celluloid_dream
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User ID: 758
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
(1c) - You've come to know yourself better: When you first started consuming media, you had no frame of reference. Everything was new, so reviewers were giving you useful information about whether you might like it. As you built a library of experiences, you gradually surpassed the critics (who must tailor their message to the general public) and became an expert on your own tastes.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
What is "price gouging"?
I hear it a lot lately, specifically as something that grocery stores are doing with food prices.
My instinct is that if retailers raises prices, even if only because they think customers will pay more, and then customers do pay more, then that is the new market price. As such, there can't really be "gouging" by definition, no matter what price retailers set.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
This is a good response, but my instinct is still that market forces should still be in effect. If prison phone prices are too high, few prisoners will make calls and the provider should be incentivized to lower prices to maximize total profits. Likewise with bottled water.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Interesting. So the obvious workaround would be for existing retailers to close during declared emergencies and reopen as (or sell their stock to) a new company "Emergency-Mart!" that has never previously sold that merchandise, who can then freely sell it at the higher price customers are willing to pay.
Does that happen in New Jersey?
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
It's "out of game" in that it is strategizing one level up. It's not playing the current instance as the game, but instead the full set. If that's the level you want to analyze, fine, but I think it's fair to say it is tainting single-game strategy with meta strategy.
I also sign on to @MathWizard's game ethics here and have always had the feeling that caching chess opening strategy is distasteful - sort of against the spirit of the game - yes.. even in the face of hundreds of years of the top players doing just that.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
There are natural and unnatural game politics. Example: SSBU (online). It's a fighting game that is most often matched as a 1v1, but occasionally puts players in 3-way 1v1v1s.
Now, the natural politics that happen in a 3-way (IMO) is that all participants begin by attacking each other equally. If player A gets too far ahead, B and C focus attacks more on them to pull A back down to their level. If player C drops too far behind, A and B avoid trying to "finish them off", since either A or B spending time attacking C leave themselves open for the other to attack them in return and take the lead. As a result, 3 evenly matched players usually end up with a close finish where anyone could win. Exciting!
... except this rarely happens. In actual play, A and B immediately begin the match by signaling that they want to form an alliance against C. A and B then easily double-team C until C is eliminated, then finish the match as a 1v1. I consider this much less exciting than the alternative, but dynamics demand that players play this way, because if they refuse to ally and the other player does ally, they become C, and lose.
I consider the first situation to be natural, because the politics are dictated by the flow of the game. The second is unnatural because players are plotting on a social level with each other before the game begins.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
It's nice to be able to fall back on a rote system to check one's work. I'm sure Magnus Carlsen can calculate chess moves explicitly.
I might intuitively feel the correctness of some quick mental math, but I can show my work in my head by laying out the calculations to prove it to be doubly sure.
When paving that intuition with a more holistic approach, how does one explain why a thing is correct?
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
With languages, I find the absorption style often leads to embarrassing situations.
It's the awful realization that the person you're talking to has no idea what the word they just spoke actually means. It's clear that they heard it in a similar-but-importantly-different context, made incorrect assumptions about its meaning, and are now re-using it liberally. Or worse, they haven't even guessed at its meaning, but are merely using the word or phrase because they want to sound impressive or charismatic, and other impressive/charismatic people say it so... ugh.
And what's even worse than THAT is that it's socially forbidden to correct them! It's insulting to point out their error - especially if they're a native speaker and it would make them look foolish.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Half the items on that list are not end goals, but (to them) necessary intermediate steps before tech or progress finds a better solution. Barring extreme identitarians, most fat/disabled/trans people wish they weren't and would like to change their situation. Antifa/BLM/squatters would similarly (I think) claim to not want to exist in an ideal world.
The rest are preferences. Would you agree that there is at least some contention over the aesthetic value of piercings/tattoos/graffiti/drugs? It's not like there's no precedent for them in human civilization.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Seems to me that Psychology can't be grounded without progress on the easy problem of consciousness; otherwise, it's just theorizing about abstractions. Quoting /u/GeriatricZergling on r/slatestarcodex:
Mechanism. If you don't have mechanism, all you have is a statistical study of the inputs and outputs of a black box, which is only as good as your statistics. That's not inherently bad, but it's only a first step, with all of the following steps being manipulative and natural experiments to open that black box. Doing further studies without opening the black box, just adding more inputs etc., is little more than a statistical fishing expedition prone to all the statistical problems outlined elsewhere, and doesn't really generate much knowledge compared to a single study that actually opens the box. Because opening the box, actually understanding how A leads to B leads to C in a causal way, allows you to understand so, so much more about the world than the fanciest statistical model
...
