site banner
PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   6215 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for May 18, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

So, what are you reading?

Still on the Iliad and Dialectic of Enlightenment. Picking up McLuhan's The Classical Trivium.

Just finished Murderbot series. Very fun reading. I hope the author writes a dozen more, if she doesn't get tired of it.

Didn't you get tired of the politics? The first two stories or so were okay, but at some point it became abundantly clear to me that it isn't just a dark satirical setting, the author genuinely just thinks that capitalism is that terrible, and that everything would be better in communist feminist utopia.

I just ignored those parts. Given that most critique of the capitalism is given in the voice of the character which understands very little about how humans work and derives most of its knowledge on the subject from soap operas and actively avoids getting any personal knowledge there, on top of being beset by a rich bouquet of psychological issues, it can be even taken as a satirical critique of the contemporary (and, really, all) left. I am not sure if that was the author's intent, but it certainly lends itself to this way of reading.

That said, "evil megacorp" is a staple villain in SciFi, at least in the settings where corporations exist at all, so it's nothing really new. And in general, economics and politics is almost never properly explored at all - the author doesn't seem to be interested in how that all "free stuff" works on Preservation Alliance - you just reverse the polarity and apply transquantum flux capacitors. Same, never explored what exactly motivates the corps and how they work and why, or why they need so many humans working in "mines" at all, given how advanced their tech is. If one can't get over it, the range of enjoyable SciFi would be greatly reduced. Fortunately, all that stuff is pretty easily ignorable for me, and most of the content is not about that at all.

I didn't mind books 1-2 dystopian dark comedy style at all - quite the opposite, that is one of my favorite settings. I think that all ultra-large/monopolist organizations can easily go down terrible paths, and that obviously includes megacorps. Even in book 3, it started to become obvious to me that the author really hates capitalism in general, but it was still somewhat easy to ignore. But in book 5 the core plot itself is very much about how amazing the feminist environmentalist communist etc. preservation alliance is, how everything bad in the world is because of evil profit-maximizing companies, and how SecUnit just has to join the Klassenkampf to bring forward the great revolution and everything will be great. Also, I'd say that SecUnit is if anything somewhat constrained, it's the humans from the alliance who are worst.

Also, the author herself is openly very far left and has in interviews quite clearly talked about the anti-capitalist messages in the murderbot series.

how amazing the feminist environmentalist communist etc. preservation alliance is

For me it looked very light on details on how exactly amazing it is - like, how their economy actually works? I get it, everything is free and there's no money, but how does it work? Is it just a huge hippie commune? BTW, how huge - how many people actually live there - it is 100 people, a thousand, a million? Never discussed. Who's in charge and what being in charge actually means? How the governance works - who decides what to do and where the external money - which they use - come from, and who decides how much of that money is spent on what? There are some officers - like chief of police - but who appoints them and how? Pretty much none of that is covered except as a third-hand mention in passing by Murderbot who barely understands what it means and really can't even contextualize it, so it just accepts it as "it's how it is with those weird humans but it's my humans so whatever they do must be a good thing". Again, this looks very much like indoctrination process of a college freshman who's not great in critical thinking because it has been successfully educated out of him. This vagueness is a double edged sword and the Murderbot is explicitly an extremely unreliable narrator in all matters human.

the author herself is openly very far left and has in interviews quite clearly talked about the anti-capitalist messages in the murderbot series

That's why I usually avoid authors' interviews (and same for actors, producers, etc.) as much as I can. Usually nothing good comes from it but spoiling a good work of art.

Interestingly enough, in the movie they also felt the decision processes are not specified at all so they felt it's necessary to introduce a scene where Dr. Mensah essentially tells everybody what to do and then they stand in a circle, hold hands and hum (literally). Given that the show makers can be assumed to be extremely woke by default, it's interesting how they decided to present this. First, they obviously see the need to make decisions, and they go for the natural authoritarian approach (not even a vote!) but then they insert some kind of obscure ritual to woke-wash it and resolve the natural question of "how other people who have no decision power tolerate it?". Simply - they hum.

Started Unsong. It's a lot more fun than I was expecting.

Are you reading the web serial edition?

No, it's an epub.

Is it this one? https://www.amazon.co.uk/Unsong-Scott-Alexander-ebook/dp/B0D84DLKZW/

Can't say for certain but it looks like a match, yeah. Why do you ask?

He originally published it as a web serial novel. I was keen to read it, but I don't like reading on screens; however, someone helpfully compiled it into a print-on-demand version, which I bought and read a few years ago. Scott later made it available via Amazon himself, and I think this edition (the edition you're reading) has been edited per the description he outlined here (don't click this link if you want to avoid spoilers). I've bought a paperback copy of this edition and it's on my to-read list for this year. I'm curious to see how it differs from the print-on-demand edition I read years ago.

I'm also curious about what the new version looks like, though I read the web serial version.

Can't offer any input on my end, I was unaware there were different versions and I'd rather avoid seeing any spoilers by reading up on the changes.

If your copy of chapter 4 begins with "Even before Erica finished formally adjourning the meeting", you are reading the original web serial. If instead it reads "Even before Valerie finished formally adjourning the meeting", you are reading the edited book version.

More comments

I finished The Man in the High Castle last week. Pretty good, although I still preferred A Scanner Darkly. It made me want to play Wolfenstein The New Order again.

A few months ago I was asking for recommendations for books about Catharism. A few weeks ago it came up in conversation with my aunt, who recommended The Perfect Heresy, which I'm now about 30 pages into. It's a fascinating reminder that there's nothing new under the sun. If I told you I was reading a book about a faction of elites who:

  • believe that there's no distinction between men and women, and the thing that defines us is an ineffable immaterial essence
  • don't have children, a decision they justify on utilitarian grounds
  • practise a plant-based diet

am I talking about French heretics in the 12th century, or woke Western PMCs today?

The topic of this past Sunday’s homily at my parish touched on how Gnosticism is the great heresy from which many smaller heresies sprang.

Is that the one where it started out as some kind of heresy and then it kind of solidified into almost an ethnic group long after no one could even remember what the original heresy was? Or am I thinking of something else?

You’re thinking of the Cagots, who were treated like pariahs for hundreds of years. No one really knows why, as they seemed similar in every way to the surrounding population, except for pariah status, which besides the strict social segregation restricted their trade to carpentry.

This has led one writer to speculate they were the descendants of a fallen medieval guild of carpenters (?). There’s the national myth theory that makes them the descendents of the muslim warriors who lost to Charles Martel when he stopped the islamic expansion in 732. There’s one etymological-based theory where they were the slaves of the ancient visigoths (“cani gothi”, dogs of the goths). There’s the reverse uno card theory that says they were the first to convert to christianity and the surrounding pagans kept resenting them for their virtue signaling long after they themselves converted.

But one of the top theories is that they were descendents of cathars. And the imo most likely, is that they were descendents of lepers, because a lot of the prohibitions involve touching.

I'm not sure, you may be thinking of something else.

Just finished Surface Detail from the Culture series. Kind of stunned by Iain Banks' forecasting. Of course the invention of consciousness upload means we would create everlasting Hell for some people to go to. Probably it'll happen 5 minutes after the guy who invents consciousness upload wins his Nobel Prize.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats