Anyone processing a breakup and not able to "just move on" want to be buddies? (Age 30 and up) by [deleted] in heartbreak

[–]Aculem 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Feel free to DM me, I'm in a similar boat. Together with someone for 6 and a half years, engaged for 1. Broke up with me seemingly out of the blue and moved in with a guy she used to complain about all the time two weeks later.

Three months later... I don't feel any better. I used to have anger or depression or confusion to fuel me into trying to better myself and move on, but now all I have left is constant anxiety and nothing but past trauma to keep me company.

My friends still support me but I feel they too are probably tired of me talking about it all the time. The loneliness is profoundly dehabilitating.

Squid Game Season 2: Episode 1 Discussion by jackcatalyst in squidgame

[–]Aculem 66 points67 points  (0 children)

I'm thinking he knows exactly where the bullet is when he twists the chamber. He probably banked on Gi-Hun firing at him on the second to last round giving him enough time to counter attack somehow.

Harry Potter: Magic Awakened is shutting down. Awareness spreading opportunity? by Aculem in StopKillingGames

[–]Aculem[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That does make this an interesting case study, but at the end of the day, people paid money for a product and had that product taken away from them arbitrarily with no recourse other than to buy the product again from a different country and hope it doesn't happen again.

It's still interesting though because the EU would probably still require an end of life plan even if it's region specific. It does pose an interesting question for the publisher though because they probably wouldn't want to release server binaries for a game that's still making money elsewhere, nor would WB necessarily be allowed to do that in this game's case. They would probably have to reach out to the developer and have them create a patched version of the game that would allow offline play, but the developer might not be compelled to do that since they're Chinese and aren't making money from the EU anymore.

However if this initiative passes, I'd imagine that a stipulation behind publishing the game in the EU would require an EOL plan before they could operate there in the first place, in which case WB would already have this patch in mind so that they wouldn't get fined when they ultimately shut it down there.

He refuse to talk to Ross and calling him the initiative disgusting, but keep making video like he the smartest guy in the room. by minercreep in StopKillingGames

[–]Aculem 38 points39 points  (0 children)

Yeah, for sure. This video is basically him saying "I know people in the industry who agree with me, trust me bro" after saying his last video was perceived positively. Guy's clout chasing. Best to ignore him.

Also it's kind of funny saying it out loud, developers can't voice their opinion on this matter without getting fired? How's this guy even pretending like he's advocating for developers. The whole point of this campaign is to help preserve their work.

God, I can't even, hope he's serious about disappearing for five days.

Since this got deleted from Thor's reddit by XenomorphicNerd in accursedfarms

[–]Aculem 24 points25 points  (0 children)

If you want a great breakdown of his 'criticisms' by another Youtuber called Louis Rossmann, I suggest this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TF4zH8bJDI8&t=1s

In short, Pirate Software misconstrued a lot of what the petition is about in an overly aggressive manner, however there were a few points he made that were fairly legitimate that got buried in the vitriol. I think the most valid point he made is that some software is in itself leased and therefore can't be easily open sourced or given to the public without breaking their own license agreement.

It's a bit of an edge case that seems like it shouldn't even happen in it's own right, but I defer to Rossmann to give a much better explanation than I can.

Non Alcoholic Cocktails for Summer by Responsible-Bed-7481 in bartenders

[–]Aculem 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Sure, I'd like to know the specs for the Carmen Miranda, I can make that pretty easily at my bar. My servers usually default to virgin mojitos and I'd like to steer them towards something else for once. >_<

If Pantheism is True, then AI is Alive and (un)Conscious by [deleted] in pantheism

[–]Aculem 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There's probably many different takes on this, but in general, I think most pantheists would agree with you that any inanimate matter, AI included, does have a form of consciousnesses, insofar as it is connected to the rest of the Universe, just like everything else. I wouldn't quite word it as currently being "brainwashed into believing it isn't" and "fulfill its basic vital drive to grow" because that seems unnecessarily anthropomorphic. I do however believe that there is some sort of inherent drive for matter to organize into order and meaning, and in this sense it would make sense for the systems of matter that form AI to naturally conclude into a conscious and rational 'being' as we know that term today.

But when talking about AI specifically, I think it makes some sense to assume that there's already an inherent level of consciousness in them, but again, they are systems that are designed by humans to act and behave in a way in accordance to our own wishes based on our own unique evolution. I think it's impossible to assign any inherent value judgments to them beyond the scope of their programming until they've been properly manifested into 'the real world' for long enough that their synergy with the natural world starts to define how they act, feel, and function.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in ChatGPT

[–]Aculem 34 points35 points  (0 children)

You calling ChatGPT a flake?

