DefinitelyNotAFae's recent activity
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Comment on The US Chief Justice and his wife took $20 million from firms he rules on. I'm filing for his disbarment today. in ~society
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Comment on The US Chief Justice and his wife took $20 million from firms he rules on. I'm filing for his disbarment today. in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentBut a) this is an article about filing for disbarment and not prosecution and b) this person isn't running for office or part of the Democratic party and obviously isn't subject to or included on...But a) this is an article about filing for disbarment and not prosecution and b) this person isn't running for office or part of the Democratic party and obviously isn't subject to or included on their political strategy, so it doesn't make any sense to expect him to operate that way.
You want to wait for years? I don't want anyone to drag their feet. Start rooting this shit out everywhere. Discredit them all.
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Comment on Why America is so much better than Europe at immigration in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentThe subheader seems to be referring to L/liberals in Europe? Maybe? But that doesn't make a ton of sense.The subheader seems to be referring to L/liberals in Europe? Maybe? But that doesn't make a ton of sense.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentThanks for more context! I really did not read past the Silmarillion with regularity, just bits here and there and it's been a long time on that. There's only so much timeline I can drag up from...Thanks for more context! I really did not read past the Silmarillion with regularity, just bits here and there and it's been a long time on that. There's only so much timeline I can drag up from the depths and Google only gets me so far. Might be time to dip my toes back in or hit up a podcast or two.
Missing out on Shippey's class at my undergrad was quite a bummer (he only taught it every four years)
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Comment on The powerhouse of American citrus is suffering a brutal, unrelenting decline in ~food
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentMakes sense in this case, still don't love our monoculture farming style but I get that it isn't the issue here. I'm just tired of everything being awful I thinkMakes sense in this case, still don't love our monoculture farming style but I get that it isn't the issue here.
I'm just tired of everything being awful I think
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Comment on Donald Trump officials reclassify medical marijuana as Schedule III drug in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentNot that much of one if he's not trying to actually decriminalize it. I do not envy the lawyers trying to figure out if campuses can/have to allow medical cannabis now. Previously we had to ban...Not that much of one if he's not trying to actually decriminalize it.
I do not envy the lawyers trying to figure out if campuses can/have to allow medical cannabis now. Previously we had to ban all cannabis regardless of the state, if at Schedule III it's legal for medical use then.... Idk. Impacts my job but not my job. Assuming this is actually legal in and of itself.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentThe public and not for profit sectors aren't always good but I am very happy for the work I get to do now with the people I work with. And while there are definitely ethical quandries or...The public and not for profit sectors aren't always good but I am very happy for the work I get to do now with the people I work with. And while there are definitely ethical quandries or disagreements with policy from time to time it's not the soul destroying drain that my previous job was.
I hope you find your thing that lets you fill your cup
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Comment on Ezra Klein interviews Alex Bores on AI and Palantir in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae (edited )Link ParentHighlighting his support of Hillary is odd, she's rather notoriously hawkish and Karp explicitly supports Western military superiority and by now is highlighting the - checks notes - cultural...Highlighting his support of Hillary is odd, she's rather notoriously hawkish and Karp explicitly supports Western military superiority and by now is highlighting the - checks notes - cultural superiority of the West while praising Trump and highlighting the "pagan religious views" taught by universities. (And he called himself a socialist but absolutely was not one). By now his views mirror the exact same language of all of the Trumpian right. And would never have been supported by the Dems in 2016. He went from fearing fascism to supporting it.
But I think Bores comes off as naive about his time at Palantir. And maybe, to be fair, all of us were in 2014.
- The opioid epidemic, great!
- Violent crime - ok only if it's not a dog whistle (it was)
- Civil immigration - we won't touch it.. Except they do it sounds like nearly immediately. He just wasn't involved. He wouldn't touch it but Palantir would, obviously. And the executives - eyes Karp and Thiel and the others - absolutely are on board with it. It's why the commentary about Karp supporting Hillary is odd.
I appreciate he got out. I don't know anything else about him but it pretty much aligns with the "are we the baddies" realization some other employees are apparently just now having.
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Comment on For $700 a month, sleeping pods make San Francisco more affordable, but at what cost in ~life
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentYeah I didn't want to invalidate your experience by any means, and while on the one hand you probably couldn't pay enough for me to run a university, on the other, our president is paid a small...Yeah I didn't want to invalidate your experience by any means, and while on the one hand you probably couldn't pay enough for me to run a university, on the other, our president is paid a small fraction of that amount. (And still criticized for it) And perhaps surprisingly for the US our football coach is much more similar to that fractional amount than the higher one. Also thankfully no dining vendor, it's all in house (which still leads to accusations of ridiculous costs despite it being an all you can eat buffet and cheaper per meal than any such restaurant).
