Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
"Behind our efforts, let there be found our efforts."
User ID: 83
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
Peter Watts is, in my opinion, a very original writer, but not a very good one. He introduces interesting concepts or combines concepts in interesting ways, but his misanthropy is downright monotonous, his characters are pretty much just "what if someone were extremely fucked up in this particular way", and the plots are always "everything's fucked and then it gets worse". Garnish with more or less novel scientific ideas, interesting to read, but not really good books as such.
My favorite flourish of his was in Echopraxia, where he casually dropped the non-bomb that reality in that book was proven to be a simulation, but it never comes up again and has no impact on anything.
I'll probably read anything he writes, if only to hear about his latest inventions.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
It's a campaign that's clever, but also kinda weird for someone who lives here.
Because Baden-Württemberg isn't really a place. It's a state, sure. An administrative division of Germany. An amalgamation of two (maybe three depending on who's counting) slightly older states, each based in turn on territories collected by different noble dynasties. Culturally broadly related, but not actually one coherent culture. You might find modern people who seriously call themselves "Baden-Württemberger", but it's a meaningless synthetic term.
If you tell someone from abroad to fly the B-W, he'll take a plane to Stuttgart and wonder about why ever anyone would come here. Terrible place, by regional standards. As far as large cities go, Heidelberg, Karlsruhe, Freiburg and Ulm (in no particular order) each have something unique going on. But Stuttgart, almost certainly the first port of call for anyone, can only claim to be the biggest or the most generically urban. There's not much good to say about it. Oh, and then there's Mannheim. The Mannheimers are full of themselves, but but I don't see the point of them.
But the cities are irrelevant.
The majority of the population lives in or near smaller towns, and there's a sizable number of rural village dwellers as well. The latter are probably not meaningfully interactive for foreigners, but the former are! Most small towns take great pains to be accessible to tourists. A potential visitor could pick a few at random, exclude the ones that have been bombed to shit in WW2 because the architecture sucks now, and visit places that are visually unique and valid representants of various local southwest-German cultures. Swabian, Franconian, Badenser, and the many subcategories and overlaps of each.
If I saw a sticker telling a foreigner to visit, say the Allgäu, the Bodensee, the Schwarzwald or the Nördlinger Ries, then sure, those are distinct geographical areas worth visiting if you like hiking. If I saw stickers telling a foreigner to visit, for example, the aforementioned Heidelberg, or Rothenburg, or Dinkelsbühl or any other of the hundreds of lesser-known towns with well-maintained medieval and early modern architecture, then that's a sight to see for those with a taste for it.
But Baden-Württemberg? What's that? Where are you supposed to go to be able to solidly claim that you have gone there? For someone right here, it's incoherent.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
I think they're mostly wrong. There's some truth in that the knowledge of an idea can spread due to the idea being publicized. Obviously the knowledge of the idea is a prerequisite of the belief in the veracity of the idea, so if you squint you can see the truth of it, but the modeling of the belief in the veracity of the idea being helplessly thrust upon someone like a cold virus is far less useful than the one involving treating ideas like things that people can and do accept and reject. Not always based on reason and logic - not often based on reason and logic, even - but not helplessly.
The sharing of an idea is usually a prerequisite for its spread though, unless it's a particularly obvious idea.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
Law, and insurance.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
They're not wrong, but the actions they endorse, promote and undertake based on this run contrary to popular concepts like the "marketplace of ideas", "free speech" or "each citizen is an educated adult fully qualified to choose on his own what to think".
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
And from adoption studies we know that parenting does not matter much.
Prima facie, this sounds absurd. Does not matter much for what?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
WTF are you doing. This is crazy talk. GTFO ASAP.
Acronyms aside, there is a whole non-crazy world out there, and you do yourself a disservice by associating with this particular flavour of deluded crazy. Whatever it is you end up losing by categorically rejecting this business, it's not worth getting dragged into it. If a friendship breaks over this, then what kind of friendship was it? Rhetorical question.
Get out of there. Don't go along with it. Sticking one's dick in crazy is one mistake one can make, but sticking the whole of you into crazy for weeks on end is another.
FWIW, the "nazi by association" rule has been strongly enforced by leftists and the leftist-dominated mainstream for a long time, has been weaponized, codified in rules and even law, has been a defining aspect of the German political landscape for generations (still being called the "Firewall" here). It's absolutely the water that most media swim in, classical as well as social, and the preferred weapon of SJWs and SJW-influenced useful idiots everywhere.
Anecdote: I used to discuss politics with my mother. Once, as she was mid-rant about the nazis ruining society, I told her that I had gotten to know an AfD voter and that they were an actual human being. Since then we never have spoken about politics again. Her way of eliding the issue that, by the rule of association and a failure to apply the rule correctly, I was now on the wrong side.
