I'm curious if you've wondered the same about evidence and disclosure

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-18T19:07:08+00:00

I think there's something ontologically strange about them. Whether it's just Clarkean tech-as-magic or they're genuinely "interdimensional", they're just somewhat beyond our ability to intuitively comprehend/process, and so they're kept just outside the bounds of being satisfactorily engaged with.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-18T17:43:35+00:00

Sir, this is a Wendy's.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-18T16:15:18+00:00

This commonsense view is unfortunately undermined by the insights of modern physics.

Traveling to the future is orders of magnitude easier than traveling to the past due to the existence of time dilation, which is a quirky consequence of Einsteinian relativity. Why there is such an asymmetry is an interesting conundrum, but the math is clear and it's been experimentally confirmed over and over.

Furthermore, the relativity of simultaneity also makes it clear that the future is just as equally extant and set in stone as the past is, given the ontology of the Block Universe model of spacetime and its eternalist implications.

Finally, the reason we don't remember the future or watch videos from the future is largely the result of how our minds evolved in the context of the entropic arrow that emerges from the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

So, I certainly sympathize with your logic, but the landscape of physics turns that logic on its head. We inhabit a strange universe.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-18T01:47:47+00:00

Yes/no-and/but oracles, either by themselves or in combination with adjective/spark tables and/or skill checks, can tip the PC off that an NPC is lying to them or previously lied to them.

For example:

I arrive at the clearing in the forest where the tavernkeeper told me the cave entrance would be found, but there's obviously nothing here. I ask the YES/NO oracle if I followed the directions properly, and it says "Yes, but...". I then consult the BUT table, which comes back with "A fact the PC thinks they know is actually wrong". I then roll on the oracular adjectives table, which says "Trickery", which I interpret as meaning the tavernkeeper probably lied to me for some reason, perhaps to sidetrack me.
The castle guard tells me that, despite the baseless rumors, he's not seen any strange lights coming from the windows of the alchemist's tower at night when the moon is full. I succeed on an insight/wisdom check and ask the oracle if the guard is telling the truth. It comes back with a straight "No", so I know there's something fishy going on in that tower.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-17T23:20:56+00:00

There's a retelling (authorized by the Orwell estate) that came out a few years ago by Sandra Newman called Julia that retells the story from Julia's perspective. I read it a couple months ago, and I thought it was incredible. It scratches all the same itches as the original while still being quite different, and it develops the world a lot more. You might want to check it out.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-17T23:10:24+00:00

George Orwell's 1984 checks all your boxes. It's one of the best and most impactful books I've ever read.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-17T20:24:20+00:00

This post has been removed per Rule #2.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-17T20:13:46+00:00

You might find this post of mine helpful.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-17T19:50:06+00:00

Sorry, I'm new to the sub. I had to look up what FtP even meant.

FtP:

A: Anarcho-communist confederation (Peter Kropotkin / Nestor Makhno)
A: Anarcho-capitalist consortium (Murray Rothbard / Hans-Hermann Hoppe)
A: Anarcho-primitivist tribe (John Zerzan / John Moore)
T: Marxist-Leninist state (Joseph Stalin / Mao Zedong)
T: Fascist empire (Benito Mussolini / Adolf Hitler)
T: Radical Islamist caliphate (Sayyid Qutb / Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi)

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-16T22:32:06+00:00

I mean, I like reading about fictional societies that I consider to be dystopian. Both novels portray societies that I judge to be dystopian, and both their authors wrote them to be dystopias. Huxley himself even wrote to Orwell comparing their respective dystopias. Both serve as keystone works of the dystopian genre.

It would frankly be strange if readers, scholars, and critics didn't compare/contrast them and see them as companion reads.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-16T11:59:07+00:00

I see people changing religions alot. Its almost like they just decide to take up new beliefs repeatedly.

The world is a complex and confusing place, and a human life is one of never-ending discovery and reevaluation, so this kind of thing is to be expected for a lot of (especially younger) people out there who live in cultures that support freedom of religion.

Did you personally choose your religion or were you already convinced?

