self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
I'm a transhumanist doctor. In a better world, I wouldn't need to add that as a qualifier to plain old "doctor". It would be taken as granted for someone in the profession of saving lives.
At any rate, I intend to live forever or die trying. See you at Heat Death!
User ID: 454
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Still alive and kicking 🤞
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Even with my minimal interest in being there, I'm always happy when I see the untamed corners of the internet flourish, or at least live to fight another day. Seeing actual unfiltered human output, even if 90% of it is painfully juvenile, is a breath of fresh air. May the agrarians Down Under And To The Side stay online even in the face of perfidy and outrage haha
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
The same to you my man, see you around at Heat Death haha
Disclaimer: I'm not an EA myself, but happen to still be quite fond of them as a whole.
Nothing here seems to warrant comparing EA to wokism in particular, you could make a similar argument about pretty much any activist movement, from Communism all the way to the Alt-Right.
Pretty much any such movement of consequence has used vivid imagery of ongoing injustices and how you, yes you right there, with a little bit of self-sacrifice and gumption, can make a difference. Calling the movement's followers unusually moral or astute is hardly new either.
I can't think of any more pertinent reasons to associate them that aren't superficial, a reasonable example would be the ~100 million USD grant that GiveWell threw to woke activism, something they eventually desisted from even before others with EA tore them a new one, coached in the exceedingly polite manner of most EA discourse.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Oh you're in for a treat, VR exercise is what you're looking for.
A purchase of an Oculus Quest 2, new at ~$499, is enough to get you access to a whole new world of exercise games.
There are great ones like Beat Saber, which is a guaranteed workout, no end of boxing games, games with virtual athletics, such as Gorilla Tag, the list goes on and on.
Even "normal" VR titles are inherently more physically demanding than flat-screen titles, and there's so much out there you won't run dry for years.
You don't need a powerful PC, the Quest 2 works standalone as well as tethered, and given your particular needs I can wholeheartedly recommend it!
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Has anyone reached out to Scott?
It's been a long time since he enacted the ban on CW discussions on his site and the SSC sub, given the NYT debacle, maybe he's slightly less worried about being PC these days?
While I don't think it's more likely than not that he'll agree, it's still worth a shot, given that The Motte has always had close ties to its roots.
(Similar argument for the SSC sub, is there any overlap in moderation nowadays?)
I'm in love
I've got butterflies in my stomach, and bees in my bonnet, I'm giggling like a schoolgirl despite being a hairy 6 foot tall man, well past the age where I could sneak into a high school and hope to avoid notice haha.
She's lovely, the more we talk, the more I feel like she was sculpted from clay just for me, with a few little imperfections just so they won't realize an angel went missing and send someone to recall her. She's 3 years older, not that I mind because a childhood spent locked up in a Christian-run school has left me with a MILF complex haha; though I'd have believed her if she said she was 18, and she can sneak into class anytime she pleases.
She's really smart, funny, and most importantly, laughs at my shittiest jokes and looks at me like I'm the only one in the world after I make them. That's shortly before she grabs me by the beard and pulls me in for a smoldering kiss that leaves me gasping for breath and one more for the road.
I wake up slightly terrified that this was all a dream, a figment of my imagination conjured up by stress and fatigue from my marathon-length sprint for a medical licensing exam. I've only felt this way once before, for a girl I loved long and deep for an unfairly long length of time, before I realized that she wasn't at all the person I had built up in my head.
They look similar too, they could have been sisters, both of them petite and with eyes I could gaze into till mine went dry and dusty. But she's fierce, a fighter, confident and assured, she's got her ducks in a row and and her feet planted on Terra Firma. I stand behind her with a proud smile on my face when she haggles with random street vendors, and then I hug her when she looks so proud of her bargaining skills, even as the poor shopkeeper wonders bemused why he ever agreed to sell half his wares at a loss. Lucky that I have nothing to sell to her, if she asked nicely I'd give her everything for free.
