wervenyt's recent activity
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Comment on The one-and-done pen? in ~hobbies
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Comment on The one-and-done pen? in ~hobbies
wervenyt LinkI've spent years and uncomfortable amounts of money trying to answer this question. For myself, the answer is simple, albeit well above your budget: the Lamy 2000. As long as it's capped, I'd be...I've spent years and uncomfortable amounts of money trying to answer this question. For myself, the answer is simple, albeit well above your budget: the Lamy 2000. As long as it's capped, I'd be shocked to see it broken by something less imposing than a car tire, the way its texture wears in feels intensely personal, and unlike most fountain pens it can handle being left unused for a week or so, no problem. Unfortunately, at your pricepoint, every fountain pen has tradeoffs. Not to say I wouldn't be happy to use a Kaweco Sport or Pilot Metropolitan, a TWSBI (although I'd recommend care with them, physically), or any number of lower-priced options, but none of them are as generically good. You could get lucky with vintage pens, like the Parker 51 or an Esterbrook J, but not likely.
Frankly, outside the realm of fountain pens, almost any body will fit a Schmidt, uni, or Pilot cartridge that will fit your preferences. Go to jetpens and buy a bunch of single ballpoint/rollerball/gel pens, and see how they write, then scour the web for a pen that takes that refill that you love. The thing that matters most is how you feel about it. I have pens over 80 years old that would snap if I got upet while using and will catch fire if I leave them in the sun, but they've gone in my jacket pocket to work and in bags on trips and I love using them despite that. Durability is great, but if it hurts your hand or you hate how it writes, then it may as well be a stick.
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Comment on Vaping DMT in ~talk
wervenyt Link ParentThis might be an issue of inflation of claimed dosage by dealers. Last time I dug around (~3+ years back), it seemed like in North America people attested to regularly purchasing 'hits' of 150-250...This might be an issue of inflation of claimed dosage by dealers. Last time I dug around (~3+ years back), it seemed like in North America people attested to regularly purchasing 'hits' of 150-250 ug, which was cast in doubt both by people who've had access to credible sources as well as lab testing, both cohorts attesting that most LSD on the market ran around 75-125 ug per hit, regardless of claims.
This would line their dosages up with more durable hearsay recommending "one hit for a first time, maybe half a tab if you're going to be around people". But I've also seen plenty of folks claiming that 4 g of psilocybe is a good first dose.
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Comment on Signal, NordVPN, Proton to leave Canada over C-22 in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentAs far as I'm concerned, the only reason you appear to be right lies in your insistence to make it so. But I think we understand each other.As far as I'm concerned, the only reason you appear to be right lies in your insistence to make it so. But I think we understand each other.
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Comment on Signal, NordVPN, Proton to leave Canada over C-22 in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentYou don't seem to grasp any of my deeper points, so I'll say this simply: institutional problem solving is a scourge in a world where every good and service could be manufactured near to its...You don't seem to grasp any of my deeper points, so I'll say this simply: institutional problem solving is a scourge in a world where every good and service could be manufactured near to its destination. Industrial logic is effective for manufacturing, and we manufactured hard enough that we don't need these petty ledgerline reasonings anymore except to distribute the future.
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Comment on Signal, NordVPN, Proton to leave Canada over C-22 in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentYou are suggesting what the minds behind the Trump administration want. The problems of the internet are simple accelerations of normal processes of sociocultural drift and diffusion, as it...You are suggesting what the minds behind the Trump administration want. The problems of the internet are simple accelerations of normal processes of sociocultural drift and diffusion, as it affords US interests the ability to leverage their massive wealth to disrupt foreign nations from a position of safety.
The military didn't end war. The police didn't stop crime. Intelligence agencies didn't deescalate the cold war. The more we feel responsible for ills beyond our command, the more violently we invade. We have to accept our horizons and work to better what we see within it, anything else is wishful thinking based on hearsay at best, and someone else's agenda most frequently.
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Comment on Signal, NordVPN, Proton to leave Canada over C-22 in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentI'm not willing to live my life insisting I know better than others' how to live their lives, nor am I foolish enough to think that blunt legislation will do anything but cause further traumas and...I'm not willing to live my life insisting I know better than others' how to live their lives, nor am I foolish enough to think that blunt legislation will do anything but cause further traumas and rifts in society. I believe you have the right intentions, just like every person who's ever wished to impose their will.
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Comment on Signal, NordVPN, Proton to leave Canada over C-22 in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentThey are uncomfortable facets of reality. Kids get hurt and sometimes die. People steal. Enslavement for sex occurs. Do something. Help kids. Pay for someone's rent or help get them a job...They are uncomfortable facets of reality. Kids get hurt and sometimes die. People steal. Enslavement for sex occurs.
