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SubstantialFrivolity

I'm not even supposed to be here today

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joined 2022 September 04 22:41:30 UTC
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SubstantialFrivolity


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
I'm not even supposed to be here today

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 04 22:41:30 UTC
				


				
					

					
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 17, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Not spending a third or more of your life in toil should be attractive to everyone.




It's attractive, but there's almost no shot of that happening even if the tech is everything people believe it is. Come on, man, these tech companies are run by sociopaths. If they have an incredible AI that can do the things they say, they will use it to put all of us peons in the dirt serving them. There's no outcome to this thing which results in "John Smith gets to live his best years in comfort", it's either "the tech doesn't actually work" or "the bastards in charge of the tech use it to screw us all".


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 21, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
My brother, I'm not pretending a damn thing. I genuinely believe female attractiveness peaks in the 20s.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 21, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I would just say "plain".


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 17, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
In my opinion, "there was an interlude" makes it not really the same thing at all. In the movies, Faramir tries to take the One Ring by force (something book Faramir declines to do). The fact that he later comes to his senses and lets the hobbits go does not change the first fact. Faramir in the movies isn't much different from Boromir when you get down to it. Both of them saw a way the Ring could be used to achieve their goals, both of them use force (or attempt to use force) to take it, and both later repent of their sin and do their best to make amends. Which isn't a bad story to tell, but it discards the wonderful example of book Faramir rising above temptation, showing that the seductive voice of evil can indeed be resisted. And worse still, the reason that it was changed wasn't because of the constraints of film as a medium (that would be understandable), but because Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh decided they knew better than Tolkien and just had to have some cheap drama. Which is such a lamentable choice.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 17, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
That's bad, yeah. The hobbit characters lost the final part of their arcs as a result. But the worst thing IMO was discarding Tolkien's story themes because they weren't the story he wanted to tell, like the changes to Faramir or the "go home, Sam" scene in ROTK. The movies are great movies, but when you discard core themes of the original story you aren't making a very faithful adaptation.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 17, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
My standard is not "nothing whatsoever is changed", but I do expect an adaptation to uphold the core themes of the original work. The LOTR movies do not: one of the most important themes of the book is that the One Ring is a powerful temptation, but that there are stronger things still. Friendship, like between Frodo and Sam, is stronger than the pull of the Ring. Faramir is so dedicated to right action that he says "even if I found it by the highway I would not pick it up", and lives up to that claim. Jackson chose to discard those moments (per the movie commentary) because they didn't fit with the story he wanted to tell of the corrupting power of the One Ring, and felt they diminished that aspect. But in so doing, he eliminated one of the core themes of LOTR. That makes them not particularly faithful adaptations.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 17, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Lords of the Rings was pretty faithful to the books, and an excellent series of films...




Excellent series of films, absolutely. Faithful to the book, absolutely not. They made serious changes to the source material in the LOTR movies, ones which I think made the movies worse off.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
You wouldn't get credit if the task was lighting the room. In that case, you didn't do a thing; the light did the work. If you happened to use an electric light in the process of another task then sure you would get credit, but the light was incidental to the actual task in that case.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Well said. To celebrate someone's death is an act of genuine evil. Sometimes it might be the case that someone must die, but even when that is necessary we should never be happy that such a thing came to pass.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 14, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Kingdom of Heaven is excellent.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 14, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yeah, I play guitar. But I have zero formal training, it's just been whatever bits and pieces I picked up along the way. I've been trying to learn more and so I've been watching the "absolutely understand guitar" series on youtube, which is where I saw the explanation of the major scale which made things click for me.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 14, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I had a real breakthrough in my understanding of music last night, and I'm pretty chuffed. I've heard lots of people talk about scale degrees, but never what the layout of the scale itself was. I couldn't quite figure it out, because neither of the intuitive options (counting up natural notes or counting up by whole steps) worked with what I knew. Anyways, yesterday I was watching a video on youtube where the guy explained the structure of the major scale, and finally a lot of things clicked into place for me. I assume that this is such basic knowledge that people online don't really mention it, but I didn't know it, and it feels great to finally understand what's going on with some of this music theory stuff.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Who are the Poms? The English?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


This is factually wrong and you know it.




