300500+ entries in 0.206s
mircea_popescu: and eating
the same food, so one'd expect molybdenum
to equalize. but...
mircea_popescu: this "is_technology" function is never as usefully decidable as schoolteachers like
to pretend.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform
there is a much much better example in your own experience. recall
the matchsticks ?
mircea_popescu: so you're a little miffed, and suspect us of collusion. so
then we capture a random inuit woman, and i spend some
time with her,
mircea_popescu: and
then i call a girl over, and she
tries it, and
there it is! a pretty one
too.
mircea_popescu: you
think i'm joking, but presently i demonstrate : i put a finger on my nose, and frown, and fart, and soon enough
there it is, another one.
mircea_popescu: and i explain
to you
that i discovered a way
to create
them by farting.
mircea_popescu: now
then, after a moment of
this, you wish
to know how
the fuck is it possible
that
these animals live here ?!
mircea_popescu: let's do a
thought experiment. suppose i invite you
to spend a week at my north pole hunting lodge, where, contrary
to what you might expect, we spend our
time hunting large floating worms of delicious carnation. with me so far ?
mircea_popescu: and
the important point here is
that no agent may be universal ; and no universal may have agency. which is why god can't act.
mircea_popescu: fine
then, let it be so.
to me
the difference is
that i perceive
the "you"
to be universalizing in your statement.
mircea_popescu: no. it picks you up, in
that some can and some can't ; some do and some do not.
mircea_popescu: that's
the point.
technology is
technology only in context.
mircea_popescu: and for
that matter, when you have sex you get a child, which is yours, even if you have nfi how cunt works. nor does she.
mircea_popescu: us army grunts notably don't know how
the fuck
their shit works.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform but in a discussion of indian
tribes,
the smaller
trbie with guns
that wipes
the larger
tribe with
tomahawks HAS, in fact, deployed
the
technology.
mircea_popescu: it is not clear
technology is an "informational"
thing. seems apt
to say
technology is a productive
thing.
mircea_popescu: yes,
there's madmen and
there's people, and
technology need not be describable
to madmen
to be
technology.
mircea_popescu: but once yo uspeak of madman you're either granting my point or else going full "no
true scotsman"
mircea_popescu: fish in
the scania is
the equivalent of lace in luxembourg.
mircea_popescu: inasmuch as it allowed
the swedes
to pretend
to being a nation for absolutely no other discerinble reason,
mircea_popescu: and what's wrong with
that ? are you derriding
the pulley system on
the grounds of how
trite
the rope is ?
mircea_popescu: so
then. accessibility is no sort of criteria for
technology.
mircea_popescu: dollars
to donuts, if you arrest everyone who ever said "quantum computing" on an webpage, and keep
them locked up in solitary until such a
time
they can explain what it means, scientifically,
mircea_popescu: and
there exists a lobby
there proposing
that for
this reason, it is not really, properly
technology.
mircea_popescu: tell you what, something as finely
technical as,
the lorenz contraction, still is not "universally accessible". in fact, it is outside of
the purview of ~all us schoolchildren.
mircea_popescu: because, as per
the discussion of "ideas" : in my hand it's an idea, in derp'\s hand is nothing, for derp may not have ideas.
mircea_popescu: ah, but no, i do not accept
this requirement
that
the DESCRIPTION be universally accessible either.
mircea_popescu: just as long as you admit
to an increase of maximal-possible-mojo per capita, and
to a decrease in marginal utility per capita, you're basically admitting
the premises.
mircea_popescu: the very point being
that it's not universally accessible.
mircea_popescu: well no, not necessarily. but on
the other end of
the same chasm, it may not be a case of "either
this leverage is universally accessible or stfu"
mircea_popescu: it ended up illustrated with minutia, but it is not
the illustrative minutia.
mircea_popescu: the particular is not a public matter. but
the
thing we were discussing, ie, leverage, and its impact of citizenship, and
the way
this drags out citizenship out of
the commoner's reach, is.
mircea_popescu: what i strictly care about is, doth it or doth it not make it easier for me
to send fifty men out of
their houses, behead
their offspring and claim
their women.
mircea_popescu: i don't give
the first inkliong of a shit as
to whether it could "rightfully" be called
technical, inovation, or pornography.
that's a concern for kids debating superman-vs-spiderman encounters.
mircea_popescu: ah but you see,
this is
thevery
thing we're discussing. ~I~ benefit from it, and it empowers me.
that'd be what i'd care about.
mircea_popescu: well,
they've been sticking
to it for a decade+ by now.
mircea_popescu: yes, of course, life
taking place in nature, its discoveries are DONE
to it
mircea_popescu: in
this sense chloroform was done
to
the discoverer, not
the other way around.
mircea_popescu: right ? so you're part of
the 55th civilisation
to discover cellphones. do you care about
the other 54 ?
mircea_popescu: context matters, who
the fuck cares what lenin's nep did.
mircea_popescu: (to be specific :
the idea
that "small corps are
the driver of economy, and should get massive
tax breaks" is entirely past 30 years.)