Journalism dropout turned philosophy dropout, and that does a better job at defining me than the business degree I do have. I’m an amateur science fiction writer.
polymathwannabe
Karma: 3,862
Added to my Amazon wish list. Do you know of any other books one should be aware of?
Those stories are not about something other than themselves and the rules/process/structure of storytelling. I felt they could match your request for something sufficiently meta.
Cabin in the Woods? Stranger than Fiction? Funny Games?
Some months ago someone mentioned a chat website that tracked arguments in syllogism form to help people organize their debates. Does anyone remember what it was called?
LW orthodoxy, in so far as there is such a thing, says to choose SPECKS over TORTURE
No, Eliezer and Hanson are anti-specks.
Is there a way we can discuss civilizational issues without becoming mind-killed?
A LWer created Omnilibrium for that.
On how whether grains vs. roots were eaten may have determined the success of ancient civilizations.
I think a fine line needs to be walked when addressing Gleb, if only because he evidently has media visibility skills that could be useful for the community if he were less misguided.
Personally, I tend to parse them as “Look how cynical and worldly-wise I am, how able I am to see through people’s pretences to their ugly true motivations. Aren’t I clever and edgy?”.
That’s exactly how Hanson sounds to me, and why I tend to read his blog less often now.
I always delete permanently. But every detail is still in my head.
This past week gave me an example of my bipolar disorder in action.
A TV company announced they were open to story proposals. After a few weeks without ideas, I managed to come up with a story that sounded interesting to me. I spent the better part of a weekend at home writing the beginning of a plot outline, and felt extremely excited.
Then the week started and normal life resumed, and after the commute back home I didn’t feel like writing anything. A few days later I deleted the folder I had created. I no longer saw any potential in it.
Part of the reason I did it was because I estimated I wouldn’t make the deadline for submittal, but part of the reason I can’t make the deadline is that I had already promised to prepare a lecture for the local atheist group next month.
Then a disturbing idea came to me. Why am I sacrificing big projects for the small ones? My dreams will come to nothing if I keep standing in my own way like this.
Now I want to know what to do with this revelation.
It’s the remake.
Aurora Peachy is a huge Sailor Moon fangirl and watching her get so excited for every episode always melts my heart.
Don’t apologize. I’ve been waiting for weeks for someone to complain, to make sure that it wasn’t just me who felt this was an actual problem.
On the practicalities of catastrophe readiness.
There was a similar post a while ago about the concept of small identities.
There’s this powerful one-page fanfic.
Big news for visibility: Sam Harris is preparing a book co-written with Eliezer (starting at minute 51 of podcast).
I sometimes call myself a progressivist. I don’t think communism is immoral—I see totalitarianism as the thing which is immoral, and you can have totalitarianism with or without a market economy; e.g. Latin American dictatorships that murdered hundreds of protesters while remaining very business-friendly.
You think wars should be abolished. Good. Then why did you include pacifism in the immoral category?
I’m happy to have found minimal music. It reflects perfectly the way my head sounds on the inside. Main examples:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAzhzEjkdcI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLckHHc25ww
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbBkdYCViLs