domain:questioner.substack.com
OracleOutlook
Fiat justitia ruat caelum
1m ago
Why is the Father God and not Jesus?
God to me isn't a Person, He's a Nature that three Persons share. That's why I can't tell you if someone is God without knowing what it is. That is probably a huge unspoken difference here, when I say God does something I could be referencing the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit.
So you hold the Father specifically in esteem because He is our creator, and when you say God you mean the Father. How odd my responses must seem to you! In that case, if you tautologically define God as the Father, then the answer becomes different as to would God be God if he did not have God's nature. I don't feel like that brings me any closer to understanding why God matters to you. The word "God" has great significance that I feel like you're copying the vibe of but then using it to refer to something else. Like having a conversation about Jesus and then someone reveals they've been talking about their gardener this whole time.
With your wife, I'm wiling to bet you do reason from first principles sometimes. By this I mean, you know she is a woman, which means that she has weeks where one hormone is dominant, weeks were another hormone is dominant, sometimes gets pregnant, etc. Knowing this, I suspect that your response to her changes depending on knowledge you have of her that pre-exists knowing her. You know pregnant women need late night ice cream randomly, for example, even before the experience of your wife kicking you out of bed at 11PM to go get pickle juice and chocolate.
Ioper
10m ago
I think we should probably be more specific, its social media and algo driven content serving (especially short form) that's the issue, not watching movies on your phone or w/e.
There are plenty of studies that show this, its not some kind of new and unknown subject. The issue isn't that we don't know what's harmful, it's that there are powerful commercial interests opposing regulation. It's the same thing with online casinos, it's not the internet that's the issue, it's specifically the gambling sites.
greyenlightenment
investments: META/FBL, TSLA, TQQQ, TECL, MSFT ...
12m ago
I don’t think tariffs are a central Vance belief at all. If you oppose them it would be easier to lobby him personally in 2028 as presumptive Republican nominee than to convince people to oppose any Republican candidate on that basis.
It's possible he personally thinks they are a bad idea, but he has to signal protectionism,, as that is what is popular with voters and necessary to win the primaries. Trump has shown the winning playbook and I cannot see his successor deviating much from it, at least not during the campaign.
2rafa
19m ago
Perhaps he hopes viewers will become better informed about trade, to dissuade them from voting for the presumptive GOP nominee, that being JD Vance, who supports tariffs?
I don’t think tariffs are a central Vance belief at all. If you oppose them it would be easier to lobby him personally in 2028 as presumptive Republican nominee than to convince people to oppose any Republican candidate on that basis.
My guess is that this is an entirely personal project in which Ballmer, who is a centrist liberal, wants to ‘make an impact’ for the usual combination of civic and personal pride reasons, and has possibly been conned by one of the usual media grifter types into pouring a huge amount of money into it (but a pittance for him). The producers or other organization producing these can claim a comfortable $250k salary for “video production” or whatever, which Ballmer personally probably doesn’t know or care about, and do some light work and get taken out to lunch and invited to parties by cool ad agency people who want the spend.
The videos also star him personally, which again is less “influence operation” and more “I want the people to know who I am and feel like I’m sharing my wisdom with the world”.
Trump frequently changes his mind though. We saw this with tariffs.
A person like Scott Lincicome of CATO truly believes that government taking equity of private enterprise is bad policy, and thus it's easy for him to critique it.
And you see with libertarian Republicans like Ron Paul, Justin Amash and Thomas Massie criticizing the Intel buy
The rise of Trump, who copied the same protectionism of Biden, on top of Obama, has basically revealed the libertarian-adjacent wing of the GOP to be ineffectual. These people forever have been on the losing side, save for Ross Ulbricht pardon. Their publications and think tanks are utterly ignored by anyone of importance. They are screaming into the wind. It has always been that way, but it's like what a waste of money promoting all those libertarian causes. I think this shows that some flexibility is good, and Trump's successes is illustrative of this. Otherwise you just become obsolete and end up wasting money and time.
Doubletree3
22m ago
There are a great many situations where your statement would be obviously untrue. Should cons start getting abortions to own the libs?