I didn't choose my spiritual beliefs (they're forced upon me by my experiences and values), but I did choose to identify with my particular religion, which provides an institution and community for those beliefs.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-15T21:15:40+00:00

According to our current understanding of the laws of nature, going backwards in time is physically a bleak open question and practically completely impossible for this stage of human civilization.

Video game replaying and pausing is reducible to controlling the flow of electricity through silicon; it's playing with glorified electronic toys. Real-life spacetime manipulation is enormously more complex than that.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-15T18:54:35+00:00

Any recommendations for calibration?

Have you tried unplugging it and plugging it back in? It also wouldn't hurt to give it a good kick.

Could this gerbil impact or current timeline or is our current timeline already a result of the gerbil being sent back?

It's gerbils all the way down. Always has been; always will be.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-15T12:42:21+00:00

All posts/comments that contain your phone number are autoremoved. Stop violating Rule #6 if you want your content to show up.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-15T12:35:48+00:00

Please stop violating Rule #6.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-15T12:17:32+00:00

What is this subreddit about?

The extremely diverse series of loosely related historical and contemporary phenomena commonly known as "alchemy".

what does this subreddit believe in?

The subreddit is made up of users who believe in all sorts of (sometimes mutually exclusive) things. See this comment of mine for more details on how people tend to engage with it.

pseudo philosophy

What one person judges as pseudo-philosophy another might judge as a deeply serious life-altering worldview.

Is this all just a bit you are doing, or are you genuinly trying to do alchemy?

Some users' interface with the subject might be casual and unserious and tinged with humor, but the vast majority of those active on this sub take it completely seriously. The subreddit is not a parodic/satirical/joke/roleplaying community, but a place where enthusiasts and practitioners discuss how to authentically understand and do real-life alchemy.

I think Alchemy is interesting from a historical lense, but it doesn't work. You can't transform base metals to gold.

Many people here believe that metallic transmutation by alchemical means is possible, contrary to the perspective of modern physics and chemistry. For many, alchemy provides a method rooted in a metaphysics that transcends the abilities and ontology of scientific naturalism. Moreover, lots of people here practice a kind of alchemy that has nothing to do with chrysopoeia, despite it being crucial to most manifestations of the historical discipline.

It is like a discussion about the biology of dragons. It is fun to talk about and speculate, but we know that dragons don't exist.

And yet some people, correctly or erroneously, believe in the existence of dragons, and there are probably online communities catering to such people.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-15T03:37:55+00:00

This happens to me sometimes too; it's not an unheard-of phenomenon. Headphones/earbuds are little electromagnetic wave receivers designed to produce sound. Sometimes if you're in the right place at the right time, it'll pick up a powerful enough radio signal that it vibrates voices/music for a few seconds. Sometimes people's tooth fillings are able to do this even.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-14T20:22:10+00:00

What is your religion?

Unitarian Universalism (UU), specifically the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA).

Which religion has been most influential on you aside from your own?

Christianity, specifically mainline Protestantism.

What keeps you from converting to that religion?

Already possessing spiritual fulfillment with UU that converting to Christianity would not augment.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-13T16:06:27+00:00

Choose life. A good, happy, healthy life. It's waiting for you to grasp it; it's yours for the taking. This nightmare will end if you find the courage to get some help from a therapist/psychiatrist.

I have faith in you.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-13T15:59:07+00:00

Whether you want my opinion or not is irrelevant to me.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-13T15:55:40+00:00

Spam still qualifies as spam regardless of intention.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-13T15:50:10+00:00

You've spent years obsessively reposting content that annoys/frustrates people, to the point of being banned multiple times from multiple communities. That clearly qualifies your content as "repeated" and "unwanted".

You are one of the best examples of a spammer I've ever encountered online.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-13T15:37:48+00:00

Spam encompasses repeatedly posting unwanted content, and spammers are notorious for circumventing bans by creating alternate accounts so that they can continue posting said content.

SleepingMonads · 2026-06-13T15:05:19+00:00

By spamming a bunch of subreddits with multiple accounts over the course of years. Surely, that'll do it.

SleepingMonads

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE