faceh
7mo ago
I could think of a number of ways to navigate through this using the rules cited.
But I think ULTIMATELY the Courts will, if they're being fair-minded, say "toss this back to the people. They can hold a recall vote or they can pursue a referendum or they can otherwise exercise their rights and authority to goad their legislators to act if they so wish. If the people are okay with the status quo, they can let it stand." Otherwise, the Courts risk overriding the 'will of the people' either way they rule.
Then someone in one of the Dem house members' districts starts gathering signatures for a recall, and force the issue.
If Minnesota looks to remain gridlocked for years to come, then unhappy constituents can move somewhere else if it matters that much to them.
faceh
7mo ago
Yep.
Reading the process by which they managed to inject that code makes you realize the only reason most of us are safe is because smart humans simply do not have any reason to target most of us for any reason.
faceh
7mo ago
Yep. The irony is that there is simply NO WAY that any car company would program their vehicles to affirmatively use deadly force in defense of a passenger.
There might be a market for jailbreaks that allow your Waymo or Tesla to run down attackers if you shout a code word or something.
I actually think I'd want my self-driving car to be offline (i.e. not internet connected) at ALL TIMES, and if firmware updates are needed it should only support a physical internet connection then.
And that's already too much of a vector for mischief than I'd like.
The knowledge that has soured me on self-driving cars as a concept is learning more about cybersecurity.
If every Tesla is running identical software with approximately identical behavior, then there are predictable vulnerabilities that can be exploited by malicious actors.
One threat model is that teenage deliquents figure out (hypothetically) that Teslas will swerve to avoid any human-shaped obstacles in the road, so they start jumping in front of Teslas for fun, knowing that they won't get hit.
Another is, of course, malicious code gets injected which, under specific conditions triggers the car to accelerate at maximum and turn into the nearest cylindrical object once it reaches 100mph.
Think of how granular the STUXNET virus was.
The one benefit that human drivers have over robots is we don't have any way to hack humans to become suicidal at scale.
I think your comment is whataboutism, but I've never been convinced that whataboutism is a bad form of argument. Why shouldn't one side complain about being held to a different moral standard than the other?
It is a really simple test to see if the person is arguing because they support their team, or if they have an actual consistent stance that they will apply to any situation.
That informs the rest of the discussion, from my perspective.
faceh
7mo ago
Yes but what is the INCENTIVE it creates, if people are aware they'll be 'cared for' if they get hauled to jail for political crimes?
Does it make such actions seem more appealing or less appealing on the margins?
faceh
7mo ago
Kinda increases the incentives for doing political crimes now.
Do you also agree that providing bail funds and free legal counsel for left-leaning protestors also does so?
Just wondering.
Because a LOT more actual violence occurred across the country on some random day in 2020 than on January 6, 2021.
faceh
7mo ago
Now it's like an IV where you push for more stupidity and lies, push the button, push, until it euthanizes you.
Hilariously accurate. Used to be useful at least for keeping a thumb to the pulse of 'the internet,' but they went and alienated the actual fun parts of the internet so now its just a thumb on the slowly fading pulse of the particular brand of 2010's atheist/SJW leftist brigade who still think that their ironclad hold on the site makes them relevant.
The button pushing also helps euthanize the rest of the patients too.
"When does the Narwhal Bacon" indeed.
Here's a nice little thread where they suggest that Elon Musk is... The Most Dangerous Man in the World.
And hey, he's probably in the top 1000, if we talk about potential to cause maximum chaos. In theory he could make millions of Teslas wrap themselves around telephone poles at 120 mph... But I don't understand how you can look at or listen to this dude and think he'd be the one who would order millions of men to their deaths or intentionally cause mass destruction.
There's a level of derangement that seems to arise when people notice a guy can shrug off social influence and utterly ignore bribe money and is, further, able to implement long term plans that happen to thwart your 'team's' goals.
But this is an extreme distortion of reality that only an internet-powered filter bubble/echo chamber can achieve.
faceh
7mo ago
My basic search is showing that panama lacks any Combat capable aircraft.
So IF it were actually going to be a fight, I dunno that they'd be able to pop their head out long enough to do much sabotage.
But more to the point, that's about the only piece of leverage they have to avoid a fight, so I suspect they might sign a deal rather than play that card.
faceh
7mo ago
Yeah, was going to say the U.S. already fought a war in Panama in the modern era. It was over in a few weeks.
Obviously there are some other parties who might object to the U.S. controlling it this time. But I think there's probably a solution that falls far short of warfare here.
faceh
7mo ago
I don't think you were wrong to make the predictions, but try to give a confidence estimate next time for sanity checking purposes.