If you don't understand the mechanism, if you haven't opened that black box, you don't know shit.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
I did CrossFit for a few years a long time ago and don't regret it, but there were cult-like aspects:
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Weirdly culty social dynamics. Everyone gets a nickname and refers to others by that nickname. At the box (gym), you're not Jane or John. You're Wondergirl or JDogg and everyone is thrilled you just beat your Fran (a workout) time - like, uncannily happy for you. It's contagious. You're ecstatic that Seabiscuit just PR-ed his deadlift too.
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Charismatic instructors preaching questionable doctrines (muscle confusion! paleo! kipping pull-ups!) to be taken on faith.
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Scams and MLM fads swept through the gym population. It seemed like half the gym members totally lacked an immune system to them.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Don't imprison the entire population was a principle so fundamental that...
Was it? I think the principle debate here would be over whether it is ever acceptable for the government to restrict movement in the interest of safety. Would you bite the bullet and say that it is never okay, even if doing so would avert a dire outcome?
"Those who would give up essential Liberty".. etc?
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Definitions are bidirectional:
If someone is a man(gender) because they fit the social roles of males (eg. football, trucks, acting tough) and not the social roles of females (eg. makeup, dresses, nurturing) then any person who fits said roles is a man(gender).
But this is obviously not how gender works in common usage. If it were, then you could tell someone they are wrong about their gender. I know several female people who, if you said to them they were actually men because of their hairstyle/personality/interests, would laugh deep manly belly laughs, and then gruffly tell you. "Fuck off. I'm still a woman."
So I don't know that the analogy to fashion is a good one. In that realm, you can still classify things as Goth or Punk or Goth-Punk or neither Goth nor Punk based on their characteristics.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
A full length text written in garden path sentences would be both impressive and infuriating.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
I'm guilty of voting to restore balance, but let me explain:
I think the voting ethics ought to be something like the original reddiquette. If a comment adds to the discussion - if it expresses something relevant clearly, even if you disagree - then you should upvote. If you can't bring yourself to do that, then at the very least, you should not downvote. In a well-behaved forum, the score of an unpopular, but valid comment should never fall below 1.
On this site (but not on Reddit for some reason) I noticed posters who play devils advocate, or disagree with the majority were regularly be downvoted below 0. Examples: ( 1 2 3, all negative at time of linking ). This is bad. These might not be quality contribution material, but they're fair comments and shouldn't be downvoted. To quote the rationalist maxim, "Bad argument gets counterargument. Does not get bullet. Never. Never ever never for ever". I see a lot of bullet holes here. I do my part to patch them up as best I can.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Then I guess I'll have to be optimistic based on Musk's track record with products I've personally witnessed:
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Tesla really changed the game for electric cars. They're fast, powerful, cool, techy. People want them. At least in my PNW costal city, you see them everywhere now.
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Starlink allows a friend to live in the middle of nowhere and still remote-desktop to work seamlessly. He reports that even online multiplayer gaming is doable with satellite internet.
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SpaceX developed into an (I think, as a layman) impressive technology, doing things that previously weren't possible.
Like, I look around and really do see the Teslas on the street. I really do see the Starlink satellites in the sky. I've watched SpaceX launches. Admittedly, I haven't paid any attention to the financials, so maybe it's all going to come crashing down, but people have been saying that for years, and they're still going strong.
The 2007 decision ruled that the right to collective bargaining existed because it existed before the Charter (according to what it doesn't say and in any case I don't see how that means the constitution enshrines that right), because of human rights obligations (why does that have any bearing on the constitution?), and because it "reaffirms the values of dignity, personal autonomy, equality and democracy that are inherent in the Charter.
@johnfabian 's post raised the same question for me. Where did this right to strike come from? I wasn't able to get any farther than that line in Health Services. It's baffling. It seems less "found" than invented out of whole cloth.
Edit: actually, later in the document, they elaborate, going on for several pages detailing the history of labour relations up to the Charter, but IMO including nothing of relevance until:
Collective bargaining, despite early discouragement from the common law, has long been recognized in Canada. Indeed, historically, it emerges as the most significant collective activity through which freedom of association is expressed in the labour context. In our opinion, the concept of freedom of association under s. 2(d) of the Charter includes this notion of a procedural right to collective bargaining.
