Oog - my little brother.

He’s a walking stereotype of a tech libertarian (which is to say, a shallow, bigoted, reactionary, right-wing IT guy who for some inexplicablec reason seems to think that all that’s necessary to count as “libertarian” is to rail against “the woke mob.”)

The first time I heard the term “mansplaining,” I knew exactly what it meant, because it’s his customary mode of communication. I already know that by about the third time I hear him say, " Well, what you have to understand is that…" I’m going to have to leave the room.

He likely won’t bring up politics directly - not surprisingly, he’s generally ignorant of both the philosophical side of it and the practical side of it. Instead, he’ll bloviate about whatever the right-wing/tech media bubble is bloviating about, so essentially political issues without the complication of political context.

It’s invariably awful, and it’s always a matter not of if but merely of when I’m going to have to leave the room because the only alternative is going to be a messy verbal explosion. And I presume it’s going to be worse than ever this year, since he’ll undoubtedly want to mansplain the mindless dogma he’s been fed about Trump and Musk and Ukraine and tariffs and immigrants and trans athletes and so on…

I would go so far as to say that it’s vital that Biden handles court reform, because it has to be done before the election.

We can already be sure that Trump and his backers are planning legal challenges on whatever grounds might vaguely appear to be something resembling legitimate in the event that he loses, and we can also be sure that at least Thomas and Alito will rule in their favor, no matter how ludicrous their arguments might be, simply because they’re entirely and completely compromised. They’ve already demonstrated that law is irrelevant - that they serve demagoguery, shallow self-interest, bigotry and corruption. And given the chance, they WILL do their parts to destroy democracy in the US.

We can’t afford to give them the chance.

And that could be Biden’s legacy - the president who led the efforts that saved America from a fascist coup.

I’ve seen no evidence that they are.

What little organic commentary I’ve seen has been cautiously optimistic at worst.

The barrage of anti-Harris stuff that all started appearing at essentially the same time reeks of astroturf.

I’m an American, so yes - in a heartbeat.

Broadly, I wouldnt much care where it was, just so long as it was somewhere that was not being actively transfomed into a plutocratic/christofascist autocracy.

And in fact, there’s virtually nothing that I want more at this point in time than to get the hell out while I can. I fully expect that if I don’t, I’m going to end up in prison or dead, just like so many other vocal dissidents under so many other authoritarian regimes.

Oh wow, I really riled you up.

Presuming, for the moment, that this laughable, trite and terribly cliched rejoinder is in any way true, how would it be relevant to anything?

Never mind though - that was a rhetorical question. I know, and I suspect you do as well, that it’s not. It’s just a casual, and at this point entirely predictable, bit of disparagement tossed out to give yourself what you erroneously believe to be an edge.

the real problem is the idiots who are paying.

I mean, I think that this is contentious enough to be worth picking apart.

Feel free. I’m more than willing to explain in as much detail as you want exactly why it is that I think that people who pay extra for early access to games are “idiots.”

(Just, by the bye, as I think that people who don’t wear seat belts, tahe the guards off their table saws or don’t get covid vaccines are “idiots.”)

I can’t imagine calling someone an idiot unless I thought they kind of deserved what was coming to them.

Which is exactly what I do in fact think.

It’s this schadenfreude you seem to feel that I take issue with.

I don’t think that word means what you think it means.

I don’t feel any sort of pleasure or sense of fulfillment at their idiocy - I simply note it.

I’m especially curious about that one.

Oh, that would be this, actually:

demonstrates more contempt for one’s fellow man than decreeing that they shouldn’t even be allowed to make their own choices.

You are, for some reason, arguing against the concept of rules. I never asked you to do that.

In response to my statement that:

any consumers who, in such a situation, do not say no to a bad deal have nobody to blame but themselves

you wrote:

Do you suppose that choosing not to wear a seatbelt, a very bad deal, should be left entirely up to individuals, um, “stupid” enough to take it?"

Clearly, with that, you established that the point you wished to dispute was whether or not “choosing… a very bad deal should be left entirely up to individuals.” That was the exact point of contention you stipulated.

So this:

You are, for some reason, arguing against the concept of rules. I never asked you to do that

is blatant bullshit. In point of fact, with the example above, that’s the specific focus you introduced. Curiously, you said nothing at all about the “contentious” phrasing of my original post or my supposed “schadenfreude.” That only came along now, in this desperate bit of backing and filling in which you’re vainly engaged. Rather, your immediate and exclusive focus was on whether or not “choosing… a very bad deal should be left entirely up to individuals.” The clear, and in fact only, alternative to that is that it should not be left up to individuals, so that’s the position you’ve taken, and the position in support of which I’m still waiting for you to provide an argument.