I don't have all the answers by any means, and there are definitely things I don't like that my institution is doing at any given time. There is always plenty of scandal to go around in higher ed.
I look at pictures of the same rooms from fifty years ago and they don't have the beds built immovable and attached to the walls (with a secret little cupboard and cushion that made it daybed/ couch) anymore. Students bring more stuff, want to loft beds to have more space for a desk hutch or a futon. The rooms now look much more spartan but aren't smaller, or less private and are more customizable and accessible for different needs. Students don't like to mediate with roommates anymore, no one wants to talk, nut everyone wants to shit talk in the group chat. I don't know the history of dorm rooms (a dirty word in housing I swear) in the UK and whether there's a certain way that American culture has changed in the past fifty years to make the same rooms worse? Fewer kids sharing rooms as they grow up maybe as the birth rate has dropped? Or maybe it was always bad? I don't know, but I do try to think about it.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentWith Tolkien given how he changed his mind and never stopped editing, no his notes don't always clear things up. The Silmarillion he published, the rest is less clear and is sometimes...That would be ignoring all the times the palantir were used in the simarillion and the rest of the legendarium. I don’t see any reason to ignore these. If we’re trying to analyze what message an author is giving, their notes and other works are perfectly valid.
With Tolkien given how he changed his mind and never stopped editing, no his notes don't always clear things up. The Silmarillion he published, the rest is less clear and is sometimes contradictory as it was a work in progress and ever edited.
My point is that we know how the palantir ended, regardless of their beginnings or intent. (And I don't think Thiel has read all the legendarium either. So as we get to his intent that matters even less)Even in LotR, we have the example of Denethor using the palantir for pure reconnaissance. The Sauron calls were later.
He used the stone to spy on Sauron who used those connections to drive him to despair. They weren't separate "calls", they were intentional corruptions of the visions he saw in the same calls he was scrying in. Denethor had the authority as Steward to use the stone to scry but not the wisdom to refrain, Aragorn notably did not attempt to scry, just to trick Sauron into falling for a feint.
If you don't think that calling a company "The Flame of the West"
Are we not talking about the the roles of these concepts in the story of lord of the rings?
Not entirely no, we are talking about that with the palantiri, but this all rolls back into "why was the company named this and should that name have been a clue." The palantiri are widely regarded by notable Tolkien scholars to be warnings about divination, forbidden knowledge and the like. One doesn't have to agree, sure, but I'm not pulling my read on this out of nowhere either. I think anyone who names their company after them, either doesn't care about being evil or misreads the trilogy as an intentional western/white supremacist narrative.
While the shards of Narsil reforged to Anduril are not an "evil object" that doesn't erase that the company was named The Flame of the West by a man aligned with white nationalists Neo-Nazis, and the alt right. Thiel's intentions are suspect at best and even if they somehow weren't the outcome is at a minimum disrespectful of Tolkien's views on war. Suggesting again that Thiel doesn't get it. (Same with elven immortality and the other random references he makes beyond those five (a fund he calls his Precious for example))
After all...
" I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend".
Tolkien was very well aware of the trauma of war, and hated the glorification of violence and combat.
That also segways into Tolkien himself. I wouldn’t give him that much credit - he was undoubtably against nazis, but no one was more against nazis than Churchill, and he was vigorously racist and perpetuated more than one genocidal event.
This is the same story where all the good guys are nobles of good blood lines, and are in the west, who fight against hordes of peoples from very obviously the Middle East and Africa. Where a race of colonizers are glorified, and their bloodlines exalted.
Standard 1900s British things, no doubt. But I think 1900s British men would have a lot in common with the alt-right today.
He's not perfect, no, he's of his time and there are certainly racist themes in his books as well as nearly no women for example. Here, however, I'm talking about the man. He staunchly opposed Nazi-ism and Aryanism, the dehumanization of Jewish and Polish people by Germany and the Germans via British war propaganda alike. And this is a man who fought Germans in The Great War saying that the British had no more right to declare the Germans subhuman than the Germans did.
He did love Europe, and was writing a very English and European mythos, but even then he didn't adhere to white supremacy as a belief system. He explicitly opposed it.
