veqq
4hr ago
lack of exposure to non-negotiable danger with permanent consequences.
https://www.thepsmiths.com/p/review-the-education-of-cyrus-by
veqq
4hr ago
is fanaticism a necessary component of grit?
Recently, a few people described rationalism as not making people... happy/productive, because they just analyze instead of doing things. Indeed, if something suddenly occurs to block you you might reassess the whole project (pausing or giving up entirely) instead of creatively finding a way to overcome it. Trying to over optimize your value capture from a 100% thing can lead to you losing out as you e.g. get stopped out.
veqq
5hr ago
Selling isn't building. Even making cigarettes isn't building. But building machines to build better cigarettes? Now we have a philosophical discussion about socially beneficial economic activity!
I'd say yes, it's good to design and even make better cigarette making machines. And evil to operate them. Just build them as a fun project, then retool for something good.
veqq
5hr ago
When they're first born, you grab them, spray paint their butts and throw them back! Repeat every so often as they grow.
veqq
9hr ago
N.b. Prediction markets aren't particularly profitable, even with perfect predictions. In the US, ForecastEX's count as swaps, but generally it's considered gambling income. But even worse you e.g. get taxed on your wager amount, besides what you receive back (put in $100 at 50%, win $200, only receive $140 at the end. Settlement time and miscellaneous fees mean you'd need events under 20% certainty to generate a livable income, but pot sizes aren't not big enough to justify the effort.
veqq
9hr ago
Great idea!
skeptical of central planning as a solution for long-running problems; the role of a rightly ordered state is more that of a gardener than an engineer
Quite tangential: We're basically identical in belief. However I believe in pro-social gains by simplifying complex systems. If you e.g. have 100,000 accountants normalizing books to match the law, the ideal gardener engineer could change the law and reporting standards, so that work's not necessary (either automatic or performed by only 10,000.) In our theoretical realm, those 90,000 could then create value instead of litigating who captures past value. In practice, I rarely believe this is done (how do you replace legalistic bureaucracies and replace them with trade practitioners who want to replace themselves?)
veqq
2d ago
What awesome denomination is this? Sounds awesome! Kuyper implies Calvinist, but who knows
veqq
4d ago
should not be a citizen as he has no actual connection
It's only consistent, as the US rather aggressively applies citizenship. There's a basket industry for "accidental citizens" who first discover they're American upon receiving a 6-7 figure bill for back taxes and renouncing citizenship incurs a tax on all assets. Further, because of FATCA, they suddenly get debanked.
veqq
4d ago
veqq
7d ago
"We," who?
...users of the Motte? How is it consensus building to ask what people are doing as the world collapses around us?
"Leftist" (larping) contacts are waxing verbosely about how to flee the US. To quote one:
frustrating that in this moment of panic, of fight or flight, the left, or what passes for it, is so quick to pick fleeing-- something mainly available to the petite-bourgeois and above, not poor proles. The thought of waging a struggle, of organizing something to get rid of the system that harms them and the majority, is so off-putting to them because they have the delusional idea that this political and economic system is actually all about serving them. I don't mean to sound idealistic, but the total lack of fighting spirit is pathetic. Liberals are like, "well, if we can't vote, then we have to lay down and die! Nothing can be changed!" They don't see when it's most apparent that voting is nothing but consent to their own powerlessness, and that they choose this powerlessness time and time again. They also seem totally unaware that they have become thoroughly conservative because their whole worldview consists in a defense of the previous status quo (law and order, patriotism, the constitution, being granted permission to grumble in the most inconsequential way).
For the most part, they don't understand how immigration works, imagining they can just go to relatives in e.g. Norway (surely, only the US has immigration laws!) They all believe they're next, that the Reichstag fire will occur, that their occasional meming or anti-Israel comments will get them sent to a Salvadoran concentration camp.
No one has the least idea of e.g. debanking, let alone how to cope with it. Their networking all happens through FB or at best ... gmail. I was kicked from the conversation for mentioning such matters (why crypto, https://odysee.com/ etc. exist etc.) and the performativeness of their whole program. They don't realize that... They have been on the (deep) state's side the whole time, while nominally opposing it? Baffling!
Anyway, https://landchad.net/ is lovely. Everyone should cyberhomestead.
What do we do now (that we "won")? What interesting projects do we have to move forward?
