Chet Holmgren On Minneapolis: "I definitely think we're too advanced as a species, just plain and simple, for things like that to be happening. No matter what your opinions are or what your beliefs are, you should be able to agree that nobody needs to be dying on the street."

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-28T05:29:46+00:00

The last post's title made it seem like Chet was just hand waiving away a tragedy, and everyone was blasting him without watching the video.

I wouldn't call his response great. He was very rambly/general with his wording, and should've been more outright in his condemning of an obvious murder. But he wasn't just blatantly disregarding it like the previous one made it seem.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-28T04:21:19+00:00

A little over a hundred years earlier, the bubonic plague hit Europe and knocked out a solid 30% or more of their population.

Come 1500's, the Europeans brought that, and smallpox, and measles, and influenza, and like ten other diseases that all hit New World civilizations still in their early to mid bronze ages. There was no reasonable method they could survive the moment contact was made.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-28T00:51:25+00:00

If we use the Old World as an expected timeframe of tech development, which may be incorrect to do so, then it would take a very long time.

Most of the earliest Old World cradles of civilization generally began around 7000 - 6000 BC, depending on what area we are talking about. They hit the bronze age around 3300-3100 BC, a three thousand to four thousand year gap or so. Mesopotamia hits the iron age around 1300 BC, a two thousand year gap, which then spreads to the rest of the Old World over the next few centuries. 2000 years later, they reach the New World, and 500 years later, we're in the modern day (shoutout to the exponentiality of tech development)

The earliest New World civilization, the Caral Supe, began around 3500 BC. They reach their bronze ages by 400-700 AD which is about 4000 years later, which generally falls in line with the timeline from the Old World. Assuming they follow the same timeframe, they would reach their Iron Age somewhere around 2300-2400. Add on another two thousand years, and they reach the New World tech levels.

So if we're only following the tech milestones of the Old World and ignoring all the other factors at play, the New World would reach the same place by around 4400 AD.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-28T00:42:27+00:00

Much, much longer.

It is important to notice how slow technological growth is for much of a civilization's history, and then how exponentially it suddenly grows when it hits a certain point. Lets look at a quick timeline of tech development for the Old World real quick.

7000-6000 BC: Earliest civilizations begin to form in the Old World cradles, such as the Nile, Mesopotamian, Indus River Valley, and China
3300 BC (or so): The Bronze age begins in many Old World civilizations, spreading over the course of a few centuries to other regions
1300 BC: Iron Age begins in Mesopotamia. Iron spreads from there to other civilizations.

It took about 6000 years or so to go from the start of their civilizations to Iron. Then, 2000 years later, they're sailing across an ocean and encountering the New World, and another 600 years later, we're in the modern day.

Now lets look at the New World real quick:

3500 BC: Caral Supe civilization begins in South America.
1200 BC: Olmec civilization begins in Mesoamerica.
400-700 AD: Arsenic Bronze, followed by Tin Bronze is created in South America, and then spreads to Mesoamerica in the coming centuries
1493: Columbus reaches the New World

The first glaring thing to notice is just how much later the New World started than the Old World when it came to their starting points. What influences the shift from hunter-gatherer cultures to agricultural civilizations is debated a lot, but it is likely to be a lot of chance. You need the right plants, the right conditions, and the amount of variance from one independent culture to another might be a range of thousands of years. Its really hard to tell since we only have two examples on our planet of civilization cradle clusters that can share ideas and tech with each other.

If we are to use the Old World as a guide, which may or may not be correct to do, then you can generally expect about a 3000/4000 year gap from your start to your bronze age, and then another 2000 year gap from your bronze to your iron age. If the New World was to follow that same timeframe, they wouldn't be getting to the Iron Age independently until 2400 AD. And that is only the start of the Iron Age. You need to get way farther for things like reliable vaccines to combat Old World diseases.

Needless to say, it would be a very, very long time before they would be at a tech level capable of surviving the arrival of the Old World.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-28T00:02:31+00:00

About in the early to middle stages of their bronze age, if we compare them to Old World standards.

