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No_one
20hr ago
Would you believe Russian theories about some silly yacht and I dunno, Serbians if their warships were observed lurking over a future bomb site ? No, you wouldn't. You can't expect anyone to believe these paper-thin denial and deflections.
I'm very curious on your original assertion, that Ukrainians as a class are bitter on the US forcing them into fighting Russia, when they had no hope and it has gone so badly for them - taking half a million deaths in the process, such that suggesting Ukraine is right to fight and America is right to help them would therefore earn you their hatred. To me that sounds the same probability as "I'm Johnny Walker, from Texas Oblast, and I think that the USA is stupid to provoke the mighty Russian bear" as a being a genuine statement on US citizen's views on foreign policy - that's the inglourious basterds three fingers meme right there on every level. It's just... Russian signaling all the way through. Are you sure these are Ukrainians?
But to be fair, you also asked me a question. These warhawks have been fighting, have family fighting, and broadly support conscription when I asked them, though there was some discussions about draft dodging. Maybe they are foolish or p-zombies, but I myself am British, and so there's something very impressive about people paying a price and are willing to pay it to go fuck you to a fucked up bully even as others think you're foolish (1939-41 were our best and worst years). I do note they've done a lot better than anyone expected, aren't done yet, and have proven that even Russia can really bleed, they've done magnificently. I don't think of them as sheep or conformist, possibly to a fault - one issue of cossacks is they can be like herding cats, but they certainly have a common enemy today (even if they want Zelensky out tomorrow).
Maybe sober reality will make them regret their actions, but honestly, I think the fact Ukraine made itself into a very unwelcome meal for Russia is unlikely to be regretted, and they are proud so far of what their country has done (which includes rolling over the 4th Guards tank div, which is one of the funniest things to have happened to a power that claims to be super in a very very long time, imagine if a US armored division was routed in the Gulf war and their tanks captured to a degree that the Iraqi army could restock vs pre war, the T-80U is now on the endangered species list).
Finally, and this is utterly vital to stress, they also clearly have their own agency. Ukraine chose this, for better or for worse.
I like the fuckers, it's vibes for me, and I think while this is hard pounding, they may well pound the longest. I think it would be good if they do.
sarker
It isn't happening, and if it is, it's a bad thing
20hr ago
Is there a way to quantify "use value"? If not, this seems to be a rhetorical trick. Why would I care about a notion of value that exists simply to win arguments about communism?
Dean
Flairless
20hr ago
We strongly disagree on who serious people are, so that's not surprising.
Dean
Flairless
20hr ago
You are doing the motte-and-bailey language game again, where you make grasping claims you'll walk back when challenged. We could do that point noting what has changed in the last 75 years, or in the last year, and so on. We can do it with different types of relationships, or even what different terms for government mean.
Really, though, it just goes back to the hyperagency bias. Keep on keeping on with it.
sarker
It isn't happening, and if it is, it's a bad thing
20hr ago
netstack
Texas is freedom land
20hr ago
Please keep it civil, and make your points without the personal attacks.
sarker
It isn't happening, and if it is, it's a bad thing
20hr ago
Yougov: https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/Worst_World_Leaders_poll_results.pdf
68% have an unfavorable view of Stalin, with only 26% undecided (a subset of which presumably have not heard of him).
Edit: stefferi beat me to it.
Arnaud
20hr ago
the ancient Christians, who steamrolled over the strength-is-beauty-is-justice pagan ethos of Rome, did not need mustache-twirling wordcels in high places berating anyone on their behalf to gain followers, nor did the French Revolution with its cries for égalité.
I'm going to take issue with both examples here, both nascent Christianity and especially the French Revolution had wordy intellectuals at the hearts of their movements. Robespierre wasn't just selling like, vibes man.
FtttG
20hr ago
My second draft is well underway. So far I've cut out 18% of the first draft, representing over 15k words - more, actually, as while cutting I've been adding in some details as I go. Would love to have the second draft ready by the end of the month, but it may not be until the end of the first week of August.
