Corvos
5hr ago
Nope, just proof a genius-level IQ can coexist with a spine of limp cardboard. Many such cases.
I have the appetite for it. Try smuggling that stuff into Japan. Your feet won’t touch the floor. Even the yakuza might turn you in.
As with so many things, it’s not that hard. The trick is preventing the other half of society from sabotaging you. When 90% of people on the darkweb or making calls to dealers are entrapment operations, and having or taking drugs is punished as harshly as dealing them, when drug-takers are socially treated like lepers who fund Mexican cartel massacres rather than cool dudes, then you will see drugs vanish pretty fast.
Corvos
11hr ago
I think you’re agreeing with @ortherox. Screwdrivers exist to screw screws for a purpose. Screwing is their function.
Likewise armies exist in order to achieve certain things - border protection, having lots of gold, etc. This involves killing people.
Corvos
1d ago
This seems exactly the wrong way round to me. You were closest with choreography - corporations exist as a handy package to allow groups of people to coordinate to do whatever they want to do.
Or are you asking, “why does the government permit corporations to exist”? Beyond freedom etc.
Corvos
1d ago
Rather reminiscent of what they say about doing mid-level business in China. I wonder if there’s some structural factor?
Anyway, always interesting to hear from people with experience.
Corvos
2d ago
It's apprenticeship. You hire them because they are now more skilled than the newer interns as a result of your tutelage. Obviously, many ways for this to go wrong in practice.
Corvos
2d ago
I actually agree with the basic thrust of your point - being rich in your 60s is nice but doesn't achieve much for society in most cases and younger people would be better off with more money for having children - but you are making incredibly strong and bad claims that are distracting from it.
Yes, someone in their 30s is usually worth 2x as much as someone in their 20s. They've had 6 to 10 years of seeing stuff actually happening in the real world, they've got some experience in when and why things work or fail to work, and they are able to reliably handle things without needing their hand held. They are less likely (though still distressingly likely) to decide that they've worked out how the world really is and everyone just needs to get out of the way.
Corvos
2d ago
"How would you approach this problem?" in a 10 min interview seems like a fine hiring screen. AI or no AI, being able to ask the right kinds of questions and work out the right initial approaches seems like the best mark of a good candidate. AI is still slow enough I doubt they can type and read answers off GPT quickly enough, and having done lots of projects using AI or not using AI should give them the experience needed to answer at the high level.
First at 45 they are afforded half-UBI like middle management positions, which 20 year olds could easily do but can never get because they're essentially handouts for middle aged people.
Counterpoint: I worked at a broadly 'flat' tech company. Having thirty young and roughly equally-qualified engineers competing for middle-management positions makes for an awful working environment. Get the oldest to do it, as long as he's decent, and everyone can get on with work instead of agonising over reviews and stabbing each other in the back. Who's most senior is also semi-random, so you don't end up with the greasiest of the pack put in charge.
Corvos
3d ago
I still have a fondness for the traditional marking scheme:
3rd: showed up, wrote something.
2.2: Wrote an essay on the question asked.
2.1: Wrote a good essay on the question asked, showing a broad coverage and understanding of the relevant material taught in class.
1st: Wrote a good essay on the question asked, demonstrating original thought and knowledge of material beyond the syllabus.
It’s surprisingly objective whilst allowing for the material and the student’s response to be entirely subjective.
Corvos
5d ago
I get that. To me it seems you at least have an opening, and a few more visits might produce either a girl who's organically interested in you, or enough practice/experience to get out of the Nice Guy filter.
Corvos
5d ago
He doesn't look, act or talk like swamp, and the swamp hates him with an open and visceral hatred. It's a fair deduction. It's also the reason nobody else could compete - any potential contender gets hailed by pundits and immediately it taints them in the eyes of the anti-swamp crowd.
Corvos
5d ago
From far away, this sounds like a decent result. Not ideal, obviously, but way better than the last speed dating event I went to. It sounds like it's worth going a few more times FWIW.
Corvos
6d ago
Good luck, @self_made_human. Rooting for you :)
(Rooting. Why? What are the roots of rooting? How in the name of God does roots have anything to do with wishing people well? Root beer?)
