justmotteingaround
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User ID: 2002
justmotteingaround
1yr ago
he didn't become a billionaire in Baltimore on a public servant's salary
I think you're off by a factor of ~100. Googling puts his net worth at 2.5M in 2016; 17M in 2020. Given he has made his tax returns public for decades, it seems implausible he could hide 98% of his wealth.
justmotteingaround
2mo ago
Would be a shame if we stopped using them because of incorrect beliefs about the root causes of group differences…
This is essentially what I am earnestly claiming, because I do see how we get back to equal protection without explicitly acknowledging point 1. The courts have been doing this since the 1970's, clarifying that disparate impacts are fine so long as a non-arbitrary business necessity can be demonstrated.
justmotteingaround
2mo ago
It is a defense to disparate impact along protected class lines if it can be shown that the discriminatory factor is a business necessity. I'm less confident in how this plays out in practiced, how many bullshit claims of prevailed since the CRA, and how much bullshit claims have trailed off since.
justmotteingaround
5mo ago
I fly international a lot. My strategies work for me and I have my typical routes mastered. Timing your sleep/wake cycle on arrival is most important.
Melatonin is great on paper, doesn't seem to do much for me. I time caffeine, cardio, and sleep so I'll be most tired at the local bedtime on the first few nights. (Example: NYC to Switzerland takes off 6pm, so I get up at 3 am in NYC, binge coffee, work, take off 6PM, and I can sleep a few hours on the plane. Arrive 8am, caffeine around 10am and I'm fresh for the whole afternoon. I make sure to to push through to at least 8pm and then pass out for the night.)
Never stay up too late. Plan everything so you're tired as hell for bedtime the first few nights. Try to avoid caffeine after 12pmish the first few days after arrival so you can sleep well later. If you absolutely have to nap, do some math to calculate if you'll be tired that night, and set SEVERAL timers. Otherwise, just push through. Get on a regular schedule. Cardio/loooooong walks are great if you have too much energy and its getting late. You need pass out and sleep well at the normal bedtime for the first few nights!!!
As for the planes themselves, noise cancelling headphones if you got them. I drink at least 1L water every 2 hours minimum. I go to the back and have them refill my airport plastic bottle. Nobody else does this and its crazy. Planes are so dry. A good book or magazine is the best to pass the time. I have a kindle with 100's of books to read or re-read, and I'll put boring ones down in search of something that is great for long trips. Download any potentially interesting podcasts before takeoff. Series are great to binge. (I recommend alphabet boys, especially season 2). I've never had a 7 hour layover. The lounge might be worth it. Going into town might be worth it just to have a mini adventure, but you have to like random stuff like that (ie not find it stressful).
Nice deadlift! At ~23sec I saw your hips come up first. I don't use a belt, but I think I take a deeper breath and expand my stomach more to fill out my leverages, then brace. Perhaps something to play around with. You may want to mix in straps just to put more attention elsewhere (hips, leverages, whatever). Just some ideas.
justmotteingaround
7mo ago
The Church has changed traditions over time in order to maintain itself, increase its robustness, promote antifragility, etc. As an institution, the Catholic Church probably isn't amenable to rapid, radical change. (hence the slow move away from a Latin mass, the gradual lack of condemnation for charging interest on loans (Islam has created a bizarre, less efficient workaround which probably cost them economically), and the explicit condemnation of slavery being late to the party). Dozens more I think, but I know very little about the history of religion.
At some point, it may be optimal for the continuance of the Church to bless gay unions. In a few decades to a few hundred years. But also maybe it will never be optimal. However, imagine a contemporary Church that continued to argue, as I think Acquanias did (and I'm not sure if he was Catholic, but just as an example), that owning people as slaves was fine so long as you treated them well. That would be bad for the institution today. I'm not chiding the Church for being "late to the party". It's the kind of institution that should change slowly, cautiously, and with much debate.
Why its relevant: As I said, I'm pretty ignorant of the history of religion (its by far my worst Jeopardy! category). Therefore, I don't know how democratic religious have fared compared to more top-down structures, and I can't analyze the causal factors in a religions outcomes as institutions (for example, Buddhism and Hinduism are about twice as old as Christianity, but I don't know their institutional structures).
