randomania

Here's what I'm figuring, based on science as laid out by the show, a couple of science sites and a college professor of mine who always seemed stoned: Presumably, creating the blastocyst from Sarah's and Ira's, uh, raw material will give them something akin to what was originally made out of Kendall's genes. That might give Susan, Cos & co. enough to work with to create stem cells. If that doesn't work, or it's just not mad-sciency enough: If they compare the Leda-Castor blastocyst's genome with Cosima's genome, they might be able to identify the areas of Cosima's genome that are affected by the synthetic sequences. I bet the Island of Dr. Duncan has a CRISPR setup, like all the other cool labs do. They could use CRISPR to edit out the bad stuff and put in some good stuff. A little hand-waving, and voila! Gene therapy!

"Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow" was the Third Doctor's solution for every technical issue. The phrase has made its way into the dialogue of just about every Doctor since then. Has someone put together a supercut video? Of course someone has. I love you, Internet. Doctor Who Supercut - Reverse the Polarity

I imagine the first rule to be bent for Josh will be the "up at 4:30 a.m." one. Duggar Time does not recognize that concept.

Disclaimer: There's an old saying, "Two Jews, three opinions." It's entirely likely that another Jew will pop in with another explanation. I'll give the outline here, and if anyone wants to really dig into it then we should probably move it to the religion thread. The laws about ritual purity after menstruation and childbirth are laid out in Leviticus 12. Basically, when a woman has blood coming out of her woman-parts, she's considered niddah - a type of ritual impurity - and remains so until a set time has passed and she's able to immerse herself in a mikvah. For menstruation, that's a period of about two weeks. There are plenty of theories as to why a woman is niddah until a week after the start of her period; I've always favored the one that points out that most women ovulate about two weeks after the start of their period - which means a couple can resume gettin' it on at the best time to make babies. After giving birth, a woman is niddah for 40 days (for a boy) or 80 days (for a girl). There's no reason given for the difference in times, and generations of scholars have had a collective field day coming up with explanations that fit their particular views. The purification ritual is the same whether a woman has given birth to a boy or a girl, which most scholars I've read interpret as meaning the amount of "impurity" is the same; it's just that for some reason lost to time, a woman goes to the mikvah sooner after giving birth to a boy. That's an outline of one Jewish perspective. What the heck the Duggars are thinking, I can't tell you.

If he were only paying for one account at a time, that would be... *scribble, scribble*... 36 months. The leak indicated that he was a member for a bit over two years, and that he was paying for two accounts much of that time. So if all he was looking and fantasizing, he got about two years of thrills in $20- and $40-dollar increments - amounts small enough to not be missed in a household budget. $250? "Business expenses, honey. I'll get reimbursed." Hey, he's already a terrible person in his mind for thinking about cheating - why not lie while he's on a roll with disappointing Jesus?

I hope this doesn't veer too much into "psychoanalyzing Josh" territory – mods, if it does, please delete and accept my apologies. I have a friend who's a dominatrix. One of her steadiest streams of income is "financial domination" – receiving money or gifts from men who for whatever reason enjoy spending money because some woman tells them to, without getting anything in return. Josh reminds me of those men. I wouldn't be at all surprised if all he did was spend money on AM because he took pleasure in secretly spending money on something illicit. If he subscribes to a world-view in which thinking about cheating on his wife is just as bad as doing it, spending $20 a month (plus a one-time payment of $250) is a relatively affordable way to get a thrill.

These people really do not understand how the Internet works.

None of the direct links posted above worked for me, although this one did. If you're having trouble go straight to Michelle's blog - it's (currently) the top link. There's one big word missing from that statement: "Sorry."

It broke mid-afternoon here on the west coast, so late afternoon-early evening where they are. They will be up all night trying to craft a response. My money is on, "He was doing research for his job, and he couldn't very well put an Ashley Madison charge on the FRC's account. He had no choice but to use credit cards tied to his home addresses. See? Totally doing the Lord's work!" What I wonder is, did Josh pay the $20 Ashley Madison was asking people to cough up to have their data deleted, even though it was still identifiable? If he did, he may have thought he would get away with it.

Gawker already has a post about the profile. I'm thinking about sending them the answers I found. Answering "Yes" to "Do you feel there are any circumstances in which a person is obligated to have sex with you?" is sadly common among male users, but combined with the other two questions, we might have a hit.

joesmithsonwa and I have only answered three overlapping questions, shots of which I've uploaded here: http://imgur.com/a/1UkMy(only includes his answers - mine are the opposite) If you don't want to click over, here's the text: Do you think it is possible for someone to be an Atheist and still have a solid moral framework by which to live? No. Do you feel there are any circumstances in which a person is obligated to have sex with you? Yes How do you feel about government-subsidized food programs (free lunch, food stamps, etc.)? Never – Get a job

Congratulations, Josh Duggar! You're responsible for the highest spike in global schadenfreude levels in recorded history!

[insert standard "I've read most of these posts, but there are so many and they come along quickly, so I might have missed someone saying exactly what I'm about to say" disclaimer...] I think Josh has been absent from the press because there's no way for him to avoid throwing his parents under the bus - and that goes against everything his parents have drilled into him. Hey, Josh, why did you do it in the first place? "I was curious about girls, because my parents never told us anything. Any questions or thoughts about sex were sinful and not discussed." Did you know it was wrong? "Yes, but my parents said that as long as I begged God's forgiveness and my sisters said they forgave me, it was like it never happened." You knew it was wrong, but you kept doing it. Your parents didn't try to stop you? "Well, they tried, I guess. But all they did was try to stop the last thing I did, rather than prevent future things. I mean, a locked door's no match for Satan, you know?" But they finally sent you away? "Yes, they decided that if I had idle hands I should have them made righteously busy and maybe get some mentorship." And then they let you back in the house? "Uh, yeah. I was forgiven, remember? They said it was cool. Thanks, Mom and Dad!" I'm sure the FRC is happy that he's keeping quiet. The last thing they'd want the public thinking is that they hired an unqualified idiot just because he had the right last name.

"Sure, we knew, but his sisters said they were cool with him when we told them to, so everything's hunky-dory. We totally got help for the boy – he's the important one here, after all. We even made him pay for it out of his own allowance so he knew we were serious about it. So shut up, leftist conspiracy!" But my favorite – and by "favorite" I mean "someone get me a tall glass of vodka and hold me – was the insistence that Josh wasn't technically a pedophile, and that the parents didn't technically have to report it. Are these people outsourcing their answers to the seedier corners of Reddit? On second thought, make it a whole bottle of vodka. And a vacation. Like, to Mars.