Grayscail's recent activity
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Comment on Ariana Grande is ‘taking a step back from visibility’ after tour as public scrutiny intensifies in ~music
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Comment on Any obscure songs you'd like to share? in ~music
Grayscail LinkThis is the most recent song I was listening to. Its a nice upbeat song for when I want to cheer myself up.This is the most recent song I was listening to.
Its a nice upbeat song for when I want to cheer myself up.
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Comment on What are your favourite anime and/or manga? in ~anime
Grayscail Link ParentI like how crude the art sometimes is in the anime because it makes the mundane world contrast more with the flashy graphics they use to show psychic powers.I like how crude the art sometimes is in the anime because it makes the mundane world contrast more with the flashy graphics they use to show psychic powers.
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Comment on What are your favourite anime and/or manga? in ~anime
Grayscail LinkMob Psycho 100 is the best across the board for me. Music, art direction, story and character arcs, its just really well done in every aspect.Mob Psycho 100 is the best across the board for me. Music, art direction, story and character arcs, its just really well done in every aspect.
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Comment on What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga) in ~anime
Grayscail Link ParentYes. By the current point in the story he has largely recovered and has returned to a personality more like his childhood before all the bad stuff happened. It actually seems like they are about...Yes. By the current point in the story he has largely recovered and has returned to a personality more like his childhood before all the bad stuff happened. It actually seems like they are about to start an arc where he takes on more of a deuteragonist role, I think.
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Comment on End of Series - Tildes Book Club discussion - July 2026 - A Psalm for the Wild Built by Becky Chambers in ~books
Grayscail (edited )LinkI didn't like the first 1/3 of the story too much. I was interested in seeing a thorough description of how this new society lives, and while you do get a brief look into it the point is more to...I didn't like the first 1/3 of the story too much. I was interested in seeing a thorough description of how this new society lives, and while you do get a brief look into it the point is more to highlight Dex being dissatisfied in order to incite the journey away from civilization. By the time they were prepared to leave, I felt like I had more questions that answers about how life works there. In that sense it was effective, because I ended up sharing Dex's dissatisfaction, and I ended up enjoying the story more once it moved away from the cities and Mosscap was introduced, so the weak opening helped me empathize with the main character a bit.
I was originally thinking a Tea Monk was going to be something like a confessional priest or therapist of sorts, and Dex's conversations with other people would give insights into the day to day life and the problems that people face in this world, and what their approach to dealing with those conflicts are. The first failed tea service was an attempt at that. Then after the time skip once Dex is considered "good" at the job, it feels more like the role is a glorified barista, with maybe a splash of mixologist. Its kind of like how you get into a career because from the outside you are only thinking of the general topic, but once you are actually doing it you understand how much of the job is just the boring minutiae.
I don't like the religion that Dex is a part of. I don't have a specific explanation of whats wrong, but it feels very made up and surface level.
The addition of Mosscap is when the more "monk" aspects of a Tea Monk start to come into play. I found it kind of crazy how the whole thing with the robots is just not that big a deal to people anymore. Like, if humanity one day randomly created souls in thousands of artificial beings, you'd think that would be a huge part of their religion, right? We are, today, having cultural conversations about the possibility that AI could be conscious, and what that means about the nature of consciousness and therefore our own existence. But here its just like "Yeah all the robots somehow achieved sapience and we don't really understand what thats about, but its not a big deal because they all left so who cares." It clearly IS a big deal on some level because their society abandoned automation as a result of this, but the fact that Dex only vaguely remembers all this was very surprising to me. The main big impact on their culture seems to be a kid of internalized shame that Dex has about letting a robot help out with things.