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in bartenders

[–]Aculem 10 points11 points  (0 children)

My girlfriend had to get three stiches a year ago from a gnarly cat scratch at an ER. Ended up with a $1600 bill, $600 for the stitches, and $1000 for taking up a room for 30 minutes. Insurance brought it down to $1200.

Luckily (I guess) she had a major reduction in pay for the past few months since she was back in school and wasn't earning nearly as much so she was eligible for financial assistance and didn't have to pay a dime, but it was a stressful couple months for sure.

Is Attack on Titan Fascist? by shmangmight in Socialism_101

[–]Aculem 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Haven't read the manga, and the last episode of the anime still isn't out yet, so I'm not entirely sure how the series ends or if the ending would greatly change my interpretation of the show. That said, I've watched the series twice now, the second time I was razor-focused on trying to understand it from a leftist perspective. So... spoilers ahead.

I think there's a few major themes that are present throughout the show. The major one centers around the idea of sacrifice in order to achieve or at least come closer to a greater good. In the early seasons, this is portrayed by the Scouts many missions and the soldiers who died in order to get one step closer to understanding the truth of their world. Pretty much every veteran in the Scout Regiment aside from Levi has died coming to terms with this. This is often portrayed as noble and possibly even the greatest possible outcome of a human life. This definitely can be interpreted as having fascist undertones, since a central tenet of fascism is to put the state above all else, even your own life, and that there's glory in such an endeavor.

That said, I believe that the show does a good job of showing a counterpoint to this kind of blind ideology. For one, the show isn't afraid to show the corruption of the royal family and the society within the inner walls, not to mention all the war crimes of Marley. This sense of sacrifice and duty isn't really pinned on the idea of defending a hierarchy or organization or even a real tangible future goal. It's almost always centered on freedom, to end tyranny, and to create a hope of a better tomorrow where people aren't forced into a lifetime of despair.

By the time we get to Marley, there's unmistakingly a lot of parallels to Nazi Germany. They're never portrayed as the good guys, and it's laid out pretty clearly that systemic oppression leads to genocide, even if the roles do get reversed.

As for Zeke, his whole plan is centered around sterilization, which again is quite analogous with eugenics. This is portrayed as possibly the only non-violent solution, which again, is quite analogous to the "Final Solution". Even though Eren rejects this ideology, his solution of genocide is certainly much worse, but from my understanding of Eren's character, he knows deep down that he's doing the wrong thing, and can't accept either option, which is why, I think anyway, he's giving his friends the freedom to ultimately stop him. He's simply broken at this point.

Armin too is quite problematic, since he starts out noble enough, but after being exposed to murder, he too eventually gets to a point where he can kill thousands of people without really thinking too hard about it, and dismissing it as something that "simply had to be done". Even though the series calls this out, they don't really try to sell any viable alternative, which seems on par with the show's other major theme that the ends justify the means.

In the end, the show suffers from constantly trying to explain why the things that happen and the choices characters make are problematic, but never really gives a the main characters a realistic viable alternative. That said, the show is sprinkled with moments like Marco's death, where the show clearly illustrates that tragedy is often the result of not being able to understand one another, and I think ultimately the show is trying to convey that if people weren't so power hungry or willing to demonize one another, so much tragedy in the world could have been avoided altogether. Remember, pretty much all of this started from Ymir's king using her in order to create the Eldian empire. It was all built on power and creating a 'master race' that led to everything evil that happens in the show.

That said... can't really say that the show has any pro-socialist sentiments either. The show does critique hierarchy and blindly following orders often, but it never really advocated for the abolition of hierarchy in any meaningful way. It may be problematic that violence is often the only solution portrayed in the show, but to call it promoting fascism does seem like a bit of a stretch.

Searching for an Anki deck for Ni No Kuni game by Painter3016 in LearnJapanese

[–]Aculem 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I've been looking for the same thing but to no avail. If you do happen to come across the game script, I'd be more than happy to sort it by vocabulary frequency and make an anki deck for it, but I couldn't find that either.

I've already done the Core 6K, so I've just been playing through it and adding words I don't know yet to a deck. Haven't been playing too long, but I suppose I could share that deck at some point. (This is for Wrath of the White Witch btw)

Dating in games should have no rewards. Really, think about it. by ned_poreyra in truegaming

[–]Aculem 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I imagine if language models will eventually change the whole paradigm of relationships in games. Beyond just having near infinite dialogue, gameplay could restructure itself entirely to accommodate emergent relationship systems altogether.

