Dialectrician

[dialectrician]

Shogun Trump has decreed that only the finest warrior in the land may succeed him so from now on new presidents shall be winners of the quadriennal "Strongest Under Heaven" Martial Art Tournament.

'Maybe we'll never take it down': Trump compares White House UFC arena to Eiffel Tower, says it could be permanent

The "UFC Freedom Fights 250" will take place on June 14.

This is somehow an improvment over the current US political system.

[dialectrician]

If I were Carrie I would have simply walked off the platform with chilly and contemptuous dignity.

[dialectrician]

Why is the beginning of Carrie shot like softcore porn

[chaumas-deactivated20240115]

dune is so funny it literally opens like

CHAPTER 1

“It sucks that I understand Time Cube and as such cannot avoid becoming a genocidal dictator,” young Paul Atreides said to himself. “For me. Moral complexity is such a burden.”

CHAPTER 2

“Heard any good slurs for poor people lately?” asked the Baron Harkonnen homosexually, knocking back another shot of orphan tears.

[chaumas-deactivated20240115]

this post was a lot longer but I forced myself to cut it back because brevity is the soul of wit and I was getting carried away

[chaumas-deactivated20240115]

anything for you darling

CHAPTER 1

“The fact that I will commit unspeakable genocide and lead a holy war across the galaxy is very bad,” said young Paul Atreides. “For me.”

“I too feel morally conflicted by my role in a ruthless eugenics program,” admitted his mother, the Lady Jessica. “Does that make me a bad mother? Who can say….”

At that moment the Duke Leto Atreides returned home from a grueling day churning out propaganda to convince his troops that he was worth dying for. His regal face was lined with deep moral complexities. “It’s tough when you’re me and everybody wants to fuck you so so bad,” he said. “But that’s the price I must pay for the future well-being of my ancestral house.” He sighed, deep and melancholy. When was the last time he’d thrown around the old pigskin with his boy? Would he ever get the chance again…?

That’s fully-manual ascetic space feudalism for you, he thought libertarianally.

Paul looked around the room and was struck by the sudden and horrific realization that he was the smartest person to ever live, and that even his own loving mother and father could never hope to understand Time Cube.

But that’s a problem for another day, Paul decided, not for the last time.

CHAPTER 2

“It’s a beautiful day to be grossnasty, don’t you think?” said the Baron Harkonnen homosexually as he surveyed the ravaged landscape beyond the window. Acid rain pelted against the glass and melted the flesh off the shrieking peasants below.

“Sure. Whatever,” said Feyd-Rautha, not looking up from his sketchbook, upon which he had scrawled the words ‘I love killing and maiming’ in large bubble letters.

“A-h-h,” said the Baron. “That was a trick question: every day is a beautiful day for being grossnasty. You must learn this lesson well, nephew, if you ever hope to get anywhere in life. Piter, what are you doing over there with that huge and evil brain of yours?”

The mentat violated the Hays Code six times in the few seconds it took him to reply. “I’m calculating a mathematically perfect slur for orphans,” he said in a gay voice. “Just as you requested.”

“Finally! A productive use of your time,” said the Baron, and flipped him off. Without a word, he snatched the pen from Feyd-Rautha’s hand and wrote ‘and oppressing the populace’ beneath the words the youth had already written. “There,” he said. “Much better.”

[dialectrician]

Is it just me or, even if you were to grant that AI is useful, having so many different AI companies is a gigantic waste of ressources?

When you have two canned tomatoe companies, you can just sum their products. But AI isn't additive. The benefits ("benefits") of having trained Claude + ChatGPT isn't equal to the sum of the benefits of having trained Claude and the benefits of having trained ChatGPT! There's got to be an immense amount of redundancy in their capacities.

[innerchildabortionclinic]

"Vote for me!" - Vladimir Lenin

[dialectrician]

Social democrats be like

[dialectrician]

Kwisatz Haderach was an ancient Chakobsa term used by the Bene Gesserit, meaning "Decrease in the Rate of Surplus Value".

[dialectrician]

Social democrats be like

[dialectrician]

I'm re-reading Dune and one thing I've never understood is why doesn’t the Guild just directly rule the universe. You control all transport and communication. Literally no one can get anywhere without your leave.