This isn't some new or poorly-observed phenomenon (just to be clear; I'm not implying that you see it that way), but a core doctrine of the left in the culture war.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3d ago
Some minor coding, preparations for future "features", but nothing visible.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
4d ago
Nah. As you noticed, in spite of taking it upon myself to scream "Deutschland Deutschland über alles!" at everyone on the internet and at some people IRL, I'm neither a pureblood nor otherwise archetypical. I suppose I put on the German extra hard to compensate. I do take to Teutonic autism, though, and very much like punctuality, order and hard work. How good I am at those is another matter. I really like the Germany I grew up with. I'm Swabian, not Bavarian, so there's a massive cultural difference between me and your picture. But OTOH, my German family were no-nonsense subsistence farmers up until two generations ago, and I was partially raised by exactly those former farmers, so it's not a complete mismatch.
As far as your friend goes - with a father like that, low agreeableness seems like no wonder!
You've already got about a million replies, so I suspect there's nothing substantial I can still add to it all. If you even want to read any more!
So here goes. I'm a half-jewish German who strongly identifies as German and effectively not at all as Jewish beyond having some family members who do strongly identify as Jewish. By what German public schooling has taught me was Nazi Racial Science, I fully qualify as a Jew to be reomved, though. My Jewish ancestors managed to flee the Nazis as well as the Soviets unharmed, so I can't claim any tragic family history on that end, though it's entirely possible that they lost many friends that I never heard of. From the German side, I know of many who died in the war, much to the family's detriment.
Politically I'm somewhat all over the place, but cluster strongly with the right-wingers. And my position on WW2, the entire Nazi era and the Holocaust is - it doesn't matter. The epistemic wells have been poisoned. There are no more productive discussions to be had. Anyone except the most autistic historians, the most unfettered reparation-seekers and the most combative wokists will gain more by burying the entire period of history than by rooting around in it. "Never forget" is a terrible approach, in my opinion, and the opposite of what should be done. The consequence of forgetting it will be dropping a ton of poisonous baggage and become a lot more agile, for everyone involved. The consequence will not be the second coming of the NSDAP. And if Jews want to prevent future attempts at Jewish genocide, then IMO they should keep a weather eye on the Muslim world, as I suppose Israel already does, rather than alienate their actual or potential allies by constantly insisting on their historical guilt. I do admit it seems to have worked well enough for a time, and I cannot fault the realpolitik here, but as far as Jewish-German relations go it'll be an own-goal when teaching the Germans to hate themselves results in the islamification of Germany.
And I'll also sing along with the chorus of "please don't go, we want you here, we need people like you!".
This place is, to me, like a martial arts club. You go in, you find someone to spar with, and by the end of the day you learned something about your weaknesses and bad habits. And that just plain does not work when there's nobody around who's willing to expose and exploit those actual weaknesses. "One crow will not claw out another's eye", goes the German saying. When everyone here more or less agrees on their respective world views, there's just not much of value going on. One Witch will not knock out the other even when they're wide open, either because we subconciously don't want that weakness to be exploited (mirror neurons being a bitch) or because we genuinely aren't even aware of it.
The reverse of this is, of course, that any one contrarian to the consensus here will get pummelled. It's like going from boxing to BJJ and all of a sudden everyone's sweating all over you on the ground. It's admittedly disgusting, but if you endure it you will come out a much better-rounded fighter than you were before. Refuse to engage in grappling, and you'll never make it in MMA. I'm probably overstretching this metaphor. But on the other hand, if we here are a BJJ gym...then you can teach us a thing or two about striking. But either way, it requires that we get down and dirty with each other, and there will be complaints about faces getting punched and joints getting locked either way. To de-metaphor it: There will be downvotes and false reports and specious arguments and trolling and all that you might complain of.
So when people here advocate for tossing the jews into the ocean and blame them for all their country's failings - I'd exaggerate if I said I can emphasize; there are too many people here who are on "my side", as it were, and who go too easy on me. Maybe they just recognize that I'm just a midwit and not worth going 100% on. But that's exactly what ought to happen. I want you to stand up to me and tell me why I'm wrong. I most likely am. Who isn't? But I'd rather have that pointed out to me in an online textual sparring setting than by embarassing myself IRL. The alternative to that is simply going with the IRL consensus, but who comes to The Motte with that intention? Who here would not rather learn to be more effective as a contrarian?
I hope you stay.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
6d ago
Be quick about it; I think the gratis period expires today or tomorrow.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
6d ago
At a guess: A high-trust world would be singularly susceptible to fraud, since people needn't be on their guard at all. Turning a high-trust world into a zero-fraud world requires extremely invasive surveillance. So zero-fraud implies extreme totalitarianism.
Contractor, by Bradley Buckmaster.
Cybernetically modified child shock trooper was abandoned by his government after the war, took to a life of nihilism and mercenary work, and now well into his fifties he takes a job that has him uncover the hidden history of the war that made him.
It's alright. Buckmaster hs a fairly unique style that's fun to read, and is almost completely unapologetical about the violence and the decidedly un-modern morality or lack thereof that fills his books. His world-building is fairly light, but his descriptions of combat and the technologies involved are probably the absolute best I've ever read (for what little I, an eternal civilian, know). At the same time the novel sometimes feels a little self-indulgent; and when you've read his other books, Brigador and Brigador Killers: Pilgrim, you notice a lot of re-cycled patterns. He describes the Contractor series as a writing exercise, so I suppose it must be forgiven. Then again, he subverts the expectations he sets up often enough to surprise this humble reader. It feels more predictable than it is, sometimes.