Some of this must just be out of necessity, the author needs to include Mosscap as a free willed sentient agent but also cant really make any hard scientific explanations for how consciousness was achieved since nobody really knows how that would work. The idea of the robots as an independent species is interesting, because they seem in some ways to be static creatures. Despite apparently being disconnected from humanity for so long that Mosscap has never met one before, it still talks with humanlike language, humanlike polite cheerfulness, a humanlike delight for novelty. They havent adapted their speech or thoughts in new ways, they kind of seem to act the way you would assume a human who was given immortality might act. It makes me personally wonder if the supposed consciousness they awakened is real, or if this is more a Turing Test situation. I wonder if robots developed any novel cultural systems over time.
Some of the philosophical topics touched upon are interesting to think about, but I wish there would have been a bit more of a back and forth between them on some of these conversations. There are a fair number of instances where it follows a pattern of one of them expressing some thought, and the other one saying "Well have you ever considered that maybe your assumptions about that are wrong?" and the first one being all "Wow I never thought of that, crazy". It feels framed like a one way conversation where one of them is clearly the wise one and one is clearly the ignorant one, and it just switches off which is which between topics.
This whole notion of the "Factory age" and "transition era" is kind of interesting because it feels like the people of this world have turned their back on their history in some ways, like their main preoccupation is distancing themselves from the old ways and not repeating the mistakes of the past. Which is a pretty normal thing, people today certainly have things in the past we don't want to do anymore. Its more of a strong break here, it doesn't seem like there is anything positive to say or remember about this past here, which almost makes the setting feel stagnant. This is largely because its just not relevant to Dex's story to think about the direction that civilization is heading, I just feel like there is some dimension of human nature which is lacking there.
I liked the writing. I don't read much, so I appreciated that this is a fairly short book. The descriptive imagery didn't land for me very well, I never got a clear picture in my head of what anything was supposed to look like, but the dialogue is clear and straightforward.
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Comment on “Hope is a method: If I do something about this situation, I might change it enough so that I can do something else about this situation.” -- Cory Doctorow in ~humanities
Grayscail LinkI think I am more or less fatalistic. I dont think its a binary thing like you have to be 100% about it, but different problems have different scales and correspondingly different levels of...I think I am more or less fatalistic. I dont think its a binary thing like you have to be 100% about it, but different problems have different scales and correspondingly different levels of plausibility that I could affect it.
There are problems like "the on-ramps to the freeway have tons of trash lying around" where I can probably expect to be able to do something about it if I really out my mind to it, and then theres problems like "Im going to die at some point" where I just have to come to terms with it because its beyond me.
The big issues today like climate change, cultural division, war, it all just feels too expansive for me to feel like there is a correlation between my choices and the broader direction of the world.
Problems in my own life are things I can hope for and do all this hill climbing stuff, but trying to "change the world" is not a priority for me.
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Comment on What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga) in ~anime
Grayscail LinkIve been following You Are A Four Leaf Clover for a while now. Its currently at a big cliffhanger with the latest release. The big overarching narrative mystery has more or less been solved, it...Ive been following You Are A Four Leaf Clover for a while now.
Its currently at a big cliffhanger with the latest release. The big overarching narrative mystery has more or less been solved, it seems, and its the endgame of the story. This most recent chapter makes it seem like it ends with the protagonist dying, which honestly could actually be how it ends because the story is pretty explicit and dark. But I still really doubt it.
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Comment on Curing concrete - improving the carbon costs of an essential material (gifted link) in ~enviro
Grayscail (edited )Link ParentYeah, it really is just a matter of taste. Personally I dont like interweaving the human interest aspect. Particularly when its something I already agree with going in, I dont like when articles...Yeah, it really is just a matter of taste.
Personally I dont like interweaving the human interest aspect. Particularly when its something I already agree with going in, I dont like when articles feel like they are trying too hard to "sell" me on something. It calls into question in my mind how much I should be trusting the piece as a source of information. If someone is pushing really hard to lead you to a specific conclusion, they might be motivated to ignore or minimize certain details that arent convenient to what they are trying to argue.