Edit: Our community's migration here went into full swing when Reddit admins removed a common of mine about quotation marks. It turns out, I don't understand quotation marks either - my load bearing quotation marks get misunderstood. This is of course my fault; I must write better. But I have not the slightest clue how that could be construed as "consensus building". As I can't magically write better, I will write more words to clarify the final question(s):
The previous system is collapsing, how do users of this forum plan to insulate themselves from the shocks and take advantages of the opportunities going forward? I shared tidings from frenemies of the old regime, who never fully captured (or wielded) it to their liking. I am curious how to e.g. influence things as a fellow traveler and not be hit by blowback, how to protect and continue to amass wealth amid dedollarization and inflation etc. New world, now what?
veqq
8d ago
'70s economics
Malthusianism reigned until 80s works like Simon's Ultimate Resource revived cornicopian thought.
veqq
8d ago
So for that whole crowd to double down on their worst issue feels mostly just disappointing
AI was the whole point and focus. The sequences and overall movement were just a method to teach people what they needed to know, to be able to understand the AI argument. A la Ellul or Soviet literacy programs, you need to educate people to make them susceptible to propaganda.
I think you guys are missing the point. US immigration law is messed up, it's an insane struggle to bring a spouse to the US (like a 10 year bureaucratic process of living and waiting in the Czech Republic to be allowed in, or a few years for some spousal visa.) This guy has a US citizen wife, who's not able to keep her family. Yes, the border's weak, many bad apples were let in which spoil the bunch, but this regulatory environment is not helping you and me; it restricts the supply of tradwives!
As a sovereign citizen, I should be able to relocate my harem to Idaho, but Johnny gov don't let me, and you celebrate precedent to arbitrarily remove the spouses we do get in?! To quote Crass:
If you care to take a closer look at the way things really stand, You'd see we're all just niggers to the rulers of this land.
Remember, they are exerting effort to defamily a US citizen, to break the bonds of holy matrimony, instead of prioritizing the millions without such bonds and connections. This is raw anarchotyranny.
veqq
11d ago
tuna
is delicious and worth protecting. Overfishing's been a huge problem since the Soviets started depleting fisheries in the 60s. Trawlers etc. are painful today. We definitely need research on how to protect our delicious tuna (or e.g. how to farm them cheaply and indefinitely).
veqq
11d ago
How do you size a (pole of) civilization/culture? Is the US the same US as 200 years ago and not a new something on the same place? At what point do they diverge? Some slice it even further e.g. Woodard's American Nations or Garreau's Nine Nations, which each have separate genesis etc. It's turtles all the way down, and we can do cluster analysis etc. So which is the most useful lens? I'm asking where to draw the line and apply morphological breaks a la Spengler.
I believe just a short jump through time brings us to alien worlds, besides across geography. The modern cannon/idea space has basically nothing in common with that of the 18th century (most of someone's reading in 1750 would not have been what we care of now from then.) I don't think I live in the same civilization as Alexander Pope or Schiller, let alone Boethius or Lucretius. Were Lomonosov and Voltaireneighbors; is Pelevin my neighbor?
Now, there are different frameworks for this, Spengler e.g. excludes succession, while Toynbeee considers parental links, but...
veqq
13d ago
internalized this idea that intelligent reasonable moral people should not exercise agency
This is a better treatment: https://www.themotte.org/post/1827/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/315895?context=8#context
Compensating for these adjustments generates a lot of alpha in macro analysis. Imputed rent is 10% of US GDP, hilariously.
veqq
17d ago
"Persian letters" (or Chinese etc.) was a popular genre, applying this outside view for whatever use. It's interesting to see modern careers riffing off the same.
veqq
18d ago
drafted ... served willingly
Too many enrolled early on, overwhelming induction capacity. The US actually ended voluntary enlistment at the end of 1942, to allocate manpower more rationally.
veqq
18d ago
But this policy hurts Europe and China by devastating the US. Europe and China can continue trading with each other before - and will do so even more.
veqq
18d ago
1/3 of Guatemalans live like Americans in the 90s (in a good way, better than modern America). 2/3 live like rural Appalachia. Prices are very high, 3-5x more than in Central Mexico (central Mexico is about 1/2 old America, 1/2 Texas truck stop) (indeed, higher than LCOL US.) Surprisingly to me, it's rather rainy and cold.
If I were more optimistic about long term dynamics, I'd quite like this. I've built some large aquariums for fun, with some fish bridges etc. Definitely fun work with potential! May God deliver me from the temptation of becoming a Mormon glazier.
Why didn't you get into this line? Does your dad work with/train others?
More options
Context Copy link