Pitt19802
23m ago
Good post.
I think where a lot of people get stuck is in waiting for the perfect piece of advice.
Line I read that stuck with me that I think applies beyond the specific instance - "Too many get stuck in analysis paralysis, worrying about the “right” source of knowledge: CLRS, TAoCP, Sedgewick, Skiena, Roughgarden, Dasgupta… you don’t need to obsess over these. Just pick something, get a foundation, and immediately move on to practice. You will learn everything from pattern recognition" (its from https://www.bowtiedfox.com/p/faang)
It's what I was trying to get at, but am not quite eloquent enough to put into words well, I think when you're young (at least I did when I was young), there's this mindset that if I follow out suboptimal advice, I'm wasting my time or I'm screwing myself over.
Being older, I think you learn a lot just by iterating over a lot of different things.
I should exercise and eat better than I do, that said, unless you're a professional athlete, starting down any path is 80% of it.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
32m ago
It may help to remember that I'm describing a last common ancestor (LCA) which would map to something like 6-7 MYA, not modern humans.
If you're discussing human evolution, why not drop the Tidus framing and just call them humans? And write a sourced post instead?
And, having studied this fairly intensively, the situation I'm describing is pretty much the current best mainstream academic hypothesis as to how they behaved.
What is the cliffnotes version of the data supporting this hypothesis? Just what you describe below about inference from modern primates?
The apes arrange themselves up and down the slopes more or less as would be expected by anyone who is familiar with chapter two's shellfish. Higher genetic quality individuals at the top, dregs down below. But we have a few key differences here.
What is the evidence for this being a relevant description in human evolution, or is it referring to some other concept in evolutionary biology I'm not aware of?
In the case of propensity to aggression, rather than there being one specific allele that makes the difference, which one population has and the other doesn’t, aggression is a complex, polygenic trait. Basically no gene does only one thing and they all interact with each other in massively complex ways. A typical single-gene variant (allele) might, for example, make the tail 2% shorter, make the lizard 7% more aggressive, minutely impact its ability to process certain nutrients, give it a slight aversion to the smell of the ocean, etc. Another allele (on a different gene) might make the scales slightly glossier and more blue, instill a minor fear of heights, a preference for rounded basking-rocks over flat ones, make certain bugs taste a little better, and shift its perception of light (colour) a tad, and so on — But then when both are present, they interact with each other in unforeseen ways, amplifying or canceling out each other’s effects basically at random and also leading to whole new effects which neither causes in isolation.
You open with wanting to discuss polygenic traits, then what follows is largely a description of pleiotropy. Pleiotropy is far from universal (your 'no gene does only one thing' quote) with 10-20% of human genes estimated to be pleiotropic. Polygenic traits frequently have very significant environmental influences (Even in animals, and even in genetically identical animals) which you also do not discuss.
This sort of polygenic interaction is almost impossible to keep track of. Computers help a lot, since even with genetic sequencing no one could possibly track the myriad interactions with pen and paper
I don't know what you're referring to here, but this sort of polygenic interaction is impossible to keep track of with our current level of understanding. There's no way to construct a deterministic/mechanistic model of how genetic variation will translate to a given trait. If you're referring to polygenic scores, I wouldn't call that 'keeping track of polygenic interactions,' and furthermore, their explanatory power is in the single to low double-digit percentages of variance explained.
They also behave differently along other axes, and look different, and — this is the important part — experience the world differently. Sense data occurs to them differently. They feel differently about things.
What is the evidence for this? Is it a purely theoretical conclusion based on your argument around pleiotropy? Because:
And you know this about them at a glance if they look different, since many genes which code for behaviour or anything else also code for physical appearance. In other words, you couldn't genetically edit an embryo to change its adult appearance without also changing its behavioural proclivities.
This just isn't true. I can give you plenty of examples of genes I could manipulate that would result in an observable difference in physical appearance that aren't even expressed in the brain. I'd have an even easier time giving you genes that would mess with your immune system without affecting the brain. I suppose you would argue that I could never prove to your satisfaction that those mice experience the world differently, but that would just a be waste of everyone's time.