"we must make a fundamental change to [institution] to appeal to more progressive audiences, and grow our membership" scenarios play out in a non-destructive way,
My view is that this debate is the long arc of history: how much progress, and how fast? A balance must be stuck according the function of the institution. The US got rid of slavery, let women vote, allowed for constitutional review by SCOTUS, etc. Perhaps its not as robust as everyone would like, but it has worked out pretty well by historical standards. Companies can change faster than governmental bodies, which can change faster than spiritual institutions. Change too fast, you blow it up. Change too slowly, society moves on.
justmotteingaround
8mo ago
This literally begs the entire argument.
At one nanosecond after fertilization, has a person formed? Is the affirmative obvious and/or rational? If not, what about 2 nanoseconds? Should murder charges apply for disposed IVF embryos? Why don't we have funerals for every lost embryo? Should the State be able to enforce veganism? Etc, etc.
The State shouldn't be able to force behavior in accordance with unfalsifiable beliefs without broad consent/consensus from the governed - which is lacking with abortion. It's exactly the kind of thing that should be left to people's own mind.
justmotteingaround
9mo ago
how do you keep a strict diet without counting calories?
For me its getting really good at estimations after logging everything in a paid app for a couple of months. Now I just log my weight a few times a week, and the scale keeps me honest. Everything is a habit now. I cook most of the food I eat, and I think thats important. If I go out, I try to eat a filling snack before (veggies, fruit, low-cal smoothie, water, etc). I just assume the calories I consumed while out are double or triple my norm, so I just go hungry for a meal or two afterwards. If the scale is trending up, I just get more strict for the next week and see what happens. The key is never letting the weight creep back up.
so I figure 1g / kg will be sufficient; do you disagree?
I'd up the protein. Iirc the research shows that protein drives lean body mass and helps spare muscle. You may have more muscle than you think and probably want to save it as much as possible. I think you have a lot of headroom for additional calories and should be mindful of crashing, yo-yoing, and lowering your BMR for a few months. Whey and filtered milk (ie Fairlife)/water might be a good low carb protein and calorie adjustment; 40-50g protein, 6g carbs, and 250-300 calories. I don't know much about keto to say if 6g is too much. Also, I do know that people take keto supplements like magnesium for some reason.
I've thought about what you're trying; melt the fat then build back the muscle. The research convinced me to go the very slow route of 0.25-0.5% body-weight loss per week for 15-30 weeks. My base metabolic rate, satiety, and fitness should be exactly where I want it as soon as I'm done. But I love to cook and lift weights so it also suits me personally.
If you go for operation fat-melting, you should start a really dialed-in fitness routine when finished, which should take 4 months to figure out. Done correctly, that should stoke your metabolism. Then you can maintain easily (with keto or whatever). I've had friends that had success going this route. Eventually they found the keto too boring, but I eat a lot of repetitive meals so who knows. You'll gain water weight if you stop keto, which isn't something to worry about. Then just keep your eye on the scale. Best of luck.
As I mentioned before, I got most of my info from youtuber Jeff Nippard. He has a lot of videos going through quality research on diets, proteins requirements, cheat meals/compensatory overeating, rep-ranges, and progressive overload.
justmotteingaround
9mo ago
When the POTUS asks someone to overturn election results immediately after falsely notifying them that they are committing a serious crime if they don't, just chuck them in a jail cell for a decade to teach them about reckless disregard for the truth, and intimidating election officials.
justmotteingaround
10mo ago
It was amazing how much that question pissed off my acquaintances.
