@Butlerian's banner p

Butlerian

Not robot-ist just don't like 'em

0 followers   follows 0 users  
joined 2022 October 11 15:37:12 UTC 

				
User ID: 1558


				
				
				

			

		

	














	


		


			



	

		

			

			

				

					

						

							
						

						

							
							

								
Butlerian


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
Not robot-ist just don't like 'em

				
				
				

				

					0 followers  

					follows 0 users  

					joined 2022 October 11 15:37:12 UTC
				


				
					

					
No bio...

				

				

				

				

				

					

					

					
					
					

					
User ID: 1558


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
‎

			

				
				

					Hour
					Day
					Week
					Month
					Year
					
				

			


			
‎

			

	
	

	 Hot Bump Top Bottom New Old Controversial
	



		

	






	

		
		

		
		
	

	

  







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


their policies weren't nearly as egregious as the British Raj since their ultimate goal was to improve the condition of India rather than England; the British implemented all sorts of policies to benefit their own country.




If I plot the graphs of "median wealth of native Indians" under the Mughals vs. under the British, which one do you think will have a higher annual growth?


Also: how do you tell the difference between "this policy was for the benefit of Britain" and "this policy was for the benefit of Indian trade, the fact that Britain profited too just proves that trade is non-zero-sum"?


Spain adopting border and trade laws that were drafted in Strasbourg and enrich France, doesn't mean Spain is a colonial possession of France, it means Spain wants the benefits of smooth movement of goods and people from the EU. If it's not egregious when France does it to Spain, why is it egregious when Britain does it to India?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It was reported at the time that Boris privately instructed his loyalists to support Truss in the contest to be his successor, precisely because he thought exactly this would happen, she'd be a tremendous fuckup and pave the way for his own return.


If the mechanism by which her successor is chosen ends up being the MPs rather than the party membership, it'll probably be Sunak though. Because there's a greater proportion of rootless cosmopolitans among MPs than there are amongst party members, and rootless cosmopolitans can't sense the metaphysical catastrophe that a reverse-colonialism Sunak premiership would represent.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Insane he thought he could take on the West.




But this seems to be OP's point: he didn't think he was taking on the West. He thought (very reasonably) that he was taking on a demoralised meme country ruled by kleptocrats with a giant Russian fifth column. I concur that the smart bet in Feb was that Ukraine would fall like a house of cards while it's elites flee to a cushy Swiss government in exile. The country wasn't swimming in Western materiél back then; if the three day blitzkrieg had worked, there would have been no taking on of the west at all because the special military operation would have been a fait accompli before the Javelins arrived in numbers. That it has now morphed into such a take-on-the-west conflict was probably unexpected by Putin (and, indeed, everyone).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of May 26, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If you've ever seen how the sausage gets made at a major company, jobs are very much withheld and created on more of an internal, political basis than any actual needs the companies have.




Well said.


I’m inclined to take the indictment of economic inefficiency even further, and point out that jobs at major companies are also created on an EXTERNAL political basis. As @hydroacetylene says, the government has a variety of incentives (which may or may not include his schizo one) to keep the (formal) employment rate high. While I am skeptical that LLM-based AI will ever get good (or at least reliable) enough to make mass unemployment a realistic possibility, even if we grant the hypothetical that it actually will, I fully expect the government to disrupt the disruption by just writing some legislation which obliges corps to employ human rubber-stampers (“supervisory oversight”) on AI processes, thereby neatly regenerating all the white-collar jobs which have been automated. Legal compliance hits startups just as much as it hits status quo inc.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 24, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Are you kidding? The official, encrypted, auto-record keeping email system the government has used for the last 40 years.




Are you seriously proposing that people use e-mail for instant messaging? What is this, 1993?




The one they undoubtedly can't access from their private iPhones, because allowing that would be an obvious, glaring security flaw.




“Security” is just a jobs programme for people who couldn’t get into the real police. They did it this way and what happened? Did the heavens fall down? No. Quod erat demonstrandum.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 11, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Can you give three examples of their fresh bold takes on policies which Dems usually tiptoe around?