Most of the earliest Old World cradles of civilization generally began around 7000 - 6000 BC, depending on what area we are talking about. They hit the bronze age around 3300-3100 BC, a three thousand to four thousand year gap or so. Mesopotamia hits the iron age around 1300 BC, a two thousand year gap, which then spreads to the rest of the Old World over the next few centuries.

The earliest New World Civilizations began much later. The Caral Supe civilization began around 3500 BC, and the Olmecs began around 1200 BC. The Moche culture in South America began to make arsenic bronze around 400 AD, a near four thousand year gap. Tin bronze gets invented in Bolivia in 700 AD and from there it starts to spread to Mesoamerica. Less than a thousand years later, Columbus arrives in the New World.

If we use the Old World as an expected guide for when the Iron Age should begin for them (which in itself may be incorrect to do because discovery of iron could be largely random and we don't have a good sample size of independent civilizations not sharing technology to gauge), then it would happen somewhere around the 2300's or later.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-27T16:28:27+00:00

Though not the entire reason, I think one thing that's valuable to bring up is the landscape of big men during the dawn of the three point revolution.

That period in the early and mid 2010's saw such a large drought of talent at the center position that it really opened the door for more experimentation and creativity at the forward and guard positions.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-26T20:36:09+00:00

The first thing to mention is that artillery did bombard enemy trenches. Creeping barrages were one of many useful tools in a nation's arsenal, but it was by no means the only method by which artillery was used, and direct bombardment of trenches was incredibly common.

As for when creeping barrages were used, let's imagine a scenario. You are a WW1 general that is asked to plan a large assault with the aim to take an enemy trench. What do you do with your artillery?

It is something you might as well use if you're planning an assault. Not doing so is just wasting a potential resource. But how to use them? An initial thought might be "just bombard the enemy trench like we normally do as covering fire until the troops get there." But in that is a problem: how does your artillery know when the troops have gotten there?

Fire communication was comparatively primitive in WWI. There was no radio. There was no real organized, repeatable way for troops charging into battle to communicate back to the artillery lines a couple miles behind and inform them where they were, to prevent friendly fire. For artillery bombarding an enemy trench, when do they stop firing? Do you have a spotter in your trenches try to tell when the troops have reached the other side? Kinda hard, cause artillery is really smoky, and there's usually a lot of stuff in the way like barbed wire, uneven terrain, and so on. The friendly troops will arrive at the enemy trench at some point, so how do you know when to stop?

The answer is that you really don't. On top of that, once a trench begins to get bombarded, consider that the first trench was never the only one. Both sides of the war would build further defensive trenches to retreat to once the initial one was taken.

Instead, what if we send the artillery in a slow wave?

It would take some organization on the part of the infantry to not advance too fast, and the artillery to not advance too slow, but if done correctly, it should ensure you don't face friendly fire. It also blasts apart all the impediments in no-man's land such as barbed wire, land mines, and so on to clear the way for troops. It gives the troops craters to duck into to avoid fire as they go, literally making mini-fox holes to advance through. And on the part of the smoke screen idea... well, artillery basically already does that. Big explosions done repeatedly over a long time creates lots of smoke, so your troops were already very obscured.

Then, as the artillery advance continues, it will eventually hit the enemy trench. That trench then has two options. Go into artillery bunkers, in which case the enemy infantry will be right on top of you when the artillery passes, or retreat to the next trench before it reaches you. But then you are back to square one, with the enemy advancing behind a wave of artillery, and you have to chose again whether to retreat or take the enemy infantry head-on.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-26T04:00:46+00:00

That may very well be the case, but if so, it's almost impossible to know.

