site banner
PaperclipPerfector  13hr ago (text post)   468 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for June 5, 2026

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

What's your score on the Cambridge Face Memory Test? https://www.bbk.ac.uk/psychology/psychologyexperiments/experiments/facememorytest/startup.php

I got just 56% and the difficulty spike between the first and the second parts was insane to me, I went from "I guess I'm not face blind" to "I better not be asked to pick one of the six perps out of a lineup" in a second.

I got 83%, but yeah the spike in difficulty for that last part was unreal. I swear some of those where just pixelated 3D shapes on some gradient where it was all the same face in increasing levels of gaussian noise. Reminds me of looking at diffusion model outputs.

My father has been claiming he's face blind for a year now, time to put this in the family chat and find out how much.

I got 83%, but yeah the spike in difficulty for that last part was unreal. I swear some of those where just pixelated 3D shapes on some gradient where it was all the same face in increasing levels of gaussian noise.

Same results, and I agree. Some of those by the end were just blobs with almost no identifying features.

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