How are they on the JQ?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 19, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
A country notorious for faking its math test scores, macroeconomic indicators, astroturfed ‘5c army’ political engagement, and COVID case numbers, is having unexpectedly great entertainment metrics?


I don’t think we need to do any sort of self-reflective cultural soul-searching here. The reflexive 4chan screech of “BOTS” is both sufficient and necessary in this case.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 16, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


have an internal party vote and then everyone is bound to vote for the winner on the floor of Congress or they get expelled from the party.




I was under the impression that this was a specific trait of Leninist parties, which might contain the answer as to why the US Republicans don't do it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of May 8, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I love this comment as a glittering example of "Comes so close to noticing but then the crimestop kicks in"


To wit: don't you think it a little... suspicious... that the """reports from IRL""" that your news media pipes you from Ukraine, map so neatly into the tropes you've been fed for decades from your entertainment?


Does that not strike you as a little, err, improbable to be an organic occurrance?


(So no-one accuses me of not speaking plainly: I am forwarding this as circumstantial evidence that Western reporting from the Ukraine War is very, very contaminated by  Western attempts to narrative craft it into the pre-prepared slot in the Western psyche of "Just like my Indiana Jones movies".)


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of May 1, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


just a 1000 km away




This is a very... American diagnosis of the European psyche.


Europe is smaller, and more crowded than America. And psychologically, Europeans are used to implacable hatred of everyone in the next valley. So 1000km away to a European may as well be on the moon. It is as much "not worth worrying about" as 13000km is to an American. So as far as agenda-setting of national policies goes, Russia may as well be as distant and irrelevant to European countries as it is from the USA.


Estonia, maybe, has cause for concern. But the Western European nations who are gun-running to Kiev? They have zero legitimate interest in Ukraine, just like America.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of April 10, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The incentives of academia seem near-perfectly configured to encourage running the programme.


Overstretched early-career academics running out of grant money and desperate for promising preliminary results now because if they don't meet the grant application deadline they're gonna get fired from their moderate-status job? When running the programme gives you a 90% chance of good results and a 0.1% chance of killing everyone, and you know that every other overstretched researcher in the world will be facing the same dilemma eventually (making it a stochastic certainty that someone will run the program)... well, it may as well be you, at least you won't have to live the Last Days of Mankind with low-status.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of April 3, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Hillary Clinton should have been jailed and she should still be in jail. ... I mean is there anyone out there who didn't understand why Democrats were in shrill hysterics about fascism?




You can't say that Hillary should have been jailed and then straight away imply that the Dems were right to think that trying to jail her was fascist. Do you not see your own contradiction here?




But the Dermocrats didn't make him give that speech on January 6th.




You mean the speech where he didn't say anything objectionable, and certainly didn't instruct anyone to storm Congress?




I regret my support for former president Trump




How do you feel about his time spent in charge of the nuclear codes?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 13, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I'll be very happy if my daughter learns a physical trade and makes a decent living by it




Would you, though?


Consider that jobs come with a physiognomy and a daughter who looks like "Barry, 63, Plumber" ain't gonna be fighting off suitors to give you grandchildren. Are you still very happy?


				

				

						

							

								
    
									
									
									
									
  • 
										 
									
    • 
	
  • 
		
			
		
		-10
		
			
		

    • 


							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 6, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Oh god this gives me flashbacks of summer 2020 when Rockstar literally closed down their servers temporarily.




I never heard about this, and I would assume that anything I found on a  Google search would be misrepresentation written as propaganda for the future, so I leave it to you, a rando blinded with rage so hot that it loops back round to calmness, to tell me the tale.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 27, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


...what the hell do you think it's going to happen once economic conditions worsen even more ?




Nothing. I think nothing will happen.


The frog will boil a little more, but as long as the crime rate keeps creeping up 1% per month instead of 5000% per day, people will just... get robbed more. As long as the electrical brownouts keep extending 1% per month instead of 5000% per day, people will just... adapt to doing their cooking in advance rather than on demand.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 20, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Sam Brinton is a proclaimed non-binary person (NB, or enby)




I've been coming across the term "enby" for months without knowing what it means (or, given context, daring to look it up). So thanks, this hard-hitting reporting justifies my continued doomscrolling!