I adore everything about her, from her nails, ragged as they are from being bitten, to her hair, still frizzy from chemo, to her tiny, barely there dimples when she smiles before standing on tiptoe to kiss me long and hard. When she told me that the first she kissed me, she'd stopped listening to my passionate lecture on the musth secretions of elephants long ago, and was looking all adoring because I was so cute, I was both embarrassed and wanted to curl up in a ball and die of happiness. Half the reason I'm laying it all out in a public forum is to leave a record of how I feel in the moment, one I can look back to in a few years with either a smile or a small tear in my eyes.
I really hope this works out, I've never been so lovesick in my life, I genuinely want to be a better person, the kind of person she deserves and needs.
We're going to be living together in the UK for a month soon, that's a trial by fire for any relationship, let alone one this brand new. But guys I'm really hoping that it works out, that this is it, and I wish everyone finds someone that makes them feel this way, love really is a helluva drug.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I was circumcised at around 7 or 8 due to phimosis, or so my parents thought. I don't really recall being inconvenienced in the least, so when I had surgery for appendicitis, and woke up missing my foreskin, I certainly was bemused to say the least! My brother had a similar issue, but he grew out of it, and still rocks a hooded cobra.
I don't know if it had any effect on sexual enjoyment, I still enjoy it as much as any red blooded young man. I am mildly thankful that I don't have to worry so much about keeping a foreskin clean, the idea of dick cheese/smegma is a nightmare haha.
Since there's no tradition of circumcision in my culture, I have little to no interest in circumcising my kids, unless medically indicated. However, it wasn't too painful, I had to go around for a week holding up my pants till the skin healed and the crust fell off, but overall it's not a particularly traumatic event or one I worry about. As a doctor, I certainly appreciate my circumcised patients, much easier to insert a catheter without faffing about retracting the foreskin!
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
That's extremely reassuring to hear! I knew he still harbored a soft spot for us, even after all the shit he was through. Thanks for letting me know.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Bwahaha, all I can say is that being a genuine nerd can be sexy at times, you just need to find someone who cares (easier said than done!).
I was waxing eloquent on elephant culture, we were pretty sloshed by then, as much as a calf trying to use the waterhole for the first time. I have no idea how that topic even came up, but it was hardly the most esoteric thing we discussed that day in the bar, hardly even top 5 material.
If anyone wants to try it (no warranty provided implied or otherwise), I was talking about the phenomenon of juvenile delinquency displayed by adolescent male elephants after being orphaned, and left without a single older male in their herd after poachers struck. They went wild and aggressive, attacking calves, and even murdering rhinos for sport.
The solution to that was to ship in a few adult males, who came by and whipped the teens into shape like an uncle restraining some kids on a bender. I'm pretty sure I was making a compelling argument about the similarity to humans who were raised in the absence of proper father figures, but if there was a final point being reached, it was swiftly derailed when she grabbed my goatee and pulled me in for a kiss that sucked all the air out of my lungs and probably the room.
I was so happy that I wasn't even deflated when she said she'd stopped paying attention several minutes ago, and was just admiring the sheer passion and animation with which I was discussing elephant graveyards and toxic masculinity in pachyderms (anyone needs to name their band?).
She's a keeper, that's for sure. Maybe an elephant keeper, now that I think about it <3
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I need to give the second part of the UK medical licensing exam, the PLAB, in Manchester. It's the only site where it's conducted, as opposed to Part 1, which is held in dozens of locations and I could have pretty much walked to mine.
So Manchester it's going to be for at least 3 of those 4 weeks. Ideally, if all goes well and we've got some money and time on our hands we'll visit other parts of the UK, it's been ages since I was last there. I think you're based in London aren't you? I seem to dimly recall hearing that, unless it was just that Burdensome Count guy who resided there.
As for where we'll stay inside the city, it's going to be accomodations affiliated with the coaching academies that help everyone prepare for their OSCEs, or if we're in the mood to splurge, an Airbnb or two. This should be in November/December, and I'm already shivering at the thought of the cold haha.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
While I broadly agree that this is a common phenomenon in the West, I wanted to say that this disdain for dialects is less prevalent/important in India.