To be frank: I find is disquieting how many people reject psychology when it concludes that racial diversity improves team efficiency, stereotype threat or whatever other bullshit and then happily eat up evo psych slop that flatters their own biases. 'Current best mainstream academic hypothesis' is only as rigorous as the data behind it, and there's obviously differences in rigor between disciplines.
Were you HelmedHorror on the old site?
greyenlightenment
investments: META/FBL, TSLA, TQQQ, TECL, MSFT ...
32m ago
Competent teachers and coaches through talent and experience are able to identify these levels in their clients/students and will adjust advice accordingly
yeah there is a "you get what you pay for" rule in regard to advice quality
Grant_us_eyes
38m ago
A different audience in Europe. London, specifically.
This particular myth tends to annoy me a great deal, because it's a perfect encapsulation of a tactic I've seen displayed by left-leaning types time and time again - the constant, insistent urge to drag politics into areas that it doesn't really belong(ie, entertainment).
This wasn't Cancel Culture. It was a masks-off moment for a bunch of grifting entertainers that were trying to belong to the Cool Kids Club. Surprise, surprise, the group that made them popular from the start didn't take well to being grifted.
Doubletree3
43m ago
This statement is wrong in the general case on game theoretic grounds. Not everything is a prisoners dilemma, and not everything your opponent does that you don't like is a game-theory defection. In this case, if you believe that government intervention in the market is bad, then cons are just doing a harm and not disincentivising future similar actions by liberals.
ChickenOverlord
46m ago
If I have to tell it to avoid common footguns then it's faster to just write it myself
greyenlightenment
investments: META/FBL, TSLA, TQQQ, TECL, MSFT ...
47m ago
For the past 3 weeks I have been inundated with ads paid for by USAFacts, a non-profit founded by Steve Balmer. In its own words, it's a "...not-for-profit, nonpartisan civic initiative making government data easy for all Americans to access and understand. We provide a data-driven portrait of the American population, US governments’ finances, and governments’ impact on society."
Some of these videos have a considerable number of views. The videos below have 10 million views each in less than a month, indicative of a large budget and a major media push. YouTube ads targeting the US are not known for being cheap, given that it's a high-SES audience. YouTube counts a view as someone who clicks the link and watches at least 10 seconds of the video, at a cost of roughly 10 cents a view. By my estimation, he has spent $2-4 million in promoting these videos, among others, in just a month alone. This is pocket change for him, but my question is, what does he hope to accomplish with this?
https://youtube.com/watch?v=JXKLoDXmZNo
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Bl1HRu18X0Y
Although it describes itself as non-partisan, this does not preclude some sort of agenda or motive by its founder.
The 2028 US presidential election is still years away. The content itself is not outwardly partisan and it's hard to shoehorn it into any specific agenda. Perhaps he hopes viewers will become better informed about trade, to dissuade them from voting for the presumptive GOP nominee, that being JD Vance, who supports tariffs? But the ads are broadcast everywhere, not just battleground states. Or he's trying to cement a legacy as a lecturer and public intellectual , similar to Milton Friedman or Ray Dalio, who also have popular economics videos. Between this and Bill Gates' philanthropy, it shows that the ultra-wealthy tend to also be workaholics. They are not content just retiring with their money. The last thing I would want to do is get all dressed up and read for hours scripts for many videos. Sounds really tedious and boring.
I don't think it will work though. The era of the 'TV public intellectual', as exemplified by Donahue and Crossfire which pioneered the format, peaked in the 80s and 90s, before the internet.
ThenElection
48m ago
I don't see the Intel buy as motivated by revenge politics. It seems more motivated by Trump's desire to be seen doing things: do a lot of random, high profile things, and select those that work out as proof of your leadership (those that don't, of course, fail because of the wreckers).
Maybe the revenge narrative makes sense, but not a revenge against Trump's most visible enemies, but the layers of bureaucrats and experts whose main function tends to be saying you can't do things and then acting to make it harder and more expensive to do things.
