Links 6/12/15

LEGO MMO’s penis detection problem.

Ocean Exploration Trust livestreams their Remote Operated Vehicles adventures.  Here’s a video they captured of a sperm whale at -2,000 feet.

On Shoulds:

A true should feels like executing a Screw The Rules I’m Doing What’s Right trope.  In fiction, a true should feels like the moment when the villain reveals that doing the Right Thing will start a war, and you set your jaw, and you look them in the eyes, and you say “so be it,” and you do the right thing anyway.

[…]

Not an external obligation whispered down from the heavens, but an internal fire, a defiance of the natural order, a need to make the world different from the way it would be otherwise.

Cognitive behavioral therapy is getting less effective over time.  There are a lot of possible explanations for this, but my favorite is that as CBT techniques have been integrated into the mainstream (therapy or helpful articles your mom sends you on anxiety) they become less useful.  I’ve heard the same thing suggested for Freudian analysis: that when it was invented it really was a revelation and helped a lot of people, but now everyone knows to ask about your subconscious feelings so there’s no value add.

Boring explanations include therapist skill, wider application, publication bias, changes in measurements.

I’m pleased to announce the return of the Beautiful Gang of Theory Killed By An Ugly Gang of Facts award.  This week’s recipient is The Bloop, an enormous sound recorded by underwater microphones over 3000 miles apart in 1997.  If you believe the video youtube showed me after the sperm whale one. it’s completely unexplained but probably some sort of sea creature orders of magnitude larger than any we have ever discovered, that only made detectable noise this one time. It might also be Atlantis.  If you believe NOAA, it’s an iceberg cracking.  Bor-ing.