asciilifeform: or for that matter the research culture that was the butthurt envy of entire 'civilized world' (as late as '90, pentagon spent $B's on translations, from which cribbed all sortsa material, e.g. 'stealth airplane' )

asciilifeform: i wouldn't go so far as 'can't', but we're talking 'lease $B plant for 6mo.' sort of figure.

asciilifeform: $B.

asciilifeform: i still dun fully grasp the supposed usg feud with qatar -- iirc the latter sank couple $B into usg's 'moderate rebels' ☟︎

asciilifeform: ben_vulpes: seekrit plot to save $B's from ru budget!1111

asciilifeform: but imho usn electric guns oughta be encouraged and cheered, per http://btcbase.org/log/2017-09-15#1714978 . especially if they cost $B each and run win95 ☝︎

asciilifeform: kanzure: approx. that you might have $B but you can't send it to isis.

asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: if you'd like to pen a 'can haz the pill against your $B 'intellektual property' racket for phreee? ' letter to lattice, go ahead. i did xilinx.

asciilifeform: by spending a few $B (yes) to build it. ☟︎

asciilifeform: (they also collected fat moneys for the service, i shit thee not, of watching that the domain reg does not 'walk away', because not-winblowzing, not-using-guessable-pw, etc. is Too Much To Expect from multi-$B 'tbtf' orgs)

asciilifeform: if you have a directed one, you can turn that $B into $2B right now.

asciilifeform: does their collective pay even add up to $B, or the cost of 1 magic airplane.

asciilifeform: pete_dushenski: xilinx and altera make $B+ of them / yr and they aren't going into tv sets etc.

asciilifeform: 'don't measure electron charge, somebody might refute. measure instead only things that can be measured solely with $B machine.'

asciilifeform: which is why you can get usg or eurounion to cough up $B for a crackpot machine, but not $1M for you to sit in a chalet in the alps and schrodingerate ☟︎

asciilifeform: $b 3

asciilifeform: adelberger would be ~nothing~ without his $B toy.

asciilifeform: the item in question is 'benevolent inca empire wants to give $billion to physics' but you can't give 'to physics' because that's somewhere between 0 to 3 guys and nobody's gonna give some unwashed weirdos a $b

asciilifeform: aha, and google bought for $B.

asciilifeform: if it means that, given a $B another fella can attempt to replicate, this does not mean much.

asciilifeform: http://log.bitcoin-assets.com/?date=20-03-2016#1436599 << 'us too! if usg can hand out $B to aggressive mediocrities, so can we!111' ☝︎

asciilifeform: and so they can charge $B.

asciilifeform: it is also not entirely clear to me where the 'better men' are to get the $b

asciilifeform: but what if your work is meaningless without $b synchrophasotron ?

asciilifeform: except if the difference only becomes palpable a few $b and decades later, it does't really exist to the naked eye

asciilifeform: which takes a few $b in imperial money

asciilifeform: (if anyone is unclear on why 'i'll bring in a few $b and then do physics with it' is a nonstarter, they must read the eotvos threads.)

asciilifeform: decimation: no need to go far. a short stretch of road - cost $b.

asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: the unsettling discovery is that mass-derp can continue far longer than the example under consideration. e.g., 'crypto ag' still exists, multi-$b, 'unknown' ownership, and... multi-decade loyal customers.

asciilifeform: somebody's idiot yacht-sailing son needed an extra $B.

asciilifeform was acquainted with one such '1%' - al schwartz. who has an eminently testable hypothesis re: parity violation, and spent a decade (& counting) trying to score 2 weeks on an eotvos rotor balance. while the charlatans build their $b colliders.

asciilifeform: false dichotomy. maxwell needed no $b hardware.

asciilifeform: mike_c: usg sent several $b in actual benjamins to iraq. i thought this was common knowledge.

asciilifeform: when that time comes, one ought to expect a lack of interest in how many $b something is worth