Do something. Help kids. Pay for someone's rent or help get them a job interview. Be someone people can reach out to. Just don't act like censorship, strangling free speech, and mass surveillance help. Every intelligence agency on the planet knew who went to Epstein's island and what for.
You are manufacturing consent for tyranny.
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Comment on Excerpts from actual one-star Amazon.com reviews of books from Time’s list of the 100 best novels from 1923 to the present in ~books
wervenyt Link ParentThere's definitely a cult against adverbs in English editing. The usual logic is that between English's breadth of hyperspecific vocabulary, the pretense of characterization, and Strunk/White...There's definitely a cult against adverbs in English editing. The usual logic is that between English's breadth of hyperspecific vocabulary, the pretense of characterization, and Strunk/White style 'it weakens rhetoric' criticism, you're just supposed to not need them. The great authors get away with it (because there's actually no issue with them), but they've been associated with unedited writing for so long that most readers recognize them as a heuristic for 'bad'.
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Comment on FBI seeks US-wide access to license plate cameras, wants "data in near real time" in ~society
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Comment on The 100 best novels of all time published in English in ~books
wervenyt Link ParentIn the development of the English language novel, Austen is a particular stand out. She pioneered the use of free indirect discourse and was so linguistically efficient in her utility of the kind...In the development of the English language novel, Austen is a particular stand out. She pioneered the use of free indirect discourse and was so linguistically efficient in her utility of the kind of sentence structures that these days are treated as self-evidently the correct mode for written word that it made her contemporaries look like doggerel mongers within a couple of generations by contrast. That's not to mention that her artistic antimoralism and gender set her up to be a sort of protofeminist symbol, especially with her most popular works' focus on the rigor and work of the petty noblewomen of her era.
She's definitely not universally beloved in English either, but almost everyone who reads has read her, and her fingerprint is on the language.
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Comment on The 100 best novels of all time published in English in ~books
wervenyt Link ParentUnfortunately where some see glittering pearls of social critique arrayed into heartwarming tales of folly, others only see sterile sarcasm in her works. They're really missing out.Unfortunately where some see glittering pearls of social critique arrayed into heartwarming tales of folly, others only see sterile sarcasm in her works. They're really missing out.
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Comment on The 100 best novels of all time published in English in ~books
wervenyt Link ParentI mean, even if you don't like the Iliad, if you read widely, it will come up. We like to pretend our aesthetic preferences are deeper than exposure, but if social status is an incentive, exposure...I mean, even if you don't like the Iliad, if you read widely, it will come up. We like to pretend our aesthetic preferences are deeper than exposure, but if social status is an incentive, exposure is the motive. Compound that phenomenon over the networks of influence of millions of works, then skim only 100 authors the Guardian wanted to ape the dignity of for their "most important"s, and you're going to get a very fragile ranking that has little to do with anything but what books have been stocked in the most libraries.
The books that are only enjoyed through repeat exposures and reward deep engagement, while not "superior", will therefore always be overrepresented in such a tail-oriented ranking, in ways that are multiplicative with the simple network dynamics above.
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Comment on When Richard Dawkins met Claude in ~health.mental
wervenyt Link Parent"Woo" is a cognitohazard that prevents the educated from being informed of novel paradigms in order to stifle the actualization of new modes of being. I shall not elaborate, because you've done it..."Woo" is a cognitohazard that prevents the educated from being informed of novel paradigms in order to stifle the actualization of new modes of being. I shall not elaborate, because you've done it well enough.
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Comment on US will revoke passports for parents who owe child support in ~society
wervenyt LinkMe, having brought up "deadbeat dads" as an ostensibly progressive angle on denying human rights as part of fascist creep merely a handful of hours before seeing this article: oh,Me, having brought up "deadbeat dads" as an ostensibly progressive angle on denying human rights as part of fascist creep merely a handful of hours before seeing this article: oh,
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Comment on Woman covertly filmed for 'humiliating' social media content - then told to pay for removal in ~tech
wervenyt Link ParentSurely the marketers are honest about their products and services!Surely the marketers are honest about their products and services!
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Comment on What does Tucker Carlson really believe? I went to Maine to find out. (gifted link) in ~society
wervenyt (edited )Link ParentQuit falling for the words. But if you polled the apolitical and unengaged democrats, they'd probably agree that "there are real differences between men and women". Those of us with nuanced...Quit falling for the words.
