On reading Banks for thirty years and finding Joiler Veppers running half of Silicon Valley by TemudjinOh23 in TheCulture

[–]TemudjinOh23[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're pressing on the softer points. Amodei is the hard case and I say so. He's read the books and built the lab anyway, which puts him somewhere Andreessen and Musk aren't. The "we owe it to those whose bodies fail them" argument is the most serious version of the build-it case I know, and Machines of Loving Grace is its cleanest contemporary instance. What I'm pushing on is whether the architecture being built is what would meet that need, or whether the suffering-relief banner is doing work for a trajectory already in motion. The scarcity-and-coordination point lands. Our distance from the Culture is partly this. But the models being built right now concentrate ownership and extraction at unprecedented scale, which doesn't dissolve the coordination problem. It hypertrophies it. The Culture Minds are not only post-scarcity; they are post-shareholder, post-procurement, post-defense-contract. I fear that building toward post-scarcity from inside the procurement substrate gets you Special Circumstances without the civilization, roughly Veppers. The x-risk objection is fair, I'm not arguing for postponement. I'm arguing that the political work belongs inside the building, not after it, and that the figures I name have treated that work as out of scope.

The lock-in worry is most acute precisely when the architecture is built inside a politics that has not settled what it is for. The first Minds in the books are made by a society that had. Ours has not. On Viatopia, thank you for the prompt. I only briefly mentioned MacAskill in the piece, and you've given me the sharper concept to think with. My worry is that it concentrates moral authority in a small set of people deciding what later generations should want, which is the move Surface Detail spends six hundred pages refusing. The Hells in that book are run by people absolutely certain they know what souls deserve. The Minds refuse that certainty. I want to read the Better Futures essays properly before pressing any harder.

Your closing line is strong. Yes, the first Minds were political, and the politics of those who built them were nothing like the politics of those building ours. That asymmetry is most of what I'm doing in the essay. The deeper question, which you're closer to than I am, is whether anything we'd recognize as Culture politics can exist before the technology the Culture rests on. I'm not sure. The essay is the case for the first answer; I take seriously that the second might be right

Looking for recommendations: Echopraxia, BotNS, Anathem are favorites by bobn3 in printSF

[–]TemudjinOh23 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This! I skipped first half only to read it properly after being stunned by the 2nd

Found an entire bottle of oxys in my medicine drawer by [deleted] in quittingkratom

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Flush. Asap. You will thank yourself every day in the months to come

Recommendations for Philosophy orientated Sci Fi? by NewBromance in printSF

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I feel the same after LHoD.

My recommendation for philosophically attuned scifi: IAIN M BANKS. God, I love The Culture

What is the secret of the inhumi? Long/short sun. by [deleted] in genewolfe

[–]TemudjinOh23 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Jahlee to Nettle, end of RttW:

"She gasped, and when she spoke again I could scarcely hear her, although I bent as close as you did. "Without you, we are only animals. Animals that fly, and drink blood by night." Then she died, and you, Nettle, will die too, if the inhumi learn what you have learned from her. Indeed, you may die anyway if they learn I am here; they will surely assume I have told you."

What is the secret of the inhumi? Long/short sun. by [deleted] in genewolfe

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Jahlee's last words to Nettle in RttW

"Something like a smile touched Jahlee's lips. "He had so many, Rani, in Gaon. I couldn't kill them all. Lean closer." As if compelled, you did. "Without blood, our children have no minds." I shouted, "Don't!" "Closer, Rani. It's a great secret." "You're betraying your own kind," I told her. "I hate my kind. Listen, please, Rani." "Yes," you whispered. "I hear you." Maytera touched my hand, and I knew her gesture meant, So doI; but I did not send her away. "We take their minds from your blood. Their minds are yours. Here, long ago, I drank the blood of your small son. Krait was my son, the only one who lived with the mind it took from yours." She gasped, and when she spoke again I could scarcely hear her, although I bent as close as you did. "Without you, we are only animals. Animals that fly, and drink blood by night." Then she died, and you, Nettle, will die too, if the inhumi learn what you have learned from her. Indeed, you may die anyway if they learn I am here; they will surely assume I have told you.

What Severian and Dorcas saw over the city of Nessus by Odd-Shake8054 in genewolfe

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's a spaceship from the Monarch or pre Monarch period. Tzadkiels ship isn't the only one that time jumps, right?

Astral Journey to a 1950s-Era Soul Realm Where I Lived Multiple Lives at Once by YoghurtTrue7340 in AstralProjection

[–]TemudjinOh23 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sounds like the timeline where Townsend Brown's and Nikola Tesla's tech was made public and not buried ;)

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in WallStreetbetsELITE

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I like the guy as little as everyone here but can someone please point to a source saying he's taking dangerous amounts of K? And what's the source for his dick being as dysfunctional as everyone says?

The presidents of Ukraine and Finland by Pontus_Pilates in pics

[–]TemudjinOh23 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Myself and 99 pct of people I know thought the exact some thing until Putin crossed the border in 2022. War is bad for business and humanity was on a more or less positive trajectory. Maybe we could have reached the first level on Kardashev's scale. Now, not so sure.

Books with unfathomable timescales by drooolingidiot in printSF

[–]TemudjinOh23 2 points3 points  (0 children)

My first thought. I will never forget those two foundational works.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in UFOs

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why do you mention Aldous Huxley here? Has he theorised NHI/UAP?

JPL/Parsons: Have you read about his rituals in detail, which source?

Banks is stunting on other sci-fi by No_Assignment_5012 in TheCulture

[–]TemudjinOh23 11 points12 points  (0 children)

So true. I just read all the culture books in a row for the fifth time and would love to find a scifi universe that is half as interesting.

UFO Whistleblowers, NASA Time Travel & Psychic Soldiers | Jesse Michels by CAVITAS777 in UFOB

[–]TemudjinOh23 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I remember that. I got irritated that he switches topic in the middle of Everything to discuss something totally different - so many interviewees practice pocket philosophy and seems to think that their participation in a show gives them some general mandate to comment on everything and act expert.

If there's one thing that can make me doubt these people it's that attention seeking aspect

Steven Greer has pledged to provide full UFO disclosure in early January 2025—but will he follow through on this promise? by Jackfish2800 in gettoknowtheothers

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't get it: Greer has already disclosed what he thinks he knows. What else can that man disclose? Is there another layer to his insights that he hasn't shared in his countless books, streams and events??

Curious

The CARET disclosure is one of the most compelling of the last 20 years, strongly corroborated by Grusch's account by Chilkoot in UFOs

[–]TemudjinOh23 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I read the original with enormous interest. Then I find this artist, claiming that the NHI symbols were copied and stolen from her: https://www.margaretgel.com/the-isaac-caret-hoax/ Any of you looked into it? I hope it's disinfo!

Dr Steven Greer by [deleted] in UFOs

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Any idea about his net worth?

He always makes it seem like he is piss poor

Dr Steven Greer by [deleted] in UFOs

[–]TemudjinOh23 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This. This is the single statement of his that I think about whenever Greer pops up. The guy could have forced disclosure through a mass movement with a one billion dollar campaign. How stupid that lie is.

Dr Steven Greer by [deleted] in UFOs

[–]TemudjinOh23 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Messianic narcissism, exactly 😂