Oh, I see what’s going on here.

I live in Europe so I’m looking at this from European perspective. While I think I don’t live in a completely just society I think it’s pretty good, it can be improved and I would like for it to survive. So I think Europe should have weapons and we should have best engineers possible working on them. While their weapons are sometimes used for immoral things I don’t blame the engineers for it.

You’re looking at this from American perspective. You think your society is evil and it should be destroyed. You don’t think it should be able to defend itself at all and all engineers helping to preserve it are morally corrupt.

You’re looking at this from a perspective or a Nazi engineer in 1938 while I’m looking at it from a perspective or a Polish engineer in 1938.

So you’re taking the most extreme case and applying it to all arms companies while I treat as… well… extreme case.

I have a friend in Poland that works for a company providing components for weapon manufacturers. Some components they make were found in Gaza. Do I think he’s immoral and should quit? No, I think those components are necessary to protect Poland from Russia and I don’t think Poland should be destroyed. He can’t decide were those components will end up. Would I say the same about Israeli engineer? No.

It’s really not that complicated. We have two “issues”.

1. Engineers making weapons
2. Weapons being used to kill innocent people.

There is an easy solution to both: don’t make weapons. That’s a stupid solution because if your country doesn’t have any weapons it will be invaded by other country and innocent people will die.

You know this easy solution is stupid so you say we should only “reduce” the number of weapons. But this doesn’t solve any issues. Engineers still make weapons and those weapons can still be used to kill innocent people. You just saved some money which is completely different topic entirely.

So now you’re stuck in a loop claiming that your stupid solution will solve issue 2 (which it won’t) while ignoring issue 1 entirely.

The real “solution” is to not use weapons to kill innocent people. “Issue” 1 is not an issue at all. Engineers making weapons are necessary. “Issue” 2 has to be solved by the entire country by electing better politicians. Engineers don’t have more power here than farmers or doctors.

Obviously.

I have literally no idea what kind of point you think you’re making.

I can see that. Let me explain that in even simpler way.

You say:

Me: Making guns.

You: “Engineers making guns bad! Make less guns!”

Me: Make 1 gun instead of 3.

US Army: Take 1 gun and kill brown children.

You: “Engineers making guns bad!”

I say:

Me: Making guns.

US Army: Takes guns and kills brown people.

Me: Army bad!

P.S. I don’t work for arms company. I was just making a point.

You do realize that if you “reduce” spending you will still have arms companies making weapons and engineers will work for them? I don’t think it’s that complicated…

You spend a lot on weapons. If you reduce it you will spend less on weapons but you will buy some weapons.

Like imagine you’re spending $100 a week on alcohol. You decide it’s bad for you and you reduce it. Now you’re only spending $30 on alcohol. You’re still buying alcohol. You spend less but you still buy it so someone will still make it.

Hope that helps.

Great, so let’s disarm unilaterally. I’m sure Russia and China will do the same.

Such a childish take…

Where did you get my desire for blood from? All I’m saying is that the same arms companies make weapons that fall in Gaza and that protect Europe. You can’t have one but not the other. It’s up to politicians to decide how to use those weapons, not engineers.

There will still be people working for arms companies. All of them will deserve hell?

The good guys. Define them as you like.

Here’s a great idea: let’s not produce any weapons and disarm unilaterally. What could go wrong?

Actually the scam was that the machine was able to do it from a pinprick blood sample. The idea was that you would take the blood sample yourself, directly at the pharmacy. No doctor appointment and nurse needed. That’s why the idea was valued at billions.

And she looks funny in this picture so I 100% stand behind this meme.

The one and only female Steve Jobs of course. Elizabeth Holmes.

I think for me personally (I get it that different people look at those things differently) movie is just a faster medium to it’s normal to use symbols, shortcuts and other story telling tools like that. Directors would love to crate a 10h long movies and include all the details they can think of but that’s impossible so they use different devices to transmit ideas. Books on the other hand do let you take time with the world building. For example in Solaris Lem spends entire chapters describing different plasma formation you can see on the planet. That’s why I find it strange that when describing a library, computers, rockets, phones, food and everything else on the station he didn’t stop to think “what this may look like in 1000 years”. I would love to ask him why he did it. Lack of time? He didn’t think it’s important for the story? He really thought people will still eat canned meat 1000 years from now?

BTW, a friend of mine claimed that Lem lived next to him when he was in high school and after some party told him to clean up cigarette butts kids threw on his lawn from a balcony. Sadly I only met this guy at the University so I wasn’t at this party.

This research is specifically NOT about genetic testing. It’s about molecular profiles.

They don’t name the exact study but this research is related: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-52310-9

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/nov/20/pinprick-blood-test-could-detect-disease-10-years-before-symptoms-appear-study

“The Invincible” was definitely tech focused, hard sci-fi, so I guess in different books he would simply focuses on different things. Which is completely fine. From the two books I’ve read I would say he definitely struggled with computers but maybe he has some books about them too :)

Weird thing is that while I love SF movies that focus on philosophy of psychology (Gattaca, Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, Never let me go, Moon, Realive, The Platform…) I like my books to be more detailed and tech focused (Banks).

Interesting point. I guess it could be an issue of familiarity. For me the concept of a “digital library” for example is obvious but maybe in 1969 people would struggle with it, especially in communist Poland. And maybe Lem simply didn’t want to spend much time explaining that because the book was about something else entirely.

I guess I always liked the part of science-fiction that is about predicting what future will look like and I struggle with books that skip it. It feels like something is missing. (that’s also why I love Iain M. Banks’ books so much, he’s simply so great at it).

I don’t!

Wake up everyone, a new shape just dropped!

Why is it improbable?