We've got a fuck-ton of dialects, which isn't a surprise given the thousands of distinct languages we have. As such, there really isn't all that much discrimination on the basis of dialect, and whatever there is usually mild, like girls speaking Hindi who seek to emulate the posh South Delhi Girl accent (exactly equivalent to the Valley Girl accent in the US).
If I had to guess, that's largely a consequence of the normal linguistic diversity, hard to care about accents when you hear 3 or 4 different languages on a daily basis.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Hmm? Not really. I have sensation in the glans, it's much less sensitive than it used to be (I remember the sensation of it rubbing against clothing being unbearable just after the circumcision), but it's not numb, far from it.
I prefer being stimulated on the shaft, by a large margin, but I wouldn't say that the glans or the margin is useless. I'm pretty sure uncircumcised guys also use their shaft more than the glans, not that I was old enough to try that when it happened.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Haha, thank you for the excellent suggestion! I'll make sure to have a permanent record made, and to keep it close to my heart, just as close as I keep her.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
There's an ass for every seat, I genuinely hope you find someone who makes your head spin when they smile some day!
And I am grateful, will do my best not to mess up what seems to be the start of something beautiful ❤️
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I'm pretty sure that post-scarcity is post-scarcity for the most pressing human needs, namely food, shelter, health care etc. It also extends to things further up Maslow's Pyramid, primarily by virtue of more time and energy being freed up for self actualization, when we're not worried about starving to death or being homeless.
There's going to be no way that any given modern baseline human can ever exhaust all of the above in a Kardashev 1/2 civilization that didn't just expand their population to the (gigantic) Malthusian ceiling that implies.
Now, humans will almost certainly develop more expensive tastes, and who the hell knows what a transhuman/AGI might want.
But other than most fervent techno-optimists, nobody thinks we'll be literally post-scarcity for everything, merely the things we find scarce today. I'm sure if you want a personal stellar mass blackhole, or a basement universe, even the most powerful AGI will cock an eyebrow and go "Aight fam, I'll put you on the waitlist for that 🙄".
(Of course, more reasonable sapients would just VR like a civilized person, but the while point of post scarcity is so people don't have to be so damn reasonable and sensible, and economically productive anymore.)
To imagine otherwise would be to expect us to conquer entropy itself, which is something I'm not pinning my hopes on.
So yeah, I'm imagining a society where the average person has, with no strings attached, has more wealth and power than a modern billionaire can hope for. Nobody starves, nobody finds themselves without a place to stay indefinitely, nobody dies of preventable illness.
The fact that it's not literally infinite stuff is, at the end of the day, unpleasant, but hardly unbearable is it?
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Pretty much every natural philosopher/scientist before the 20th century counts, they were pretty much all "amateurs" who conducted experiments as a hobby, and were largely independently wealthy gentlemen who could afford such esoteric pursuits.
Newton, Darwin, barring a few of the more entrepreneurial types in the US in the late 19th century, they should all be considered dilettantes by modern standards.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I can't say Hlynka ever made me seethe, or I saw him give others a reason to. We have grossly irreconcilable worldviews, and he wasn't always great at expressing his, but I never got the impression that he was intentionally yanking on chains to get a reaction.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I'm not sure the degree is doing anything for you? It seems that instead of being flexible, it's outright redundant, or just a placeholder for doing something else.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I swear by levocetrizine, with or without Montelukast.
It's a miracle cure for rhinitis as far as I'm concerned, I took one today for dust allergies, and I've even used it to good effect for covid, it reduces colds to almost imperceptible levels. You can get it OTC and it ought to do wonders!
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I wasn't aware that it made things easier when it came to patent law, thanks for the clarification. I thought you were alluding to what you meant in the second paragraph of this reply, but I didn't quite see how your anecdotes supported it at the time, thanks!
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
Well, you're not putting the in in incel, because you're being voluntarily celibate.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1yr ago
I would wager that it's largely because of the forum culture/subreddit culture. People don't usually expect their interlocutors to be acting in good faith, and are thus more defensive/less interested in a dialogue than they are in TheMotte and other rat-adjacent fora.