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 6, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If I asked people "All else equal, would it be better for everyone to do their absolute best to be timely?" or the same for objectivity, I suspect I would nearly universally get affirmation.




What? No! Absolutely not!


This sentiment belies a total failure to understand why people sometimes aren't timely: because it's more important for them to spend time with their loved ones / doing the things they love, than to arrive on time for your sterile business meeting at a possibly Bullshit Job that didn't need doing anyway.


The tyrrany of the schedule is profoundly inhumane, never mind anti-white.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 26, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


rebuild and to compensate families who've lost children or adults to the war.




???


Dead people don't need houses. Ukrainian casualties mean they need money less, not more.


And that's before we even get to the question of why my tax money should be the money that Ukraine gets.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 26, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


And by and large he is known for being a genuine and empathetic guy rather than loudly spouting any particular ideological viewpoint.




Ah, but is he known as that by Rian and his class buddies?


I am perfectly willing to believe that they genuinely believe that Rogan is a roided out misogynist manosphere dudebro, because it's very easy to believe unflattering things about the people you perceive as enemies.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 19, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I had this conversation IRL yesterday with (strangely) an Indian who nevertheless has the persona of an Extremely Online American Liberal.


Basically the attitude was that running foreign election meddling is "legit ops that every country should do", but also identifying and defending against having their elections meddled with is "legit counterops that every country should do".


Russia isn't bad for running ops in Anerica (and, by analogy, America isn't bad either for running ops in Iran), but if you're American then you should ID and ignore Russian ops' talking points.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 7, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Pretty much my sentiments. The only reason there's any patchwork in NY is because of the 37% foreign born there. The differences you are observing are the chunks that have only just been thrown into the homogenous soup. You are watching them as they dissolve.




Now, all these people, at least most of them, enjoy the fruits of globalization. They drink coke. Eat pizza and sushi. Browse reddit. But overall, their primary cultural identity is unaffected.




See? They're dissolving already. Their primary culture isn't unaffected: every bowl of goyslop they eat is a bowl of lutefisk they don't, becoming less distinct from you one meal at a time.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 24, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The people who designed the original IQ tests included a balance of (I forget the specifics, take these as possible examples) spatial-reasoning tasks which men are better at, and conditional hypothetical verbal problems which women are better at. The number of each kind of question is calibrated such that men and women will both get an average score of 100. But it's a kludge; IQ tests could be more sensibly understood as "intelligence test to grade women against other women" and "intelligence test to grade men against other men" smushed into the same paper.


They did this because they couldn't be bothered to do two separate normalisation operations, but their laziness has had the tragic knock-on effect of giving entire generations the chronic misconception that women are as smart as men.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 10, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I am extremely anti-lockdown but I also don’t see any problem with locking down the population for the right virus.




Well the failure mode of this attitude should be obvious (because we lived through it): if you say "no population level mass incarceration EXCEPT for the right virus" then that just incentives neurotic hypochondriac safetyists to hysterically propagandise that a virus barely worse than the common cold IS the right virus.


And then we go back to playing the ol' "Redefine words out from under people" shuffle, where if you lose, you get locked up in isolation for 2 years while the government folks keep on partying (see: Boris Johnson's "Partygate", Obama's birthday garden fetê, etc.)


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 7, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Can you imagine Ben Franklin telling politicians they don't have to accept the result of a vote because the Pennsylvania Gazette wrote absurd lies about the candidates?




No, but I can imagine 2017 Democrats yelling “not my President” ad infinitum, and trying to impeach on tendentious grounds for an entire term.


Vance gave the right answer here. He should have refused to certify the election - not because he had just cause, but because he who does not fight fire with fire, specious lawfare with specious lawfare, is a sucker.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 25, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Is there anything to this post beyond sneering at a member of the outgroup?




This isn't sneering at a member of the outgroup, it's policing the crazies of the ingroup.


Do not forget themotte.org's heritage, we're an offshoot of an offshoot of an offshoot of LessWrong. EA is kind of our great-aunt in terms of Internet genealogy.