site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   1757 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 28, 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.

1
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I bought a mechanical automatic watch from Temu for 26 euro. I am sucker for observing movements in action. I was pleasantly surprised by the polish and the clarity with which you see the mechanism working inside. What are yours - I am amazed at the bang for buck findings?

My take is that we are going to see watches with similar levels of polish and accuracy as an omega watch selling for 1500 dollars from Chinese brands.

https://www.seagullwatchcompany.com/movements

You can buy a watch with even better accuracy than an omega for about thirty bucks.

Fancy watches are primarily a status symbol. Mechanical watches as a whole are basically obsolete anyway. So it doesn’t really matter that you can get one with roughly the same mechanism quality on Temu. The last time anyone bought a Rolex solely because they needed a good reliable watch was around 1968.

I am continuously amazed at how dirt cheap precision engineering has become. I am sucker for gears going brrr too. Even if I become Elon Musk rich I will never wear mechanical watch - wearing a rolex means you are a person that wears rolex, which is hardly a compliment - but damn if I won't be patron to some of the best horologists just to go berserk and see what can be done in purely mechanical way just for the lulz.

wearing a rolex means you are a person that wears rolex, which is hardly a compliment

That’s the way the Rolex brand is now. For a long time Rolex was what was called a “tool watch”. That is, just a good accurate watch that you would wear because you were in a profession where you needed to be precise about time. Che Guevara wore a Rolex when he was tramping through the jungle, because you don’t want to whiff an attack because your watch lost eight minutes and you sent the reserve element in at the wrong time. Divers would use them a lot too, because when you’re calaculating oxygen reserves you need to be accurate.

Over time that reputation for good quality gave Rolex some cachet, and it gradually morphed into the gaudy status symbol it is now.

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