WestphalianPeace
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User ID: 184
WestphalianPeace
6d ago
Ommegang Witte
Spring is here. The weather is warming up. Stout season is done and it's time to embrace lighter beers again. The beer is a Belgian white ale, heavy with coriander & orange peel. Just a delight everytime.
WestphalianPeace
1yr ago
Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East - David Stahel
1/2 through. Makes the case that Barbarossa started shitting the bed in the opening weeks, not just at the gates of Moscow. Casts a very harsh light on the Minsk and Smolensk pockets in the immediate opening stages of the war. Very critical of Halder & Guderian.
Money- Emile Zola
1/4th through. Realist fiction of the moneyed classes in mid 19th century Paris. Absolutely hilarious. The main character Saccard is a delight of failure & ambition. The audiobook for Zola's 'Germinal' was very good and made checking out Zola's other works seem worthwhile.
WestphalianPeace
20d ago
It was! Thank you so much! I'd thought it lost to me for good.
WestphalianPeace
20d ago
that was always my issue. I find the combat system to be too opaque.
EU4: First more morale, then more discipline. Have enough artillery. use terrain. done.
CK3: Good Knights. Good men-at-arms. have more troops. men at arms. done.
Victoria 3: Don't ever go to war. Just build tall. comfy. done.
Victoria 2: Enough infantry to fill the frontline. Enough artillery to do damage. Some cav for early game capture.
Stellaris: A confusing as figuring out HOI4 Navy.
WestphalianPeace
21d ago
I never could get a full grasp of Stellaris. And the new ck3 expansion is just okay. After the End 2 released on steam though. Shame they removed the California rationalists big Yud lore.
Suzerain is unique as a western VN. And it's hard. But pulling off the Great Sordish Recovery is incredibly satisfying.
It's also a great way to understand the struggles of post ww2 Turkiya
WestphalianPeace
3mo ago
If you're a weeb them Akame ga Kill: Gekisen it's a minute and a half of calm before the drop/hype. I time it to 30 seconds before the drop to psych up before heavy squats.
Military music is also pretty effective. Any Sousa march. British Grenadiers or US Field Artillery March. Sakkijarven Polkka. Though I have a special place in my heart for "Merck toch hoe sterck" for those lifts where it feels like it's not about exploding but rather about grinding the bastard out.
WestphalianPeace
7mo ago
I kept thinking that I should respond to this with some other longwinded paragraph of text. But you are right. and I'll keep it simple. I'm happy that I could help. Anyone wrestling with these questions deserves nothing less.
WestphalianPeace
7mo ago
While in the vernacular it's common to use Agnostic to mean "I don't really know but I think it's possible" and Atheist to mean "I believe there is no God" I think you'll find that when pushed hard to really clarify exactly what Belief and Knowledge are that most of what we think of as knowledge claims are in fact belief claims. I do not "know" that say (purely for example), the Chicago School of Economics is true. But I may perhaps "believe" that it is. Or to be even more pedantic, I may assign a 90% chance in my head that I think it's true, a 5% chance it's flawed but mostly true, and leave the remaining 5%.
I do not "know" that I am not a brain in a vat in a jar experiencing a simulation. But I don't find this particularly likely, and am happy to say that I believe my toothpaste exists and should be applied before bed. Even though if sufficiently pushed I'd be stuck arguing that, yes, it's true. I can't be literally 100% confident about my toothpaste the same way I am that A = A. This 'mere belief' state of affairs has yet to stop me from brushing my teeth before bed.
In that sense the vast majority of Atheists are, more precisely, Agnostic Atheists, and are happy to describe themselves as such. They do not Know, but they lack assertive belief that God exists. Much like how I lack a belief in the efficacy of Mercantilism, even if I can't write a PhD paper explaining why. Atheists may vary in the particulars. One may give God a 10% chance, which isn't enough for him to believe in a positive existence. Another may say God's likelyhood is less than 1%! I have even seen someone describe himself as an Asymptotic Atheist. His credence towards Gods existence approached infinity but never quite touched "cannot possibly exist".
Actual "God does not exist, 100%, stop" Atheists do exist. They'll have uncommon definitional arguments about how all sufficient definitions of God are inherently incoherent or contradictory. But these are rare indeed, and functionally arn't all that different than a mainstream Atheist.