But if you polled the apolitical and unengaged democrats, they'd probably agree that "there are real differences between men and women". Those of us with nuanced understandings of queer issues are not in the majority. Increasing border security also cuts across political lines, unfortunately. This is the thin end of the fascist wedge, in other terms.
Whether he believes it or not is irrelevant. But "great replacement" is not a thing people who can read books and control their urge to burn crosses at the same time believe. It's a myth that only holds together through news media spectacle, and Carlson is a spectacle organizer.
Edit: as a system of memetic consolidation and mass manipulation, Tucker Carlson is a force for bigotry. as an individual moral entity, Tucker Carlson is either so bigoted that it's comical, but clever enough to be incredibly inconsistent, or he's so evil that his personal bigotry is irrelevant.
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Comment on What does Tucker Carlson really believe? I went to Maine to find out. (gifted link) in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentHe's worse than Jones. Jones is a crank to the core. The real Tucker Carlson is evident from his decades of public speaking: he is a canny, cynical, and hateful person who is perfectly calibrated...He's worse than Jones. Jones is a crank to the core. The real Tucker Carlson is evident from his decades of public speaking: he is a canny, cynical, and hateful person who is perfectly calibrated to surfing the tides of respectability. He's a literal national socialist, and pushed the Fox viewership toward those views more directly and effectively than almost any of their other pundits. While their other talking heads have more brashness, rely more on fearmongering and bigotry, and couldn't care less about anything but their level of comfort and control of their surroundings, he was able to appear erudite, and levelheaded, and reasonable, and became the place that Foxists would seek real solutions. Because he is relatively erudite, levelheaded, and reasonable. He's just reasonably evil.
While those like Jones are happy to go off the deep end over conspiracy theories and inculcate themselves into hatred, Carlson's project has been the strategic utility of bigotry to maneuver the masses into supporting fascism directly. Now that the fascists have power, his role is to evangelize to those apolitical and unengaged Democratic voters the real values of capital consolidation, military expansionism, and strongmen. Fascists know better than anyone, you put the screws to a liberal, and they'll stare at their feet to justify their complicity in genocide, blinders not necessary.
He's not a racist or sexist or antisemite or transphobe because he's scared by Them, hell, I don't know if the guy actually has a problem with anyone he propagates hatred against. But it paid the bills and got his points of view their feet in the door, and that's even more reprehensible than blind hatred, IMO.
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Comment on Why I find woke criticism of veganism and effective altruism so outrageous in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentFor all the hot water I get myself in about using new terms, I can't help but cling to woke (positive). In its original sense, it's playfully self-congratulatory, very apt/easy to explain, and...For all the hot water I get myself in about using new terms, I can't help but cling to woke (positive). In its original sense, it's playfully self-congratulatory, very apt/easy to explain, and doesn't really imply anything negative about anyone but racists and their power structures. In the short period where it just meant "progressive (positive)", it lost some charm, but now that fascists are going around acting triggered by alarm clocks and labeling taxation as woke, it has become an excellent bait term for the purposes of disrupting the language of right wing propaganda in one-on-one conversations. The moral panic is so transparent that all but true blue fascists immediately deflate once they're defending some of it.
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Comment on Did wokeness leave us worse off? (gifted link) in ~society
wervenyt Link ParentI mean, in the context of that exchange? it was dismissal of the person you replied to, and dismissal of other's points of view. Say disagreement is not dismissal all you want, but you don't get...I mean, in the context of that exchange? it was dismissal of the person you replied to, and dismissal of other's points of view. Say disagreement is not dismissal all you want, but you don't get to play that card if
[you] have yet to see is an example of what that means, or any concrete example of the left actually "going too far".
That is dismissal of opposing viewpoints as failing to engage, when plenty have.
You can rattle all that off. I don't really disagree. But I can read between the lines and grasp that people dislike being expected to change their language at the drop of a hat and that the hyperperformative side of progressivism is literally the subject at hand. Pretending that the pushback hasn't been continual, even within groups of relatively sympathetic individuals, because you agree with the end goals, is disingenuous and fucking insulting.
It's actually one of the only fountain pens I've been able to hand to random people and have them figure out using without standing over their shoulder, funnily enough. I think some number of people (a large minority) genuinely dislike it, and there's so little QC that I don't doubt that most people's experiences with them are hard to compare, so those are great asterisks. I feel that, given their focus on buying for life, the former is going to be obvious off the bat, and the latter is remediable with some time and effort or money. I was mostly recommending against idealizing cheaper fountain pens, as it's all personal, I suppose.
But the Lamy rollerballs are excellent, no doubt about that. I haven't used the 2000, but I'll vouch that their non-fountain pens are as high quality as the messy ones.