campfireSmores
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User ID: 539
campfireSmores
1yr ago
I should point out that these sort of restrictions often end up killing people by causing inaction, as well as saving lives by causing inaction.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Well ultimately one's reaction to OP's story rests partially on how much you take his description at face value.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Well I think it's fine to borgify characters that no one on earth cares about, like the protagonist of Comix Zone. They're also developing Toejam and Earl and Space Channel 5 games, btw.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
I don't think the initial story is small potatoes. The initial story is the VP of the US trading money for influence.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/article-on-joe-and-hunter-biden-censored
Hunter Biden was employed in highly paid positions despite being a very unstable guy. Joe Biden was a partner or possible partner in Hunter's business deals. Hunter Biden wrote in the emails insisting that most discussion of Joe Biden's involvement happen not in writing. We know that Hunter said that Joe Biden was going to be paid for his involvement in at least one business venture, although we don't know if that deal was ever completed. We don't know that it wasn't completed either. There may be other Joe-Hunter joint business ventures that weren't featured in the emails because of the aformentioned desire for them to be not-in-writing.
It seems like Hunter was getting money from these companies in exchange for favors from the VP of the US.
One such favor:
Concurrently, Biden was involving himself in ousting the Ukranian General Prosecutor for alleged corruption, an action that benefited Burisma.
"how Biden could justify expending so much energy as Vice President demanding that the Ukrainian General Prosecutor be fired, and why the replacement — Yuriy Lutsenko, someone who had no experience in law; was a crony of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko; and himself had a history of corruption allegations — was acceptable if Biden’s goal really was to fight corruption in Ukraine rather than benefit Burisma or control Ukrainian internal affairs for some other objective."
"Third, the media rush to exonerate Biden on the question of whether he engaged in corruption vis-a-vis Ukraine and Burisma rested on what are, at best, factually dubious defenses of the former Vice President. Much of this controversy centers on Biden's aggressive efforts while Vice President in late 2015 to force the Ukrainian government to fire its Chief Prosecutor, Viktor Shokhin, and replace him with someone acceptable to the U.S., which turned out to be Yuriy Lutsenko. These events are undisputed by virtue of a video of Biden boasting in front of an audience of how he flew to Kiev and forced the Ukrainians to fire Shokhin, upon pain of losing $1 billion in aid."
"But two towering questions have long been prompted by these events, and the recently published emails make them more urgent than ever: 1) was the firing of the Ukrainian General Prosecutor such a high priority for Biden as Vice President of the U.S. because of his son's highly lucrative role on the board of Burisma, and 2) if that was not the motive, why was it so important for Biden to dictate who the chief prosecutor of Ukraine was?
The standard answer to the question about Biden's motive -- offered both by Biden and his media defenders -- is that he, along with the IMF and EU, wanted Shokhin fired because the U.S. and its allies were eager to clean up Ukraine, and they viewed Shokhin as insufficiently vigilant in fighting corruption."
I'm having difficulty summarizing. Just read the article.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
I was not being sarcastic about anything. I'm not sure when you think I was being sarcastic.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
You can submit questions to the candidates.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Well you should read up on the evidence.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
File under "the world would be better if people understood basic economics".
On the plus side, I think people will slowly come around to dynamic pricing. It might become standard in 15 years or so, if the world lasts that long.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Definitely true. I once talked with someone who realized circumcision was immoral but thought red vs blue stuff was more important. I don't think her calculation was fully rational. It could be that she wasn't willing to be a nonconformist.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
This would be a wakeup call for me if I thought all aspiring rationalists were operating at a level of rationalism too high to dig themselves into a hole like this, but I did not in fact have such a high opinion of this community (which I do like very much).
campfireSmores
1yr ago
"Some have lasted over a thousand rounds, which is impressive, but military weapons last for tens of thousands of rounds. I’d imagine the FGC-9 acts like a modern Liberator pistol."