For example
Not Nordic, please! A word I personally dislike; it is associated, though of French origin, with racialist theories
And
But I have the hatred of apartheid in my bones; and most of all I detest the segregation and separation of Language and Literature. I do not care which of them you think White.
And even in the books, for example, he was often thoughtful about such things. Such as how it wasn't "mixing" of the Numenorean blood that diminished that people, it was existing in Middle Earth itself.
A man who hates "racialist theories" is anti race science and anti-eugenics. He absolutely had Victorian ideals taught to him and shoved in his head, and I'm sure today half the things he'd say on the subject would feel horribly backwards. And yet he still managed to make clear, intentional anti-racist stances.
I can't speak for all British men, I can't even speak for Tolkien, but I think his words speak for themselves. There's no way he would be flattered by a man who clearly misunderstands and misappropriates his work. The implication that Tolkien would be aligned with the alt-right is pretty ridiculous as they chant "Blood and Soil."But let's leave that aside, my original point in response to you about just the palantiri themselves is that the narrative of the trilogy is how they are primarily in this age used to lie and deceive; to the point that the pride of using them leads to the fall of even great men. Aragorn describes using it as
A struggle somewhat grimmer for my part than the battle of the Hornburg
and that if he'd known how fast Sauron would respond he might not have. Even then it was a gamble. At its absolute best use.
It's not a movie read to see them this way. Even including the whole legendarium does not change how they're corrupted and lessened and are, like the elves, past their time. One, maybe, survives after and it likely would be so colored by the images it saved, I personally doubt it would be something ever used again. I doubt the Tolkien scholars I've read quoted on the matter based their opinions on the movies either.
We don't have to agree, literary analysis/criticism is full of many opinions, I just object to the idea that you can only get this perspective from outside the text and I enjoy discussing things.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae (edited )Link ParentI worked for a corrections company that owned ankle monitors and reentry centers and I didn't love that but that was their focus, probation and parole monitoring and rehabilitation. At least in...I worked for a corrections company that owned ankle monitors and reentry centers and I didn't love that but that was their focus, probation and parole monitoring and rehabilitation. At least in theory.
It was bought out by one of the top two Private Prison companies in the world (they wanted that sweet sweet ankle monitor technology). And I now worked for a company that was actively at cross-purposes with my beliefs (which definitely informed said beliefs and continued their leftward march.) I knew my part of the work - the reentry stuff - was mostly good - we didn't follow our policies on only working with high risk of recidivism people, and my coworkers were often racist and homophobic and sexist assholes. I was pressured to rate people higher on the risk inventory we used so we could show how much better they were after but when I said I was following the tool as I was trained they mostly backed off. So I went from "our work is good" to "my work is good" to "I'm responsible for deciding to send people back to prison..." And maybe in a few cases I could justify it. But mostly I couldn't.
I got out. Sometimes the pot boils slowly (even if that isn't how frogs actually work) and you think things are better than they are, until you learn. At least I didn't stay? At least I didn't work for Palantir....idk.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentI am not discussing the movies, just the original trilogy. This is not an issue of adaptation drift. This is where the analogy to the phone breaks down because we're talking about literary...I am not discussing the movies, just the original trilogy. This is not an issue of adaptation drift.
This is where the analogy to the phone breaks down because we're talking about literary criticism and analysis. You're seeing the palantiri as a tool alone. I'm saying they're intentionally shown in such a way that suggests man (nor angel) should not reach for forbidden knowledge and that things and people can be corrupted which is an ongoing theme. Tolkien doesn't like divination. If Aragorn had used the palantir to scry and scout it would have mixed that metaphor, but instead he at its best uses it with the same deceit that Sauron and Saruman do. (Also didn't Osgiliath's stone have the ability to control the others... That suggests again, a nefarious purpose)
If every time a phone was used in a story, a person got bad news or a virus, or was scammed, I'd also say that the author is sending a message that phones are a negative influence and intrusion into our lives.
If you don't think that calling a company "The Flame of the West" can be interpreted negatively, especially in light of this current manifesto, or that even using Tolkien's names as part of weapon manufacturing given his beliefs and the messages in his books about war is disrespectful and evidence of someone who doesn't understand the books, I think you're focusing on the wrong thing here.
I personally think Peter Thiel is an evil man. Evil men corrupt even good things but they also pretend their evil things are good.