Seems more highly predictable than amazing. I'd save such questions for a more appropriate social context (ie here, among a different group), even if they're interesting. To borrow an imperfect analogy from the imperfect gender debate: momness is a spectrum. If the kids, father, and law all view the stepmom as a mom, then yeah, stepmom is pretty much a mom. Self ID doesn't work here because so much of momness is contained in others. Steven Dubner of Freakonomics fame has talked about adopting a kid (after having many kids the usual way). The kid was adopted near birth, and he says it was just as special.
justmotteingaround
1yr ago
While I can empathize with discontent caused by anti-Anglo identity politics, the claim that they have been pushed out every powerful position is so factually incorrect it borders on fantasy. Wealth, political power, judicial power, institutional power, and business power is overwhelmingly and disproportionately in the hands of Anglos. This is neither inherently good nor bad, but it can take thick skin to understand. I fail to see anything wrong with aspiring to achieve the highest ideals of the declaration of independence and US constitution.
justmotteingaround
1yr ago
but claim to have purchased yourself
This breaks the analogy because there is no legal theory where Trump can claim he owned the property, especially after he was no longer president. He didn't create the documents. His office may have, but it was probably created by the IC. Regardless, it's spelled out that he can't keep any of it after he leaves office. Sure, it might be mingled with personal effects which need to be separated, but he is legally required to give back State property. Of course he is allowed to dispute that he is allowed to keep it, but he can't refuse to show why.
justmotteingaround
1yr ago
A bunch of intelligence officials including the Obama's SecDef and the Director of the NSA sign an open letter declaring the laptop story to be a Russian disinformation
"We want to emphasize that we do not know if the emails, provided to the New York Post by President Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, are genuine or not and that we do not have evidence of Russian involvement
As much as I'd like to be skeptical of the IC, its hard to square these two claims.
justmotteingaround
2mo ago
While I think your initiative is extremely laudable, just know that the path ahead of you is fraught. You may have a serious medical issue which forums could exacerbate. But keep documenting things, trying new things, and taking the initiative. I'd recommend a heavy bias towards experts who can see you in person, even if you have to shop around for the ones that work for you. Cautionary note: cascades of care, and incidentalomas.
Lastly, this reads like you're looking for a simple fix that has a clear mechanistic explanation. Generally speaking, I would not expect such specificity, but keep trying to make things better.
So, here is a layman speculation (without knowing your age, weight:height, mood, stability, aerobic capacity etc).
sorta-permanent emotional numbness and pleasure deficiency.
This sounds like anhedonia. It could be hormones (testosterone, free-T, T:E ratio, various thyroid hormones, medications you are taking, cortisol, micro or macro nutrient deficiency). These can all be looked at in one blood panel. I'd start with a full workup from a GP. (and the results will give us amateurs more to (possibly dangerously) speculate about!)
It may be a neurotransmitter imbalance. This can be an appealing thought, as it seems to promise a clear mechanistic solution. IME, it isn't nearly so cut and dry. If you can get through your day without chaos, I'd investigate this last.
For now:
Consider cutting caffeine. It isolates one variable and should improve sleep. I won't sugar coat this, this is awful for a week or two. However, you'll get back good data quickly. Sleep is a miracle drug.
Consider following a balanced diet of whole foods with a tiny caloric surplus. Whole foods and sufficient calories are the goal.
Supplements: vit-D+k, zinc, and magnesium are the most common deficiencies. Might want to wait until after the blood panel. Creatine 5g per day because almost no harm, many potential benefits. L-citrulline (malate is fine). May improve blood flow at 10g per day. Glycine for sleep. NAC works for some to clear brain fog. Can also allegedly cause anhedonia (did neither for me). Prob some others but the supplement world is waaaay overhyped imo.
One-crazy-thing: Carnivore diet. Never tried it. Seems insane. The good: It's simple (but not easy) to adhere to. It's an elimination diet so fewer variables. Its radically not the same, perhaps resulting in different outcomes. Wide anecdotal support. The bad: most support is anecdotal. Its wild. Diarrhea for a week.
Again: have a bias towards experts in person, but keep the initiative. Its your life you're free to experiment and deviate. Best of luck.
justmotteingaround
7mo ago
Who thinks this represents either an improvements or degredation of cultural norms? Its pop art that served its utility at the time and might not work today, but it is an interesting cultural time capsul.
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Neutral. Maybe some people are asexual. I'll never care either way. If its caused by a medical issue, it sould be treated.