Perhaps you will find your argument for God and change your mind. Perhaps you will look back at this moment as your crisis of faith and in the end it was the testing fire you needed to harden your spirit into a faith a strong as steel.
I can't prevent you from doing that. But what I can say is that even losing all faith that God exists, the world is still beautiful. Painfully, overwhelmingly, & shockingly beautiful. It's the beauty of a cherry blossom caught in the wind between branch and ground. We travel in the now between the Scylla of pre-existence and the Charybdis of our species eventual end. In this precious moment we exist and are lucky enough to be conscious of it. There is no reason for our morals to atrophy or our marvel of the natural world to diminish because what we do now is only heightened in importance by it's transience. There is a joy to be had in the self regard as one made in the image of God. But when that disappears it does not stay a God shaped hole in the heart. Rather, I regard every piece of civilization as a precious jewel against the void from which we came. Humanity as universe's greatest happenstance. We could have stayed as brutes. We could have been born and winked out of existence. Humanity was once reduced to nearly a thousand people!
But today an atheist can go to the cathedral in Cologne and tremble at how passionate humanity was even during poorer times. And a believer can know his doctor is an atheist and realize that his doctor regards his life as something that once extinguished is gone forever, and that his doctors will fight like hell to help him get back to good health as a result. And we can all build something together and marvel at this incredible world we all live in.
There is no shortage of arguments intended to pull you back to a faith in a Creater Deity. But if you should wonder once more about the other side then here:
If you want the old argument, then read De Rerum Natura De Rerum Natura. On The Nature of Things. And realize that these notions about the world are by no means new.
If you want the new argument, then read On the Big Picture, by Sean Carrol. And really understand how we got to this point.
Finally, the rationalists are sometimes cringe. But even in their cringe they have a point. You said "I want to convince myself there is a God". I ask you to consider instead, their Litany of Tarski. Contrast your desire to believe in something you find comforting vs whether you can can find real comfort in belief in something you know just isn't so. And consider instead your desire to believe what is true. That:
If the box contains a diamond, I desire to believe that the box contains a diamond; If the box does not contain a diamond, I desire to believe that the box does not contain a diamond; Let me not become attached to beliefs I may not want.
WestphalianPeace
1yr ago
I've been meaning to read On the Nature of Things for awhile now. Having read it would you stick by the prose translation or advise looking for something else?
WestphalianPeace
1yr ago
As a Delaware Valley Quaker with a Scots-Irish best friend that book was positively eerily familiar. I was expecting interesting facts and instead simply felt uncomfortably seen. The audiobook also perfectly recreates the rhythmic cadence of a proper silent meeting.
WestphalianPeace
9d ago
dammit how did I know that would be a video of Kensington before I even clicked it.
WestphalianPeace
1mo ago
at risk of a low effort warning for memeing.
WestphalianPeace
1mo ago
This is a very reasonable critique.
I should be clear that the Cadastral Map Bias lens is my strong prior of first resort for inexplicable behavior by companies. I am not well read enough on SBI to back up the truth of the grapevine claim.
What on earth is going on with the layoffs btw? Did the industry over hire? It seems really inexplicable from afar.
WestphalianPeace
4mo ago
There is certainly precedent for it
WestphalianPeace
5mo ago
I just want to say that it's always a genuine joy to see what I write put up here on the AAQC. I am not a prolific poster and so it's a real honor to see my efforts nominated for the AAQC when I am moved to post.
WestphalianPeace
8mo ago
Act 3 is absolutely the weakest act (although it also had my favorite Boss). I did not encounter any bugs but there are so many parts of the narrative being kept track of that Act 3 is where something would show up. I've heard of bugs showing up regarding Oathbreaking Paladins in Act 3, but i never had one.
If you've already sunk your teeth into the game into Act 2 then it's worth it to see it through to the end.
My biggest complaint with Act 3 isn't the devs politics but rather that there are so many plot threads that need tying up that the Act doesn't have a strong "Do X then Y then Z" narrative structure. Instead it feels much more like going down the checklist of plot points that need to be wrapped up. A bit of a "wait remind me who this is?" issue.