Now - if that’s truly not what you intended to say or imply, that would be another matter. And in fact, in any other situation, I’d be willing to simply grant that that wasn’t your intent and amend my responses accordingly. We could simply cooperate to find the exact point of our disagreement and focus on that (and could both enjoy this exchange much more).

But you blew that chance a long time ago.

So that was in fact the position you took, whether intentionally or not. And I’m still waiting for an argument in support of it.

It’s amusing and revealing that at no point here have you actually directly addressed anything that I’ve actually said. Instead, you’ve just used what I’ve said as a jumping off point for a ludicrously exaggerated, barely relevant and deliberately insulting strawman.

Here’s a challenge for you - instead of leaping from strawman to strawman in this vain effort to somehow prove that I’m a horrible person and therefore wrong, go all the way back to the beginning here and frame a positive argument for your position. Tell me exactly why and on what basis (as appears to be your position) publishers should be prohibited from charging extra for early access, and what nominal public good that would serve.

As a bonus, you might also try to explain how the position that publishers should be allowed to charge extra for early access is in any way “a very anti-covid-vaccine argument.” I’m especially curious about that one.

Feel free to take your time

I would say that there’s almost nothing that demonstrates more contempt for one’s fellow man than decreeing that they shouldn’t even be allowed to make their own choices.

Yes.

It’s that population that actively makes games worse for all of us

That’s exactly why I don’t cut them any slack. Their dumb choices don’t just harm themselves - they harm me and all other gamers, insofar as they’ve made it so that publishers can get away with putting out unfinished, buggy, unbalanced crap.

Sure - the gamers might spend a while ineffectually bitching on forums and handing out 1 star reviews, but that’s just meaningless noise. The ONLY thing that matters to the publishers is whether or not people buy the game, and those dunderheads not only buy the game - they line right up to buy the next one too.

Or, now, line right up to pay extra for early access to the next one.

Yes - it really is the customers’ fault.

It’d be different if games were a necessity - then the idea of “predatory” behavior would be relevant, since we’d be talking about someone taking advantage of the fact that the consumer has to buy the thing in question.

But games aren’t a necessity - not even close - so any consumer is at any time entirely free to say no to any transaction without suffering any meaningful ill effects.

And any consumers who, in such a situation, do not say no to a bad deal have nobody to blame but themselves.

Hot take - while it’s obviously greedy for the publishers to be charging for this, the real problem is the idiots who are paying.

I’m often reminded of a bit on Top Gear years ago, when they were talking about “turbo” as a marketing tool in the 80s, when you could buy “turbo” sunglasses or “turbo” watches or “turbo” after-shave.

At this point - no - probably not.

I think he should have stepped down weeks ago. Framed correctly (something along the lines of "I still want to believe I’m the best possible candidate, but I can’t deny that there’s significant doubt about that, and this is a point in history that’s far too important to allow for doubt), AND accompanied by the DNC (acting entirely out of character and) simply throwing open the nomination and going with whoever proved to be the most popular candidate, I think that would’ve generated enthusiasm that Biden never has, and would’ve led to Trump getting his flabby ass handed to him.

But I worry that it’s too late for that now - that at this point there’s been too much fiddling around, too much dissension and too much astroturf to allow for the sort of spontaneous rally 'round a candidate that would’ve worked so well. And I worry that if he does drop out still, it’s not going to be so that the voters can get a candiadte they’ll rally around, but so that the DNC can just saddle us with some other drab establishment hack who’ll likely end up being even less popular than Biden.

So no - at this point, I think the best strategy is to stop bitching about it and focus on beating the fucking wannabe dictator in clown makeup and his christofascist coattail-riders. It really doesn’t matter who wins, so long as it’s not that foul piece of shit Trump.

The Song That Doesn’t End

That’s a fascinating concept.

And yes - though a yank, I know Doctor Who. ;)

(And this is the point at which I accidentally tapped “Reply” last time through, which is why there’s a deleted post before this one)

Anyway…

My first reaction was that it didn’t make sense that a consciousness could find itself attached to (hosted by?) a different mind and just blithely continue on.

But the more I think about it, the more I think that’s at least reasonable, and possibly even likely.

A consciousness might be comparable to a highly sophisticated and self-aware frontend. Any range of data or software can be stored and run through it, and when new data or even a new piece of software is introduced, the frontend/consciousness can and will (if it’s working correctly) integrate it with the system, and it can review the data and software it’s overseeing and find flaws and (unless the ego subsystem intervenes) amend or replace it, and so on.

And viewed that way, and taking into account the likely mechanics of the whole thing, it really is possible and arguably even likely that it would be essentially content-neutral. It would make sense that while the experience of “I the audience” is itself a distinct thing, the specific details - the beliefs and values and memories and such that make it up - are just data pulled from memory, and it could just as easily pull any other data from any other memory (if it had access to it).

Fascinating…

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Fight the urge to immediately get off the train.