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Improvment. Probably best not to comment on hot kids at work. Calling someone passing and living as a gender the opposite is hugely unprofessional and a dick move.
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Improvement. Casual racism at work is a terrible idea.
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Improvement. Similar to above. Sexual innuendo is dubious in the workplace.
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Neutral. Euphemism treadmill. Tranny was acceptable enough at the time.
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Improvement. Dont mock peoples inherant differences, especially at work.
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Neutral. Its neither bad nor good that society is surprised by bisexuality.
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Improvement. Revenge porn and hacking are serious actions.
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Improvement. No need to overly bash the beliefs of most of society.
justmotteingaround
8mo ago
We should give climate science whatever veneration it earns. AFAIKT, it has produced results and useful predictions, but this is largely immaterial to what I'm talking about.
If there was Blah Science, researched for decades by tens of thousands of smart people who overwhelmingly agree that X is true, I'd bet on X being true.
My point: most people would bet on X being true in normal circumstances. People seem to make an exception for climate science. I'm curious why people make this exception.
I'm also curious if there are any other broad fields where this pattern holds. Things surrounding nutrition come to mind. Perhaps there are many, and what I'm calling special pleading is quite common.
justmotteingaround
9mo ago
Based on the source you provided it sounds like the outright majority of sexual abuse happens at school.
It does sound that way. And it might be that most sex abuse outside of family (most common iirc) happens in schools. However, my confidence on that proposition is proposition is quite low because of some bayesian reasoning. For example, the established prior is that men commit 80-90% child sex abuse. This is a high confidence, long standing datapoint. Because it's so heavily weighted towards males, any male dominated group should have dramatically more abuse. Like, my heart says the sources we have, but my math side says just default to maleness as a proxy.
Around the time of the Sandusky scandal I recall reading that some abusers spend years inserting themselves into professions which might have the ability to provide access, acting gregarious and helpful. Its all very frightening. The sources we have indicate waaaay to much abuse.
justmotteingaround
1yr ago
I lived in India for a year and became obsessed with the food, which is comparatively bland in the States. So, I learned to cook it myself. Indian food is all about the spice - heat as well as flavor. The key is good recipes and quality spices (which I eventually bought in bulk or at import stores because supermarket price/quality/quantity ratio's are expensive. Fresh Indian food is totally different form the restaurant stuff. My Lamb Rogan Josh is well liked by my fellow western friends (the key is large cubes of lamb imo).
My guess is that you're probably right; they might add more chili to heat up dishes for an Indian sounding names. I know they do this in Thai take out places. But it'll pale in comparison to making it at home (which will indeed smell for a few days).
justmotteingaround
2mo ago
I am optimistic, especially compared to what I gather is the median for themotte. I think institutional bias over fake racism claims is an issue, but Bayesian thinking leads me to think it cannot possibly be a primary concern (ie it cut the other direction for a long time so that is the initial given, and you update towards the current state with examples of it cutting the other direction. Sanity checking my guesswork seems to indicate that outcomes are in line with expectations, and have been for decades (given both the priors, and the explanatory assumptions of HBD). Each individual example of the current bias is infuriating, but I don't yet see dispassionate quantitative reasons to think it has large consequential effects (although I'm open to such reasons).
justmotteingaround
2mo ago
No I mean using that a explanation as a sorting or policy heuristic. Suboptimal imo. Take the analogy of gender differences and firefighters. Biology explains the difference. All else equal, males will make better firefighters in many circumstances. Is biology the best policy tool are political talking point. I'd argue no. Are there females who could make the cut? Sure. And hiring differences in firefighters has successfully defended against disparate impact (people will argue the test doesn't demonstrate a necessity, but I digress). There is prob a better analogy using evolution (explanatory) to sort or guide something is less optimal than extant sorting or guiding policies. Hope I'm clear enough. But yes, HBD is not a heuristic, but the OP opened that analogy.
