You're sure that it's a "British English" dictionary? All its sources include both British and American texts. OED is supposed to be "the definitive record of the English Language", leaving nothing important out. (Not even Aussies!) Sure, if you were talking about one of the "concise" versions, that would make sense - there's the Oxford Dictionary of English which is based on the British National Corpus, and its American English counterpart, the New Oxford American Dictionary, which is based on an American English Corpus. But a suggestion that the OED itself (which is a distinct work from both) is a "British English dictionary" sounds preposterous to me.

Webster as an authority? Sure, if you're bold. The thing is, I've never seen anybody to refer to the Commonwealth of Nations as just "Britain", but everyone around here in Europe uses "America" either for the US, or for the combined NA+SA landmass, quite unambiguously based on the context.

Obviously, it got snubbed!

Actually, they do understand that at truly large scales, the solar and wind production over large areas reduces the fluctuations. That's been known for quite some time, just as it's been known that their actual production can be predicted and anticipated by simply predicting weather patterns.

Well, that sounds like a serious "do some fucking real wealth generation yourself!" incentive from the state, doesn't it?

There's a rumor that a few people did that with the Black Stone in the Kaaba. Apparently, it just seems like the right thing to do with stones that people are used to kiss, wherever you live!

Funny thing is, that's less due to Achaeans and more to Schliemann's "excavations". ;-)

(BTW, when did Shuttleworth decide to grow a kinkled beard?)

, I wonder how many men, if going away with perceptions like these, would be ready to ascribe it to some "them vs. me" issue. I mean, one can't conclude on basis of statements like these that some sort of improper discrimination wasn't going on, but neither can one conclude that it was.

As opposed to the "non-breakaway" US culture, where a small portion of very rich people - coincidentally "the very same people who benefit from the suffering of others" - can afford medical procedures that the rest of the population can't?

You make it sound as if every transhumanist wished for immortality. I have strong transhumanist inclinations but I believe that immortality is a logical contradiction. How does that compute to you?

I doubt that there is an actual possibility for any entity to live for a billion years and still to be able to consider itself "itself". Unless you have the huge storage to keep the whole personality and all the memories mostly intact, if you picked two random points in the time line, the "same" entity in those two points would most likely be two completely different ones, making the continuity sort of a moot point.

Also, you've just mentioned the reason why heaven in many religions is not far removed from hell. You get screwed either way!