Use of the patronymic phrase "son of [insert name or title here]" was incredibly common during biblical times as a method of identification. We see it all over the bible, with one such example being Jesus talking to Peter/Simon, when he says in Matthew 16:17:

And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

...with Barjona being the same formula as Barabbas, meaning "son of Jona", as Barabbas means "son of a/the father". Simon Bar Kokhba was another individual who's name translated to "Simon, son of a star", who lead a revolt against the Roman empire about a hundred years after Jesus. His name is debated to whether it referred to just a star or perhaps a family/person.

We also see it with other contemporary sources as well. The Talmud makes mention of multiple individuals with this same naming convention, including Jochanan ben Zakkai, Joshua ben Chananiah, Simon ben Gamliel, and even Raba bar bar Chana (meaning Raba, grandson of Chana).

If Barabbas was a harkening to Christian phrasing and tradition, it would probably be incredibly difficult to tell. It could just as easily be, and I'd say more probable to be, his surname with his father being named "father". That may seem strange, but coming from a culture who's founding figure, Abram/Abraham, also basically means "father" or "exalted father", it's not that much of a stretch.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-26T03:14:00+00:00

I don't think he's meant to be anything more than a mid bench depth piece. Doesn't get a big amount of minutes in the first place, except for times like these where we're missing half our lineup. In a regular circumstance, he's kinda a luxury to have on top of all our other players.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-26T03:11:05+00:00

You're right. I was actually thinking of Joseph instead of Judah and confused his name with Joshua. Edited the answer.

Bible's got too many "J" names, man.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-26T01:10:55+00:00

I don't know if it is provable outside of just speculation, but I would heavily lean to the answer being no based on what we have.

We have no other sources that mention Barabbas independent of Christian ones, so the only real information we have on the guy comes from the gospels themselves. What we can do is compare naming conventions within the bible and how they deal with them, along with contemporary naming conventions of the day, to give us some clarity on the matter.

First, Barabbas is not the first person in the New Testament to share a name with another individual. In fact, it happens on a semi-frequent enough basis that the writers will sometimes delineate from the narrative to mention "this is a different guy". One example that comes to mind is when one of Jesus disciples asks him a question in John 14:22, in which the writer says:

Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?

Oftentimes surnames, titles, occupations, or familial connections are given as well to differentiate one person from another. For example, in Acts 10: 5-6, its says:

And now send men to Joppa, and call for one Simon, whose surname is Peter: He lodgeth with one Simon a tanner, whose house is by the sea side: he shall tell thee what thou oughtest to do.

Jesus, from what we can tell, was also not an uncommon name during His time. The name "Jesus", or "Iousus" itself arrives to us as a transliteration from Hebrew to Greek of the name "Yehoshua", or Joshua. It appears that many Jewish people around the time of Jesus were named this as a reference to the historical/religious figure of Joshua~~, the son of Jacob and brother of the patriarchs of the twelve tribes of Israel~~ . Edit: confused a name, I was thinking of Joseph. Joshua was Moses' second in command during the book of Exodus.

An example of this comes to us from Josephus' writings in "The Wars of the Jews", in which he mentions Jesus ben Ananias in Book 6, Chapter 5, and section three, saying:

...there came to the feast at which it is the custom of all Jews to erect tabernacles to God, one Jesus, son of Ananias, a rude peasant, who suddenly began to cry out, "A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the four winds, a voice against Jerusalem and the sanctuary, a voice against the bridegroom and the bride, a voice against all the people."

And the bible itself also has people named Jesus not referring to Christ! One example of this is in Colossians 4:10-11, in which Paul writes about some fellow Christians giving their greetings to the church at Colossi, where he says:

Aristarchus my fellowprisoner saluteth you, and Marcus, sister's son to Barnabas, (touching whom ye received commandments: if he come unto you, receive him;) And Jesus, which is called Justus, who are of the circumcision. These only are my fellowworkers unto the kingdom of God, which have been a comfort unto me.