They're useful, I think.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
I don't think that's quite what would happen but it's late at night and I'm tired. It seems like the right-wing/orthodox coalition would be pulled along with popular sentiment, and things would realign in a new equilibrium where the orthodox aren't be given the things that they were, but the right isn't disempowered.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Interesting...
campfireSmores
1yr ago
I don't think the hyper-progressive coalition was saying it would be terrible if Elon Musk didn't buy twitter. Only that the way he was trying to get out of it was dishonest.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
These are extremely rare
The rate of serious problems is debated. For instance, Intactivists say stuff like this
"Study design has an effect on the estimation of complication rates. Prospective studies, in which complications are tracked going forward from the circumcision via follow-up examinations, theoretically should capture the incidence of complications most accurately.[11] On the other hand, retrospective studies typically rely on a review of patient charts, a form of data that was recorded for a purpose other than research. Inaccuracies in the medical record (e.g. the not uncommon possibility that the complication was not charted in the first place) tend to lead to underestimation of complication incidence.[12] Even less reliable are retrospective database studies which can only capture events that have had an actual diagnostic or procedure code listed upon discharge.[E.g. 13] It has been estimated that database studies may miss up to 90-95% of complications.[14]"
I do not believe you can demonstrate a significant difference in population-level outcomes.
There are some studies showing a significant difference. Here's a list:
https://www.doctorsopposingcircumcision.org/for-professionals/psychological-impact/
Autism is 5 times more prevalent in the United States than in Europe, some people think MGM might have something to do with it.
We used to perform other surgeries on babies without anesthetic, do you think that had a long term effect on their psychologies? From Wikipedia: "It is now accepted that the neonate responds more extensively to pain than the adult does, and that exposure to severe pain, without adequate treatment, can have long-term consequences." Do you think science is just generally wrong about this? It seems to me like the idea that torturing babies has long term psychological consequences is just obviously what we should predict based on priors. Are you really skeptical?
There are a lot of Jews who do a religious ritual called the Brit Shalom instead. Religions give up stuff all the time; I think the transition would be easier than you imagine. What percentage of Mormons still practice polygamy? Catholics no longer say that people who commit suicide go to hell. Etc etc etc.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Well there are other ways to hurt a brain besides lowering IQ. Neuroticism, Autism, etcetera.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
What arguments do you speak of? What about them do you find unpersuasive?
campfireSmores
1yr ago
ultra-hardcore Taiwanese nationalists
There's something to be said for using nukes. Game theory. I'm sleepy, but using game theoretic deterrents are kind of rational, I think. Maybe, I need to read up on that.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Why?
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Possible solution: Say "I'm pretty sure X will happen. Let's say 80% sure." Sounds very unassuming that way.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Elon didn't walk back his twitter purchase out of bipolarity, he did it because his net worth crashed when the tech stocks did. No mental illness required as an explanation.
In my opinion.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
It's not easy to think of an IP that's buyable that has nearly as much pull as lord of the rings. Almost everything famous is owned by someone that doesn't want to sell it. Amazon already acquired MGM for 8.5 billion dollars (the James Bond owners), so there's that.
And Netflix is in the same boat as Amazon with regards to "Oh shit we don't own enough IP, what can we buy/license" so they're going to be bidding against each other.
The only big one I can think of that isn't already outright owned by someone who is making full use of it and therefore probably won't license it is Godzilla.
Smaller ones:
Popeye
Starship Troopers (the novel)
Robocop (which Amazon now owns through the MGM deal)
I think an adaptation of Stand Still Stay Silent or Bad Machinery would be cool. Two webcomics.
I try to care about artistic merit and not intellectual property/license/brand. But I do think some Nintendo movies would be cool. Nintendo's probably already got their course plotted out with Illumination though. There's probably some other videogames from other corporations that might be worth licensing.
campfireSmores
1yr ago
Magnolia is my favorite Cruise performance.
I have a response to this, but we shouldn't be having culture war talk in the wellness thread.
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