Fine print: 'Seasoned with nanoscale mechanochemical generators, this TSP (textured soy protein) not only tastes good but also self-heats when its package is opened
Keven posted:I'm preeeeetty sure you should still be pooping on a liquid diet lol
Those Silicon Valley boys are whizz kids in more ways than one
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/08/op-ed-how-i-gave-up-alternating-current/
some choice bits
The walls are buzzing. I know this because I have a magnet implanted in my hand and whenever I reach near an outlet I can feel them. I can feel fortresses of industry miles away burning prehistoric hydrocarbons by the megaton. I can feel the searing pain and loss of consciousness from when I was shocked by exposed house wiring as a boy. I can feel the deep cut of the power bill when I was living near the poverty line. I can feel the cold uncertainty of the first time the power went out due to a storm when I was a child. How long before the delicate veil of civilization turns to savagery with no light nor heat nor refrigeration?
Kitchens are expensive and dirty. This home manufacturing center has been by far the most liberating to eliminate. They are the greediest consumers of power, water, and labor and produce the most noise and garbage of any room. Moreover, they can be made totally unnecessary with a few practical life hacks.
I am electrically self-reliant. My home life runs comfortably on a single 100W solar panel, which cost $150 and was available on Amazon Prime. I tracked down a few manufacturers in China who all said it costs around $40 to make. The US for some reason leverages massive tariffs on Chinese solar panels, so they ship them through Malaysian customs. Why do the politicians even bother?
First, I never cook. I am all for self-reliance but repeating the same labor over and over for the sake of existence is the realm of robots. I utilize soylent only at home and go out to eat when craving company or flavor. This eliminates a panoply of expensive tools and rotting ingredients I would need to spend an unconscionable amount of time sourcing, preparing, and cleaning. It also gives me an incentive to explore the city’s fine restaurants and ask friends out to eat. In fact, I find soylent has made me more social when it comes to food. I can spend the money I saved from groceries and take out to buy a friend lunch or dinner. When soylent 2.0 reached private beta, I was thrilled to learn that thanks to aseptic processing the product does not require refrigeration, and will still keep its nutrition for at least a year. It tastes better cold but I think it’s fine warm. Getting rid of my fridge was one of the greatest days of my life. Nevermore will I listen to that damn compressor moan.
I have not set foot in a grocery store in years. Nevermore will I bumble through endless confusing aisles like a pack-donkey searching for feed while the smell of rotting flesh fills my nostrils and fluorescent lights sear my eyeballs and sappy love songs torture my ears. Grocery shopping is a multisensory living nightmare. There are services that will make someone else do it for me but I cannot in good conscience force a fellow soul through this gauntlet.
I buy my staple food online like a civilized person. It takes me mere seconds to order enough soylent for a month, and version 2.0 does not require any preparation, so I got rid of my noisy blender. At less than $2.50 / meal it also saves me loads of cash, and I appreciate the use of more soy and less rice, finally bringing a nutritionally optimal PDCAAS score of 1.0 while improving the taste and especially texture. I also think it’s crazy cool that some of the ingredients are made by algae rather than water-guzzling pesticide-spraying farms.
With no fridge, no dishes, no microwave, no oven, no range, no dishwasher, no utensils, no pests, no cleaning products nor dirty rags, my life is considerably simpler, lighter and cleaner than before. I think it was a bit presumptuous for the architect to assume I wanted a kitchen with my apartment and make me pay for it. My home is a place of peace. I don’t want to live with red-hot heating elements and razor-sharp knives. That sounds like a torture chamber. However, it’s not a total loss. I was able to use the cabinets to store part of my book collection.
I enjoy doing laundry about as much as doing dishes. I get my clothing custom made in China for prices you would not believe and have new ones regularly shipped to me. Shipping is a problem. I wish container ships had nuclear engines but it’s still much more efficient and convenient than retail. Thanks to synthetic fabrics it takes less water to make my clothes than it would to wash them, and I donate my used garments.
