SophisticatedHillbilly
No bio...
User ID: 1964
SophisticatedHillbilly
1mo ago
Isn't this point basically just "yes you should be able to have contrarian views, but only when they're completely ignorable and useless." If the Opposition can't actually do anything, then there's really no point in having them. I understand if you just think the Anti-AI position is dumb, but your argument seems like a general argument against opposition.
SophisticatedHillbilly
3mo ago
And Gold was slapped down pretty hard in the 60-70s, and God was dead by the 90's. That leaves conquest, which we've all decided is illegal for whatever reason. We need a new combo, and "Cash, Grass, and Ass" doesn't seem to be cutting it.
SophisticatedHillbilly
4mo ago
I flatly disagree with this, though I'm sure data is hard to find.
SophisticatedHillbilly
4mo ago
Yeah that first definition seems about what I was thinking. Thanks for the more detailed info.
SophisticatedHillbilly
6mo ago
Actually, sexuality as well I would think. Any time I've viewed a particular strain of porn over an extended period, it's certainly influenced my inclinations and attractions in the real world as well. I won't give specifics, but some of these went rather far. I believe the porn treadmill is a decently well-known phenomena.
SophisticatedHillbilly
6mo ago
The problem for Russia is that they have not finished paying costs.
True, but I guess I'm not just expecting their costs to mount much higher without a proportionally larger gain. The front has largely stagnated. Any operations large enough to move the meter would also be liable to shred what's left of Ukraine's fighting population and end with much larger land gains.
Russia is not really having shortage of land, this is not a Singapore.
It's not about square footage, it's about production capability. Major steel manufacturing industries, a very significant chunk of farmland, some of the world's larger lithium deposits and (if they can push into Kharkiv province,) significant natural gas deposits. For western countries that are living on their inheritance, things like that aren't too important. For everyone else, resource extraction is vital. Even what they've taken now is a win. In the case of unconditional surrender? It becomes the biggest material win any country has had since World War II.
When thinking about the land gains through conquest, it's worth looking at through a lens of "How much would you have to pay to acquire that area and everything in it minus the people?" There is no way anyone could acquire it cheaper than the price Russia will pay for the war.
Now of course, all of this is predicated on "If they can keep it," but with the combination of nuclear MAD and the unwillingness of any other major powers to step into a full-scale hot war, that seems likely.
My experience with it is from working with a mining company that surveyed a rather large area, including our property, looking for mineral deposits. It was a large array, probably around 10'x10', carried by a helicopter, and the results were impressive. Can't remember if they let me keep any copies of the study, but I'll dig and see if I can pull it up as it may have more details. It was definitely considered pretty cutting edge at the time, but it was like 10 years ago. Might have been more of a proprietary secret than I realized at the time.
SophisticatedHillbilly
7mo ago
Very interesting to know that about the Kinsey data, thank you. I never went as far as to actually look at the primary source (classic mistake!). Frankly it being defined that way makes the stats for farm areas absolute nonsense. Of course like half of people on farms have had "sexual experience" with an animal if you count something mundane like cleaning a horse's sheath!
SophisticatedHillbilly
8mo ago
That doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of intelligent life theories. Some of my personal favorites are:
5. Intelligent life exists, but not in a form that is at all comparable to life as we know it. Perhaps it exists on some other combination of dimensions, leaving only strange occurrences when their "dimensional plane"* temporarily intersects ours. Perhaps they communicate in ways that are nonsensical to us, or seem to violate laws of physics, but this is only because they are 4 dimensional, or something like that.
6. There is a highly advanced species of subterranean-dwelling creatures that occasionally surface for reasons unknown to us and occasionally kidnap or observe people. Bonus points if you can tie this to Martin Van Buren's attempted expedition to the center of the earth and the Mammoth Cave Network.
7. A second intelligent species co-evolved with humans here on Earth and is controlling us or parasitically reliant on us for some reason. Could be lizard people, could be whatever else, but the idea is usually that they maintain secret control of all the world's important institutions while the actually-human-humans are basically livestock. Opens up exciting options for baby-eating and body doubles as well.