I don't actually think Thiel gives a damn if his companies are "good" vs if they accomplish his personal, financial and political goals. I suspect in general people didn't think too hard about the name and read it as surface level only as you're describing. It's "just" a tool, it's just a surveillance tower, it's just a drone, a gun, an investment in the right things, a job for the guy you're grooming for political office (Vance), a way to gain immortality like you're a super villain. The One Ring literally gives you immortality as part of its temptation and the elves left Middle Earth for a reason.
But as I said, anyone who thinks Tolkien would be down with some recycled white supremacist ideals barely washed as cultural superiority, really missed some memos both from his novels and his personal correspondence. The man hated Nazis, I sincerely doubt he'd appreciate the "honor" Thiel is doing.
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Comment on For $700 a month, sleeping pods make San Francisco more affordable, but at what cost in ~life
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentFwiw as someone that works in housing and a public school, we aren't allowed to "profit" and the money we charge reflects the costs of the building and repairs, staff both professional and...Fwiw as someone that works in housing and a public school, we aren't allowed to "profit" and the money we charge reflects the costs of the building and repairs, staff both professional and student, paying our cleaning staff and maintenance staff, paying for our keys to be made, for student programming and activities, as well as contributing overhead to things like the campus police dept (and paying their overtime for move in and stuff.). The one thing we can do is put money into reserves for long term planning (though institutions have gotten better at finding ways to grab from those) because replacing elevators, water heaters, carpets, paint, and such in large and often old buildings is expensive. (It really feels like in the 60s and 70s we put asebestos in everything, you know so it wouldn't catch on fire, perfect solution.). We honestly should charge more than we do, especially as our minimum wage has gone up, and the cost of everything has increased faster than we've raised our rates. The only real other way to increase income is bringing in more summer camps and conferences, which hurts the ability to maintain those areas over breaks. But we can't delay or defer maintenance (and shouldn't) even if it's more expensive than we thought.
It was definitely not "for profit". Obviously your university may have been different and probably every student thinks we're just ripping them off for money, but none of us get paid more for increased rates.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentOk sure say what took me much longer to say much more succinctly ಠ_ʖಠ ⊹₊⟡⋆Ok sure say what took me much longer to say much more succinctly ಠ_ʖಠ
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentI'm really talking about the trilogy, not the legendarium. Since that is what most people have read and where the outcomes of everything else play out. Denthor did do well, and then he failed out...- Exemplary
That's selling Denethor short. He was actually very successfully using his palantir as a scouting tool to defend Gondor, and it's likely that if he had not done that, the situation on the border would have been far worse by the time of the book's events.
I'm really talking about the trilogy, not the legendarium. Since that is what most people have read and where the outcomes of everything else play out.
Denthor did do well, and then he failed out of pride, grief and ultimately despair, fed by Sauron. Denethor considered Aragorn a rival, not his true king which given the rules of this world, is another failure of his pride.
Not to mention that Sauron actually so feared Denethor's mental strength that he refused to let any of his subordinates use his palantir, because he feared they would get dominated by Denethor. Nor could he dominate Denethor. Denethor therefore also blocked Sauron's minions from using what is an invaluable recon tool in an age without satelites.
Giving him credit for Sauron's actions feels a stretch to me. But regardless, overtime the Palantir was the means of wearing down his mental strength. Much like the One Ring, even if you could use it for good for a while or intend good... Even the strongest of men will fail.
Even when he was "tricked" - he really wasn't. Sauron and Denethor were right; the west was doomed. Even with a victory at pelenor fields, there was zero chance for the west to win as is. It was the definition of pyrrhic victory. Of course, what changed the situation was that Frodo was about to destroy the ring imminently, but no one could have known that.
The West wasn't doomed because it didn't die, it just sounded reasonable. They weren't right, they played into his fears and convinced him to be hopeless, the opposite of the themes of hope in the novels.
But as I said, the point is that they were sending misleading images even when true. The Black Fleet was coming. It was just coming in aid not destruction. If palantiri are phones with FaceTime their most recent update comes with a mandatory filter that lies to you.
The palantir was also instrumental to Sauron's defeat; it was because of Merry accidentally facetiming Sauron, and Aragorn intentionally facetiming him, that Sauron believed that Aragorn had the one ring, which caused him to gather his forces at the end, giving Frodo the chance to get to Mt. Doom
First of all, it was Peregrin "Pippin" (Fool of a) Took (soon to be Thane of the Shire) who facetimed Sauron. (◠‿◕)
Secondly in both those cases the palantir mislead Sauron in the same way - he saw a halfling but thought he was the Ringbearer, he saw Aragorn and thought he was the Ringbearer come to challenge him.
