Kellhus and Cnaiur journey through the trackless steppe.

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Talking about just in the US. Or just in a single country, not a world-wide event.

What would be the economic, political, sociological, or other impacts if the entirety of the poorest group of people died in a country?

"Poor" being anyone without the means, economic or otherwise, to keep themselves and/or their families alive. So pretty much anyone that was homeless and/or uses major government/private/humanitarian subsidies to live off of. Wellfare, food stamps, food pantries, shelters, etc.

Also, would it make a difference if it was some kind of 'rapture' and all those people dissipated, or if it was a conscious decision and/or calamity that caused the slow starvation/death.


You'd have to raise taxes to pay for all the empty buildings, menial jobs would still need to be worked.. The debt owned by those people would still exist and would probably collapse banking systems or require huge bailouts. How many jobs would be lost that are dedicated to helping people in need, those would all be lost. So then those people would be unemployed, and likely replace the lowest wage jobs....

Or would it create a golden age? Its often believed that people who aren't contributing dollars to the economic system drag it down. You'd free up large portions of tax monies to invest in other things, like infrastructure, education, etc. etc. The man-hours dedicated to aiding those people could then be put towards something else. Donations both of money and time could then go somewhere else, further improving other vital aspects of life... Would life continue as normal without much of an impact?

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I'd argue that silly and feminine isn't actually bad in this case. I think the Sranc are deliberately supposed to provoke a huge cognitive dissonance in observers. They're a perverse Inchoroi joke, after all. Not just a bioweapon.

Great point. Purposely juxtaposing beauty, subtly, and dare I say subtle femininity, onto the frame of the most rapacious, destructive, and demonoid animals imaginable. Strong and masculine features just wouldn't evoke the same dissonance

Update: Finished in 09/2016. Took me nearly 2 years, but was well worth it.

Yeah I know we already have a few topics on him, but I want to make a new one .

Figured I'd write some stuff down, thoughts etc., as I slowly plod through the epic that is Malazan book of the Fallen. I'll try to keep out spoilers I suppose.

Gardens of the Moon (GotM)
08/2014 - Really thought this was a great opening book. Plenty of things going on to keep me interested and wanting more. Once I began getting the hand of the world, magic, and characters, it started to open up for me. Maybe this is why I thought the latter half of the book was better than the first. Either way, a great read.

Deadhouse Gates (DG)
Better and worse than GotM. Could have been because I took too long to read this, but I felt disconnected from many of the characters by the time the end rolled around. Too many to keep track of I think. hat said, I think the character development was better, and I was rather invested in many of them at the end. Similar to GotM, I think the second half was better than the first, and the ending was quite amazing. I was hoping for a greater expansion of sorcery that never came.

Memories of Ice (MoI)
12/19/2014. What a phenomenal book. Easily my favorite so far. Around page 600 I thought to myself "that would have been a great place to end it", but holy hell I'm glad it went on. The rest of the book went by so fast, I couldn't put it down. And what an ending! All the things...

More of the same from above though. The first half was a bit slow, though better than the first two, like climbing that initial hill on a rollercoaster. Oh so worth it on the way down though.
I was considering reading a few other books before I started House of Chains, but I don't know if I can do that now. The story is so enticing now, and I'm so glad that I finally got some background on the characters.... If the books keep getting better, I'm going to be sorely pressed to pick a favorite author.

House of Chains (HoC)
This one has started out rather different than the others, but its pretty entertaining so far (4 chapters in).
After finishing, I'd have to say this is, by far, my least favorite of the lot so far, and I don't like Karsa. Finished 04/20/15.

Midnight Tides (MT)
Just finished Midnight Tides last night (08/26/2015). Overall I think it was a pretty great book. I loved Tehol and Bugg's interactions, had me laughing pretty hard more than once, and really made the book flow. Granted, this may have been more difficult had I not been looking forward to Bonehunters, where allegedly storylines start to converge, but I can't say that for sure. Regardless, MT was a lot of fun to read

Bonehunters (BH?)
Finished 9/12/15. Really liked this one. It flowed a bit better than MT, and  it was nice having all the old faces back. Maybe that't why I liked it so much, storylines converging is always a favorite of mine. Unfortunately I feel like I'm missing a lot, forgetting things, forgetting characters that show back up, and it makes me sad. This seems like a series that would be great to read each book more than once, but I just don't think I'll have the time. Maybe someday. Still an amazing series so far though.

Reaper's Gale (RG)
Finished Reapers Gale 9/23/2015 (had some downtime at work this week...). I really enjoyed this book, probably contending for 2nd with GotM and DG. Without spoiling anything, geez, this one has all the feels. I was almost moved to tears once or twice. With all the storylines converging, it was nonstop fun the whole way, while still maintaining that feeling of mystery happening behind the scenes.

Toll the Hounds (TTH)
11/2015. Another great book, though since I didn't write my reaction when I finished the book, I don't have much to say. I've given up picking a favorite in the series, too many great ones, this included. As someone mentions upthread, the end of this book is particularly salient and satisfying. Loved it

Dust of Dreams (DoD)
06/01/2016. I was pretty underwhelmed with this one. I felt that there were too many side-plots explored. All build up with not nearly as much crescendo as the preceding books.  Had to slog through it.

