I did, but Nick is paying me off in in pastries so I won't post any wacky, off-the-wall comments in here, as he's trying to keep the place respectable just in case any corporate sponsors like Nickelodeon accidentally wander in here:
"We were willing to ignore practically everything being said in here in order to sponsor this site...but that one weird guy ruined everything!"
It's a holdover from ancient online gaming, where I routinely showed up and at the last minute, came up with a randomly-ridiculous name as I was signing in.
That one kinda stuck.
And I also sorta terrorized automotive message boards with it throughout the early 2000's: I was banned from probably 50-60 sites due to my tendency to go in and start huge internet pissing matches. Armed with the power of Toxic Online Disinhibition Effect, I was undefeatable, as it rarely ever occurred to anyone to simply not take the bait, playing heavily upon European honor/shame complex in order to keep things rolling (once offended, nobody walks away from a fight), hardly anyone ever realizes that IPM's (internet pissing matches) can't continue unless there are at least two people involved. The one who walks away, wins.
I pissed off so many people that it never registered to simply ban me permanently, I always had to mention it, sort of like Larry Bird announcing or telegraphing what he's going to do to other players, and he goes ahead and does it anyway. Fun times.
And concerning Online Disinhibition Effect: This kind of describes what people do online, and why they do it (there's a paper on it, Suler/Blackman).
Essentially, think of how someone might behave in a bar, respective to how much they've had to drink.
As an example, let's say that I hate Single White Medusa's hair. I don't, although I think that my hair is far more luxurious and beautiful.
Okay, so maybe my hair is more 'fire-hazard-y'.
I really want to tell her how much I hate her hair. I won't say a damn thing, however, because there's this perpetually-scowling guy sitting right next to her, and even more terrifying, IT LOOKS LIKE HE KNOWS HOW TO USE A KEYBOARD. In addition, she looks like she's lethal with any number of licorice-based stabby weapons.
I've now had one drink. Some inhibition is gone...I now ask who her stylist is.
Two drinks. I suggest that she needs a new stylist.
Three drinks. "Dude, I think I see a set of car keys in there, and possibly a badger nest. You definitely need a new stylist."
Four drinks. (To the entire bar) "Holy crap, there's an OSHA fire hazard on that lady's head! Why aren't there any emergency sprinklers up there?!?"
...and it's about this point where I'm pummeled by dozens of book-writing keyboards wielded by practically everyone in the bar, even bar patrons who don't write books.
Concerning our online interactions, people who aren't paying attention sort of digitally skip drinks one through six and go straight to textualized Karen shrieking...and this pretty much describes Twitter, people who have zero inhibitions about saying disgusting things.
There are two forms, toxic and...geeze, I can't remember...but the toxic side is what you all see in comment sections of news sites, blog comment sections (that of course doesn't happen here, cough...cough...), Twitter (especially Twitter), Facebook, etc, etc. The toxic side is easily recognizable these three ways:
1. You can't see me
2. You don't know me
3. Who's going to stop me
There are three other ways to spot toxic disinhibition, but those top three pretty much cover everything concerning toxic conversation on the internet.
The other side, the do-gooders...sort of a benevolent disinhibition. These are people who routinely do ridiculous things to help complete strangers (drive a couple of thousand miles to deliver something, go waaaaay out of their way to help in a crisis, all in the name of making themselves feel awesome and benevolent, something we'd never do with complete strangers in person, etc, etc), but while that in itself is incredible, the toxic side gets all the headlines.
I don't know why you did either, but I enjoyed the hell out of it. And I was doing similar things during the same period. I don't have the energy for it anymore, but occasionally.. I get uppity, and decide to throw down the gauntlet of ridiculousness and wear people out.
Yeah, I kinda became bored with it as well, it was fun for nearly a decade...and then FB kinda sucked the fun out of everything, although I should probably note that I also saw the signs of decreasing attention spans and thus moved on from long-form character assassination to one-or-three-liner destruction of souls.