If you want to say "HBD not racism or culture explains much of the disparate outcomes", then yeah, fine. I agree. Nevertheless, I'd argue that taking about it in political or policy debates is usually suboptimal imo because the flack (just and unjust), better tools, the fact that society is often sorted that way anyhow. HBD could really illuminate understanding of reality.
justmotteingaround
2mo ago
depend on either their outcomes being race-neutral
I may be wrong but I think this is explicitly untrue legally. AFAIK, if you can demonstrate a necessity of hiring in a way that causes a disparate impact, and your methods were not arbitrary (standardized tests are usually used as a defense), then it's perfectly legal.
Are there people making ignorant or bad faith cases about the arbitrariness of the standardized tests? Of course. But as far as I can tell, they lose in court.
justmotteingaround
5mo ago
I think it's me not pulling the slack out of the bar.
I was thinking something like that too, but I'm no expert. The straps are only to theoretically free up concentration on other body parts, and dial those in.
I usually "sit back" just before initiating the movement. My final cues are "big chest, chin neutral, sit back (this takes the slack out too), drive through the heeeeeeeeels". This keeps my hips low, makes for a better hip hinge for me, while accentuating leg drive. For practice I found that breaking up a set of 5ish into a set of "consecutive singles" to near failure (ie quickly re-set and fully re-cue after each rep) really helped me dial in my form and approach failure. My toes are mostly parallel, but I've been told this can come down to personal preference. Enjoy the trip!
justmotteingaround
7mo ago
Everything is on the table for change, but its not equally wise or good to change any aspect. The US nearly wrecked itself to get rid of slavery. Legal slavery in perpetuity probably wasn't a stable solution, and the US paid dearly to change a fundamental aspect of its operation, deleting the 3/5 compromise and adding new lines to its "code". The Catholic Church moved away from Latin mass because that was probably a sub-optimal configuration. If, in the year 2300, society has determined that being anti gay is as bad as being pro slavery, I'd bet that the Catholic church will bless gay unions, or something similar (its unlikely, but possible). Solutions like "making killing legal to solve murder" are generally unstable solutions to law and order institutions.
Well, just as a quick sanity check, which sects of Christianity are flying the rainbow flag right now?
Oh, I have no idea. I wasn't raised with a religion, and haven't really chosen one.
"progress towards what?"
Kurt Vonnegut would sarcastically argue its to make more plastic. Ellul would argue 'technique' is progressing to separate us from nature for its own ends. Dawkins would argue for the successful propagation of replicators. Steven Pinker would argue its a move towards less violence and loger, healthier lifespans. I'm closest to the latter arguments.
Not all changes are good just because they're changes
Agreed! Chesterton is a very wise part of the conversation. The pride-flying sects are either blowing themselves up, or evolving to a more stable structure. I think the latter, but who knows. The ACLU is blowing itself up imo, but FIRE is filling the void. The reactionary and unwise BLM movement is blowing up racial progress imo, but they seem to be cashing out. There may or may not be some wise findings in the debris (for example, I'm in favor of skepticism to police power, training standards, and attitudes, and I hope these change at the institutional level).
Should Christianity endorse Satan worship, if it increased it's chances for survival? Should progressives endorse white supremacy?
This sounds like should X become not X to survive. Not sure it fits. But say in the rubble of WW3 might progressives become totalitarian to put society back together. Yeah, but they won't claim to be progressives anymore. Have to run, getting increasingly less thoughtful.
Have they confirmed she is stepping down?
justmotteingaround
7mo ago
The people who say weed is some harmless wonder plant are annoying.
Agreed, but its worth considering that "weed is harmless" is a considerably better approximation of the truth than weeds classification as a schedule 1 nacotric in the US.
There are good reason to criticize family court. Divorce rape is a thing in need of wild reform. However, I think even modest proposals to abolish family court and usher in the return of some 19th century norms takes it a bit too far. Making only women responsible for the consequences of pregnancy (while rolling back abortion rights) is exactly the kind thing which might convince me that maybe a patriarchy does exist, and then I'd look silly so I'm against it on those grounds alone. As proposed, I really wouldn't want be a woman in that society.
Sweden has at least been talking about letting fathers abort responsibility up until 18 weeks; an incremental change in the right direction.
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