rock.

Fetuses are not special cases. Because fetuses aren’t persons, they cannot instill their own lives with value. Yes, they are human. Yes, they are alive. But they are not persons, like you and I.

Of course, it is wrong to kill most fetuses. This is because most fetuses are considered valuable by their mothers. They have value instilled in them the same way a statue might. But in the case of a fetus who does not have the mother’s consent, abortion is fully justified in a similar fashion to the justification for demolishing a random rock.

It should be important to realize here that the fetus at this point is not yet a person. We cannot say he or she has any desire to continue living. While of course we would all prefer to have that tiny human become a person like the rest of us, we must weigh those interests against the interests of the mother, whose body is so completely used for months by the growing fetus. Despite there being a slight positive benefit to allowing the fetus to live, in some cases it is overwhelmingly outweighed by the benefit to the mother if an abortion is allowed. In fact, in this particular case, the moral consideration of the mother is astronomically overwhelming.

If you’ve read the above, you’ll see I have not referred to your (1), (2), (3), (4), nor (5) for the above argument. Incidentally, I agree with (4), but even if I didn’t, I would still maintain the same position as outlined above.

Re: Remember Those Red Darpa Balloons? We Helped Find Three Of Them

Eric Herboso — Wed, 12 May 2010 05:07:59 -0000

As the former webmaster of strength.org, the leading domestic childhood hunger organization in the United States, I have spent quite a number of years researching hunger charities of various kinds in many different countries. Out of them all, the best one you can choose to donate to in order to do the most good per dollar is Oxfam International.

With that said, remember that the optimal donation method comes from diversifying where charity dollars go. While Oxfam receives 80% of my charitable dollars, I still donate to other organizations that achieve separate goals in the same arena, such as Unicef for targeted children's hunger relief and the Poverty Action Lab at MIT, which does scientific testing aimed at trying to determine which anti-poverty methods work best.

Re: How+Funny+Are+You%3F+Microsoft+Explains+4+Levels+Of+Humor%26nbsp%3BProficiency

Eric Herboso — Mon, 03 May 2010 07:51:33 -0000

The actual shortest joke ever is even better, if you're familiar with mathematics:

Consider ε<0…

Re: Robin Raven's blog | Observations from an Optimistic Dreamer - Guest Login

Eric Herboso — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 11:48:38 -0000

The video embed is broken; please fix!