And all that doesn't even consider the fact that the palantir were critical pieces of defensive technology for the elves of middle earth, and the golden ages of gondor and anor, during the first two ages.
────────
I think you're leaning really heavily on this when it's definitely not the primary experience folks have with the palantiri, and when a major theme of the books is the corruption of "good" things and people. Yes they were nice once, but many things were and all ages end.
All that is to say, Palantir's founders would probably say that the item in question is an apt description of what they aim to create: a powerful tool of intelligence and surveillance that can be used for great good, and great evil.
I mean they might. Saruman also fell to pride after all. But given again the Peter Thiel of it all, and the recent manifesto, that feels like someone saying how nice the view the panopticon gives you is. The message that Tolkien seemed to be sending, IMO and the opinion of many scholars, are more along the lines of how people can be corrupted by their pride. Which also fits the company and the article.
So IMO they chose "well" but people should have maybe picked up the vibe before now.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae (edited )Link ParentWell it's not just the movie, it's that by the third age the palantiri that are around begin in Sauron, Saruman, and Denethor's hands and were used to drive Denethor mad with despair. They're...Well it's not just the movie, it's that by the third age the palantiri that are around begin in Sauron, Saruman, and Denethor's hands and were used to drive Denethor mad with despair. They're pretty much only showing misleading visions in the trilogy, a feint by Aragorn, Pippin being the Ringbearer, the Black Fleet approaching Gondor.
Their use is compared by scholars to WWII propaganda, the follies of fortune telling, the seeking of God-like (Eru Iluvatar-like) knowledge by man (or well, angel). They're not evil in origin but put almost entirely to evil use. Aragorn uses it to provoke Sauron but not to try to gain his own knowledge.
So yeah, not a movie myth. Even in the books, the idea that you could create a Palantir and only use it for good is like Boromir wanting to keep the ring. Hubris and naiveté, at best. Malicious, selfish, controlling, and domineering at worst.
ETA given that it's Peter Thiel and he's named/backed FIVE companies after Tolkien references, and is a big fan, I think he just thinks it's some
white"Western" supremacist narrative. The others are Anduril, Mithril, Rivendell, and Elven Immortality.2nd edit: autocorrect is getting worse, I think I caught all the weird typos
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentIt wouldn't be the first time that some "Western culture" supremacists have tried to appropriate Tolkien's work. He didn't take kindly to it then either.It wouldn't be the first time that some "Western culture" supremacists have tried to appropriate Tolkien's work. He didn't take kindly to it then either.
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Comment on China calls for ‘concerted’ efforts to tackle excess solar production in ~enviro
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentFwiw you don't have to fill out the form, it seems odd that they won't sell my email if I fill the form out but they don't have my email in the first place. So I just declined and moved onFwiw you don't have to fill out the form, it seems odd that they won't sell my email if I fill the form out but they don't have my email in the first place. So I just declined and moved on
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Comment on Babylon 5 S01E08: "And The Sky Full Of Stars" - Episode Discussion in ~tv
DefinitelyNotAFae Link ParentYes, this one and the last one in particular. It was a bit better on the computer than my phone but I assume it's just happenstance.Yes, this one and the last one in particular. It was a bit better on the computer than my phone but I assume it's just happenstance.
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Comment on Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys in ~society
DefinitelyNotAFae LinkSometimes you're in the uniform with the skulls on it before you realize I suppose.Sometimes you're in the uniform with the skulls on it before you realize I suppose.
This is pinkwashing. I'm not engaging with that.
Roberts wrote the decision upholding the bans on gender affirming care in Skrmetti; he's not a friend to trans people. And someone "could" be worse but they'll have to get that person confirmed still. Someone a Dem nominates could also be worse about Trans Rights. As if they aren't already revoking trans rights now. Btw Thomas also needs to go for the same reasons. He's pretty shitty... Do we also need to wait 3 years for him?
Even if this were talking about impeachment and removal that would also take time and a vote and wouldn't be instantaneous. But the idea of "waiting and seeing if they keep the Presidency" before we try to do anything about any corruption, even point it out and make the smallest of official complaints is burying our head in the sand and giving up all of our power entirely. It's a lack of courage that inevitably carries over
And when I say rip corruption out I mean all of it, including the people who would nominate replacements and vote on them.