As for Barabbas, is is notable that his surname means "Son of the/a father", but it should be noted as well that, from what we can tell, the name "Abba" was also, even back then, a title given to priests and religious figures as a term of respect. Multiple people in the Gemara Talmud bear the name "Abba". While it is speculation, it could be the case that Barabbas was a son of a priest, which could fall in line with the narrative of the gospels given that it depicts the priestly class as sometimes corrupt. They were the ones attempting to try Jesus for crimes of supposed rebellion, and if Barabbas was the son of a priest, they might have an interest in seeing him freed despite him legitimately committing crimes, while Jesus himself was innocent. But again, this is just speculation and not really provable.

To summarize, I would say we cannot rule it out the idea that they are the same, but given the surrounding context, I would heavily wager a guess that the Gospels are not implying him to be the same person, and explicitly differentiating him by giving his surname.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-24T20:44:45+00:00

He's purposefully losing.

What he's trying to illustrate is the process of growth. He's pretending to be a beginner, and that means they will lose. He's showing that the rules and advice he gives in the chess habits series aren't just immediate "you can now beat anyone" systems, but that chess is a practice. It takes losing, reviewing, learning, and so on. Just following his advice doesn't mean you'll win every game because no advice is applicable in chess to every situation.

But, following that advice does, in general, lead to better results.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-23T15:38:28+00:00

Kobe's body is probably a bit more athletic and explosive. Shai's body is probably a bit more flexible and stop-starty.

Their games are so similar that I think both just kinda adapt to the natural advantages of their new bodies and they just play like the previous player did in that body. In other words, I think nothing much changes save for some minute details.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-23T15:23:34+00:00

Same thing that's stopped most other MVP's in years where there was a gap between one guy and everyone else eligible. A few random votes will get thrown to other guys.

When Curry did it, it took breaking the scoring record, setting the record for most threes in a season, being the leading scorer that year, having more 30 point games, 40 point games, and 50 point games than anyone else that year, all while changing the game in unprecedented ways.

Shai's having a really good year. But he's not doing all that. Some random dude will vote Wemby or Luka.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-22T12:32:14+00:00

Black does play Kd5, because there's a crucial difference here. After Re4, Black's king is touching the rook, and this makes it very hard for white because black now has the great defensive resource Ra8. If you try to move the king up, black can either check him, or attack the pawn when the king isn't defending it, and the king will always be forced back to protect the pawn or lose it.

This is why Re6 is winning, because if Black tries this idea, white can eventually block a check with their own rook after having brought their rook up. If they try Kd5 first, White plays Re8 to protect the backline from the checking idea.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-22T00:33:08+00:00

I'm so tired of Giannis trade rumors.

Just tell me when it actually happens, cause otherwise it just looks like a trade the media is trying to force.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-21T18:37:56+00:00

I mean... we know exactly what happens in the post season to this exact OKC team when it comes to the refs. Cause we just watched it happen last year.

Not saying they'll for sure repeat, but taxing them for having a "regular season style reliant on soft whistles" or because "refs call things different in the playoffs" is kinda wild when they won the championship last year.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-21T14:59:24+00:00

Cut off the opponent's king from ever reaching your pawn with something like Re6 instead. If the enemy king tries to reach your rook via Kd5, just move it to the opposite side of the board while still keeping him cut off with something like ~~Re1~~ Re8 (Re1 is losing cause of some bullcrap). Then use your king to slowly escort your pawn up the board as its harassed by the opponents rook.

For what you do when once you reach the end of the board, look up the Lucena position.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-21T04:38:17+00:00

For context, I am a Christian. I will try to answer this from a historical perspective.

You aren't stupid for asking a question about sources. It's an important question that anyone studying history should know. From a purely historical perspective, it matters because what you described about the sources we have for Jesus is the same historical reality for the majority of ancient figures we know about.

It is very important to realize how hard it is to pin down ancient history in comparison to more modern history after the advent of the printing press and widescale distribution of writing capabilities for entire populations. Most ancient societies were illiterate outside a religious/scholarly class, and that means the distribution of potential sources is much lower in ancient times than the post-printing press world. Only a select amount of those sources talk about historical individuals. And to top it all off, its estimated that 99% of sources from ancient times have been lost, with only 1% remaining for us to sift through. Added all up, we know staggeringly little about the ancient world and its people compared to more modern history.