I'm just glad that nobody here has pressed charges yet.
It boils down to the original sin "You will be like gods!" But as our first parents found out, it is not the truth. We will not be gods, but fodder for something daker
Our Shining Ones have been trying to "prove" the nonexistence of free will going back at least to B.F. Skinner. I kind of like the way Claes Fornell (business faculty like me, only much smarter) once said it -- I think it was Fornell, anyway -- "Free will lies in unexplained variance."
I like to say I can prove free will in four words if you let me use the fancy book-Latin, eight words in plain grumpy English. For whatever it's worth, here they are:
Fiat justitia, ruat caelum. (Let justice be done, though the heavens fall.)
I argue that it proves free will because no mere stimulus-response animal could even _conceive_ such a thought, let alone articulate it, let alone _believe_ it and be willing to accept the consequences regardless of the cost to oneself. My argument may be faulty, but no one has yet tried to refute it.
Ray Kurzweil and others have been pushing transhumanism since the '80s, and I remember a lot of breathless talk about the Singularity in the 'oughts. It always skeeved me out, even before I thought deeply about it.
"I can’t imagine having to inject myself with needles like my mother did when she was a child. Now it’s a microbe transplant that auto adjusts and reports on my levels." Shyeah, assuming you're permitted to be born: there were elements of the Hillarycare proposal that were awfully eugenic. If memory serves, it wasn't going to cover things like spina bifida or cystic fibrosis (those units would either be aborted, euthanized, or paid for out of pocket). I caution that I may be misremembering, but I don't think I am.
Further along that line: "The epigenetic markers in children’s teeth have to be analysed and catalogued on our family genetic blockchain in order to qualify for the open health rebate, so I need that done today." The one bit of the quiet part they're _not_ saying out loud is that one assumes there are conditions -- and possibly findings in the epigenetic marker analysis -- that would _disqualify_ one for the open health rebate. YOU FED YOUR BIOOFFSPRING UNIT A BLACK MARKET DONUT BAD THOUGHT BAD THOUGHT....
Finally, here's the end of that "Good Morning, Biodigital" piece: "Oh wow – is that the time? I have only 10 minutes before my first virtual meeting. I tighten the belt on my skeleto-muscular strength chair, lean back, and log into my workspace. First I get the debrief from colleagues finishing their work day on the other side of the world. I shiver momentarily as I think about how intimately we’re all connected in this digital biosphere – then it passes. Let the day begin."
*I* shiver momentarily, and then say, "Casper, get the trigger nuke. The _big_ one."
"Ray Kurzweil and others have been pushing transhumanism since the '80s, and I remember a lot of breathless talk about the Singularity in the 'oughts. It always skeeved me out, even before I thought deeply about it."
On the surface, the Singularity thing sounds fascinating: If I understand correctly, you're uploaded into something else so you and your soul get to live forever...but you're locked out of a human body's fringe benefits, namely the five senses...or six, if you've ever survived a Taco Bell stomach pumping...so to that end, what's the point of keeping your soul on that sort of leash, unless that's the point entirely, a religious experience that happens when you shed your earthly ties to the flesh?
"...so to that end, what's the point of keeping your soul on that sort of leash, unless that's the point entirely, a religious experience that happens when you shed your earthly ties to the flesh?"
You may be onto something. Alternatively (in some cases), some of 'em may want to preserve their mind and soul "forever" in _this_ world in order to _avoid_ a religious experience, if you get my drift.
The lefts idea of a Utopia is very rose colored glasses. There are so many issues with their idea of the future its scary. The reason for this, is that there is no more frontier. No more land to explore. In the 1880s Germany, the Prussians had just united the various German States and created the German Empire. Then the adopted the industrial revolution whole hog. They took to it greater than the British who created the idea of industry, but less than the states. This created hordes of disenfranchised people. They were farmers and artisans out of a job as machines took theirs. Many of these people came to the new frontier. The US, Canada, Austrailia, etc. They moved to find someplace where they can farm, or make their crafts. (Crafts and Artisans in the sense of skilled workers making things like fabric, chairs, smoked meats. These jobs were taken over by machines.) People could still be what they were and still have self worth.