I'm not quite done with it, having a few chapters to go yet. It's fairly short overall. It's currently free on Kindle.
Edit: Finished it now. The ending is somewhat...out of scope? It's okay for Sci-Fi and I suppose the story has built up to it, but it has nothing to do with why anyone might read these particular books.
Recommended if you like boots-on-the-ground military sci-fi.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
7d ago
I thought that were the thousands of news headlines along the lines of "worst summer ever; climate finally punishes us for our sins; repent now the end is nigh".
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
7d ago
I don't get it. What exactly is the problem with their appearance?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
Will someone please make a Zardoz joke already?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
Did you accidentally fire off this post mid-write? This seems a little thin for a top-level comment.
I at least can't fathom why this is "kinda important".
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
Book 4 of the Meditations of Marc Aurel:
32: Call to mind by way of example the time of Vespasian: you will see everything the same: men marrying, bringing up children, falling ill, dying, fighting, feasting, trading, farming, flattering, asserting themselves, suspecting, plotting, praying for another's death, murmuring at the present, lusting, heaping up riches, setting their heart on offices and thrones. And now that life of theirs is no more and nowhere.
Again pass on to the time of Trajan; again everything the same. That life, too, is dead. In like manner contemplate and behold the rest of the records of times and whole nations; and see how many after their struggles fell in a little while and were resolved into the elements. But most of all you must run over in mind those whom you yourself have known to be distracted in vain, neglecting to perform what was agreeable to their own constitution, to hold fast to this and to be content with this. And here you are bound to remember that the attention paid to each action has its own worth and proportion, only so you will not be dejected if in smaller matters you are occupied no farther than was appropriate.
33: Words familiar in olden times are now archaisms; so also the names of those whose praises were hymned in bygone days are now in a sense archaisms; Camillus, Caeso, Volesus, Dentatus; a little after, Scipio too and Cato; then also Augustus, then also Hadrian and Antoninus. For all things quickly fade and turn to fable, and quickly, too, utter oblivion covers them like sand. And this I say of those who shone like stars to wonder at; the rest, as soon as the breath was out of their bodies were 'unnoticed and unwept'. And what after all is everlasting remembrance? Utter vanity. What then is that about which a man ought to spend his pains? This one thing: right understanding, neighbourly behaviour, speech which would never lie, and a disposition welcoming all which comes to pass, as necessary, as familiar, as flowing from a source and fountain like itself.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
And there's a very large degree of difference between what seems to have been the historical reality in 19th and early 20th century Germany and what I assume most people would imagine when they hear "a legacy of democratic norms".
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
I can well imagine that "brought to life" implies that whatever damage it suffered since or even leading up to death would be repaired in the process of resurrection. Which might raise the question of why damaging it further matters, then, but I suppose it would be disrespectful to intentionally work opposite to God's intended course.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
I have nothing to say about America. Let the Americans do that. But on the topic of patriotism: In so far as each citizen is a cell of the body civic - patriotism is a must-have. Imagine the anthropomorphed cells of your own body deciding they'd rather not feel overly invested in your fate! So long as the patriotism isn't generated by stupid means (e.g., citizens bonding over self-destructive warmongering or ideology), having patriotic citizenry is strictly advantageous. Maybe there are diminishing returns at high-levels of patriotism or even disadvantages to excessive patriotism (inability to admit when the country has taken a wrong turn; overestimation of country's capacities?), but it seems naively obvious that the society that citizens feel is justified in its existence will be fitter and better than one in which citizens doubt the same.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10d ago
I agree with your overall reasoning. Our favorite current-day technologies could theoretically be used as the next step in the formation of homo technicus, tool-using man who outcompetes his more natural rivals because technology just makes him better at life, but right now those technologies are mostly used to hook into our path-of-least-resistence hedonism to maximize engagement and minimize agency. In the long run, we'll figure out how to use them more intelligently and efficiently for productive purposes, and how to protect ourselves from addiction and brain-addling engagement-maximization-schemes. Well, "we" - some will, some won't, and the former will make it further into the future than the latter before technology progress makes humans in general obsolete.
RE: Uploading.
Do we really need to worry about our uploads being abused and tortured, or sold for parts? By the time technology is far enough along to upload minds, what really is the value of an upload? It can be copied and modified infinitely. Most likely they can be synthesized, procedurally generated or just generated by "AI"s. If a virtual mind is good for anything, then there will be so many of them purpose-built that nobody needs a pre-singularity upload to do the job.
You'll be a useless scrap of data. Just to be very clear about that.
Other than that, I think you reason it out very well. I'd disagree on the assumptions - might even suspect that your motivation is mostly wishful thinking - but the actual arguments flowing from them seem pretty solid.
In some cases and otherwise to some degree, yeah. Tattoos signal any of the following:
Nobody will ever convince me that the one-billionth "tribal" tattoo or chinese lettering down the spine of a non-chinese-speaker is meaningful or artistically valuable.
as @Iconochasm said. Hits the nail on the head.
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