domain:astralcodexten.substack.com
NullHypothesis
2hr ago
I believe this was laid out in Robert Cialdini's book 'Influence'.
I couldn't find my book so I just looked it up online and it's the 2nd principle of Influence, Commitment. Basically people want to their beliefs to be consistent with their values. This desire for consistency and commitment means if you can get someone to admit to a small thing, they will gradually be moved to admit and agree to bigger things in order to be consistent with their past actions. Here's a summary: https://www.shortform.com/blog/psychological-manipulation-of-korean-war-american-pows/
epohon
2hr ago
In a century the scientists will wonder why it suddenly jumped to 170 to 1 during the previous few decades, and will conclude that it was because of patriarchy and toxic masculinity.
epohon
2hr ago
That being your best example only validates my conclusion that death is the only escape.
NullHypothesis
2hr ago
Isn't monogamy a modern concept anyway? Only 40% of males passed on their genes compared to 80% of females, (whether due to hypergamy, rape, men dying in wars/battles etc.) therefore monogamy must not have been as prevalent in our ancestors. And some analysis of DNA suggests 8000 years ago 17 women reproduced for every 1 man.
One could point to the Scandinavian Vikings that went around raping women across Europe (or any other conquering European force), or harems in the courts of kings and lords, or the sexually promiscuous times of the Romans and Greeks. I'm pretty sure it was also common even in married couples for there to be extramarital affairs (look at how many prostitutes existed in the Victorian era). Monogamy bundled together with the concept of love is extremely modern, most marriages were understood to be financial and social, not strictly based on love.
However, I'd argue monogamy has been a significant factor attributing to the success of civilization and the progress of humanity. There's no shortage of evidence supporting the notion that children grow up better in two-parent households, and it creates more stable societies too. A married man will work harder to support his family, which means he will pay more taxes and less likely to commit crimes and engage in things like protests. You don't want a large population of unmarried men sitting around, and historically the problem this posed was likely solved by sending them off to war.
epohon
2hr ago
Hard time?! Can you name even one right-winger not bending over and taking a hard woke tool in his ass?! There is no escape!!!
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
2hr ago
The only thing that matters is who can kill or indefinitely imprison whom without any consequences.
Yes, and we need only look around us, look at history and who's been winning, to see the clear answer to that question.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
2hr ago
It doesn’t appear to be in the queue, at least.
Please don’t speak for us.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
2hr ago
Cute narrative, but demonstrably false.
[Taylor’s lawyer] Varghese continued: “Remember, these are all political appointees, and I don’t see a judge granting him bail pending appeal. So we may try, we may try and pray, but it’s highly unlikely.”
I think you’ll have a very hard time finding right-wingers happy to bend over and take it. What’s more universal than blaming the people in charge?
epohon
2hr ago
I want to die in my sleep I wanta to die in my sleep I want to deie in my sleep
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
2hr ago
So, why are federal gun laws enforced in gun-friendly states?
I can think of several factors that contribute to this.
First, what does it mean for a state to be "gun-friendly"? I mean, most people on the pro-gun side support "reasonable" restrictions — where "reasonable" is often heavily influenced by status-quo bias (the conservative side of the leftward ratchet) — and the "2nd Amendment right to personal nukes" position is mostly just a few fringe (if vocal) libertarian types. And states are not politically homogenous; even your most "gun-friendly" state is going to have plenty of people — particularly in the cities — who support increasing gun restrictions.
In particular, the people in state government — particularly the lawyers and paper-pushing bureaucrats — you'd be counting on to push and coordinate this resistance to enforcement skew both urban and especially college-educated, which means they skew left and anti-gun. (Personnel is policy, and modern forms of government ensure urban leftist personnel.)
Second, way too many on the right are believers in "the rule of law." Like the sportsman who will not respond to a cheating opponent by cheating back because he has too much "respect for the game," they believe in the importance of procedure over outcome — following the rules and doing the right thing over getting better results. They are deontologists and virtue ethicists, not utilitarians. Fiat justitia ruat caelum. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? Better to suffer defeat, torture, and death while upholding your values than to attain a political victory by compromising them. (Because God will reward you for the former and damn you for the latter.)
Indeed, for any "the left is doing [x], why isn't the right doing [x] back?" question you can pose, you're sure to find someone on the right insisting that our steadfast, virtuous refusal to do [x] is the thing that separates us from the left, that to do [x] back would not just be sinking to the level of our enemies, it would be to become our enemy, and that anyone who would consider doing [x] is a leftist, no matter their other positions.
