ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
No bio...
User ID: 1012
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
One of the GOATs.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Christ in the Americas, a high school history textbook for Catholic students. It's a pro-Catholic telling of North and South Americans history. Columbus is portrayed as a good man with flaws. Cortes is portrayed as a champion of order and goodness, a sort of crusader king. Aztec nobles are portrayed as blood drinking demon worshipers (Aztec deities are referred to as "the devil gods") who oppress the borderline-enslaved peasant masses. St Brendan the Navigator is claimed to have probably visited Newfoundland. The writing is definitely aimed at high school kids, but the narrative is compelling. It's kind of like reading an action novel.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
For me personally, good examples would be Snow Crash, The Bonfire of the Vanities, and a Confederacy of Dunces. All three were just a pleasure to read. For something more niche, I really enjoy reading almost anything written by G.K. Chesterton. His prose is very good and I never get tired of his irony.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Hey, The Motte. Recommend us some books that are fun to read and that aren't about the destination, but the journey. Books that delight the reader with clever turns of phrase, witty jokes or badass scenes every few pages.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
conveniently forget that Jesus said that it's easier for a camel to thread the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven (how convenient that my new religion that is supposed to save me from the problems of modernity doesn't require me to give up the material trappings of that same system)
Nitpick since it's irrelevant to your main point. As I understand it, the church threaded this needle by differentiating between the not-intrinsically-evil state of merely "possessing material wealth" and the intrinsically evil state of "being possessed by ones material wealth," i.e. not being "poor in spirit."
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
The arguing is what drives me nuts. It's surely karma for my behavior at that age.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
I think some kids/families are just biologically different. When any of my kids were under 4, I was nervous when we hit a stretch of highways with more than 30 minutes until the next gas station. Some people just gotta go when they gotta go.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
I've read that the reason Trump's impact on Canada was a disaster was that there is no analog to blood-and-soil MAGA voters there, only what would be called in America progressives and "RINOs"/"boomercons". Is that why Trump has damaged conservatives in Australia?
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
I'm disappointed that I missed @coffee_enjoyer 's post on audience manipulation in Adolescence. It vindicates an intuition that I've long held (since high school at least) that the average person is completely defenseless and unaware of the psychological damage that is being done to them by popular media. It's the mental equivalent of being a radium dial painter or a pre-modern lead smelter.
Another poster in that thread asked you for your research notes. Do you know of any accessible articles or books on this subject that I could share with normie friends and family?
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Not a rhetorical question -- do many Australians know who Tucker is? And do many Australians care what he thinks? I thought he was only relevant in American politics.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Don't feel too bad, I (incorrectly) referenced @Hoffmeister25 a progressive in a post from a few years ago. I think his criticisms of his right-wing fellow travelers are just memorable and incisive.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
little patience for the trad LARPing that some of the less well-thought-out posters here seem to embody
I genuinely have no idea what sort of Motte user this refers to. I'd like to ask for examples, but I don't want to start a shitstorm. I see tons of trad LARPers on Twitter so I think I know the type you're references. We have had indeed had some "trad" edgelords on here in the past, but the most trad/socialcons here these days seem to actually be in committed monogamous relationships, have several children, and regularly attend some form of Christian religious service. One can of course quibble over the line between LARPing and authentic living, but that's a general problem in the 21st century, not one that's limited to trad right-wingers.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Thanks, good to know. I think we will be homeschooling anyway, so maybe school district won't be as much of an issue. And DFW is pretty well connected so I suppose it wouldn't be hard to visit home.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
The better known acronym is POSIWID.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Charisma
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
These days, it's been day trips to a nearby town or city to check out food, museums, and nature. Get back late and crash, chill the next day to recover.
I'm working in tech. Some questions:
- Are there any tech hubs where the COL isn't bananas? SF, NY, NOVA, and PNW are right out. I'm okay with living in Kansas or whatever since everyone has a hard-on for in-office now, I just need a place where 50%+ of my salary doesn't go to rent. It seems like even second tier places are expensive now (Research Triangle, Huntsville)
- Any good recruiters or recruiting firms you'd recommend? DMs appreciated.
