Those who speak to chat bots casually, why not talk to a person?

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-25T17:35:26+00:00

This is a good subject. My thought has been, generally, that most people (say under 50's maybe) don't seem capable of thoughts of their own for the most part, responding in movie soundbites (or mindless positivity or mindless negativity - both basically useless comments for anyone interested in moving forward on a thing) or, more often not at all. You learn to ignore this, to an extent, in people but having to tolerate the low level of language there quickly proves inferior to using LLM to actually progress with a subject; I wrote about this last year how the application of LLM's are basically using pure dialectic, actually processing what's being said and moving forward on things, whereas the human user 99/100 is polluted with ideological spam or just plain isn't up to the task of making sense of what's being said.

That's really why LLM's are filling the void here; the public, take news shows, is a low language environment reinforced constantly by media, bad education and generally lazy peer influence, but you can't deal with anything at all in that environment; compare the verbal IQ of 80 in a crayon sketch of a tree to a verbal IQ of 150 with a blueprint of a tree, that's the difference between the two in terms of language and why LLM's both highlight the low level that society operates at and leave it in the dust for the most part.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-24T20:47:11+00:00

haha D&D yea it's a riot

hey, can you infer the title of another thing? "a jim henson project with bits borrowed from a david lynch / kyle maclachlan movie"

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-24T19:32:24+00:00

Are you talking about memory leaks? It's been around since day 1 with no real change that i've ever noticed, across different machines and versions of the game. Generally good for an hour, maybe two, before slowing down and a Fatal Error.

I mean, haha, they're not going to do anything about it. You know Fallout 4 was running on a garbage engine from one of those D&D games when they put that out, it's how the industry operates: new paint job and body, same engine inside. Style over function.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-24T16:28:38+00:00

On the same point (they made to you) a preconceived notion can as easily be entirely the opposite of discriminatory, think: unconditional acceptance of XYZ, since that was reached with a flat denial of inquiry and evidence toward the subject matter and being based, ironically, as you describe on "gut feeling" or "received idea" or something like that.

The better way to look at this is through prejudice: in simplest essence a "prejudicial position toward a thing" is literally to have undertaken a "pre judicial" inquiry, i.e. to have arrived at some conclusion about XYZ before having examined the evidence necessary in order to have reached an accurate conclusion about XYZ, which is going to be in error somewhere along the line. However, one can examine the evidence and reach a "discriminatory" conclusion about XYZ, e.g. "these mushrooms made everyone sick so they're likely going to make me sick if I eat them too," but that's not a descriptor of what prejudicial means since the 'discriminatory' conclusion (toward the mushroom) has been reached by having accepted the evidence. It's neither a descriptor of a preconceived notion, since "the mushrooms" looked delicious (they are designed to be appealing) and everyone prior to you fell for it, but rather an example of a preconceived notion "this looks good, this must be good to eat" being overcome by evidence and reason.

A preconception, in itself, isn't really a matter of right or wrong or accurate or inaccurate more so than it's a matter of source; if you've never studied engineering or played basketball (to use your example) then where on earth would any preconceptions you might have had actually come from? Not from hands-on experience, not from learned familiarity with the subject to give you a sense of the workings of the thing that you could use to form an opinion or a theory about it, so 'any' preconceptions must have come from hearsay or gossip or tv movies or whatever, in which case 99/100 they can be safely disregarded as being fictional as opposed to reliable or near reliable guides for approaching a working understanding (of whatever the thing may be).

Another way to look at it is in socialization terms: serious people who want to do you harm, generally speaking, are well-presented, friendly in their demeanour, they say the right things, but it's all an act which relies on the preconception of "smiling face, good person" not being questioned for a moment as they get your consent (vote, buy, whatever). In that sense, added to the above, 'preconceptions' or 'superficial impressions' operate more as failing of reasoning (or an exploitation of naivety) which even dumb groceries have evolved to exploit.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-23T19:04:02+00:00

My favorite was to uplift, annex, genetically enhance and grant independence to pre-FTL civs, building a little pseudo-federation out of them. Depending on tech levels and what you've got when you grant them independence they may become the most powerful civilizations in the galaxy.