Now we are moving from a manufacturing society, to a global, informational one. This has taken peoples self worth away. The only real industry that's expanding is the service industry. Which pays like shit. There is no place for the disenfranchised people to go. They are being told to "Learn to code." This stagnation has forced people to look for other ways to get self worth. This is one reason people are turning to the far-left. They are offering some type of hope. They are offering this Utopia Society where they get to live in a pod and have no worries. They are also being told the far-right (anyone right of Mao) are fascists. (Fascism is a leftist ideology. Far-right is no government control. Fascism is all about government control.)
The right is offering individualism, hard-work, and working for your dreams. (The right has a marketing problem. Nothing is an easier sell than offering things for free. That's the left. Offering free shit.) The right's society is very much like the one we currently have. Just with some tweeks to make things better. The left is about tearing down society and rebuildings.
Me. We need a new frontier. We need someplace for the disenfranchised to go. Someplace where those who want to work hard, be free, and to build something with their own hands can go. (This is why I hope Musk gets a Mars colony going. Though the guy has issues, he is the best hope to get one moving.)
Funny part is, it's okay to tell a coal miner or a pipeline worker or a truck driver to learn to code, but associate professors are sacrosanct: "You can't possibly retrench faculty, it's just so haaaaard to find another job in the profession...."
Yeah. I should say "us" instead of "them," because I'm at least technically one of them, and no one's offered to retrench me (yet), but I was in industry for 20 years and before I went in for a professor, and I have been laid off in my time. If it happens again? Sucks to be me until I make alternative arrangements, but it's nobody's responsibility but mine.
I think a once weekly video podcast might not be a bad idea at all. You two are definitely entertaining enough to pull it off. Singing or not! Either pre-record it and upload it to youtube ((don't surrender the platform! Make them kick you off! ha)) or rumble, or one of the other alternatives. Or even do a livestream, see how quickly you can get banned. Ha. Maybe pull in some guests from time to time. Lot of options.
I'm a few months late, but that was the perfect dystopian terror short story, so good that they snuck the terror right past the reader in the beginning, rather than the more obvious reveal at the end, and an author could release it and play a years long game with readers, simply write on the back "dear reader, can you find the terror?" And the answer is, the main character's "reoccurring stuck in a box nightmares" are real. Dont even explain. Let the reader make up their own terror, she's probably a brain in a jar in rack DF24, and her daughter isn't even real, or whatever.
The technology in the pipeline inspires and horrifies me. The tech that's in development could do so much good, it could change all of our lives for the better. So many of the health issues we have now could be eradicated by whats coming, but the potential for abuse and control is just as great.
Elon Musk's Neuralink could bring healing to thousands of men and women with PTSD, TBI, Alzheimer's patients, and so much more. But it could also allow the invasion of the one domain that is truly ours, our minds. It could potentially be used to alter "bad thoughts," used in interrogations and more. Lot of scary possibilities. It'll be interesting to see where this rabbit hole goes.
I'm only here for the free pastries.
Wait, we got pastries?
Yeah, where's mine?
I should probably note that everything they've sent here is usually a day or two after the expiration date, but it's still mostly tasty.
I did, but Nick is paying me off in in pastries so I won't post any wacky, off-the-wall comments in here, as he's trying to keep the place respectable just in case any corporate sponsors like Nickelodeon accidentally wander in here:
"We were willing to ignore practically everything being said in here in order to sponsor this site...but that one weird guy ruined everything!"
I'm just giggling madly over your name. I love it.
It's a holdover from ancient online gaming, where I routinely showed up and at the last minute, came up with a randomly-ridiculous name as I was signing in.
That one kinda stuck.