[dialectrician]

Actually thinking about it it makes sense in that, in a way, they already rule the universe. They can already extract arbitrary amount of wealth from the planets by charging whatever they want for transport and then buying all the spice they need. Appointing their own planetary governors would avail them nothing since they'd do the same thing the houses already do, so they can just let the houses administer the plebes for them.

Kind of a paradox of power-as-potential-to-act, really: once you have all the power you actually have no reason to use it so it becomes the same as not having power.

[geyfrog]

Modern life is too atomized; life would be better on net if we more interdependent like we were in the past

Strongly agree

Somewhat agree

Neutral

Somewhat disagree

Strongly disagree

Voting ended onMay 29

[dialectrician]

We are far more interdependent than we have ever been. Alienation ("atomization") is an artifact of generalized commodity exchange, the very thing which fostered interdependence even as it created the illusion of independence ("me, my money and my property", as if those things had any meaning or power outside of social relationships).

[dialectrician]

You can tell that Herbert hadn’t come up with the plot of the latter books when writting Dune Messiah

Really, more historians than even the giant omniscient worm-mutant that ruled for 3500 years?

[dialectrician]

I'm re-reading Dune and one thing I've never understood is why doesn’t the Guild just directly rule the universe. You control all transport and communication. Literally no one can get anywhere without your leave.

[linguistness]

No, actually, i want cables and not bluetooth, i don't want touchscreens, i want buttons and knobs, i want to be able to take the battery out of my phone, i want to charge my phone and plug in head phones at the same time, i want a cd drive in my laptop and not have to buy an external drive, i want a car without a display, i want to turn on the lights with a switch not with my voice, i want to have a paper cinema ticket not a QR code, i want to listen to illegally burned music on a 00s cd player, i want to watch movies that i actually own, i want to read news once a day on paper, i want to aimlessly flick through magazines and not doomscroll on social media, i want to write emails and not talk to chatbots, i want to own stuff without hundreds of digital subscriptions, i want

[glintblade]

Hiro Shima, the only japanese kid at hogwarts, locking eyes with a boggart as it transforms into an exploding nuclear bomb in the middle of the classroom:

[dialectrician]

*Hit the Economist Bong*

"What if the real rent was every penny a worker makes above a living wage."

[dialectrician]

Two for two where I hear about a major strike in the US and the rat-adjacent cult here is begging the US government to use its power to shut it down because they are fascists and always have been.

[iwakurawired44]

it kind of drives me insane that so many "marxists" on here haven't even read Capital. Like if youre presenting yourself as a Principled Marxist:tm: and youre telling me you haven't even read through Capital vol 1 and really digested it???? Dont read a summary or an abridged version or fucking Stalin quoting Lenin quoting Engels summarizing Marx. Actually read the damn thing. If you claim yourself to be a Marxist, offering Marxist opinions, do yourself a favour and base your opinions off of Marx's magnum opus. Frankly id love it if as many people as possible read through all of Capital and Marx's later political writings but we dont live in the perfect world where all of us can dedicate ourselves to enriching reading.

[dialectrician]

*Vol 1, 2 and 3.

[iwakurawired44]

wow, someone found my rambly post!

Vols 2 and 3 are good of course but getting people to read those through is even harder (alas, wishful thinking....). Vol 1 is a wonderful self contained piece that gives you a proper understanding of capitalism along with an understanding of the neccesity for revolution. For me (my knowledge of Vol 2 and 3 is lower than it really should be) I find Vol 2 and 3 are things that come into my mind when thinking of niche questions on marx writing about X. The revolutionary content is also unfortunately lesser.

[dialectrician]

>Vols 2 and 3 are good of course but getting people to read those through is even harder (alas, wishful thinking….).

All the more reason to not preemptively concede the point imo. I personally think it's more valuable than any of the myriad 20th century texts that usually get recommended beforehand. It also basically answers most of the objections usually raised to Marx (price vs value, non-productive wage-labor, trpf and crisis theory...)

[dialectrician]

Like the fundamental problem I think (this is true for Vol 1 but especially vol 2&3) is that people are so so afraid of being seen as cranks that they avoid Marx's economic work and instead consume the socio-historico-philosophical stuff first or Marxian "critical" "anti-dogmatic" stuff which prims them to think Capital's economics are not worth taking seriously and they're right to not engage with it so they don’t.