Id be happy to read a piece of this same length if it was more dispassionate. For example, the article discusses the "hard problem" of calcium carbonate inherently needing to release carbon dioxide to become quicklime. There are some efforts being made to develop alternatives to using limestone. However I don't have any idea how economical that would be or if we can source alternative materials at the same rate we do limestone.
I would love to see a really thorough breakdown of something like that on a purely analytical level, where someone just investigates whether that seems like a good solution and presents their findings whether it gives them the answer they wanted or not. Like a scientific paper, but written in this more journalistic style.
Something like that I wouldnt mind the length at all, Id actually be thrilled about it.
Still glad you posted this though, its an interesting topic of discussion.
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Comment on Curing concrete - improving the carbon costs of an essential material (gifted link) in ~enviro
Grayscail LinkMan, thats a pretty long article. I want to read this, its a topic Ive been interested in for a while, but I got about 1/3 of the way through and its really taking its time to get into things. Its...Man, thats a pretty long article. I want to read this, its a topic Ive been interested in for a while, but I got about 1/3 of the way through and its really taking its time to get into things. Its like half infodump and half travel blog. Ill try again a bit later.
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Comment on US Federal Communications Commission bans foreign-produced solar inverters in ~enviro
Grayscail Link ParentIt not entirely coming out of nowhere, cybersecurity on the grid in general is a big concern for defense agencies, as currently there isnt really much effort put into securing infrastructure. More...It not entirely coming out of nowhere, cybersecurity on the grid in general is a big concern for defense agencies, as currently there isnt really much effort put into securing infrastructure.
More relevantly, there was some chatter last year about some chinese inverters being flagged as having remote shutdown capacity built in. I found an old article from last year about it.
There have been a number of small incidents throughout the years that have laid the foundations for conspiracy theories about grid attacks, but I dont think there has ever been any conclusive evidence that anyone is planning to try anything like that.
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
Grayscail LinkI accidentally posted this on a different thread, but Ill repeat it here: Ive been replaying Blightfall Its a minecraft modpack that takes place on a fixed map. The premise is that you are a...I accidentally posted this on a different thread, but Ill repeat it here:
Ive been replaying Blightfall
Its a minecraft modpack that takes place on a fixed map. The premise is that you are a colonizer on an alien planet that has been overrun by a magical disease called Blight from the thaumcraft mod.
Your main goal early on is just to survive, but as you explore this alien planet you discover the remains of the former civilization that lived there and discover the principles of magic that their civilization was built on, which eventually gives you options to clean up the planet entirely.
Ive played the game before but never finished it. The basics game loop of trying to gather resources while staying alive in a hostile environment is fun at first, but the endgame is a real slog because there is no quick amswer to how to clean up the map. There are several options to pursue but they all involve a heavy investment.
Blightfall as a whole is a great modpack. A lot of work has been done on crafting a map with lots of secrets to be found, and exploring all the different mods feels very rewarding with how much they inprove your quality of life.
The biggest complaint I have is how much of a slog the endgame is, but my second complaint is that the food changes are too much.
Normal food has diminishing returns for how much hunger it restores, which over time makes any reliable food source seem like a waste of time to cultivate. You definitely could go through the effort of making lots of different foods like you are supposed to, but personally I always just make mana cookies because its less hassle. On one hand I like that they included this special reward for people who bother to cultivate mana beans, but on the other hand I feel like I would have been willing to explore more with culinary variety if they didnt make the diminishing returns so penalizing.
Id definitely recommend this modpack to anyone who enjoys minecraft.
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Comment on The Odyssey - discussion thread in ~movies
Grayscail Link ParentWait, they murder Athena the actual goddess? Is that a visual metaphor or is Athena canonically dead in this universe?Wait, they murder Athena the actual goddess? Is that a visual metaphor or is Athena canonically dead in this universe?