I know no such thing. I think you are way off base, though I wouldn't go so far as to say it is a fact you are incorrect as I don't have hard evidence. But neither have you provided a basis in fact for your claim, so I guess we are just going to have to agree to disagree here.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I do not see how this reply is relevant to what I said. Your argument that I responded to (paraphrased) was "those books are old, comparable to [other old books], therefore kids are going to be disinterested". But books being old has never precluded interest in them before, even from kids. Therefore, books from the 20th century being old doesn't seem likely to preclude interest in them now.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


the language they used and the values in their works are already at as far of a remove as Victory Hugo and Mary Shelley would have been to you. Entertaining, perhaps, for their distance from the present-- but otherwise largely inapplicable to their current concerns.




That argument doesn't really make much sense to me, considering that Hugo and Shelley are considered classics of literature that many people (young or otherwise) enjoy to this day.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If we accept this as a premise, that the wrong prompt is going to kill everyone, then honestly what are we even doing here? Treat your loved ones to something nice and enjoy your life, because even with maximum safety someone is certainly going to fuck up and eventuate human extinction.




There is, as usual, a CS Lewis quote for that.




This is the first point to be made: and the first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.




I think he's right. If the threat from AI is so great that it poses an existential risk to humanity (which I find a pretty implausible claim given the stupidity of what passes for AI currently), then there's no sense worrying very much about it. All you can do in that case is act right on your part (i.e. don't make the situation worse by continuing to research the death machine), and otherwise conduct your affairs with dignity and not waste your limited time on this earth worrying about things entirely out of your control.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 7, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
For me too. I played for an hour or two, wandered around as I took actions that seemed to have no meaningful effect on the world, and eventually said "eh fuck this" and refunded the game.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for August 7, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I have been playing Cyberpunk but hit a couple of snags that derailed me. I kind of want to go back but am not sure if I will. First, I've been having performance issues where the game will freeze entirely for a second or two. I can't pinpoint why exactly this happens but it seems to be when I turn around (maybe the engine loading or unloading things). It's really annoying though, moreso because I'm playing a melee build so I bounce around a lot as I go from enemy to enemy.


Second, I'm finally doing the Phantom Liberty content and I got to the tank boss fight. I died in the third phase (after the repair drones come out) and was frustrated because it was kind of a slog. There are a ton of weak points to hit in phase 1 so it takes a hot minute, which was even more annoying with the aforementioned performance issues going on. So I put the game down for the evening and haven't gotten back to it yet. We'll see.


In the meantime I finally started on the DLC for FE Engage, figure I'll knock that out before Fortune's Weave next month. And I also gave into the itch to start another P5R playthrough, though that's lower priority than other stuff.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 3, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Whether typical or not, it should not be allowed. There are occasions when a public official might have to do things in secret for the good of the public (military matters and so on), but deals like this are not among them. And whenever government affairs can be conducted publicly, they should be.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Third season comes upon us like a Balrog out of Khazad-dûm
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Who cares if it's a top level thread? They aren't a scarce resource that must be protected. And I at least am happy to read a thread of HereAndGone dunking on the show, it's entertaining to read.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 3, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Also, don't forget that there are plenty of programmers who do not find LLMs useful for programming either. To be fair I will say that there are those who do, but anyone who tells you that LLMs have revolutionized the industry is not telling you the truth. The truth is that the level of benefit they bring is controversial and not settled, even among programmers.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 3, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Conversely, the meme presumably is not funny in its original context to people who do think that Jesus/Allah/middle-aged ladies have a right to restrict the sexual dealings of consenting adults.




It's not your main point, but I'm a Christian and I find that meme hilarious even as originally presented.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 3, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I second the recommendation. FMA:B is one of the best anime series I've ever seen, bar none.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for August 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Malibu and pineapple. Can get it most places, easy to make myself on the rare occasion I want to drink at home, tastes absolutely delicious. You can't ask for much more.