8. A second intelligent species evolved alongside but separate from humans here on earth and is still hanging around somewhere or is extinct. This would include all the weird theories of a giant-race still living in Afghanistan, a historical race of giants that once lived in the Basque region of Spain until the Romans worked them to death, a historical race of giants that existed in the Amazon rainforest, weird goblin people that used to occupy Ireland and are now the weird goblin people that live in the caves of the Appalachian region, and so on.
* Not really sure what the term is for "the set of dimensions on which something exists." Like if something is 2D+time vs something that is 3D+time,
SophisticatedHillbilly
8mo ago
Very different setup, but I've experienced the exact same issue before. Nothing fixed it until I replaced the CPU completely, but YMMV
SophisticatedHillbilly
9mo ago
There's an old sci-fi story (Asimov maybe) that I can't seem to find which involves the hunt for the most normal citizen of the country, who will then have his brain scanned by an AI, which will then compute the outcome of the election with 100% accuracy.
My ideal world would involve a jury selected similarly. We simply hunt down the most grill-pilled Iowan, the most relaxed Floridian, and so on, and form the jury from that pool.
SophisticatedHillbilly
10mo ago
Any explanation of the Christmas Effect that's faster than 1.5 hours?
SophisticatedHillbilly
1yr ago
Not all problems necessarily have practicable solutions, but I'll do my best.
Parenting: rebuilding intergenerational wisdom after a gap occurs is difficult, and the reality is traditional parenting is difficult to work in the modern world.
Additionally, the average parent just isn't that good at navigating the modern world in their own right. However, children need role models, guidance, and all that, and frankly the state should be able to provide at least some of that. State sponsored tutors, a restructuring of the school system, and similar things could help, or even just state funding for third-places with productive activities would be good.
Values: Mine obviously, but I'm not so unreasonable as to think that's a solution. I see it as [my values > your values > no values > my values inversed]. Most value systems I've encountered are broadly good, with some rough edges. What isn't good is a valueless society drowning in ennui. Obviously some values will prove to be maladaptive, but those inherently end up being uprooted one way or another.
SophisticatedHillbilly
1yr ago
Sadly no. My extended family is all more likely to fall on the other side of the law, and I haven’t made any lawyer friends, nor have any of my friends, to my knowledge. You have a good point though, and I’m going to need to find a way to foster that relationship. If you have any advice on how, I’ll take it.
SophisticatedHillbilly
4mo ago
I don't entirely disagree with your point, but:
Regression to the mean is a major issue here. The children of elites frequently do not have great genes, as the elites who spawned them was simply a statistical anomaly. They get to keep their elite status, however.
What we lack for the meritocracy you describe is downward social mobility. I want every high-class idiot out of their positions, but at the moment the upper class is far too secure.
If we had that then I'd be mostly fine with the system yes.
SophisticatedHillbilly
8mo ago
Yeah, expected outcome is absurd in this circumstance. Should someone who is 1% likely to have committed a crime have to serve 1% of the sentence? No, they're either guilty or innocent, and the whole point of the system is to find that out. It is admittedly broken at the moment, but only because we need somewhere around 10X the number of judges/clerks/courtrooms/prosecutors/defenders/bailiffs/police etc that we currently have. Not sure why no one ever seems interested in growing the infrastructure to match the population, but so it goes.
SophisticatedHillbilly
9mo ago
I think this is where the class/income distinction is important. We need highly intelligent lower-class people, because we need highly intelligent people running industries like resource extraction which will never be high class. A role being difficult doesn't make it classy, and a society that siphons off its best production plant operators and logging magnates to become ad-revenue optimizers and theoretical history researchers isn't on a good path long-term.
SophisticatedHillbilly
9mo ago
I've always seen it more as "accept that water runs downhill." Yes, you can pump water uphill, but there is a cost, and it must be done intentionally. Try as you might, you will never be able to get the universe into a state where "water runs uphill or downhill as needed at no cost" is a fundamental law.
People who successfully change things for the better tend to have internalized this. They understand that their actions have tradeoffs, opportunity costs, and that some things, like the past, are unchangeable. Others beat their heads against the brick wall that is reality.
