site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   805 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for October 2, 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.

1
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Watched Overman: The Meaning of Life on Eliezer Yudkowsky's mention. It was pretty good! Definitely at least as watchable as the average Hollywood superhero movie. I loved the part where Overman is flying around stealing random people's powers to a catchy tune, and at least the climax didn't come down to a big fistfight.

Eliezer's comments:

There goes Hollywood.

Context: I rolled my eyes and tried watching this AI gen YouTube suggested. It was kind of cliched and a bit predictable but I didn't downvote and leave immediately as I'd expected.

Then I looked up when it was done and 28 minutes had passed.

Ooh ooh, you spotted a flaw! Great! Remember when AIs couldn't draw hands WELL? But they could draw hands AT ALL? And then TIME happened and it was SIX MONTHS LATER?

I mean it is garbage but it is borderline sufferable which was not the case with previous attempts. That means that the moat of billion dollar productions will hold for another year probably maybe hopefully.

The pace of releases has increased relative to what it was three years ago.

He beats the US armed forces handidly, his powers increase exponentially since then, but Japan's leader thinks she can nuke him. I suppose Chinese domestic natrative portrays Japan as being more indepedent from the US as it is in reality.

Chinese are appearently big on AI generated TV drama, at least according to this tweet which cites .cn sites, so I assume it is at least somewhat close to true.

the climax didn't come down to a big fistfight.

The "interdimensional entity", the last external adversary, is defeated by a literal punch.

Edit: The video linked by Yud was not uploaded by the movie's author and is geavily monetised, lots of ads. This one's uploader is the movie's director.

spoiler

I was wondering if one asian government was standing in for another one that the author couldn't talk about or criticize in any way without tripping censors.

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