Corvos
6d ago
How?
I've done the 'anxious with an avoidant' bit from the avoidant side. Wasn't fun at all. Any advice much appreciated.
Corvos
6d ago
I believe he meant on a more personal level. Committees take on a life of their own, but two finance bros can fund a starving artist on a shoestring budget no problem, through commissions etc.
Corvos
7d ago
I don't think this was usual. My father got a computer in 1997 or so and it was a big deal as a professional to have a PC.
People are taking my example far too literally. I wasn't saying 'Ukraine trying to fight the Russians is like refusing to pay your taxes', I was trying to demonstrate to @sun_the_second that whether you should tap out in response to pressure, and whether you should blame people for forcefully subjugating resistance, can't be a universal principle you can decide once-and-for-all and base your entire life around.
Of course, one is expected to pay one's taxes every year :P
My point is that, as the libertarians like to say, there is not a huge difference between the government saying 'we will lock you in a box if you don't give us the money we've decided you owe us, even if you disagree' and a gang saying they want your stuff and they'll hurt you if you refuse.
It can simultaneously be the case that:
- the justice of a demand is heavily debated, especially between demander and demandee
- refusing will have predictably bad consequences
And the result is therefore some mixture of:
- refusing to give in is morally foolish or reckless, given the way it affects those who depend on you
- refusing to give in is morally noble and brave, given the way it discourages demands towards others
which varies case by case.
Ultimately context and viewpoint are doing 90% of the work here. Neither 'be reasonable!' nor 'always stick to your guns (metaphorically), son' are reliable ways of thinking that you can apply to all areas of life.
For an example with a very different valence, if somebody doesn't pay their taxes and they eventually end up in court and they refuse to settle in court, they eventually end up in prison. It wouldn't be usual to cheer them on and say, "Keep fighting! Don't let the bastards get you! Never give in to pressure!".
EDIT: since people are taking this to be an enthusiastic support of Russia's behaviour, my point was that "if you refuse to tap out under pressure, you're going to get hurt" and "you're not at fault for refusing to give into threats" are both pretty context-dependent. I should probably have been less gnomic but I have other things on my mind.
Corvos
7d ago
I'm sorry, then I misunderstood you. I thought you were talking about 'asylum seekers' in general and using Afghans as shorthand.
Corvos
8d ago
the left and half the right won’t stand for 3
What's the logic here? Too expensive?
Broadly my model is that 95% of the Labour party and 35% of the Tory party don't want restrictions on 'refugees' no matter what, so they're a dead loss. 3 is therefore viable but very difficult to get through Parliament in its current configuration.
The public does want something done, but balks if it's visibly violent or leads to deaths. So 1 and 2 are out.
"send them back directly where they came from. Don't ask any questions, don't bother with process, just send them back"
is difficult practically. There are three questions: how do you get them on the planes, how do you make the planes carry them, and how do you make the destination let the planes land / take them off the planes?
Mostly the relevant countries don't want these people back and / or it would be unpopular to be seen to take them back. So dedicated transports are unlikely to be permitted to land. For weaker countries you could always start landing unapproved somewhere, but that is difficult and expensive and technically an act of war. If you can't do that, you could put them on passenger jets, but that's expensive and you need a minder to supervise them and passengers / airlines are likely to protest or grandstand.
Not saying it's impossible with enough will, but it's not straightforward. By and large it doesn't beat the Rwanda plan.
True, I just think that (dependent on circumstances) “it’s impossible, give up” can and should be countered with “it’s perfectly possible but you are sabotaging it”.
So eg inventing an EV battery with 6000 miles of energy is impossible in a different way than building a massive factory of them in Britain is impossible.
Now, this is dangerous because the response to genuine failure is often to blame saboteurs, as in the Soviet Union, but it’s true sometimes.
On the object point, the government in the UK has pretty much wiped out smoking now, for example. And I’m pretty sure cannabis is going to start slipping back towards illegality. It’s been behind some really nasty murders lately (schizoid breaks), even when legalised it’s heavily associated with crime, it stinks all the way down the road, and it turns people into boring vegetables when it’s not sending them crazy.
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