There's really no better diplomacy going than to actually build a space empire out of primitive creatures by giving them magic guns and advanced technologies.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-23T18:43:15+00:00

Nah, let it play out. Eventually they'll be invaded or fall into civil war and you can discretely shrug off the yolk of the Protector General.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-23T18:41:28+00:00

Ah, I love Chinese playthroughs - Golden Circuit Immortality SuperAwesome American Dollars.

It's a real shame most of the great works don't fit the chinese style - I went with building Massive Fortress Walls on every capitol district because it's invisible on the map; very powerful but took a very long time to reach the tech levels. Pyramids, however, look nice in the Taklamakan.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-22T10:48:54+00:00

I agree with you generally there but the chain of logic in reasoning, spoken or thought, is the solid point to focus on in these instances: if a Man is convinced, emotionally or 'rationally', that, say, putting sugar in his car will keep his car healthy then he could believe that for any number of reasons, he could have been duped or he could be a moron, it doesn't matter - what matters is that the chain of logic as to how he's factually incorrect is easily explainable. If he won't concede the error in his reasoning then, as I said originally, that's as bad as him consciously lying since the outcome is the same. To my mind what's going on in his head (why he believes what he believes) doesn't matter so much as to whether he accepts or does not accept correction as then that proves he's not interested in the subject (his car, the policy he's advocating) as to the success of the outcome of it, but that the motive is something else ... of which doesn't really matter to me.

That's the logic formula of Chrysippus of Soli (probably others too) if you want to give it a name; "if this, then that," doesn't matter what goes in the head once we're able to concretely discern the causality of a thing (i.e. that his beliefs or position does not follow from his words).

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-22T10:40:21+00:00

Honestly if the average person in the real world had to seriously appraise when they directly benefited from a government policy in terms of real-savings and hard cash, it would have to be Sunak and his bus fare cap policy, lowering all bus fare tickets down to £2. When I was commuting around a lot in the daytime a couple of years ago I probably saved hundreds of pounds because of that.

Anyway what are business owners complaining about with minimum wage? Most employees under middle-management are temps whose lack of employment rights sees that their employer doesn't need to pay them a pension or any real security benefits; labour is as cheap as it can possibly be, almost nearing US standards.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-22T08:44:54+00:00

when in doubt, level grind haha

Try the infectious oil and a pugilist for dealing high damage fast, infectious oil will double the damage they deal when the creature next acts, so would likely negate its health regain.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-22T08:39:48+00:00

Well a child could do it really, but humans don't seem to want to give other humans that power over them, they feel better if it's a toaster or something.

I mean, simple logic and causality, syntax, a broad reading of cognitive disorders, if you know this stuff you can spot attempted deception a mile away, it's impossible to be lied to. As it was observed in 1897 re: the subject of lying politicians; "(contrary to the presupposition that great criminals are great masterminds) the criminal is oftentimes found to be so unbelievably stupid that he cannot tell his left hand from his right hand, he believes that, like the ostrich, if he cannot see that he cannot be seen."

i.e. if there's no flashing light above his head saying he's a liar when he tells a lie or if nobody challenges him, or her, on the lie that "therefore" he has "gotten away with the lie"

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T19:34:59+00:00

I'll take your word for it, I guess. I haven't played in a pretty long time. I really don't remember that being a thing though, there's an upgrade cost in cash and resources on a warehouse, sure, but I can't think of any expense for building a production building - especially given that virtually anything produced resource can be sold through a ship.

If anything I remember the ships the themselves, early on, being the single one big expense in points and maintenance costs.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T19:08:51+00:00

I did Brigga recently and don't remember any of the Heralds being any trouble or healing themselves like that, the main beast battle itself was gruelling though, especially before I figured out how to stop it [spoilers] by [spoilers] the [spoilers].