And I also sorta terrorized automotive message boards with it throughout the early 2000's: I was banned from probably 50-60 sites due to my tendency to go in and start huge internet pissing matches. Armed with the power of Toxic Online Disinhibition Effect, I was undefeatable, as it rarely ever occurred to anyone to simply not take the bait, playing heavily upon European honor/shame complex in order to keep things rolling (once offended, nobody walks away from a fight), hardly anyone ever realizes that IPM's (internet pissing matches) can't continue unless there are at least two people involved. The one who walks away, wins.
I pissed off so many people that it never registered to simply ban me permanently, I always had to mention it, sort of like Larry Bird announcing or telegraphing what he's going to do to other players, and he goes ahead and does it anyway. Fun times.
And concerning Online Disinhibition Effect: This kind of describes what people do online, and why they do it (there's a paper on it, Suler/Blackman).
Essentially, think of how someone might behave in a bar, respective to how much they've had to drink.
As an example, let's say that I hate Single White Medusa's hair. I don't, although I think that my hair is far more luxurious and beautiful.
Okay, so maybe my hair is more 'fire-hazard-y'.
I really want to tell her how much I hate her hair. I won't say a damn thing, however, because there's this perpetually-scowling guy sitting right next to her, and even more terrifying, IT LOOKS LIKE HE KNOWS HOW TO USE A KEYBOARD. In addition, she looks like she's lethal with any number of licorice-based stabby weapons.
I've now had one drink. Some inhibition is gone...I now ask who her stylist is.
Two drinks. I suggest that she needs a new stylist.
Three drinks. "Dude, I think I see a set of car keys in there, and possibly a badger nest. You definitely need a new stylist."
Four drinks. (To the entire bar) "Holy crap, there's an OSHA fire hazard on that lady's head! Why aren't there any emergency sprinklers up there?!?"
...and it's about this point where I'm pummeled by dozens of book-writing keyboards wielded by practically everyone in the bar, even bar patrons who don't write books.
Concerning our online interactions, people who aren't paying attention sort of digitally skip drinks one through six and go straight to textualized Karen shrieking...and this pretty much describes Twitter, people who have zero inhibitions about saying disgusting things.
There are two forms, toxic and...geeze, I can't remember...but the toxic side is what you all see in comment sections of news sites, blog comment sections (that of course doesn't happen here, cough...cough...), Twitter (especially Twitter), Facebook, etc, etc. The toxic side is easily recognizable these three ways:
1. You can't see me
2. You don't know me
3. Who's going to stop me
There are three other ways to spot toxic disinhibition, but those top three pretty much cover everything concerning toxic conversation on the internet.
The other side, the do-gooders...sort of a benevolent disinhibition. These are people who routinely do ridiculous things to help complete strangers (drive a couple of thousand miles to deliver something, go waaaaay out of their way to help in a crisis, all in the name of making themselves feel awesome and benevolent, something we'd never do with complete strangers in person, etc, etc), but while that in itself is incredible, the toxic side gets all the headlines.
Why did I just write all of this? Who knows.
I don't know why you did either, but I enjoyed the hell out of it. And I was doing similar things during the same period. I don't have the energy for it anymore, but occasionally.. I get uppity, and decide to throw down the gauntlet of ridiculousness and wear people out.
Yeah, I kinda became bored with it as well, it was fun for nearly a decade...and then FB kinda sucked the fun out of everything, although I should probably note that I also saw the signs of decreasing attention spans and thus moved on from long-form character assassination to one-or-three-liner destruction of souls.
I'm just glad that nobody here has pressed charges yet.
All things I've noticed too. Things just aren't like they use to be!
John C Wright had a series of essays on Transhumanism
https://www.fantasticfiction.com/w/john-c-wright/transhuman-and-subhuman.htm
It boils down to the original sin "You will be like gods!" But as our first parents found out, it is not the truth. We will not be gods, but fodder for something daker
Our Shining Ones have been trying to "prove" the nonexistence of free will going back at least to B.F. Skinner. I kind of like the way Claes Fornell (business faculty like me, only much smarter) once said it -- I think it was Fornell, anyway -- "Free will lies in unexplained variance."