For example, a poorly phrased/apparently snide question would get a much more considered response around these parts due to the extension of charity and reward for good faith interactions, as opposed to likely being ignored or responded to with worse elsewhere.
An Indian Abroad in the UK
There's a Union Jack flying outside my window, juxtaposed against a generally dismal sky, lead gray and swollen with cold rain, just yearning to ruin the aspirations of fresh-faced visitors who would love to picnic in the back garden.
I suppose that's as good a mood as any for writing this post, having spent a week settling in, staring wide-eyed at the way the odd billion or so first-world denizens spend their lives, even in a country that's in genteel decline from its glory days.
Long-time readers here might recall my previous posts from my time in India, as I went from a fresh-faced intern to a cynical, bitter survivor of what passes for medical care there. For those who don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of all moderately-decent posts ever posted on /r/TheMotte, here's a link to my repost on /r/Medicine, since Reddit's abominable search function makes it impossible to dredge up the original, which had one of the few comments Scott makes in these parts on it, still a highlight of my Reddit career:
https://old.reddit.com/r/medicine/comments/j30vj2/my_experience_as_a_frontline_doctor_in_a_3rd/
At the time of writing, I was still yearning for escape from India, a squalid, small-minded and parochial place (although, if I had really wanted to, I could have mostly insulated myself from the worst of it, all that takes is tons of money and a willingness to ignore the human shit and suffering in-between expeditions from one enclave to anotjer).
And I'm not entirely home free, so far, I've passed one of the two licensing exams I need to practice in and emigrate to the UK, but pass that one I did, after studying harder than I ever have in my life (because I cared goddamnit, unlike all the times before when I was coasting through simply because it was expected of me), and in an example of positive reinforcement, it paid off, and I'm spending over a month in the UK, prepping for the second, which can only be given in-country because it's OSCE based.
But I've actually left India, and spent enough time here that I can collect some of my thoughts and musings while the awe has yet to wear off.
You know the first thing I noticed after landing here?
How fucking clean London was. No, really, some Indian cities have tried to clean up their act, but the sheer neatness and tidiness of the place was deeply disconcerting to me. I felt as if I was intruding somewhere I wasn't meant to be, a place kept lovingly clean with the devotion given only to private property back home.
The airport experience wasn't particularly different, most countries take pains to set high standards for their international terminals, being the place where many foreigners make their first and only impressions.
But having boarded the tube, still clutching our luggage close, I stared intently at everything around me, how clean and well-maintained it all was, the drastic improvement in the quality and grammar of all the text I could read, the superior typography of all the advertising.
Relatives who had been in the country had also instilled paranoid notions of how run-down and dangerous the neighborhood (full of immigrants) I was going to live in was. Either they were completely ignorant, or simply clinging to an outdated perception of the place, but it was a sleepy, pretty place, only the skin colors of the locals and endless arrays of convenience stores touting their "afro-caribbean" meats and spices that reinforced that. Still plenty of happy families and expensive cars parked outside, so I quickly dismissed their paranoia.
Oh, and closely tied for second place in terms of things that leapt out at me is how utterly multicultural the UK is. I certainly had heard about it, it would be lax of me to plan to move over without doing my research, and I was somewhat concerned about being buttonholed with other South Asians, but the sheer ease and comfort with which people of grossly different ethnicities interact was cool to see!
Third, but certainly not the least, was how streamlined and easy to use the public transport system was. The London tube certainly seemed intimidating with its half a dozen different lines, but once I examined the maps more carefully, I was able to get the hang of it quite quickly.
The buses run on time, with minimal hassle, and just while the prices certainly seemed steep to my Indian sensibilities, they make sense in context. Not seeing people crushing each other or arguing with a conductor about stops was a shock, leaving aside the fact that the buses themselves didn't drive like maniacs haha.
And London is goddamn empty, no seriously, even if I'm staying in a relatively sleepy part of the place, Central London was practically deserted I'm comparison to the metropolitan cities I'm used to. Traffic seemed minimal, and pedestrians were hardly the crushing mass I expected. Perhaps I need to visit New York again in order to dispel my uneasiness..