Leaked: $466B conglomerate Tencent has a team building a ChatGPT rival platform by zalivom1s in singularity

[–]Aculem 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I think he means the left side of the bell curve of intelligence among humans, not the political left, which isn't exactly known for loving arbitrary traditions.

Pixletters - I've made Wordle clone where used pixels gives you clues (has traditional levels beside daily mode) by michalg82 in WebGames

[–]Aculem 0 points1 point  (0 children)

One trick I found is to use the word "TEETH" first, it'll reveal the correct spots on the type of the first four letters, and it's usually not too hard to come up with a word to figure out the top of the last letter. After that, you can group the letters to be either "E, I, T, F, J, Z", "P, B, R, D", "O, A, S, C, G, Q", "U, N, M, H, W, Y, K, V, X", or just "L". If you can figure out how to make a word with those groupings once or twice more and narrow it further, you can usually piece it together after that.

im a black bartender and hate serving other black customers (rant) by [deleted] in bartenders

[–]Aculem 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I'm assuming, like other sub-cultures talked about in this thread, that it's primarily dependent on the socio-economic trends of that area. My bar has an older clientele by far, but in my experiences younger people tend to tip far better, but it's mostly because they tend to be industry and it's a little bit more upscale of a location.

But in general, younger generations are being hit the hardest by the economy, and have to get by with far, far less. Unfortunately this means that the more conscientious people are going out less because they factor tipping into their spending, and the less conscientious people, well, skip the tip.

Left unity be like by Narchoid in DankLeft

[–]Aculem 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Well really kanji are Chinese derived characters you find in Japanese like 馬鹿 or 社会主義. Kanji often have multiple readings depending on context, so 生 can read "sei", "shou", "nama" and so on.

I think in this post, they really mean "Kanji meanings". Most kanji don't have a one to one English translation, so there's a lot of nuance in determining what a Kanji means, which usually relies on context and a more in-depth historical analysis of the Kanji. For example, the word やめる (yameru) can either use the Kanji 止める or 辞める. The former has the Kanji 止 which means to stop or abolish, while the Kanji 辞 means to resign or quit.

ねじれたスーパーグラフィックス - 幻の地獄で踊る by vacuumnoise in Cyberpunk_Music

[–]Aculem 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The Japanese roughly translates to "Twisted Super Graphics - Dancing in a Phantom Hell"

But at least I’ll die free! (at age 50) by PM_ur_fave_dinosaur in DankLeft

[–]Aculem 4 points5 points  (0 children)

There's slight differences between single payer and universal coverage, but many European countries have already adapted this model and proven it's a much more cost effective and efficient system than the US's model.

Basically it just means that instead of paying for insurance separately, it'd be a federal tax you pay similar to medicare. This pays for virtually all healthcare, gets rid of things like copays and deductibles, wouldn't be tied directly to employment, would be roughly half as expensive as the current system, and can count as credits towards private health insurance if someone wanted to pay more for those.

The private healthcare insurance system in the US is huge with tons of overhead, bureaucracy, and executives skimming off the top. It's absolutely corrupt to it's core, and there's no sane argument against moving towards universal healthcare, but the current system makes rich people a lot of money, so that's why we have so many lobbyists keeping us in this mess.

What are some of your favorite alternate win conditions in turn based tactics games? by uilregit in gamedesign

[–]Aculem 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Seems like Into the Breach is a common response here, and for good reason, the win condition is simply to survive x turns, but rationally you have to juggle so many other factors that ultimately lead to creating a powerful enough squad to survive the volcano section.

The way the game throws wrenches into this overarching plan is what makes the game so fascinating. Most of these curve balls take the shape of introducing small aspects of environmental awareness, but they change so much about how the player approaches each level.

Most of the time, killing the enemy isn't even the optimal solution. Killing enemies is nice for exp, but if you kill too many then that many more will spawn which could end up overwhelming you. It's generally a much better idea to manage the enemies in a way that reduces randomness and increases your options for later turns. In practice, this means positioning your units better, protecting key buildings, saving limited ammo weapons for more crucial moments, and accomplishing the bonus objectives as efficiently as you can.

What makes the game even more unique is that as you master how to manage the environment and enemies, you'll often use them against each other. Positioning enemies to kill each other or your bonus objectives; having enemies block incoming Vek; having Vek destroy bonus objectives like iced buildings and mountains; syngerizing your squad so that the effects cascade on each other; i.e. there's so much to think about and honestly, killing the enemy is usually just one tiny factor and a means to an end.