- What's the market like? I don't really know who I'm up against. Posts online seem to be either "things are tough but manageable" or "the tech market is ending, get out now" and I'm not sure which is more true.
- Should I just sit tight at my current job for another year? The pay is shit and it's a miserable place, but it's something, and Trump seems indifferent to the economic chaos he's causing, so I imagine tight budgets and hiring freezes will remain for a while.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
I bet you won't last 5 months.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Cool write up, I'd like to read more stuff like this on The Motte.
Is the show worth finishing? I got a few episodes in but dropped it for the gore, which I found gratuitous and distasteful. IIRC the last episode I saw was about a serial killer high school girl who killed people and made gruesome public art displays with their viscera and mutilated bodies. I wasn't sure how that really contributed to the (very interesting) themes of mass surveillance and social credit, it seemed more like a torture-porn filler episode. Is there more like that, or does the show get back on track?
That makes more sense. I think my weakness is taking an interest in other people. People who are genuinely interested in hearing a stranger's story seem to network well. I've been working on this over the last few years (currently going through an interview process as a referral!) but I still have a long way to go. If I could do it again I would have learned this skill earlier in my career.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
1mo ago
Networking is building trust with others in a professional context so that they trust you'll help them and you trust they'll help you. I've only been able to network with former colleagues with whom ive worked closely. My CHA is not high enough to charm randos at events into doing things for me. Some people seem to be able to do it though. I envy them.
I don't know enough about AI to say anything about the current state of things. But I have spent the last ~20 years hearing ridiculous takes about how China is an unstoppable juggernaut that is just so much more efficient and growing so much faster than the West, with a growing middle class! and a cashless society! and giant dragon drone formations! and cyberpunk LED skyscraper forests! and, and...! They must be doing something right! Look how much more advanced they are! They're going to eat our lunch!
All of that just flies in the face of my actual experience over there (in one of the richest cities no less). Everything was Potemkin, everything was corrupt and chabuduo, everyone lied to your face with a smile, the gaslighting was off the charts. Buses broke down, parts of my quite expensive apartment fell off, litter and human feces were everywhere, and eating at an unknown restaurant was truly a gamble, especially when the weather was warm. Business dealings were (are -- my team in Japan is currently half Chinese!) a game of brazeness and information warfare where you try to hide your true intentions for as long as possible and, when you are caught, you just shamelessly tell outrageous bold faced lies ("I never promised that." "But I literally have your promise here in writing." "Well, I never promised that.") And somehow despite this incredible culture of shoddiness and aggressive deception there were plenty of Americans taking Chinese news outlets' and and China boosters' reports of the incoming Chinese Century at face value with zero skepticism.
Of course, there were also the "China is collapsing!!1" set. I had slightly more respect for some of them. Their predictions were equally dumb, but at least a few of them seemed dimly aware of the very deep rot. Although, the majority were of course mere chauvinists, racists, or grifters.
Both the optimists and the doomers' predictions were based on little to no verifiable evidence, especially since most people had never been to China or spoken to non-Westernized Chinese, much less read a Chinese newspaper in Chinese (an important distinction!). I'm surprised you're not more skeptical -- isn't the Western reporting on "Russian intentions" and "the Russian mind" just completely laughable to you? And Russian society and culture that (AFAICT -- low confidence) are considerably more accessible to the average Westerner.
To return to the main topic, because of the above, I simply don't trust any alleged incredible scientific miracles coming out of China. I think that if they were truly crushing America in AI, they would be hiding that fact (能而示之不能，用而示之不用 / 謀密則無敗). When the Deepseek news came out about it costing 95% less to train, my bullshit detectors went off. Who could verify their actual costs? Oh, only other Chinese people. Hmm, okay.
And then 10 more tricks by shorter-range combinatorial noticing of redundancies, similarities, affinities. It doesn't look like much, but three papers later you see a qualitative, lifelike evolution of the whole stack, and you notice this research program is moving very quickly. They do likewise in large hardware projects.
