folksinger

6 ms·

1.
by folksinger 9y ago
Thank you for such a charitable interpretation. This is basically what I was trying to get across. Depression is a son of a bitch that I have also known at times and it really is as hard and as easy as just doing anything at all.
2.
by folksinger 9y ago
What your life is missing is meaning. Meaning is action. If a word means anything at all it is because it is in reference to some kind of actual experience. Blogs, books, and media of all kind are basically meaningless. Vanity of vanities a
3.
by folksinger 9y ago
Bouncers are fooled by people wearing paper masks of the people depicted on a photo ID? When bouncers let people enter a bar with a photo ID that does not match the person in question they are not failing to identify a human. They are faili
4.
by folksinger 9y ago
Do you think you could fool a human intelligence with some paper printouts taped to your face?
5.
by folksinger 9y ago
Once you become aware of how many people on HN are part of that LessWrong AI immortality cult it becomes pretty obvious why they are so defensive.
6.
Merry Christmas, Nerds
29 points by folksinger 9y ago|4 comments
7.
by folksinger 9y ago
Trust? This word depends on context. Do you trust your spouse? Do your trust your waiter? Do you trust the news? Do you trust that the sun will come up? I will grant that both Bitcoin and dollars depend on trust. But both are grounded as we
8.
by folksinger 9y ago
This is exactly the kind of comment that confirms my hypothesis of the anti-philosophical spectrum.
9.
by folksinger 9y ago
At least we can both agree that we are talking about how we interpret and react to hypothetical utterances on the internet.
10.
by folksinger 9y ago
Think of a triangle. At one point is "philosopher", at another "asshole", and the third "idiot". Consider the edge between "philosopher" and "idiot" to be "innocent love". Consider
11.
by folksinger 9y ago
Those tradeoffs are as chilling as a nationalized postal service. The "chilling consequences" that you are imagining are as speculative as any other work of science-fiction that you've read online. Ask yourself: where did you
12.
by folksinger 9y ago
We make natural monopolies into public institutions. Roads, sidewalks, parks, copyright registrars, postal services, land surveyors, courts, law enforcement, etc, etc. And then we take an active role in their management. Notice the differen
13.
by folksinger 9y ago
This is the solipsistic perspective of someone floating in the ocean, looking in only one direction and sure they are alone, sure they are surrounded by nothing but an endless expanse, completely unaware that they are just a few hundred fe
14.
by folksinger 9y ago
> Without any examples for or to the contrary, I'm not convinced this is true. There are two volumes of Songwriters on Songwriting and I guess I could introduce you to all my songwriting buddies if you're so inclined.
15.
by folksinger 9y ago
Neither of us want me to write an essay about Wittgenstein's notion of "meaning through social interactions" and how this applies to artistic value, but I'll summarize it thus: art needs an audience. Now, given the vast
16.
by folksinger 9y ago
The point of the article was in encouraging writers to hone in on an individual voice as opposed to being influenced by thousands of competing tones. Perhaps an analogy to songwriting will make things more clear: how well received are the w
17.
by folksinger 9y ago
> A particular medium is not (necessarily) to blame. Even the proliferation of what can be perceived as low quality examples of a medium isn't purely to blame. A large part of it is in how you interpret it. Suppose we were to say, “
18.
by folksinger 9y ago
Yes, and before recent innovations in prescription drugs, all that people had was heroin. That's what fentanyl and oxys are replacing, and it's a huge improvement.
19.
by folksinger 9y ago
I'd say that books and museums are problematic in very similar ways. Neither of those institutions are focused on reality. Both are contrary to human dialog and an unmediated existence. When I'm sitting on the train I'm study
20.
by folksinger 9y ago
You mean the same Andrew Gelman who did not predict the election of Trump and took the time to reflect on the issues with polling methodology? http://andrewgelman.com/2016/12/08/19-things-learned-2016-el... I
21.
by folksinger 9y ago
Let's take a recent election as an example: A Bayesian pollster began with a certain set of prior probabilities. That the college educated were more likely to vote in previous elections, for example, informed the sample population, bec
22.
by folksinger 9y ago
"The more information the better". This dogmatic and unqualified belief must be revised by the technology industry.
23.
by folksinger 9y ago
The actual solution is to go for a walk in the woods with some friends or family members. The actual solution is to invite your neighbor over for dinner. The actual solution is to volunteer at a retirement home. The actual solution is to jo
24.
by folksinger 9y ago
The Facebook logo is everywhere. On the side of delivery vans, pizza boxes, business cards and paperback books. Public spaces are littered with people staring down at their phones. Our politics has been usurped by the machinations of social
25.
by folksinger 9y ago
Ah, the age old argument for personal responsibility... "Oh, is the river polluted? Then don't go in the damn river! Use your head! Don't expect someone, or god forbid the government, to force someone to clean it up just so y
26.
by folksinger 9y ago
Eventually Jesus will come back to Earth and that is where the real magic is going to happen.
27.
by folksinger 9y ago
You claim to have the facts on the human brain? My God, the level of hubris expressed by members of the cult of AI has reached a fever-pitch. Stored procedures and memory? Newton, in the age of clocks, managed to present the universe in the
28.
by folksinger 9y ago
Kant's notion of synthetic a priori knowledge, that is, the innate abilities for geometry in the human mind, the preprogrammed understanding of space and time, seem somewhat related. The mystery remains for humanity itself: How can we
29.
by folksinger 9y ago
Speaking of uncritical readers, you clearly didn't read the same article as I did.
30.
by folksinger 9y ago
How is it bad advice to avoid gorging the mind and body on garbage, no matter the technology at one's disposal? Reading an awful novel to avoid the people or duties in your life is clearly as bad as using Twitter for the same reason. Y

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