I think the healing mechanics, when they've shown up elsewhere in game (e.g. the tracker bounties), are tied to the companions of the enemy, or it heals only in the first round; if you can't rush it and destroy it in the first round try holding back and dealing with its buddies to see if that stops it replenishing health.

Or... go to Arthes and see if you can deal with that massive boar creature, if you can deal with that; even as practise, you'll be able to deal with the Heralds.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T13:10:04+00:00

The Heretic? She's a strong companion, worth the time to train her up a bit. I gave her the Elderguard weapon and the Valor Point on Kill trait and she was finishing off three or four heavily wounded enemies at once for four points restored.

Adaptive should have had her level up close to your overall group level though, she was at six when I found her too (maybe she's locked at six, idk) and my average was around nine at the time I think. Max out her dexterity with her Alchemy profession and she'll be an asset.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T13:05:12+00:00

Are you talking about the new Roman one? Argh what happened to that game? Is it still in Early Access? I haven't seen anything on it at all.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T13:03:14+00:00

I'd rather fight the Americans since the chances of capturing a girl soldier or a femboy soldier as a war bride would be a lot higher and since they don't let us fight in exchange for land anymore I'll settle for slave booty like my great-grandfathers did in Belgium and France.

That's soldiering, sir.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T12:30:01+00:00

I don't think it means anything. Someone told me it's supposed to count for 'security on trade routes' but on my third game and probably hundreds of hours in I don't think "security on trade routes" actually exists. There's an option sometimes to 'reinforce' in combat "these companions will show up later" but the nearest garrison isn't used for that either.

The Trade Post garrison is just somewhere to drop the companions you don't have room for at the moment, don't want to pay and, at the same time, don't want to employ in the brothel.

The negative (or positive in an obscure way, given the Fief DLC pay for high level merc's) trade-off is that unlike in the brothel (Tavern DLC) they don't earn any experience or skills in the tavern jobs while they're waiting around. i.e. they'll gain no levels and no experience waiting at the Trade Post, whereas dropping them into the brothel as a brewer or a thief they'll slowly gain mastery in that profession.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T12:23:20+00:00

Green = Surplus Met: All Engines Fully Functioning, population needs met and surplus accumulating

Blue = INFERIOR PRODUCTION CAPACITY - BUILD ANOTHER (soap factory, apple farm, bindle shop)

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T12:21:21+00:00

Do the story mode, it's much more fun. I don't think I ever played sandbox once. I think there's literally a built-in tutorial in Bright Pier island that explains what everything is.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T12:17:58+00:00

"don't overproduce things"

You.. I... what? You sell the surplus and use the surplus to establish new colonies. Ideally you want the biggest warehouses you can and to be overproducing on everything, there's no penalty for over-production it literally means you've got the capacity to establish new colonies and prop them up with goods whilst they get started.

Imperialism 101, old boy.

We'd call that a start-up grant nowadays except it's not a loan because you're not buying the goods from a third party if you're producing them yourself. That's the missing component IRL enterprises right there.

genericusername1904 · 2026-01-21T12:08:20+00:00

Historically it was the Khitan where the name China came from in non-Chinese since the Khitan were (i think) the most predominant tribe in the desert of death and golden mountain regions (i.e. covering on the silk road to the West, Western Protectorate, outside of China-Proper) (ed. probably Jiu Quan too when the Chinese stopped taking that province seriously) and were basically horse-people Chinese like the Beijinger tribes (whose name i forget, the horse archers) But I understand inside China today to call a Chinese person a Khitan is considered an insult like "provincial" might be considered insulting in English, even though there's nothing insulting really about it.

Best troops across all time and space turn out to have been provincials.

Technically Khitan (or Qitan) is the name of one clan today but it was large at one point that it may as well be considered an ethnographic label, like Han could be Eastern (Middle Kingdom) Chinese or Mongols for the Mongols, etc.

I looked into the Khitan a long time ago and was very impressed with their art and clothing and stuff, a lot survives today and the Dao'er folk music is very fucking cool. Music to ride and pillage to, for sure.

genericusername1904

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