SophisticatedHillbilly
1mo ago
Banning women from the workforce makes such wages possible, because it more than doubles the labor bargaining power of men in middle-class and white-collar lower class jobs.
SophisticatedHillbilly
6mo ago
When you face something ‘systemic’, you need the strong and long reach of the arm of government to be able implement solutions that are 1) unprofitable to do, 2) can’t rely on community consensus to generate the will and 3) need nation state backing - all of which are unworkable on a local level.
Which issues does the US currently face that require a government to have the level of power that the US currently wields that could not be better solved by simply allowing people to act freely?
SophisticatedHillbilly
7mo ago
So maybe I just don't understand what people have been meaning by having a Bronze Age Mindset, because to be BAP's position seems perfectly ideologically consistent. Them raping and pillaging is bad, us raping and pillaging is good. What's more Bronze Age than that? For anyone reading this forum, the Palestinians are not your allies and never will be, so it seems only natural the Bronze Age response is "slaughter them and salt the earth"
SophisticatedHillbilly
11mo ago
As someone with 4 siblings and who ideally wants 12 children of my own (my father had 11 siblings!) I think I can offer some perspective. Me and my siblings are basically going through the gamut of possibilities, which I find very interesting
My eldest brother moved away, currently works in some sort of research support role, and is part of a poly-amorous relationship. He drank the Blue-aid as deeply as possible, and he has no intentions of ever having children. If pushed he'll say something like "when I can afford it," but he doesn't seem to be too interested in saving up to do so. He takes international vacations, he lives in the core of a big city, and he spends what he makes. He is also perpetually miserable, God knows why.
My second eldest brother is severely physically disabled, and he has no real shot at procreation. He exists by still living in the childhood home, cared for by our mother. Sad, but he does okay. He actually tries his hand at creative projects quite frequently, but he's not particularly capable mentally either (though not retarded.)
My younger brother is the only one of the family who grappled with the challenges to religion and kept the faith, and he is in the process of steadily working himself into a well-paying trade job, buying some land in the middle of no-where, and intends to have a large family with the girlfriend he has had since he was a young teenager.
Then there is my younger sister. She wants to farm, and she does so. By the age of 10 she had convinced her parents to buy her a few dairy goats, which is now a sizable herd with impeccable lineage. She has maintained a rigorous schedule for as long as I remember, and refuses to break it for anything. I don't know what her plans are for children. I don't know if she's considered them. She just wants to farm.
Then there's me. I intended to become a journalist, run away to a foreign country, and experience interesting places and things. Once I learned that the whole field was rotten, discovered I hate working for other people and returned home, I have gradually grown in my desire to have children. I think part of it is being around a place where I have childhood memories. Part of it is knowing that I can bring them into a world where they have a future of something better than [school (which I hated and was worthless) --> college (same) --> Drone job (same).] Part of it may be reconnecting with family history, which I have records of going back a straight 130 years (not just names, but business records, letters, all sorts of things.)
More than anything though, I think my desire just grew as I began to hate life less. All these convoluted schemes seem to be missing the core idea that "people who are miserable and think life is meaningless don't really want to perpetuate that." But that's getting too into my own analysis, which I can share separately if anyone cares.
SophisticatedHillbilly
1mo ago
I love this poem. Any more you'd like to share?
SophisticatedHillbilly
2mo ago
For additional evidence for the signature farming: the existence of companies like Fieldworks, or the fact that you can find the job "Political Canvasser" on job search engines and it pays $25/hour. Not a lot of places for that money to come from but PACs.
Now this is an honest question and not meant to be snarky: When?
I just genuinely cannot think of a single situation in which men and women behave the same. Not one. Not when studying in school, not when walking to the bathroom, not when sitting down for lunch, not when speaking in a business meeting. Maybe I'm just not thinking broadly enough?
Currently though, I'm liable to think the proper heuristic is "men and women literally never behave the same in any situation ever, and if anyone says they do they're either smoothing over differences or autistic." If there are some weird exceptions then those seem to fall more under the "exception that proves the rule" than anything else.
This doesn't give unlimited explanatory power, but it does require every single generalization about people to be split into two more specific generalizations, which I feel will cleave reality much closer to the joints.
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