Even with as many episodes of Star Trek as I’ve seen, I’m sure I’d want to rush right out and start exploring.

Neither really. Sort of.

There are certainly inherently repugnant beliefs, but beliefs in and of themselves are harmless - they’re just a particular pattern of firing neurons in a brain. They literally cannot bring harm to others just in and of themselves.

The thing that makes some beliefs horrible is not the mere holding of them, but the things one who holds them is likely to do. It’s those acts that are the real evil - the beliefs are just a foundation, or a trigger.

Now, all that said, I would hazard that it’s exceedingly rare at best (and arguably impossible) for anyone to hold noxious beliefs without them in some way affecting their behavior, so the mere holding of noxious beliefs can certainly serve as a justification for the conclusion that the person in question is in fact horrible. Still though, to be (perhaps overly) precise, I’d say that it’s not the belief itself that makes them a horrible person, but merely that the belief makes it quite likely that they’ll act in ways that make them (or reveal them to be) horrible people.

I get where you’re going with that analogy. It’s a bit awkward, just because, as you did, you have to stipulate shelter as opposed to the sheltered area, but with that stipulation it does work, and quite well really.

And as analogies should be, it’s intriguing.

But…

My first reaction is that it’s sort of similar to the “consciousness is an illusion” concept in that it appears to just move the problem back one step rather than solve it.

It seems to me that what you’re describing is the “space” (or maybe "framework would be better) in which consciousness takes place, but not consciousness itself.

The problem then (as is the problem with the consciousness is an illusion idea) is that that space/framework/whatever is only of note if a consciousness is introduced.

At the risk of bringing in too many metaphors, it’s akin to the “tree falling in a forest” thought experiment. The tree falling in the forest certainly generates disturbances in the air that, were there ears to hear them, would register as sound. But without ears to hear them, they’re just disturbances in the air. Similarly, it seems to me that the “shelter” that’s apparently intrinsic to the brain is only rightly considered “shelter” if there’s a consciousness to experience it. Without a consciousness to experience it, it’s just a space/framework/whatever.

Anyway, do you believe there is any ingredient to consciousness other than the physically of the brain?

I believe that consciousness in and of itself is obviously that.

I probably should’ve clarified - when I say “consciouness,” I’m referring to the state/process that’s at least one step removed from immediate perception.

I see a round red thing and recognize it to be food. That’s just perception.

I also recognize it to be the thing called an “apple” (in English - other languages have other words). I know that they grow on trees and come in many varieties, and I remember the tree in the side yard of the house I grew up in and how the apples were small and yellow and very good, but I had to generally get a ladder to get any apples, since the deer ate the ones close to the ground (and the ones on the ground, which at least meant I didn’t have to worry about cleaning them up), oh yeah and mom had a recipe for raw apple cake and it was delicious, but she bought the apples for that because the ones from the tree were too firm and tangy to bake with… and so on.

That’s the part that, to me, corresponds with the “shelter” in your analogy.

But that’s still not consciousness.

Consciousness is the apparently entirely non-physical “audience” to all of that - the “I” that’s aware of the process as it’s happening.

For example, it’s not the part that recognizes an apple, or the part that categorizes it as food, or even the part that remembers the apple tree and the cake and feels nostalgia - it’s the part that’s one step removed from all of that - the internal “audience” (of one) that observes that “I” am experiencing all of that.

And it seems to me that your view accounts for all of those subsidiary things, but doesn’t account for the “audience” - consciousness. Consciousness is distinct from, and at least one step removed from, all of those things.

And finally (though this has already gone on quite long) -

I don’t believe that consciouness is a manifestation of some “spark” or “soul” or anything else external. I think it’s really a relatively mundane function of the brain that we simply haven’t come to understand yet (and for as long as “science” remains blinkered by reductive physicalism, likely won’t be able to come to understand). The key, and the thing (to go all the way back) that ties it in with free will, is that I believe that (as I mentioned before) the communication between brain and consciousness is bidirectional - that there’s some mechanism by which conscious thought alone can at least affect if not wholly direct the path along which neurons fire, and likely not only pioneer new paths, but in some way “flag” them, such that the new path is (nominally) properly fitted into the whole.

And again - thanks. This is some of the most rewarding mental exercise I’ve had in a long time.

There are a bajillion crappy old games that I actually dislike more, but none of those would be interesting answers.

Of games that are generally well-regarded, so the gap between my opinion and the common opinion is largest, I’d have to say Final Fantasy Tactics.

It’s not that I dislike it - it’s just that, between FFT and Tactics Ogre, there are five games of the same type from the same devs and the same general era (FFT, FFT Advance, FFT A2, Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together and Tactics Ogre: Knight of Lodis) and IMO, FFT is the bottom of the barrel - every single one of the others is better.