I like to say I can prove free will in four words if you let me use the fancy book-Latin, eight words in plain grumpy English. For whatever it's worth, here they are:
Fiat justitia, ruat caelum. (Let justice be done, though the heavens fall.)
I argue that it proves free will because no mere stimulus-response animal could even _conceive_ such a thought, let alone articulate it, let alone _believe_ it and be willing to accept the consequences regardless of the cost to oneself. My argument may be faulty, but no one has yet tried to refute it.
Ray Kurzweil and others have been pushing transhumanism since the '80s, and I remember a lot of breathless talk about the Singularity in the 'oughts. It always skeeved me out, even before I thought deeply about it.
"I can’t imagine having to inject myself with needles like my mother did when she was a child. Now it’s a microbe transplant that auto adjusts and reports on my levels." Shyeah, assuming you're permitted to be born: there were elements of the Hillarycare proposal that were awfully eugenic. If memory serves, it wasn't going to cover things like spina bifida or cystic fibrosis (those units would either be aborted, euthanized, or paid for out of pocket). I caution that I may be misremembering, but I don't think I am.
Further along that line: "The epigenetic markers in children’s teeth have to be analysed and catalogued on our family genetic blockchain in order to qualify for the open health rebate, so I need that done today." The one bit of the quiet part they're _not_ saying out loud is that one assumes there are conditions -- and possibly findings in the epigenetic marker analysis -- that would _disqualify_ one for the open health rebate. YOU FED YOUR BIOOFFSPRING UNIT A BLACK MARKET DONUT BAD THOUGHT BAD THOUGHT....
Finally, here's the end of that "Good Morning, Biodigital" piece: "Oh wow – is that the time? I have only 10 minutes before my first virtual meeting. I tighten the belt on my skeleto-muscular strength chair, lean back, and log into my workspace. First I get the debrief from colleagues finishing their work day on the other side of the world. I shiver momentarily as I think about how intimately we’re all connected in this digital biosphere – then it passes. Let the day begin."
*I* shiver momentarily, and then say, "Casper, get the trigger nuke. The _big_ one."
Bad thought bad thought! Nailed it. I love this.
They write it like we're supposed to love it. Like this is utopia. This seems like my idea of hell.
Would you like ProteSim or SucroMash today?
What about REAL pastries?
Only way to *really* KTF those Savages.
"Ray Kurzweil and others have been pushing transhumanism since the '80s, and I remember a lot of breathless talk about the Singularity in the 'oughts. It always skeeved me out, even before I thought deeply about it."
On the surface, the Singularity thing sounds fascinating: If I understand correctly, you're uploaded into something else so you and your soul get to live forever...but you're locked out of a human body's fringe benefits, namely the five senses...or six, if you've ever survived a Taco Bell stomach pumping...so to that end, what's the point of keeping your soul on that sort of leash, unless that's the point entirely, a religious experience that happens when you shed your earthly ties to the flesh?
"...so to that end, what's the point of keeping your soul on that sort of leash, unless that's the point entirely, a religious experience that happens when you shed your earthly ties to the flesh?"
You may be onto something. Alternatively (in some cases), some of 'em may want to preserve their mind and soul "forever" in _this_ world in order to _avoid_ a religious experience, if you get my drift.
"Fiat justitia, ruat caelum."
Hey, that's pretty damning of FIAT owners, especially anyone named 'Tony' who works on the poor things.
What Would Crometheus Do?
Trigger nukes sound good....
Ripped Fuel was good but for the optimum bump, Rip It is my go to.