This established Canadian right to collective bargaining was recognized in the Parliamentary hearings that took place before the adoption of the Charter. The acting Minister of Justice, Mr. Robert Kaplan, explained why he did not find necessary a proposed amendment to have the freedom to organize and bargain collectively expressly included under s. 2(d). These rights, he stated, were already implicitly recognized in the words “freedom of association”:
"Our position on the suggestion that there be specific reference to freedom to organize and bargain collectively is that that is already covered in the freedom of association that is provided already in the Declaration or in the Charter; and that by singling out association for bargaining one might tend to d[i]minish all the other forms of association which are contemplated — church associations; associations of fraternal organizations or community organizations."
(Special Joint Committee of the Senate and of the House of Commons on the Constitution of Canada, Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence, Issue No. 43, January 22, 1981, at pp. 69-70)
Which I think settles it. I mean, I don't think that's what most people would interpret "freedom of association" to mean, but if that's what was originally intended, then the court's decision is reasonable.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
I hear that. The headphone jack was a great standard. You could bring along a cheap male-male cable and interface with nearly any device with a speaker.
The good news is that Bluetooth in the current year is that universal standard. It's supported by as many, if not more devices. I initially thought charging the headphones would be annoying, but I find I rarely need to do it. The charging case keeps them topped up. Plus, you can still use your wired headphones with a lapel clip BT adapter. It's much better than trying to use the awkward phone port ones that always come loose.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
I do wonder what is the probability that "Sarah" is a pseudonym to make the agent seem more amenable to a Western customer
Obviously this. There are enough clues that "Sarah" is an Indian support rep following a strict flowchart:
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Use of the word "Kindly"
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Puzzling grammar errors and stilted professional speech (no contractions, jargon, or slang)
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"You've been pretty quiet" at the start is an automatic idle detection script - possibly misfiring
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requesting permission for everything is likely a CYA tactic so they don't get fired in the event you escalate. I've found this to be common in dealing with offshore support
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Paradoxically, making promises that both parties know is unlikely to be kept is also common: "Rest assured you will receive the by end of tomorrow."
Alternatively, it's a chat-bot trained on offshore support transcripts. God help us.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
I swear Google is deliberately hiding a large portion of real results.
Often when I search exact phrases from lyrics or samples, I'll get nothing. Zero results for "I love the island" and "I love the palm trees". Zero! I don't believe it. Google is telling me that no one on its history of the entire indexed internet has included those phrases together. I refuse to believe it. Those aren't Chomsky sentences that have never been spoken before. Where are the travel blogs? Where are the Hawaiian tourism ads? Where are the yelp reviews? Where are the misheard lyrics? (turns out it was "I love the islands" and the sample was from a Janet Jackson interlude)
But Google says no. 0 results. Zilch. It just makes me wonder what else it's not showing.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
why should there be anything with the incorrect spelling?
Because there are tropical islands full of palm trees that are very nice, and people love them. "I love the island" and "I love the palm trees" are basic, common sentences that you would expect to see in a review or travel blog about such an island (eg.), and it seems extremely unlikely to me that they have never appeared on the same page together on the internet.
I think there should be a lot more results with the correct spelling too, for the same reason.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
It's the combination of "I love the island" and "I love the palm trees" that returns 0 results. Now, maybe I'm wrong about this. Maybe those two phrases have truly never appeared on a single page, but it seems very unlikely. Of all the personal blogs, facebook posts, travel diaries, fanfiction, forums, auto-generated SEO text, etc. etc., I would expect it to have happened once. There are a lot of people in the world posting a lot of text on the internet.
celluloid_dream
1yr ago
Finished Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy. Enthralling despite the brutal subject matter, it had this kind of meditative cinematic quality. Probably half the allusions and references were over my head, but the stark account of events cut with poetic landscape paintings hit the spot. Days later I'm still turning over some of the chapters in my head.
My excuse in these situations is that we're satisfying our preferences better this way. <Sibling> is reading about the latest sports happenings (don't care). <Parent> is playing an ad-ridden slot machine game (ew!), and I'm reading culture war insight porn (which would horrify them).
If we all tried to have the respective conversations that interested us, it would be awkward. I didn't see that ludicrous display last night. Neither <sibling> nor I want to talk about grandkids, and my family doesn't appreciate abstract argument the same way I do. They get *annoyed* at disagreement. They are allergic to contrarianism. They don't like philosophy. They're low decouplers. We can't even discuss pop culture: "Ugh. Must you overanalyze everything?"
So .. phones.
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