a nation of monsters

*banging together two trash-can-lid-shaped copies of the Melian dialogues during every press conference*

Read the SEP article on the coherence theory of truth, and this seems like .... a very very bad theory of truth*?!?!? * Except for moral/counterfactual/mathematical discourse, in which case it seems like a very good theory, but not necessarily of truth per se.

Post a random GIF, and everything will go good in 2026:

hmmmm

When you get spaghettified by a black hole, the That's All Folks song from Looney Tunes plays

There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness is the true method.

today’s affirmation: I am within the acceptable range of deviation. I am a perfectly roasted quail. if I was a car the mechanics would find nothing weird or rodent related in my air filter. I am upright. There are no stones or excess debris in my shoes. I still have all my bones.

One of the most reliably painful symptoms of Eastwards Jetlag is that the UK political scene gets considerably more vicious, racist, and foolish, as I become awake to see more posts about it.

you'll be fine if you've read the origin story "Naming and Necessity"

Encore une fois les IA génératives c'est tellement populaire et tellement utile que l'armée veut t'obliger à l'utiliser.

dynamic semantics is so cool y'all

Nobody. I do not think you can eat chair

This is a nice in-the-wild example of a rather complex dynamic semantic speech act: a conditional with a factual antecedent, an imperative consequent which itself embeds a factual consequent, producing a warning, and is itself conjoined to another disjunctive imperative consequent. 🐦🐦 #philsky

This Philosophical Sleep Manifesto, by Sara Protasi, is very good and very relatable.

Incidentally, I think this is also the main thing that doomed the 2015-2022ish online subcultural Left, and which the Left since then has imo been much better at. I suspect there's nothing particularly partisan about this: it's just the mode of human behavior that social media selects for at scale.

one thing that's really bad about Oops, All Viziers governments (vs democracies) is that there's adverse selection for each portfolio to be run not by someone who thinks they can do something popular with it, but by the biggest thirstiest most deranged psychopath on the topic.

Uncle Boonmee

Late 2026 at the rate things are going. I am so appalled at the world that I might have to start writing fiction again to cope.

GOOD. Also let's not forget that in addition to being an odious misogynist predator, Summers exercised undue infuence on the Biden & especially Obama admins' policies in naked ideological service of capital. His sabotage of the recovery from the Great Recession cost lives & boosted fascism.

There are many things I dislike my dad for, but his unthinking AI boosterism is high up on the list. I've always suspected his work is bullshit and has no social value whatsoever, but the fact that his job is now mostly just saying "put it into ChatGPT" over and over again has fully persuaded me.

still waiting for intelligent longform cultural criticism with psychomarxist explanation of the "everything is butthole" logorrhea in the AI space

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHH

"Hors de combat" discourse is basically the "technically it's ephebophilia" of war crimes

"The first strikes were doing illegal nihilistic murder of civilians the right way" — Ezra Klein (presumably), plus many of you on this website (actually)

If a moral system or code of honor makes the first strikes somehow more honorable than the second strikes, that to me is a sign of the total incoherence of that code of honor

Why are the second strikes worse than the first strikes? Can someone please explain this to me like I'm a kindergartner?

I'm actually kinda confused why people are clutching their pearls over the second strikes. The first strikes were also murder. I've truly never understood the idea of the "law/rules" of war. The whole point of war is to hurt people. The violence is the point. The harm to civilians is the point.

"I love salt, I love sweets I know there's danger but I fall asleep The curves, the gasps, the love of life Headlines, gum box, faceless paradise Life rafts bobbing at the bottom of the pier Wood burns faster if it's soaked in gasoline All these towns look the same, everybody's clean"

Anyways, if anyone wants to diagnose me based off my posts, please have at it (by which I mean "Help me, dear God, help me"). I release you from any liability. I am aware that Bluesky is not a doctor.

where my nerds at

I'm a little worried that the media frenzy around the second strike on the shipwrecked is masking the more important fact that every single strike is illegal

I unfortunately relate a lot to what I've read on the phenomenology of "narcissistic injury". I have abysmally bad self-esteem, rigid perfectionism, an arrogant belief that I'm very smart despite no accomplishments, and melt into totally compulsive desperate rage in the face of abandonment.

I would like one (1) "preventative MRI" to get to the bottom of this before middle age. Would also accept trepanning as a cheaper consolation prize.

Current top candidates for WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH ME, in no particular order: • CPTSD • OCD • OCPD • depression • "Pathological Demand Avoidance" • Borderline Personality Disorder • Narcissistic Personality Disorder • ADHD • bog-standard addiction (weed) • Internet brain • 21st century

In all seriousness, the Horseshoe Theory of self-loathing/self-regard remains undefeated. One of the major emancipatory advances of our species.

I enjoyed this article on limerence during the weekend, and much more when I unexpectedly read commentary by Sam Shpall, who is one of my favourite living philosophers (I have recommended his tripartite theory of love paper dozens of times)

i made a helpful reference

This is one my favorite photos ever taken of me. Shout-out to my friend Doug. MEMENTO MORI

It’s strange to me to insist that every frame the right successfully mobilizes is ceded ground from the left. Sorry but “western civilization” isn’t a terrain the left should claim. It isn’t a redeemable concept or a good frame for left politics. Unless you are ok with them becoming right politics

One thing that's been clarifying about this trip is it's helped me accept that I despise my father.

Maybe this is from not renewing my guanfacine before Japan and having to halve my dose.

I don't know what's wrong with me and I've kind of lost hope that any therapist or psychiatrist will ever be able to help me.

I got taken by my dad on a free trip to Japan (a longtime dream of mine) and I basically feel nothing. Just numb and dissociated and sad. I feel like I'm in some sort of subtle nightmare.

the digital subject is split between I checked this out so you don't have to AND I can't unsee this so you must see it to

Something very bad is happening to my brain

I'm losin' it again