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Comment on Save Point: A game deal roundup for the week of July 26 in ~games
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Comment on Save Point: A game deal roundup for the week of July 26 in ~games
Grayscail LinkIve been replaying Blightfall Its a minecraft modpack that takes place on a fixed map. The premise is that you are a colonizer on an alien planet that has been overrun by a magical disease called...Ive been replaying Blightfall
Its a minecraft modpack that takes place on a fixed map. The premise is that you are a colonizer on an alien planet that has been overrun by a magical disease called Blight from the thaumcraft mod.
Your main goal early on is just to survive, but as you explore this alien olanet you discover the remains of the former civilization that lived there and discover the principles of magic that their civilization was built on, which eventually gives you options to clean up the planet entirely.
Ive played the game before but never finished it. The basics game loop of trying to gather resources while staying alive in a hostile environment is fun at first, but the endgame is a real slog because there is no quick amswer to how to clean up the map. There are several options to pursue but they all involve a heavy investment.
Im currently going down the Blood Magic path. This more recent update Im playing gives a quest line to help guide you along a typical blood magic mod progression, but it is a lot of up front work. Ive juat about gotten to the point where I have a Well of Suffering for automated LP generation and am trying to make the Blood core staff to benefit from it, but I need to go down the Thaumcraft progression first to get a scepter that can actually craft it.
Blightfall as a whole os a great modpack. A lot of work has been done on crafting a map with lots of secrets to be found, and exploring all the different mods feels very rewarding with how much they inprove your quality of life.
The biggest complaint I have is how much of a slog the endgame is, but my second complaint is that the food changes are too much.
Normal food has diminiahing returns for how much hunger it restores, which over time makea any reliable food source seem like a waste of time. You definitely could go through the effort of making lots of different foods like you are supposed to, but personally I always just make mana cookies because its less hassle. On one hand I like that they included this special reward for people who bother to cultivate mana beans, but on the other hand I feel like I would have been willing to explore more woth culinary variety if they didnt make the diminishing returns so penalizing.
Id definitely recommend this modpack to anyone who enjoys minecraft.
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Comment on Mobile Suit Gundam RG XARX-ZERO | Teaser PV in ~anime
Grayscail Link ParentI hope there is a scene where it dramatically whips off its cape during its entrance and tosses it into the wind where it floats in the air for a second or two before careening into a nearby small...I hope there is a scene where it dramatically whips off its cape during its entrance and tosses it into the wind where it floats in the air for a second or two before careening into a nearby small village while the Wilhelm scream plays.
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Comment on Avatar: Seven Havens | Official teaser in ~tv
Grayscail LinkArt style seems fairly different than the previous installments, it seems to be further ahead in time but also feels like a new location. Kind of hard to place the protagonists in terms of...Art style seems fairly different than the previous installments, it seems to be further ahead in time but also feels like a new location.
Kind of hard to place the protagonists in terms of elemental ancestry. They look like they might be from wherever Guru Pathik was from, but also maybe theyve moved past that whole idea altogether.
Interesting to see that history didnt seem to remember Korra fondly. I assume its going to turn out that everyone is wrong and she was forced into an impossible position or its based on a misunderstanding or something like that which ultimately absolves her.
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Comment on Atari makes Universal movie deal for ten iconic game properties in ~movies
Grayscail Link ParentPong? Theyre making a movie about Pong??Pong?
Theyre making a movie about Pong??
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Comment on Sweden prides itself on equality, so why is its political gender gap growing – as general election looms, survey shows twice as many men as women support far-right Sverigedemokraterna in ~society
Grayscail Link ParentReminds me of the post a few days ago about UnicontextReminds me of the post a few days ago about Unicontext
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Comment on Tildos, let's be unserious for a while; show us your dankest memes and god-tier shitposts! in ~talk
Grayscail LinkI remember laughing at this one a few months back: https://pin.it/4vZILkMEcI remember laughing at this one a few months back:
Ariana Grande has been getting a lot of scruitiny for her appearance since at least the Wicked press stuff started. In particular, she seems to have been losing a lot of weight the last couple of years, suspected to be a result of Ozempic and possibly body dismorphia.