asciilifeform: (they've declared that the bus was torched by a generic pyro)
asciilifeform: if china gov. doesn't answer with a thousand dead uighurs, perhaps the rulers have already lost, to use their traditional term, 'mandate of heaven.'
asciilifeform: some record, e.g. 'herr schmuckison refused to confess, was strapped in on the year of our lord xxxx, crunched nicely...'
asciilifeform: if i recall, there is no proof, for example, that the ubiquitous 'iron maiden' was used even on one occasion.
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: interestingly, afaik it is unknown how many traditional and picturesque 'inquisitorial' instruments were actually put to use with any regularity - and how many did most of their work in 'questioning of the first degree' - i.e. 'being shown the instruments'
asciilifeform: word is, king vlad was handy with uteri.
asciilifeform: indiancandy1: you're looking at a piece of kit from spanish inquisition.
asciilifeform: you can shield a semiconductor-based gizmo from njd - faraday cage - but then it will turn up on ordinary metal detector. and won't transmit (you'll have to fetch the bug like your ancestors used to)
asciilifeform: i'm certain other people have thought of this.
asciilifeform: when i first heard of njd, i drew up a recipe for a purely chemical audio recorder. just for shits & giggles.
asciilifeform: don't buy russian, chinese njd. it'll cook yer balls. but will pick up a semiconductor through a metre of concrete.
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: lucky the brits invented the NJD right after ww2. and made, sold, even in the meanest pestholes on the planet.
asciilifeform: e.g. 'we can have exactly the kind of civilization we grew up with, but with Moar Sex!'
asciilifeform: good example of what, for the lack of a better term, i think of as 'partial differentiation'
asciilifeform: mircea_popescu: sexual promiscuity... it'll be the norm, stop bitchin << interesting how early 20th c. folks imagined that birth control would be 'a thing' - i.e. that people would actually use it, and promiscuity would have zero impact on how children are brought up
asciilifeform: can't help but recall the american expression 'indian gift'
asciilifeform: st augustine's 'god, grant me chastity and continence, but not yet!'
asciilifeform: (basic physical principle - any semiconductor is a rectifier. any conductor is antenna. together - 'rfid' whether you wanted or not.)
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo, mircea_popescu, others: re: electronics-sniffing dog << distraction psyop. in real life, hidden electronics are found with a nonlinear junction detector.☟︎
asciilifeform: kakobrekla: yes. they're using soldering equipment designed for leaded alloy - on lead-free
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: these people must already have 'special' legal status - even the copyrasts are not yet permitted to burgle houses to determine who has w4r3z, etc.
asciilifeform: kakobrekla: also thank the lead-free folks for separated tracks. high melting point of lead-free alloy -> hot iron -> lifted tracks
asciilifeform: the chinese could always go with the retarded (though 'humane') american style subjugation of the farmers - i.e. by herding them into growing crud for which the market is mostly artificial, built by government hands
asciilifeform: cazalla: the interesting thing is that they needn't catch anyone. merely spray herbicide (authorized crop is resistant. others - not.)
asciilifeform: cazalla: death also finds a way. (caught planting unauthorized organism? firing squad.)
asciilifeform: i can easily imagine chinese gov. handing out chicom-monsanto seeds, aerial spray of 'roundup' at public expense
asciilifeform: won't play ball? no seeds for next crop.
asciilifeform: BingoBoingo: 'terminator seed' is actually a very intriguing instrument from the standpoint of the mega-state. solves the ancient problem of the peasants not really needing the state for much of anything (as described in j. scott's 'the art of not being governed.')☟︎
asciilifeform: if only feeding people turned them 'rational'...
asciilifeform: naturally intentional. folks like huxley, etc. who imagined that the totalitarian kingdoms of the future would farm children in mass orphanages got it all wrong. the 'children of the state' are instead grown - like described above.
asciilifeform: (anyone who wants to be nomad - straight to herr orlov)
asciilifeform: easier to go with the ancient formula - live off salary? peon. live off capital? burgher
asciilifeform: might be too easy - some folks have very apathetic inquisitors attached
asciilifeform: let's go straight to the guild. the proverbial google grunt, who pays 150k usd / yr. to live in auto range of his 200k gig - is he a proper burgher? or peon imposter?
asciilifeform: with mechanisation of agriculture, everyone is stuck pretending to be a burgher
asciilifeform: housing racket is just one of the mechanisms used in usa to separate folks from their 'excess fat', but it is the one best visible to unarmed eye
asciilifeform: ohio is 'cheap' to the californian who never sets foot there.
asciilifeform: notice also that the 'technology' - as in, the nature of the actual 'machine that keeps the rain out' has regressed, rather than advanced.
asciilifeform: housing - at least in usa - is where the real racket is.
asciilifeform: the only interesting costs, to monitor, for the question of 'what could worker afford then vs now' is food and rent
asciilifeform: usg1 - 'idealism', attempt at actual federation of independent states; usg2 - strong federal / centralized, slave states alive; usg3 - slave states zapped, vestiges of state autonomy removed, capitalism; usg4 - the one we know and love.☟︎
asciilifeform: 'The chronic UR reader will be familiar with my own humble periodization of American history, arranged by constitutional singularity: USG 1, the Congressional Republic, 1774-89; USG 2, the Original Deal, 1789-1861; USG 3, the Old Deal, 1861-1933; USG 4, the New Deal, 1933-present.'