The Crippled God
09/2016 - Crippled God was a great book. All climax the whole way. There isn't much of anything that can be said about it without spoilers... so I'll just say there are emotional moments everywhere. I probably had tears a half dozen times or more, both happy and sad.

Not everything clicked for me, and I think some things were tied up almost too neatly, but generally speaking, a good end to a good series. I'm 100% glad that I read it and finished it. The biggest shortfalls, for me, were HoC and DoD, but the other books heavily outweigh those books.

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I can see why Erikson is a successful fantasy writer, and I'm glad he is. While Bakker remains, to me, at the top of the pile, Erikson's story is a great one that ends with a bang. His is an easy world to get lost in, and imo his popularity makes room for a better fantasy genre as a whole.

I have amassed a collection of authors/books that have been suggested on this forum. The list contains everything that got either lots of good reviews from you good people, or seemed interested to me. There are some missing that I have already read. This started as a list of books I'd like to at some point read and add to my collection, so it is not a complete list of all the many authors/books that have received recommendations.

Format:
Author - Name of Book (Series its from), Book 2 from same author, Book 3, etc.

Recommended from the SA community/forum:
Kevin J Anderson - Hidden Empire (Saga of Seven Suns)
Terry Brooks - The Sword of Shannara (Shannara trilogy)
Lois McMaster Bujold - Shards of Honor (vorkosigan saga), The Curse of Chalion
Arthur C. Clarke - 2001 A Space Odyssey, Rendezvous with Rama, Childhood’s End
Susanna Clarke - Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
Stephen R. Donaldson - The Gap into Conflict: The Real Story (The Gap Cycle)
David Gemmel - Legend (or Against the Horde), Dark Moon, Echoes of the Great Song
Peter F. Hamilton - The Reality Dysfunction (Night’s Dawn), Pandora’s Star/Judas Unchained
Nick Harkaway - Angelmaker
M. John Harrison - Viriconium, Light (Kefahuchi Tract)
Robin Hobb - Assassin’s Apprentice (Farseer Trilogy)
Robert Jordan - The Eye of the World (Wheel of Time)
Stephen King - The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower)
Stanisław Lem - Solaris
David Mitchell - Cloud Atlas
Christopher Moore - Lamb
Andrzej Sapkowski - The Witcher
Robert Silverberg - Far Horizons
Dan Simmons - Olympos, Ilium
Matthew Stover - Heroes Die (Acts of Caine)
Brent Weeks - The Way of the Shadow (Night Angel Trilogy)
John C. Wright - The Golden Age
David Zindell - The Broken God (A Requiem for Homo Sapiens), Neverness

Below are other books I'd like to read someday
Winner of both Hugo and Nebula Awards, since 1950 (somewhat in order):
Ursula K. Le Guin. -The Left Hand of Darkness, The Dispossessed
Larry Niven - Ringworld
Arthur C. Clarke - Rendezvous with Rama, The Fountains of paradise
Joe Haldeman - The Forever War
Frederik Pohl - Gateway
Vonda McIntyre - Dreamsnake
David Brin - Startide Rising
Connie Willis - Doomsday Book, Blackout/All Clear
Joe Haldeman - Forever Peace
Neil Gaiman - American Gods
Lois McMaster Bujold - Paladin of Souls
Michael Chabon - The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Paolo Bacigalupi - The Windup Girl
Jo Walkton - Among Others
Ann Leckie - Ancillary Justice


What remains of the first 20 books listed in the "top 100 sci-fi books of all time" list that has not been covered above.
Top 100 sci-fi of all time
Julian May - The Many-Colored Land
Philip K Dick - The Divine Invasion, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Robert a Heinlein - Stranger in a Strange Land, Starship Troopers, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Ray Brandbury - Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles
Joe Haldeman - The Forever War
H G Wells - The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds


At some point I'm going to have to rank these in order of interest and dive in. Much of the above are series, so we'll see how I decide to cover all those. At my current rate, I'll never read all of these before I die, so I'll also have to start reading more. Hopefully having the list written down will  help?

Anything I missed? Feel free to post comments, suggestions, or your own lists.

Edit:
"The Magicians" by Lev Grossman
"Lord of Light" Zelzany
"Blindsight" by Peter Watts
"The Lies of Locke Lamora" Scott Lynch, Gentleman Bastards #1

So I've read a couple brief things about password strength and found a list of the top 10,000 passwords that account for some 99.8% of all passwords on the internet. Below are some things everyone should know based on what I found.

1. Don't use anything less than 8 characters.
2. Never use single words. Anything that is found in the dictionary is no good.
3. No common names of people, places, books, characters, movies, etc.
4. No Makes or Models of cars
5. No sports teams or mascots
6. Don't do the above and misspell a word, or replace letters with numbers. You aren't helping yourself.

This password checker I found seems to contain the list of 10k that I found. Easy to test how terrible your password is, though I'd probably not put in exactly what your "really good password" is.
https://howsecureismypassword.net/

This comic explains password strength pretty amazingly.
http://xkcd.com/936/

Worth noting that the comic puts 1000 guesses a second. Apparently, unimpressive cracking algorithms and a computer with a mediocre graphics card could do 1billion a second or more. Or at least thats what some places said.So you'll need to do better than correcthorsestaplebattery