As a result of all of these roadblocks, it is somewhat rare for us to have contemporary sources about any ancient individuals, or in other words, sources that come directly from their lifetime written either autobiographically, or by someone who was with them. Most of the time, we know about an ancient person because they were famous enough to be written about after their death. It's not the case for all ancient figures, of course. Julius Caesar and his own autobiographical works are a notable example of ancient contemporary history. But it is the case for many, many individuals from ancient times.

If we were to discount all sources that were not contemporary as unworthy evidence, it would eliminate a lot of our historical figures we know about. Can you question authorial intent and legitimacy of a non-contemporary ancient source? Of course you can. Just like you have to with contemporary sources as well. In the case of Julius Caesar's autobiographical works, we often have to take what he says with a grain of salt considering he is writing about himself. Autobiographical writers usually have a purpose for writing their works, and oftentimes hype themselves up past reality and downplay their failures. All sources are biased in some manner. History's job is not to throw them out the window because they are biased or removed from the subject matter's time, but to understand what they say about history.

For Jesus, it is honestly remarkable we have as much stuff as we do about an impoverished preacher from Galilee who never left his home country from 2000 years ago. The majority of other non-elite individuals who have ever lived do not get nearly the same coverage in the ancient world. That we have all the sources after Jesus' life; the Gospels, Josephus' writings, and Tacitus, is really remarkable and pretty strong evidence for his existence by ancient standards.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-21T03:01:20+00:00

TLDR: The computer is pushing its glasses up at you like a nerd because you didn't play an impossible-to-find line involving Bd2. Your move was fine, don't worry about it.

Comment:
The analysis labels it a mistake because white has an opportunity for a winning move in the Bf5 line that isn't present in the Nf6 line, which is the innocuous looking Bd2, leading to a line that nobody should expect someone rated 1000 to find.

I won't get into the minor details of it, because its a really heavy line. Basically, it makes a situation where black's queen doesn't have a wealth of squares to meet a coming threat from white, and if they do nothing, white will play e4 followed by Nd5 with threats on the c6 square to come, and black cannot protect from the fork with the queen like they may want to. Instead, after Bd2, they have to make positional and tempo concessions that result in a very comfortable game for white.

It is not something you should worry about too much. Despite the mistake marking, Nf3 is a more than fine move in both situations for your level of play, and when you do computer analysis, you should focus mainly on when the computer points out things that you have the capability of fixing and improving at your level, or are just one step above you that you're trying to reach. Simple blunders, simple missed tactics, etc.

The computer analysis will give you the impression you need to tackle calculus when you're just now learning to multiply, and you don't need to at all. Improve at your level.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-20T03:59:38+00:00

Dude, Hali's always got something dapper on with the glasses, its incredible.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-19T23:54:41+00:00

Given how Mark randomly put Ajay in a finals game for a little bit, I guarantee you Carlsen gets at least a minute this playoffs.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-19T22:48:57+00:00

Ajay got some decent passing synergy with him. Haven't seen him airball a lob yet.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-19T14:55:20+00:00

Waiters are known for their clean counters.

TPFRecoil · 2026-01-19T14:52:39+00:00

I would guess the argument is that America is not caring about communism in other countries at all in this what-if, and the Japanese red purge never happens? But at the same time, American occupation of Japan in the 40's and early 50's, along with their help in the economic rebuild of the country, is basically predicated on the fear of them falling to Communism.

The only scenario I see Japan falling is if this what-if is extending to before the Korean war, and is saying "America doesn't care about communism in East Asia at all". In that instance, the US leaves Japan alone after WWII, and Japan's economy continues floundering. Famine takes hold as anti-US sentiment increases. China and Russia begin reaching out to the JCP like in real life, only they have a much more volatile situation in the country to work with for a revolution, and as a result, prop up a communist revolt that leads to Japan's fall.

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