Want to wade into the sandy surf of the abyss? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid.
Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful you’ll near-instantly regret.
Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.
If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cut’n’paste it into its own post — there’s no quota for posting and the bar really isn’t that high.
The post Xitter web has spawned so many “esoteric” right wing freaks, but there’s no appropriate sneer-space for them. I’m talking redscare-ish, reality challenged “culture critics” who write about everything but understand nothing. I’m talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. They’re inescapable at this point, yet I don’t see them mocked (as much as they should be)
Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldn’t be surgeons because they didn’t believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I can’t escape them, I would love to sneer at them.
(Credit and/or blame to David Gerard for starting this.)
Friend of Ziz and cofounder of the 'rationalist fleet' pops up out of the woodwork trying to clear Ziz's name
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/mbrmZmzBdtn4qrSus/re-introduction-of-a-rationalist-dragon-and-clarifications
I find myself noticing things rather detached from the typical Ziz funnybusiness more strongly than I notice the stuff about that whole situation.
"I'm Gwen Danielson, a neuroscientist and bioengineer, who decided as a child that I would end Death (and bring people back if I could) and that I would become a dragon and help generally facilitate a fantastical transhumanist future."
"I dream of non-Euclidean geometries, of countless worlds visible and accessible in the daytime sky, of competent infrastructure, of soul forges continually working to bring back the dead... I dream of reaching through warps in the spacetime fabric to save the dying across time"
"Signed, the dragon of creation Creatrei (cree-AH-trey) also known as Gwen Danielson or as Char and Astria (when referring to my hemis as distinct individuals)"
The reactions are fun. "This post is not actually doing a good job of making me trust you and think this conversation is safe to have[1], and I notice that as I am saying this that I am afraid that this will now somehow result in someone trying to murder me in my sleep"
Even in death, duty does not end.
Does "read a second book" apply here, or is this a "read a first book" situation?
I'll have you know there's lots of important WoW lore in the novels!!!!
Tassadar's probably the most telling. For those not in the know, the Protoss are noble savages modeled after samurai, templar, and Native Americans. Tassadar in particular is modeled after the stories of legendary Hiawatha and real person Geronimo, first uniting the Protoss under a single banner and then sacrificing himself in a cutscene at the end of a big battle before repeatedly re-appearing as a ghost in later titles. On one hand, Tassadar's the most influential Protoss in the entire setting; after his death, everybody switches in-game from a greeting revering ancient hero Adun ("in taro Adun") to a greeting mentioning new hero Tassadar ("in taro Tassadar"). But on the other hand, he's a general and warrior deeply enmeshed in a military tradition which demands his unwavering total sacrifice in order to achieve any progress. Tassadar is a racist stereotype embodying the idea of stoic acceptance; when Protoss say "it is a good day to die" they are echoing tropes about Native American beliefs.
Not gonna touch the Undertale reference today.
I feel like you may be judging Tassadar too harshly. What you said is true but his defining feature is openness and empathy towards other cultures. The Conclave, the ruling body of the protoss, consider humans basically animals and blast them from orbit without a care, and they dismiss the 'Dark Templar' as heretics. This even though the Dark Templar are the only ones who have the magitech to kill the invading aliens. His whole arc is about rejecting prejudice and teaming up with people your culture considers inferior, not just heroic sacrifice.
while it's technically plausible that Ziz was involved in a minor oopsy whoopsy fucky wucky deady weady or two or six, she's always been lovely to me, much of the time,
Uh oh
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/gwen-danielson-zizians-interview-1235552043/
Going on a media tour now
Aella also lost much of her early earnings on crypto.
Curtis Lind reminds me of the businessman who supported Elron early on and lost most of his money.
The end where Gwen Danielson decides that Yudkowsky is ~~her~~ their savior is tragic.
edit/ The article describes Danielson as transfemme but refers to them as them so I will do the same
Ah yup, that is definitely the type of person who’s deeply attracted to cults.
thiel jumpscare
Is the crappy dragon fursona related to Peter Thiel being an anagram for "the reptile"?
they're all cosplaying medieval alchemy so at least it fits a theme
The back-and-forth between Gwen and LessWrong commenters is getting spicy. This definitely deserves a top-level post on SneerClub.
Not really part of the back and forth but I find this illuminating of their recent travails, regarding it not being a step to far to prevent them from posting:
"This isn’t super relevant since it’s not like the standards are super high but ever since the enormous onslaught of LLM psychosis posters, the default of people who try to post to LW is to get rejected from posting here"
Sounds like the mods have had to deal with a lot of unbalanced people lately, and are not having it.
Habryka's all, "Dammit, why do you have to come here and remind everyone where the Zizians came from?"
EDIT: This person also seems to have no concept of the finality of death, which might explain why the Zizians were so murdery.
The god ai can perfectly simulate people, and a sa copy is you, death isnt permanent. And when you start to think this is inevitable and close, murder becomes just another way to signal how strongly you feel about a thing.
The link to the guide to setting up a retrofitted boxtruck to continue AI alignment research in with local copies of the internet archive after civilization collapses in 2025 is fun
@BioMan
These are the kind of people who I could picture working away at a laptop in a box truck and they tell you they're close to a breakthrough and then you get closer and the laptop isn't on, and hasn't been powered up for years.
SCENE: a wind-blasted desert landscape. In the foreground, a weathered truck rests on the side of a ruined highway. The windscreen is dusty and cracked, and the tyres have long since rotted away.
A PAIR OF SCAVENGERS, clad in bulky rags, approach the truck with a mixture of excitement and trepidation.
Using a CROWBAR, they force open the back doors of the truck, and exclaim
"Fuck it, Ted, it's one of those dumb AI trucks!"