You missed on education. Cuirrently at least some schools require that the students have internet access to get assignments. Possibly for other reasons, I don't have a kid in school now, but a friend does, and here daughter is required to get her school assignments over the internet. Actually over the javascript web. I didn't ask whether Flash was required.

You are making assumptions about their goals.

The US legal system derives from the British which, since the Magna Charta, has been about ensuring that nobody who is powerful enough to overthrow the government wouldn't lose more than they would gain by doing so. So the courts attempt to provide a veneer of justice while actually finding in favor of those with the most power, including wealth as a form of power. They don't always do that, but that's always the way to bet. The problem is you don't always know all the players.

Please note: I believe that the Civil Rights movement was fostered by the Dixiecrats repeatedly flouting the desires of the Democratic party, and voting with the Republicans. That's not the way it looked on the ground, and there were easy justifications based around equity, and popular mores, but those had been ignored for nearly a century. OTOH, another factor was a bulge in the population in the early 20's, when people tend to act more idealistically and without fully counting costs. So it's not all for one reason.

Well, passing the Turing test may be further away than I suggested, after all, many people have failed the Turing test.

The thing about corporations is that the same people can be the corporate officers of more than one corporation...and if I understand correctly, a corporation is enough of a person to be one of those officers. So the AI could go "sponsor shopping".

Given our conservative legislative system, I don't see AIs being given personhood through special legislation within the current century, but getting it by being a corporation seems already possible. And If I've got my legal theories correct (dubious) once you get three AIs, they can elect each other to be their own corporate officers, so you have something vaguely resembling a "bottom-up family" where you CAN choose your relatives.

If I understand recent studies on the placebo effect correctly, you don't need to deceive your customers (though that may make it more effective).

But if I'm reading my history correctly, the distinction between existing in the mind and existing in the physical world was not as clear when the term was created. Ghost and geist (as in zeitgeist) are clearly from the same root, and probably originally meant the same thing. Casper, etc., is NOT the traditional meaning of ghost, but merely a perversion created by Hollywood.

Seriously trying meant if I didn't win enough to buy a meal I wouldn't have any food for the next 12 hours. So I really wanted to win. (I had a Greyhound bus ticket to get home, and that was it, besides the quarter. I'd been a bit foolish about how I spent money earlier, but gambling wasn't involved.)

Please note, since we are talking about parapsycology, gambling schemes are out of context. But I really wanted to win, and that's in context.

OTOH, it's also clearly not statistically significant.

Please notice that there is no evidence that Google did or said anything. This story is pure speculation about why Eich resigned. Plausible, but not convincing.

FWIW, I could make up an equally substantiated story that it was because he was clearly affiliaated with the council of Boskone. It might not be as plausible or as conviincing, but it would have as much evidence in support of it.

What about marrying their robot? This year that's clearly silly. Ditto for next year. Ten years from now? Probably still silly. Twenty years from now? Well....

When AIs are close to human equivalent (and how close is needed) they will need to be able to sign contracts. That might be the distinction, except that it's likely that AIs will gain rights by being incorporated, and thus have them because they are corporations. This is a lot different than the current Japanese life-sized doll. But how is it different from 3M...outside of locality and reaction time?

The problem then becomes various things that traditionally go along with civil union. E.g. health insurance. Divorce. Liability for debts. etc.

It's not that these things couldn't be solved, it's that there is no simple way for them to be solved en-mass.

Are you talking about String Theory?

Pretty much, perhaps slightly more trustworthy than more established religions. But don't believe the origin myths. There's no evidence that modern witchcraft much predates the Golden Dawn society. (There are isolated witches who claim a family tradition that is older. Perhaps they are correct, or some of them are correct. Much of modern Wicca derives from the Alexandrine tradition, which is recent.)

OTOH, origin myths don't have much to do with validity...whatever that means when applied to a religion. The Wicca are generally trying to create a religion that is harmonious with the way people naturally think, and which doesn't promulgate harm. So far they seem to have done better than most "Christian" denominations. Possibly *because* they are more recent and relatively powerless.

P.S.: After you sacrifice the chicken, you barbeque it and eat it. You may also draw designs with corn meal. I've never learned what designs.

Did you ever test it? I did, but without really understanding Voodoo, so I now know that it wasn't a valid test. So that was a fail in critical thinking. I've still never actually experimented with actual Voodoo, according to the currently most dominant beliefs. (There are lots of variations, so I couldn't actually disprove all variations of the belief. I've never even ritually sacrificed a chicken...though I did once ritually sacrifice a pint of rum.)

But you are ignoring the placebo effect...intentionally, given that you mention "double blind studies". Magic magnetic bracelets WORK (to an extent), because people believe that they are being treated.

FWIW, many currently FDA approved drugs have an effect weaker than the placebo effect as measured in double blind studies, and also come with significant side effects. Of course, in actual use their effect is compounded with the placebo effect, so they're better than the first statement would indicate, but the side effects can be crippling, so they are also often worse.

I think the basic problem is a mixing of the levels.

Ghosts clearly exist, but I believe them to be features of the human mind. Saying they don't exist is like saying that software doesn't exist.

Telepathy is believed in with certainty because before people are able to talk, they observe older folk around them transfering thoughts from one to another. Remember that the older name for telepathy is "thought transferrence".

Etc. You literally can't prove these things wrong, because at their roots they aren't wrong. They only become wrong when they get turned into words and talked about in a social context.

OTOH, I've had a bit of success with dowsing, (two out of two, when I was seriously trying...not statistically significant) and a bit of success with gambling (1 out of 1 when I was seriously trying against a slot machine...I wone $7 starting with a quarter). And I can't explain those, except that they aren't statistically significant. But I wonder. So I'm not unbiased.

But the real thing is that I don't believe that the current schools CAN teach how to apply the methods of science even to ordinary phenomena. They should tackle something that is at once more basic and more useful: Critical thinking.