Un-rules question: what happens in the interaction between Karn the great creator and blacker lotus? Can you put the pieces in your hand, and if so are they cast together or a separate cards?

Karn can only get a single whole card, not pieces of a card.

You said the other day that silver border cards are considered lesser by players, but I just wanted you to know that the folks in my lgbt magic discord server are organizing a small silver border/playtest card legacy league (with a banlist, because we can't have any blacker lotus, lol) and it's been a lot of fun brewing! I personally am a big fan of using silver border in constructed, even if that wasn't the intent. They're still fun cards. And a lot of them are pretty darn playable too!

I always encourage more casual players to consider adding some silver border cards that feel appropriate. There are a lot of real fun Un-cards.

What can Richard Garfield Ph.D do with augment cards? Can he make them a suspend card like lotus bloom? Can he make them a black lotus or a mox card. If I'm mindlavering someone who has him in play, can I make him make one into a blacker lotus and tear up their card (obviously there'd be social repercussions independent of any rulings). Can I cast them as something that costs X? Or another Augment? Can I make lands into other lands?

Richard Garfield, PhD can’t do anything with cards that lack a mana cost.

"our research shows players aren’t fond of permanently defacing their Magic cards" - You mean there aren't a lot of Ironman Magic playgroups anymore?

No. Fun story. We did market research on Unglued. I was told that the two most unpopular cards were Blacker Lotus and Chaos Confetti by a large margin. The data people doing the market research said that they cross referenced all the various elements - art, name, flavor text - but couldn’t find any correlative connection between these two cards. I said, “Don’t worry. I got it.”

More on Botania (from Minecraft), there's also a Blacker Lotus (which adds more mana) and the Planestrider's sash (it says if you go slow, you're a plainswalker). There's probably more.

Thanks.

Will the Great Silver-Bordered Oracle Update (Silvoracle?) finally replace Blacker Lotus's tearing up with something a bit less physically destructive? I've got a Blacker Lotus in my cube, have had to replace it a couple times, and would like something a bit more definitive than house rules to fall back on to make sure I don't have to buy another one ever again.

The card requires you tearing it up. You can have whatever house rules you like though.

Will Tabak's silver-bordered Oracle update be removing the "rip this card up into tiny pieces" mechanic? It seems like "remove this from your card pool" would be a much better way to reduce the bad feelings that come from having to tear up a Blacker Lotus, and completely eliminates any issues with having to tear up someone else's Blacker Lotus in Cube games.

Oracle clarifies but we try not to functionally change the card.You can have house rules not to rip cards if you like.

Have you thought of return the self destructive element of Blacker Lotus to limited commons in a desire to combat collection creep?

Blacker Lotus was the number one most disliked card on Unglued according to our market research. Chaos Confetti was number two.

Who designed Blacker Lotus?

I did.

We seem to be on the subject so I'll resubmit my Un-rules question: I put Blacker Lotus into play. An opponent gains control of it. It seems tearing BL up is part of the cost, so how is that handled given I don't want my card torn up by an opponent?

You are allowed to concede at any time meaning the answer to not having your opponent tear your card is to lose the game.