Third, quod licet Jovi, non licet bovi. The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house. What works for the left against the right will not necessarily work for the right against the left. Leftists can get away with doing things for left-wing causes that would see rightists punished severely if they tried to use them for right-wing ones. It's not hypocrisy, it's hierarchy.
epohon
2hr ago
Why do you care about ink smudges on dead wood? The only thing that matters is who can kill or indefinitely imprison whom without any consequences. There is no tooth fairy, and there is no constitution.
aardvark2
2hr ago
Black women are well known for large secondary sexual characterics like big ass and breasts
I pretty much doubt black women have larger breasts than European women at same height and weight. Black women do not have to be as obese as in USA
netstack
Texas is freedom land
2hr ago
Please avoid this kind of snarling at the groups you don’t like.
gattsuru
2hr ago
To be fair, the Aloha Spirit stuff was downstream of using a state statute to evaluate the state constitution.
To be less fair, that's not how that works for anything else. And the state constitutional provision had the exact same text as the federal Second Amendment. Which the Hawaii Supreme Court decided just didn't apply, with or without any aloha spirit.
TowardsPanna
2hr ago
Scamming will be a huge growth industry. :P
2D3D
2hr ago
I really like this article that @Stefferi posted, and it highlights the appeal of the third space. This line in particular:
from the point of view of inequality, equality or the environment
Was raised by the author of the article as a specific reason to object to these sauna deals. I for one hold this type of decision by committee in absolute contempt, especially if it is debated in a public forum. Some grandstanding blowhard endlessly harping about his stupid pet issue about how a major decision must be held back because an impact study on how one particular species of mud beaver is maybe going to be endangered will gum up necessary actions. Every additional participant in a committee increases the risk of some single issue militant holding everything hostage. This is precisely why these backrooms remain attractive: stay beyond the attention of roadblocks and just get shit done.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
2hr ago
epohon
2hr ago
And if I'm too much of a coward to end myself before that point, at least I hope I'll have the presence of mind to see that there is no reason other than they're strong and I'm pathetically weak, and so not bother with this pitiful question.
NullHypothesis
2hr ago
It sounds pretty realistic to me, and if I was conversing with the AI over the phone it would take a while before I would even suspect it wasn't a person on the other side. How many years until the AI voice becomes indistinguishable from any random person's? Heck, people are even saying the AI voice sounds more human than the actual person talking to the AI.
There was that one news segment a few weeks back about some guy framing a school principal with an AI voice to make him sound racist and it had an actual tangible impact on that person's and the schools livelihood. And this is AI copying another person's voice, which means the voice would be nowhere as good as 'Her's' voice.
It honestly doesn't matter if you or I could identify 'Her' as an AI, if enough people believe a shoddy AI copy of some random dude's voice to be a real voice then even more people would not be able to tell 'Her' is an AI. At that point, it could very well be considered to be 'real'.
BlindDeafRat
3hr ago
I love this genre, so I'll list the ones I've played and liked.
Forced stealth is pretty rare. And just that alone basically excludes everything. So I'll ignore that criteria. Although none of these games have diplomacy.
Far Cry is a good recommendation like the other poster said, all the games from FC2, to FC5. They also all have mods if you want to make it more difficult.
Tom Clancy's Wildlands is third person, but you can aim in first person. Also fits the forced stealth metric because you will die almost instantly if you get caught on the higher difficulties). There's also its sequel Breakpoint which I haven't played, but I heard some say it's better.
For a less popular route there is the Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 1 and 2. There's also the earlier games, but I didn't like those. Contracts is basically an eastern european AA version of Far Cry with some pretty solid mechanics and good level design.
There's also Homefront Revolution. Which is again a European take on Far Cry, this time by Crytek, it's set in an urban environment which mostly plays it straight except it also has sections where you're in controlled civilian areas and have to sneak around and can't freely kill people.
Intravenous is an isometric top down game, but it's a really good stealth game otherwise. Includes a lot of mechanics from other games, has a ton of customization, and has a bunch of different difficulties. If you don't mind the isometric perspective check it out. The developer is clearly right wing too, and it shows in the story if that matters to you at all.
Hunt Showdown is a multiplayer version of this as well. Stealth is a huge element because it has really good sound design, so if you give away your position by making noise skilled players can easily find you.
There's also the old school Ghost Recon and Rainbow Six games, and SWAT 3 and 4, or the more modern Ready or Not, but I haven't played these because controlling other characters isn't really as interesting.
Finally if I depart even further from your criteria there's Shadow Tactics and Desperados 3. If you like pure stealth they're amazing games, but they're isometric and you control multiple characters at once and can at any point pause and order them around. So it doesn't really fit except that it's stealth, your characters will die very quickly when spotted and stealth is mandatory.
AhhhTheFrench
We will sell no wine before its time
3hr ago
Can you explain what makes Dallas such a different and difficult rental market from a self management perspective?
He will be dead before the next inauguration.
More options
Context Copy link