WhiningCoil
Ghost of Quokka's Future
20hr ago
You know, I floated that by the wife, and she wasn't a fan. These were really for her, so she gets them how she wants them.
But man, it was fun flexing some craftmanship on those back slots. Used a spacer to make sure they were exactly 24" on center apart to match the studs they'd attach to. Outlined the brackets with a marking knife, hogged out the middle with a router, and then finished up with a freshly sharpened chisel. Was a perfect fit. Probably couldn't slide a playing card in there.
Edawayac_Tosscount
20hr ago
I assent to everything you said, albeit without any of the prerequisite expertise to give me proper knowledge. In short, and I hope this does not do your piece a rhetorical disservice, I vibe with it.
I've dealt with the products of the current AI paradigm as a mere enthusiast, watching 4chan /g/ threads from about 2021 and onward, looking on with both excitement and disappointment as text and imagegen models, though both increasingly easy to deploy in reduced scope on consumer hardware and increasingly capable when developed and hosted by professionals, nonetheless retained epistemic and recollective issues that, while capable of being papered over with judicious use of the context window and ever-more training data processing power and storage, nonetheless gave me the impression that there was a fundamental kink in the underlying implementation of mainstream "AI" that would prevent that implementation from ever achieving the messianic (or demonic, or, at the very least, economic) hopes foisted onto it.
That said, I'm provisionally materialist, so barring me becoming convinced of the human soul I don't see why in principle software couldn't achieve incredible intelligence, either by your definition of it or in some more nebulous sense. I'm just thoroughly disappointed by the hopes piled onto (and consumer software & web services tainted by) the current "AI" bandwagon.
crushedoranges
Can Marx explain the used panties market?
20hr ago
Noted.
FtSoA
20hr ago
I think the ROC is a bit more deluded than the PRC at this point, lol. The PRC clearly won the civil war, just didn't quite get the chance to invade Taiwan like they did Hainan and establish 100% control over the map.
But yes, the "unresolved status of Taiwan" is a pleasantly functional fiction.
Supah_Schmendrick
20hr ago
The US Army is so far behind we're bragging about just being able to drop grenades from drones
Why assume the public-facing releases are actually the state of the force?
I've watched people I identify with (Orthodox Christians) be ethnically cleansed out of the Middle East in my lifetime. The priest who taught me chant fled to the US after having ISIS kill 6 members of his parish in Syria. The USA spent decades aiming to bring down Assad, and for what? What was so bad about Assad? Assad was not Orthodox, but neither was he a persecutor of us.
Russia wanted Syria to be stable so that Christians would be protected and so that they could earn oil profits together. The USA wanted Jihadis to overthrow the Syrian government in order to... in order to...
You know, I'm not sure what the point is. As far as I can tell, it's to line the resumé of some apparatchik in the State Department. Too bad thousands of people have to die and an ancient culture has to be wiped out for that.
I get tired of praying for my friends' family members who are in mortal peril due to US policy choices.
I'm still a bit unclear on whether you think increasingly efficient production is a good in and of itself,
I used to, but I do not anymore. Increasing efficiency is still pretty close to a primary goal, though.
However its a prerequisite to many, MANY good things. Some of those things result in less efficient use of resources, however (broadly speaking, leisure/leisure activities).
What kinds of other things?
Have they invented the wheel yet? If so, lot of things they can work on with wheel tech available.
If not, it slightly increases the odds of someone stumbling upon that invention.
That's closer to my conception (contra Hegel et. al) of how society ends up improving changing.
What if we could hypothetically assume an eternal universe? What then?
From my perspective, seems obvious: develop tech as close to immortality as you can, then go travel around to see all you can see that's out there. Unless we can mathematically prove that we'll eventually saturate our desire for 'fun' and novelty, and we can't augment those desires, seems like one can make good use of eternity tooling around the galaxies looking for cool stuff.