The lefts idea of a Utopia is very rose colored glasses. There are so many issues with their idea of the future its scary. The reason for this, is that there is no more frontier. No more land to explore. In the 1880s Germany, the Prussians had just united the various German States and created the German Empire. Then the adopted the industrial revolution whole hog. They took to it greater than the British who created the idea of industry, but less than the states. This created hordes of disenfranchised people. They were farmers and artisans out of a job as machines took theirs. Many of these people came to the new frontier. The US, Canada, Austrailia, etc. They moved to find someplace where they can farm, or make their crafts. (Crafts and Artisans in the sense of skilled workers making things like fabric, chairs, smoked meats. These jobs were taken over by machines.) People could still be what they were and still have self worth.
Now we are moving from a manufacturing society, to a global, informational one. This has taken peoples self worth away. The only real industry that's expanding is the service industry. Which pays like shit. There is no place for the disenfranchised people to go. They are being told to "Learn to code." This stagnation has forced people to look for other ways to get self worth. This is one reason people are turning to the far-left. They are offering some type of hope. They are offering this Utopia Society where they get to live in a pod and have no worries. They are also being told the far-right (anyone right of Mao) are fascists. (Fascism is a leftist ideology. Far-right is no government control. Fascism is all about government control.)
The right is offering individualism, hard-work, and working for your dreams. (The right has a marketing problem. Nothing is an easier sell than offering things for free. That's the left. Offering free shit.) The right's society is very much like the one we currently have. Just with some tweeks to make things better. The left is about tearing down society and rebuildings.
Me. We need a new frontier. We need someplace for the disenfranchised to go. Someplace where those who want to work hard, be free, and to build something with their own hands can go. (This is why I hope Musk gets a Mars colony going. Though the guy has issues, he is the best hope to get one moving.)
Another ramble rant.
Nathan
They will sell the disenfranchised a digital frontier to trap them in.
Funny part is, it's okay to tell a coal miner or a pipeline worker or a truck driver to learn to code, but associate professors are sacrosanct: "You can't possibly retrench faculty, it's just so haaaaard to find another job in the profession...."
The rules for them are always different. Always.
Yeah. I should say "us" instead of "them," because I'm at least technically one of them, and no one's offered to retrench me (yet), but I was in industry for 20 years and before I went in for a professor, and I have been laid off in my time. If it happens again? Sucks to be me until I make alternative arrangements, but it's nobody's responsibility but mine.
I took 2 Ripped Fuel capsules before P.T. when was in Army back in the 90's. Good stuff! That's why they banned it. 😒
😅 It did get the job done. I’m glad I didn’t take it for too long though. I’m sure it was not good for me!
I chewed coffee beans and used instant coffee dip. Same effect, how did we survive before they were here to help us?
I think a once weekly video podcast might not be a bad idea at all. You two are definitely entertaining enough to pull it off. Singing or not! Either pre-record it and upload it to youtube ((don't surrender the platform! Make them kick you off! ha)) or rumble, or one of the other alternatives. Or even do a livestream, see how quickly you can get banned. Ha. Maybe pull in some guests from time to time. Lot of options.
I'm a few months late, but that was the perfect dystopian terror short story, so good that they snuck the terror right past the reader in the beginning, rather than the more obvious reveal at the end, and an author could release it and play a years long game with readers, simply write on the back "dear reader, can you find the terror?" And the answer is, the main character's "reoccurring stuck in a box nightmares" are real. Dont even explain. Let the reader make up their own terror, she's probably a brain in a jar in rack DF24, and her daughter isn't even real, or whatever.
I have been catching up on the podcasts in reverse chronological order. Surprisingly still works.
The technology in the pipeline inspires and horrifies me. The tech that's in development could do so much good, it could change all of our lives for the better. So many of the health issues we have now could be eradicated by whats coming, but the potential for abuse and control is just as great.
Elon Musk's Neuralink could bring healing to thousands of men and women with PTSD, TBI, Alzheimer's patients, and so much more. But it could also allow the invasion of the one domain that is truly ours, our minds. It could potentially be used to alter "bad thoughts," used in interrogations and more. Lot of scary possibilities. It'll be interesting to see where this rabbit hole goes.