(All that said, in this case the naysayers are entirely correct, and Trump should be picking his things to do more judiciously.)
RoyGBivensAction
Zensunni Scientologist
56m ago
Some of this is different strokes for different folks
Yes, definitely. I have an upcoming backpacking trip where my phone will be off or in airplane mode (when I need it for navigation, unfortunately) for 5ish days. It will be heavenly. And I'll be reminded when I get back how little I really need the phone and how much I pay per month to have a texting/email/wikipedia pocket tracking device.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
56m ago
I mean, yeah... you can almost hear the voice deepen and roughen and see the lighting change when you read that last phrase.
RoyGBivensAction
Zensunni Scientologist
1hr ago
Yes, but your definition of 'right' is outdated compared to the actual definition of 'right'. I assert that, after 2016 and especially after 2020, the Blues repositioned themselves firmly on the Right and the Reds (the people who will be paying for that gross conservative decadence that was the uncommon cold for the rest of their lives) have inherited the Left.
Care to expand on this? I've read it multiple times and still can't follow it.
FtttG
1hr ago
I can't remember the payoff matrix for the iterated prisoner's dilemma, so it's possible.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
1hr ago
The Venn diagram between “thinks SJ is existentially dangerous” and “has given up on liberalism” is damn close to a circle.
I'm rather bemused at all the people here who bemoan the lack of charity for left, casually just making shit up about their outgroup, but I suppose such is life. Anyway, sadly, you are mistaken. Liberalism skeptics managed to appeal to some of the elites, but we're yet to win mass appeal, even among anti-SJ people.
ThisIsSin
Liberty has an anti-privilege bias
1hr ago
I think the right is becoming the party of nothing but political grievances and emotional overreactions in much the same way.
Yes, but your definition of 'right' is outdated compared to the actual definition of 'right'. I assert that, after 2016 and especially after 2020, the Blues repositioned themselves firmly on the Right and the Reds (the people who will be paying for that gross conservative decadence that was the uncommon cold for the rest of their lives) have inherited the Left.
This is why I believe that [by that definition] the Right's current strategy of "mimic Trump on Twitter" is going to fail. It isn't the left that can't meme: the left is where memes come from, 4chan was just confused as to who left and right actually were at that time, as were [and are] we all.
A lot of wokeness is nothing more than people being sanctimonious on the internet
Well, that and the human trafficking (sorry, "illegal immigration"), and the "ban all business for 2 years" thing, and Burn Loot Murder, and encouraging your children to castrate themselves (and arresting those who voice opposition thereto), and...
I could go on. Those have real sociofinancial costs, and the Left would like the Right to pay for them.
But unless you want government czars deciding how individuals relate to each other, what are you going to do about it?
We already have that: it's called the Civil Rights Act. It was a weapon used by one side for the last 60 years, and it's understandable that that faction using it in that way is apoplectic about it being used for its stated purpose (not the one they used it for).
FlailingAce
1hr ago
It seems to me that you're conflating pricing and insurance.
You can imagine a world where prices factor in the expected cost, but we're not in that world. If I have a complication in a routine procedure, they will charge extra to handle the complication. Then my insurance spreads that extra cost between a pool of policy holders. The pricing for the procedure doesn't spread the cost, and doesn't need to, because that's the purpose of the insurance. Instead, insurance will pay the minimum it can get away with for a specific procedure. They sure as hell aren't paying $2000 for a $1000 cost procedure because sometimes things go wrong - they pay $1000 and then upcharge when things go wrong.
Analysis paralysis is definitely a part of it. I feel like there are twin traps, one of analysis, the other the fact that continued inaction seems to have a momentum all it's own. Analysis paralysis might get you into the trap of inaction, but inaction's own gravity keeps you there.
But there is also this aspect where our modern society seems to be producing and entire oversocialized professional and expert class. They're risk averse and initiative averse to a degree which stifles all human actions, and they are supposed to be our betters to whom we listen.
I would trust the blue collar BJJ coach who barely graduated highschool far more than the PhD trying to give me advice. And on a lot more than BJJ at that.
More options
Context Copy link