Edited by le_nelson_mandela_face ()
one of my favorite book series is Gene Wolfe's The Long Sun. its central protagonist, Silk, is a humble (if somewhat horny) priest of a pagan religion who has a monotheistic vision which motivates him to set off on a quest to save his temple from the threat of economic redevelopment. as a genre fiction character, he's extraordinary, because he really doesn't get what he wants through skill or strength or brilliance (even if he does have a measure of all those), but through being really, really, really decent and understanding. he just does the morally correct thing with respect to the people around them (even when doing so requires understanding those people better than they understand themselves), and achieves his personal goals both because the people he interacts with invariably respect and care for him and subsequently act on his behalf, but also because his goals and his actions are share the predicates of making the world a better place and therefore naturally end up in harmony. I've always considered this to be a truly unique character unparalleled in all of fiction, but this morning i realized that while that is true, I am aware of one other example of that very facinating archetype
thirdplace posted:deboer deactivated his twitter.
one of my favorite book series is Gene Wolfe's The Long Sun. its central protagonist, Silk, is a humble (if somewhat horny) priest of a pagan religion who has a monotheistic vision which motivates him to set off on a quest to save his temple from the threat of economic redevelopment. as a genre fiction character, he's extraordinary, because he really doesn't get what he wants through skill or strength or brilliance (even if he does have a measure of all those), but through being really, really, really decent and understanding. he just does the morally correct thing with respect to the people around them (even when doing so requires understanding those people better than they understand themselves), and achieves his personal goals both because the people he interacts with invariably respect and care for him and subsequently act on his behalf, but also because his goals and his actions are share the predicates of making the world a better place and therefore naturally end up in harmony. I've always considered this to be a truly unique character unparalleled in all of fiction, but this morning i realized that while that is true, I am aware of one other example of that very facinating archetype
wheres this from
thirdplace posted:deboer deactivated his twitter.
kinch posted:middle guy straight out of the society of the spectacle cover
I wasn't familiar with this before, some incredible foresight (for 1967):
Wikipedia
According to Debord, the integrated spectacle goes by the label of liberal democracy. This spectacle introduces a state of permanent general secrecy, where experts and specialists dictate the morality, statistics, and opinions of the spectacle. Terrorism is the invented enemy of the spectacle, which specialists compare with their "liberal democracy", pointing out the superiority of the latter one. Debord argues that without terrorism, the integrated spectacle wouldn't survive, for it needs to be compared to something in order to show its "obvious" perfection and superiority.
cars posted:thirdplace posted:deboer deactivated his twitter.
*nodding sagely*
Hey, Mark Zuckerberg here. Before I tell you about the really special chance that Priscilla and I had to mingle with some Iowans who are facing unique challenges and struggles every day, I want to get something off my chest.
...
But I am not running. I am just doing a year of travel, for normal reasons. Hey, I’m human, and what human can resist the chance to go to small-town Iowa, multiple times, to appear in photos with the great people I meet there? I’m only human! I am human.
toyotathon posted:.... no food, and dim sum! ....
wow. idiot. come back when you figure out what food is.
kinch posted:i got banned from the slate thstar codex subrettit
— "Big" Keven (@ChurdChamp) August 8, 2017
tears posted:To the many level-headed rationalish people here reading this who work in tech (myself included), who always wondered whether the 'impolite' topics discussed in the rational-sphere could get you fired, I guess we don't need to wonder anymore,
nailed it. i was drunk and wanted to throw away the account tied to my email anyway. I could slip in a comment here and there using 'liberal-as-a-pejorative,' but scott alexander's readers are a thousand times worse than he is. They applaud themselves for their openness and being above it all, but even their self-identified 'left' flocks to the forbidden knowledge of human biodiversity and defend their own as the true victims. and I really can't believe how these idiots think this will jeopardize their careers, as though google shareholders give a shit about diversity quotas. It's funny to me that scott alexander keeps the last psychiatrist on his blogroll. the guy may be a crypto-libertarian, but his arguments are pure lacan. google doesn't hire qpoc because they care about them, but because you can convince them to work for less, since being there is worth more than wages. there are a handful of people who are much better than me at sneaking true leftist critique into this fold, but realistically i can't imagine that they will ever matter.
nick land deserves better fans
Edited by parabolart ()