12900+ entries in 0.008s
mircea_popescu: unbest for japan, they had very much sparta problem -- dead japanese not replaceable through usual process
mircea_popescu: specific example of why i say war is fun -- not only losses don't count, but their replenishment consists of fucking a buncha women, whether they want to or not.
mircea_popescu: this is why people like engineering for war, too. it's a whole of a lot more fun to make a tank than a water boiler.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform war is specifically this arrangement where you don't count the losses. who's gonna fine the victor for his more expensive tanks in terms of "wildlife-variety" ?
mircea_popescu: so in this sense, because the t-34 cost 18 units and provided 6.5 to 30 or so sovheads while tiger cost 77 units and provided .1 to 24 naziheads, we can resolve the matter : 18 for 195 vs 77 for 2.4
mircea_popescu: THIS is what matters. the per capita productivity gain from capital investment.
mircea_popescu: in any case, the problem in terms of "1 tiger is said to have been match for 2-3 t-34" is already misstated. the point is : marginal war gain per german soldier from tiger was like .1, marginal war gain per soviet soldier from t-34 was like 6.5
mircea_popescu: turns out the correct cut lay so close to "don't bother", russki not-even-replaceable-parts accidental constructs were closer than the finely zeiss'd german items
mircea_popescu: of course, in fairness, there's some hidden lulz in there : turns out tank ~seems~ perfect assault weapon, but ~in fact~ is perfect infantry support weapon. which is why t-34 won over both kv and tiger ; and why the best use of tanks came from north africa, where there being no "armored positions to storm", tanks could be used correctly (if uncomprehendingly) by the germans too.
mircea_popescu: russkis just went "how about if that abandoned tachanka people take cover to shoot from behind was motorized"
mircea_popescu: they made it too big, overengineered, "what if i was the last man and this was the last tank" otherwordly consideration.
mircea_popescu: germans did to platonic tank the wrong thing that you like doing.
mircea_popescu: i have an alternate theory, but im not sure you wanna hear it.
mircea_popescu: by same token, moon landing is not american, american is moon landing. a moon landing's just like a moon landing is, your lookup table consists of "who did that ?" not of "what'd this doing indicate". without preloaded history, you wouldn't know.
mircea_popescu: hehe, you did ~the reverse~. you looked at item that looked like the item has to look and went "well, russki is like item does", not "item is like russki does"
mircea_popescu: in what sense was btr russian ? there's only so many ways you can do armored vehicle.
mircea_popescu: in the sense of flying their colorful if meaningless flags.
mircea_popescu: people exactly 100% as african as before -- but capital investment fell off cliff in 80s and never recovered
mircea_popescu: it wasn't ~just~ leadership that gave up, let gorby in. i suspect it was just about everyone capitulating by 1985
mircea_popescu: (your
http://btcbase.org/log/2019-01-08#1885908 courtly comment, which is factually untrue -- ru 5-6x the headcount, sparked some investigation that turned up a buncha lulz like that. turns out mid 80s soviet was INCREDIBLY weak and complacent, for some fucking reason.)
☝︎ mircea_popescu: asciilifeform in other lulz : in 80s ro was actually making the btr-80 for east germany export. because russkis found it cheaper to license than to manufacture, and the ro had stolen it already anyway.
mircea_popescu: should be at least 7-8x, considering what "redundancy" means and how heavy the shit is.
mircea_popescu: it's a pretty sweet item, except for one point : its twin engines together less power than bartholomew.
☟︎ mircea_popescu: asciilifeform aha. tech transferred for i don't recall what economic deal in the 70s
mircea_popescu: you know ? maybe the girls recount sometime that night i nearly drove through a washed out road.
mircea_popescu: "artillery observation post" my foot, it's jungle adventure vehicle.
mircea_popescu: i was really contemplating getting the car jacked on those APC tyres they had back in soviet days.
mircea_popescu: last trip did ~50 mi through gravel road. you even have those back in pinehouse lands ?
mircea_popescu: you should question the fabled quality of costa rican road.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform i have the converse problem. alternator dies on road, /me takes car back to (otherwise very competent, and very able) independent mechanic who charged 75 an hour for tools and labour to find what needs changing and then install mp's parts (75 CENTS!!!). "why the fuck was not this on the bill ?" "ah, it wasn't really broken yet, still hung on a thread".
☟︎ mircea_popescu: except apparently gypsies don't grow fast enough for the us, notwithstanding they marry the girls once they bleed. so the locals build out of pine and then charge to fix it.
mircea_popescu: this reminds me of how gypsy teams "fix cheaply the roof" in the old country.
mircea_popescu: and yes mod6 is the mark of all time, always ready to pay for such a superficial and self-evident scam. cuz he's a well bred midwestern man whom you can't help but love (notwithstanding the cockroaches can't help but fleece).
mircea_popescu: ra new york is organized around strong-arming and then charging "for protection" the independent moron, aka hayseed immigrant.
mircea_popescu: BingoBoingo but yes, i guess if you put it out there i have no choice but to spell it out : of ~fucking course~ the carpenter "sticks his file in there". it's a sales gimmick, like the new york electrician pointing out to people they gotta pay him a billion to "bring the buildingto spec" because "otherwise he has to report them" because "otherwise he loses his own license". because we're supposed to not notice the whole mob-e
mircea_popescu: "freedom" of the hallucinated optionality flavour has costs.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform because they don't believe in the oppresive multi-generartional patriarchal home.
mircea_popescu: right, hammer/splints powered oil presses, stuff like that
mircea_popescu: took chet there personally ; she got to touch everything ; at the end hands so full of splinters i spent an hour digging them out.
mircea_popescu: there's splendid wood in new world, are you kidding me ? no cedar can match redwood.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform this is what i mean. i saw 300 yo wooden construction, made by ro mountain folk. but that wood...
mircea_popescu: well, wood has its place, but a) it's very knowledge-intensive -- notice how some shipwrights make ships that never rot, some others -- rot in a month. and b) by the time you're actually building complexly enough to even have rim joists etc... wooden construction's intended for hunting lodge not townhouse.
mircea_popescu: if only soviet union lasted a decade or two more and had better notions re cs, he could have been so happy. imagine -- re-doing emacs FOR STALIN
mircea_popescu: my personal "this is a moron" realisaiton occured upon reading some nonsense about how "more fair" division of proceeds from creative fields was to pool all the results and issue them back out by some log function, ie guy with 1mn fans gets 6 units, guy with 10 fans gets 1 unit, something like this.
mircea_popescu: it'll be so fucking splendid to link a bitcoin without glibc jaysus
mircea_popescu: i wanted to put it on trilema, dun recall if i ever did or not, but anyway, quite the item
mircea_popescu: teh withdrawal into biology historically works way the fuck better for women than for men.
mircea_popescu: i don't understand how these misfortunate kids are supposed to respect the human failures using them for props.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform they punch the juicer button or w/e it is cuckdads do.
mircea_popescu: if you look about, ~all these loud and "successful" narcissistic dorks end up in the ~same arrangement, rescued by marriage of convenience.