I have no ability to judge whether this is true, so feel free to Euler me if you like. But if Chinese research is so superior, why aren't Western AI companies falling over themselves to attract Chinese AI researchers? I know we all spend too much time online, but many Western countries are still much nicer places to live than all but the absolute richest areas of China (source: Chinese friends living in China, Chinese friends who permanently emigrated to America, and having lived in a rich area of China myself).
I'll stop my rant here, and also offer some preemptive defenses. First, I'm no Anthropic/OpenAI fanboy. I think it's probably a good thing if they fear Chinese competition since I'd bet they're slow rolling progress to maximize profit. Second, I'm not a European/white chauvinist. The Chinese people I've known were mostly quite intelligent, some even brilliant. But as I said before in the post you linked, Chinese mind games and information warfare are simply on a different level than that of the more candid and credulous Westerner (note that I do not say "honest" or "virtuous").
tl;dr Chinese are intelligent and have a rich and deep culture, but they are next-level deceivers and should be treated as such until proven otherwise
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
2mo ago
I'm skeptical of large society-wide initiatives, there are just too many places to hide graft and ulterior agendas. So I apply my environmentalist principles the same way I try to apply my other Christian principles -- locally, on whoever and whatever is around me on a regular basis. I have a hard time figuring out whether a given political policy actually helps, but it's easy to not waste food or destroy plant or animal life unnecessarily, to "leave no trace" when camping, and to tend the small strip of land around my house to make it beautiful. This is a bit more abstract, but I also think that gifts are meant to be enjoyed, so I make an effort to enjoy the outdoors and say prayers of thanks while doing so. I think that's also part of it.
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '24
2mo ago
Others have addressed the theology/philosophy a bit, so I'll speak to the other two.
Re. environmentalism and animal welfare, I do agree that many Catholics oversimplify the genesis story as you describe. FWIW, I've heard some priests and laymen say (and I personally believe) that humanity is something akin to a "father" or "priest" to all animals and to nature. We have authority over the natural world, but we also have an obligation to treasure it, to respect it as a gift, and to leading it to perfection by applying human virtues (charity/mercy, temperance, humility) to our interactions with it. I don't know if that makes sense, but I could try to give examples.
I've thought a lot about this over the last few years, as I am living in Japan, and Shintoism is quite nature-focused. I've heard it said by some here that "ittadakimasu," the one-word ritual word said before meals, mean something like "I will (humbly) take," as in "I will humbly partake of this food given to me through the sacrifice of animal and vegetables lives.". Not sure how many people here truly believe that, but I think it's a good little reminder to be thankful for what I consume, both to God and His creation.
As far as parishes go, some are just not great. I've been living in a rural part of Japan for a few years now, and my family probably includes nearly 50% of the entire population of kids. The median age is probably over 70. The priest himself is nearly as old. I tried to get involved for the first 2 years we were here only to be politely ignored. The level of catechesis here is lower than in America, even among young people, if you can believe it. Ignorance of basic doctrines, so it's impossible to have much of a discussion about faith.l or Catholic life. Zero accomodations for kids. There was a cry room, but the priest asked us not to use it unless the baby was crying, and asked us to sit in the first row instead (!) with our baby and two toddlers and one young elementary schooler.
I was angry the first few years I lived here, but then I realized -- maybe I was not sent here to enjoy parish social life or have deep discussions. Maybe that's not what my mission is. Maybe I'm supposed to be here to be an example of a young family with kids in church. Maybe I'm here to learn that theological rabbitholes and after mass coffee and donuts aren't what Mass is about. Maybe I'm not meant to feel spiritual peace and ruminate on scripture during mass, but instead to do the hard work of showing my kids how to pray, and to show others that yes, it is possible to have more than 1.5 kids and to bring them to church every Sunday. My point is -- consider why God brought you to this parish. Some spiritual work is fulfilling and rewarding, and other spiritual work is taxing and dry, and which is which differs based on the person. Perhaps it might be worth trying to engage with some of the folks you dislike at your parish with a more open mind.
Yes, but as the poster you're replying to pointed out, he wouldn't say it that way. He believes in human "nature" and that human beings have different "purposes" or roles depending on their nature (i.e. a teleogical belief). But he doesn't know what "telos" is, so he would just say:
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