And props for taking the outcome with good humor.
I'll bet you 50$ that if you look around your neighborhood, you'll notice 0 changes over the next 4 years attributable to Donald Trump.
I'll take that bet, but only if "Vance/Desantis 2028" yard signs and flags count as a change, since I think that would easily be 'attributable' to Donald Trump. As far as material changes, go, I have a few Hispanic neighbors, its entirely possible some of the are here illegally, so if they get removed and housing prices in the neighborhood go down due to fewer migrants in the South Florida area generally that can probably be attributed to Trump as well.
Note: I like my neighbors so I'm not going to be the one calling ICE.
faceh
7mo ago
Days like this I kinda wish I was still on Reddit because I couldn't resist telling them how badly they screwed up for things to get this far and reminding them how utterly powerless they are to stop what is coming (whatever that is, I can't even say for sure), and if they had an ounce of self-awareness and the ability to reflect, this might cause them to change some of their beliefs about the world but no, they will be stuck in a cycle of learned helplessness because they can't even exit the echo chamber that has rendered them completely incapable of interfacing with the reality on the ground, and the beliefs 'normal' people hold anymore.
And also Sotomayor has a decent chance of dying or retiring in the next 3 years so lol enjoy having that shoe waiting to drop the entire time.
I'm not really sadistic, but that site has really become a pustulent sore on the Internet's face. I want to keep poking it until it pops. At least 4chan has the decency to stay hidden on the internet's ass.
faceh
7mo ago
Yeah. I should have specified that the strong correlation is found among the young, not the older groups.
https://www.nihr.ac.uk/news/teenagers-problematic-smartphone-use-are-twice-likely-have-anxiety
Note this study where anxiety disorders among adolescents are generally decreasing over decades in the 'developing' world (smartphones less common!) and INCREASING in developed countries:
Yeah its almost paradoxical. On one end, if there is extremely high pressure to attend/not flake then attendance seems to be more reliable (maybe there's a nonrefundable charge of some kind or some other major cost for not attending). Or its an extremely desirable event that isn't repeated often, like a popular band's concert or similar.
On the other end, if its lowkey, minimal cost, and you just invite as many as possible and don't really put much pressure on attendance then you also get pretty decent turnout (although oftentimes people will happily arrive 'late' or leave 'early.'
Its the middle zone, where you invite people to an event with a CLEAR expectation that they will show up if they agree to, and where the main 'cost' of flaking is losing social points, and you put in at least a medium amount of effort to following up with people/'securing' commitments to come where people are most likely to cancel on the day of. Probably a combination of feeling pressured to accept at the time they're being asked, and then 'deciding' later that its really not that serious and cancelling.
There's also a particular dynamic with females. I specifically try to have mixed-gender gatherings (part of my goal is to get people of opposite sex to form connections and maybe create dates and relationships), but with females in particular, they tend to only want to come if they can 'know' that other females will be there. And if they aren't coordinating directly with other females but instead through me, the organizer, there's an information asymetry. If I tell them "oh yeah plenty of women are coming" how much do they trust my word? So last minute flakes are probably the rule there.
And the end result seems to be that usually NO (single) females attend an informal event unless there is some other major enticement. Some girls will attend with their boyfriend, and sometimes a lone female shows up and ends up being the only female there and hangs around somewhat awkwardly then leaves early, unless someone manages to engage her in a friendly conversation and puts her at ease. I've gotten decent at that.
The trick I've tried lately to some success is to try to invite two females at the same time (i.e. approach both simultaneously so they can both see/hear the other accept the invitation). And likewise if I have a female friend that I'm sure is coming I ask her to follow up with/confirm other females attending. It feels like an interesting game, trying to lure a woman who is extremely skittish about going to events with unfamiliar people out long enough to gain her trust.
I'm sure there are more secrets to getting women to attend but its a very consistent pattern at this point.
While ease of communication seems like a good thing, it has the unfortunate side effect of making it easier to flake.
Yeah, I think your whole first section makes sense when you include the whole "devaluation of relationships" aspect.
THAT'S the part that makes it so easy to be flaky. If you truly value the relationship with your friends, you make an effort to be at the event as planned, because even if its easy to cancel last minute, you know that this will eventually lose you status points (you'd lose more in the older days where people would be stuck waiting for you and get pissed) and people will stop inviting you at all, eventually leaving you out of everything.
This is bad if its hard to find new friends OR there aren't many things to do by yourself. But guess what? You can make friends online! You can pay an Onlyfans girl to talk to you while you sit at home! You can watch a streamer and PRETEND he's your friend!
