Sunday 16 September 2012

Things We Laughed About This Week

Whenever probability theory hits you, it’s time to start thinking about things more interesting than this one:

 bayes
It doesn’t matter how much sense it makes, or how useful it is for human survival (or whatever), it’s not FUN. Not as fun as the following remarks or events:
  • The leader of the Left Alliance, Paavo Arhinmäki, publically wished to give Carl Haglund, the chairman of the Swedish People’s Party, a train ticket to Siberia. It’s not politically correct, someone might even find this statement quite disturbing. Personally, I did giggle a little bit when I read the story and the reactions it caused. If Mr. Haglund doesn’t want the ticket, I wouldn’t mind using it. No problem - дайте мне
  • Russians trying to order vodka in Russian in the middle of the (non-Russian) forest. The poor bartender was very confused. 
  • Ski-jumper Harri Olli wants Finland to join Russia because Finland is such a “s**t state”. There’s nothing wrong with Russia, so no offence – but, this is a statement that will confuse and anger, rather than .make people bounce with happiness. I wonder how all this is related to ski-jumping?

NB: the purpose of this post is not to shed negative light on Russia. Rather, yours truly finds it quite interesting how Russia is used in political discourse (and apparently also in ski-jumping circles) to make fun of opponents or for social commentary.

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