The best part of Act 3 is that you really get to feel like your party has come into it's own. Everyone is levelled up. End game equipment starts coming into play. You feel like everything you've been building towards has really come into it's own and you can bask in the fruits of your labors. But the game really simply isn't balanced at that level 12 and the solution of 'add more enemies' tends to make some combats a slog.
It's a Larian CRPG so the illusion of choice is precisely that. Most conversations are more about the tone/flavour of how you respond than an actual diverging choice. But there are still real choices in how you want to approach the ending and i'm satisfied with the path I took for (in my eyes) a maximum Good ending.
WestphalianPeace
8mo ago
I will reaffirm reading War Nerd's version of the Iliad. The novel format communicates the humor, frustrations, and desires very clearly for anyone who isn't already intimately familiar with a more formal translation. It is simply fun to read.
WestphalianPeace
11mo ago
would definitely be very interested. even just spitballing the German fraternities part and then doing the modern day later would be fine.
WestphalianPeace
1yr ago
Going from pure lurker to attempted effortpost-er can be intimidating if you aren't a natural writer. But if you have a subject that you are passionate about then that passion will carry through even if you find the idea of be awarded an AAQC to be challenging to imagine.
WestphalianPeace
21d ago
"Suzerain" finally got it's "Kingdom of Rizia" expansion. Still rough around the edges and falls prey to purple prose but it's still a fun expansion to a unique game.
Did a reformist diplomatic run. Next is to do an Absolutist militarist run.
WestphalianPeace
1yr ago
Unity of Command 2: Desert Fox DLC - Rommel's North African campaign with 2 alt history scenarios (One for taking Tobruk and one for failing Tobruk but taking Malta). A lot of fun to play the opposite side after the Desert Rats campaign.
Victoria 3 - It's not polished but I played way too much Vicky 2 and it's just satisfying to maximize the Standard of Living for my pops
Darktide - 40k Horde-shooter. Dreamed for a long time about a game like this finally coming out.
Persona 5 on PC - JRPG's at their best.
Anno 1800 finally came out for steam so I'm hoping to finally try the anno games for the first time.
And at some point go back and get around to actually reading Chaos:head Noah.
WestphalianPeace
1d ago
just googled her. Yeah I see what you mean about winning a few Keynesian beauty contests. Anyone describing her as 3/10 is definitely outside my comprehension.
WestphalianPeace
25d ago
This is excellent stuff! With this place off reddit, not advertising elsewhere, and slowly developing it's own jargon things like this are great for legibility for newcomers.
"Westphalian....From a series of treaties in 1648. We also have a member with this as part of his username."
Hey that's me! Hi everyone!
It's an honor to be a recognized name enough to make this list. I don't comment that often but I like to think that I have a pretty good AAQC-to-comment-ratio to compensate. Actually AAQC as shorthand should probably also make the list.
A "prominent people" list may also be useful at somepoint. If only to explain why everything is on the main thread and then suddenly this Kulak guy thinks he's important enough to justify his own thread that's just a link to his substack. Which makes sense in context but must seem kinda bizarre from afar.
WestphalianPeace
2mo ago
I'd forgotten about the Japanese wargame carrier issue! Thank you for reminding me. I've never given the Pacific Theater the attention it deserves. Navies just don't click in my head the way they seem to hold a spell on some people. But yeah I'd heard about the carrier anecdote. Mind-numbing stuff. I've read enough books on the European Theater that I can sometimes see how the Germans would see things the way they did. But it's really difficult for me to get into the mindset of the Japanese regarding attacking America.
Actually I've been using your exact book as an audiobook to fall asleep to! (i already listened to it once properly. don't worry) I should probably read it as an actual physical book. The details stick better that way. If you like Stahel then you should definitely check out Robert Citino's trilogy. His accounts are fairly mainstream but he summarizes the mainstream take on things very well.
Got any other recommended books? If you havn't read/listened to Adam Tooze's "Wages of Destruction" then I can't recommend it highly enough.
My family was employed by the son of a Holocaust victim. Multiple friends of mine have their entire extended family tree snuffed out and all that remains is a small nucleus that moved to America during the golden age of European migration.
So no. While I don't agree with government suppression of such materials I assure you you will find no fertile grounds for conversion here.
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