And people are generally law abiding. My girlfriend and I probably jaywalked and gave some of the local drivers an aneurysm before we realized that people actually cross the streets in an organized manner, whereas zebra crossings are more of a suggestion than a rule back home.
Oh, and nobody let loose on their horn at us, in fact, I hardly hear them at all! This is fucking alien to me, in India, horns are considered to be an extension of the driver, and the first and last resort for self expression.
Driving fast? Toot.
Driving slow? Toot.
Feeling annoyed? TOOT
Just want to express your sheer gratitude for existence and having a motor vehicle? A little toot for the road.
That sheer cacophony is the Cosmic Microwave Background Noise as far as I'm concerned, and its absence is unsettling haha.
On top of that, people seem quite polite and considerate, albeit that's been my experience with people in general. I guess I look too intimidating to fuck around with, but plenty of people offered helpful unsolicited advice when we ran into issues due to our ignorance as tourists, and it was all deeply appreciated.
We did a round of the local supermarkets, and I was absolutely blown away by the sheer variety on offer, like goddamn, you lot have better Indian cuisine than we do! And it's so convenient, everything comes nicely packaged, you can just buy freshly prepared tandoori chicken without needing to mix up half a dozen spices at home. I can empathize with Gorbachev, the West really does things better.
Also, being a couple is absolutely stress free. My girlfriend and I have been extremely risqué even back home, doing absolutely Bollywood-tier stunts like kissing on a moving train while I was on the platform. Thankfully, nobody made a fuss about it then, barring some dirty looks, but the fact of the matter is that nobody cares about us here, I can kiss her and hug her out in the streets or in the bus without a single fuck given (which I can't say about back in our room ;) )
There's hardly any dust to speak of, I could barely open my windows back home without ending up with noticeable coatings, whereas it's been a week and we don't even need to vacuum or dust.
There's also a notable lack of crushing poverty, it's hard to tell at a glance who is working-class, struggling, or quite wealthy. No signs of any homeless, not that the winter would be kind to them.
But you know what I miss the most, something ubiquitous in India?
Bidets.
Toilet paper is absolutely barbaric. Like seriously, what quirk of history made it so that wiping your ass with paper of all things is taken for granted? How does anyone keep their ass remotely clean?? At this point, the modern Western fetish of eating ass is probably the largest health hazard I can think of hahaha. That's the first thing I'm going to get when I find a place of my own, mark my words.
(This paragraph ought to elevate my post to the level of Culture Warring, if nothing else does haha)
But throwing some heavy shade on my happiness is the slow-motion implosion of the NHS, my employer-to-be for the foreseeable future. The situation is getting pretty bad, elective lists for surgery were already backed up for 2 weeks, now there's serious thought being given to simply unloading patients in the parking lot from the ambulance given the lack of room indoors. People spending a dozen hours in the A and E is commonplace, and even a day or more is a distressingly common occurrence. There are plans to strike in Jan, which I'm not able to participate in, but you bet your ass I would if I could. Things are rapidly becoming untenable, with either a massive shakeup (or more likely a collapse of the NHS followed by privatization) being on the cards.
And you know what? If the NHS did fail, it would still be superior to conditions back home. Please, read my previous post if you want to know what healthcare looks like for a billion odd people, with maybe a couple hundred million able to receive care to a standard that wouldn't provoke a lynch mob in the West.
And the UK is far from the richest part of the West. Americans have significantly more wealth, and salaries are pathetic compared to their US counterparts.
So what if it's in (debatable) decline? As painful as it must seem, there's just so much room before you even approach Third World conditions. Like seriously, you guys have no idea how much worse things can get before it gets that bad.
At any rate, I'm just grateful that the end of my time in India is in sight, and I'm studying my ass off for my last exam, motivated by my sheer dissatisfaction at home, and even more by the absolute utopia that the UK is in comparison. (My girlfriend wishes to add that in her absence I'd be eating microwaved meals and hardly studying, so much love to her 😘)
Here's to things not getting as bad as home, and may I not have to refer to India as that any longer!
I'm touched to be called out by name, and am certainly more than happy to remain one of the resident transhumanists!
More options
Context Copy link