If you REALLY fuck up and gain a bad reputation throughout your town, its relatively easy to move to a new town and make new friends quickly.
I have to imagine that 'ghosting' dates was simply NOT a common practice before dating apps, for similar reasons. You really needed to keep your appointments because the pool of potential dates was relatively small and so if you offended too many you might be locked out of dating altogether. Instead, of course, you ghost one match because you can always go back to swiping with zero penalty.
So now it is easier to be flakey without wrecking your social status, AND its easier to move on if you do wreck the status.
And that flips over to your arguments that phones are now status symbols. Which man, I hadn't thought deeply on that and there's something to unpack there.
For me, I place an insanely high value on maintaining relationships, so I have inbuilt incentive to honor my commitments once made, and I thus hate hate hate feeling like my personal relationships have been devalued. But the world is how it is. I just put in the effort to maintain the friendships I really care about.
faceh
7mo ago
Yeah, I've heard it said that the internet is, broadly, a 'pull' medium rather than a 'push' one. Contrast to, say, broadcast TV.
That is, the user gets to request the content, and then control which content is actually displayed on their device, they don't have to accept ads or videos even if the provider really wants to send them.
UNLESS they are in a phone app that doesn't allow that control. So getting people into an App where the environment is less user-controlled is a major win in the long term. I've seen so many sorts of incentives offered to try and get me to install certain apps and I am more than happy to just keep using my mobile browser with adblock because I value my sanity and avoiding malicious persuasion attempts more than whatever they're offering.
But my point there is I think even with such a mandate, companies will manage to get a LOT of people into their apps.
A good question to examine. The more marriage-minded ones would probably be selected out by getting married early to some large degree.
I can say there's an unfortunately high number I've noticed who are just horndog lotharios who know how to appeal to young women (of a certain type), and are unrepentant about that. And some who get divorced or otherwise find themselves single in middle or late life and decide to go for it.
It is more than fair to say that there's increased competition for the young, marriageable women due to older guys also jumping in the pool.
As to how they treat the women, well, there's nobody actively policing these guys so we can be pretty sure there's some significant amount of destructive behavior occurring.
faceh
7mo ago
Another key, though, is that if you want to develop a social circle, oneself has to show up when others put on events.
Whoah now buddy, that could turn me into some kind of... extrovert?
More seriously, the type of friends I make tend to be introverted nerds so generally speaking they don't like planning and holding events, so I do most of the heavy lifting there. But when somebody is putting in the effort to coordinate something, be it trivia or just hanging out at a park and tossing a frisbee, I want to recognize that effort and show up for it.
I'll be honest, its a good way to sort high agency people from low agency ones. The sort who actually plan events and put out the word and do the legwork to 'make things happen' are generally high functioning and reliable, which is a signal correlated with other good traits, generally. That is the signal I'm trying to send.
faceh
7mo ago
Reasonable hypothesis.
It gels with my general model that scared/anxious citizens are more conformist and easier to sway by simply telling them what to be afraid of and how they can alleviate their anxiety by voting the 'right' way come election time. It failed to produce the desired outcome in 2024 but there are plenty of folks who still think we're about to collapse into a fascist dictatorship.
Phone use and anxiety and similar disorders is very strongly correlated in the research, so that's one way to 'produce' your loyal voters.
faceh
7mo ago
If I can steelman an argument: If they're married, working professionals trying to build their own life, have kids, etc. its not particularly efficient for them to donate times to various causes that, while altruistic, are also burning up manhours that they could use on things that produce more value, and for which they capture more of the value.
They're married, so they don't need to meet potential partners.
If they donate a sufficient portion of their money to the church, ostensibly this should substitute for actually doing the low-value work themselves?
What does the Bible actually command about spending your own time in service of the poor?
I will die on the hill that "Meta" had a winning play available to it that was implied by the name.
Design the website/app so that it centralizes all of the other information feeds everyone else has into a single dashboard.
Make it so you can receive messages across EVERY other major messaging app, from Discord to Signal on your Meta app.
Be the app that flies over all other apps so users don't have to maintain 16 different logins and have their friends spread across all the other different messengers, but can instead respond through one handy chat window.
That does present a killer solution in my book because I'm sick of having to coordinate with my friends across text messaging, Discord, Whatsapp, snapchat, signal, telegram, gmail, twitter/x, Steam, slack, etc. AND Facebook messenger.
Give me a single app where I can send a text blast out to EVERYONE at once, including a link to an event or something else I want to show them, regardless of how I'm connected to them and you'll have my loyalty. I can even tolerate some ad injection.
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