If we start talking like "the best man is the one who sires the most children", then all we've done is smuggle the same language of marketplace efficiency into a new domain.
I kind of use it in the broad sense of "there exist some people who can trace their genetic background to you (and beyond) and thus will acknowledge your existence long after you're gone."
Add in some sci-fi, and it becomes "you have descendants who might be interested enough in stuff that happened in your lifetime to run a simulation of you, assuming they can't resurrect you directly."
I dunno, I'm not trying to impose my terminal values on everyone else. To the extent people have different terminal values, increasing the amount of energy and resources available to people, and increase the efficiency with which we use them means more people can chase their preferred terminal values without stepping on each other's toes/inciting conflicts.
As I asked, what use does Marxism have on offer for any rational human being, other than perhaps allowing incisive critiques of the flaws in a Capitalist system which we can then try to address and fix within said system?
All the stuff I'm suggesting up there are achievable within Capitalism.
Supah_Schmendrick
21hr ago
in 2014 we got strong allies in the region
Er, I think "strong" is a bit optimistic - Ukraine was and remains a comparatively backward, deindustrializing, poor, and corrupt country with horrible demographics.
TIRM
21hr ago
My public K-12 education had 0 hours on Hitler. It had no WW2 history at all. We went over Japanese internment quite a bit. But somehow not the theaters of war or Hitler. Which seems like an obvious gap.
5434a
21hr ago
rounded the front edge where the J-Bracket comes up so that it sits perfectly flush
It's too late now but it would look extra nice if they had slots all round so that the bracket fitted seamlessly into the shelf. Could still do the undersides.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
21hr ago
This is a wonderfully pedantic stance you're taking. The PRC is viewed by everyone, except the ROC, as the One True Chinese Government.
The One China policy is a diplomatic fiction. Despite it, the US maintains, and always has since recognizing the PRC, "unofficial" relations with ROC. In as much as relations can be "unofficial" when they're backed by official statute. The US does not recognize the PRCs claims over the territory controlled by the ROC.
The ROC has not tried to formally define itself as a separate country (though some want to). Or give up it's claims to the mainland.
Indeed, the ROC claims all the territory held by the PRC in its constitution. This doesn't mean there's 22 rogue provinces of China any more than the PRCs claim over Taiwan means there's one. It just means both governments are officially deluded.
self_made_human
Grippy socks, grippy box
21hr ago
I did play plenty of 5, more of 6, before the dumbass AI in the latter threw me off for good.
You're correct to wonder if I dislike the single unit per tile limitation. I think it sucks, and makes warfare a matter of attrition (across dozens of turns), traffic control, micromanagement and heavy reliance on choke-points. I'd rather take doom-stacks any day of the week.
Back when I played 3, I didn't have any internet access, and didn't know how to mod it. If I were to revisit the game, I'd definitely look to do what you did, corruption was a pain.
Oh that's sad, and kind of recent too. I disagree with Trace's manipulation of Libs of TikTok, but it looks like he regrets it too. And that commenter was an asshole to bring it up on an unrelated thread.
It's sad to see Trace ragequit. He's a good poster, a shining example of the kind of person that keeps me around the rationalist-adjacent sphere. I worry about the motte's inability to retain quality centrist and left-of-center members, even though myself I am far right.
He's a big fan of the block function on twitter, along with plenty of other large accounts. I wonder why he didn't avail himself on that more on TheMotte.
thejdizzler
21hr ago
Especially since according to woke we also have to spend inordinate amounts of time on slavery and the wrongs done to minorities and other minorities. There isn't enough time for that and 155 hours of Hitler.
We did spend a lot of time on Hitler relatively speaking, but I also remember reading animal farm in history class and spending almost equally large amounts of time on the evils of communism.
You may not believe or understand why I wouldn't put a given act past multiple different actors. That is your limitation, not evidence of either my position or of culpability.
This sort of (inaccurate) mind-reading and incredulity of alternatives is why we disagree about who the serious people are.
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