
Stephen Fry: “The future of humanity and technology” [video] - jpm_sd
https://youtube.com/watch?v=24F6C1KfbjM
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lashdav
He's essentially expanding more on his lecture from the Hays Festival earlier
this year. I found his examples of how exponential growth presents itself in
real life to be entertaining and effective.

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pervycreeper
The "highlights reel" consists of short video clips set to music (without any
audible speech).

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nautilus12
Why is his podium set so low so he has to hunch over it the whole time?

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golemotron
Because it's sized for normal people.

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boxcardavin
I couldn't make it very far through this video, I was reminded too much of an
unattributed quote from Twitter, "Stephen Fry is a stupid person's idea of
what an intelligent person is like".

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CryptoFascist
A lame joke-quote that tells you more about the person saying it than about
the person referenced in it.

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throwanem
I don't know. Fry did once claim on QI that the fins on rockets provide
aerodynamic lift, and that's why rockets work.

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thomasfoster96
QI did end up having quite a lot of rather dubious facts in the end (or at the
very least, a lot of the answers given as correct on the show required a very
unintuitive interpretation of the question, despite the nature of the show).

But given that this seems to have continued well after Fry left the show, I
can only assume it’s the researchers on the show making the errors, not Fry
himself.

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vidarh
"a very un-intuitive interpretation of the question" is often part of the game
on QI.

As for the researchers, yes, QI has little to do with the knowledge of the
host. The researchers actually got to present their own (extremely low budget)
show for a while - it was quite quirky and fun, but you should take QI and
their other show more as a bunch of geeks talking about fun stuff and
frequently getting caught up in juggling technicalities and stuff they don't
necessarily know all that much about.

It's entertainment, after all, not documentaries.

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thomasfoster96
> "a very un-intuitive interpretation of the question" is often part of the
> game on QI.

Hence my clarification that this was despite it being the nature of the show.

The question about “who was the first president of the United States” really
annoys me, because the definition of ‘president' was so poorly explained on
the show yet the (incorrect) answer has probably now become a dinner party
anecdote for lots of people.

> you should take QI and their other show more as a bunch of geeks talking
> about fun stuff and frequently getting caught up in juggling technicalities
> and stuff they don't necessarily know all that much about.

Which I do, but I’m also aware that it presents itself as being a factual quiz
and so I do think there should be some level of fact-checking (or
clarification). Random QI Elves writing complex questions on topics they know
very little about without consulting experts doesn’t make good TV.

> It's entertainment, after all, not documentaries.

I’m aware it’s for entertainment, but lots of people take everything that’s
said on QI at face value and don’t try to find things out for themselves,
which is sad.

