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Cake day: July 4th, 2023

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  • Put those monkeys underwater and you might conclude that drowning is in their nature. I know of the studies you’re referencing regarding monkeys being taught to use money and I’m aware that they were done with monkeys in captivity. In the same vein, the debunked study about “alpha” wolves was done on wolves in captivity and observations of wolves in their natural environment countered the study’s findings. Our actions are a result of the context and material conditions that we are in.

    People dominate others for personal gain because they live in a system that rewards them for doing so. Place those people in a system that rewards them for helping others and the very same selfish impulse will make them saints. The “tragedy of the commons” is enlightenment era defeatist bullshit. The commons existed and were managed by people for thousands of years before capitalists enclosed them and dared to claim that it was the inevitable result of human nature.



  • These kinds of movements are a consequence of over-exploitation. The “lie down” movement - also “let it rot” - is similar to the “quiet quitting” movement in the US. People will not be motivated to contribute when they are struggling and do not see any benefit to trying harder. If these people were fairly compensated for their labor and had greater autonomy over how to contribute they would not lose motivation. Alienation from the result of their labor is also a huge contributor; feeling rewarded for your work can be as simple as seeing the result (a teacher seeing their students find their passions, for example).



  • Communism envisions a society where there are no haves and have nots (classless) and socialism is put forward as the economic system that will get us there eventually. There are criticisms to be made about the method but the vision is good.

    Capitalism does what you’re doing here, snarkily talk down to anyone who dares suggest such a society might be possible and is worth working towards, and puts forward instead that there must be haves taking advantage of have nots for society to function and that no other way is possible.







  • Pantheon.

    Really thoughtful and smart sci-fi animation. Don’t want to spoil it so I’ll be vague, it has the most realistic depiction of modern tech and how people interact with it than any other show I’ve seen. Really great commentary on big tech corporations and even a bit of geopolitics. Super ambitious yet it somehow pulls it off.

    There is also a scene that still gives me nightmares (not even joking, I still dream about that shit) which is more than any horror movies or shows have done for me. Anyone who has watched it knows exactly what scene I’m talking about.






  • Imagine enforcing shitty copyright laws on yourself like some code of honor. We developed the technology to make infinite copies of any media and then spend endless resources fighting it because it undermines our parasitic economic model.

    Imagine for a moment that society embraced the full potential of digital technology. We could have a library of all human art and knowledge ever produced available for free, instantly, everywhere. If book libraries didn’t already exist and were proposed today the excuses for rejecting it would be the same. The answer is also the same, change our economic model to support people’s basic needs unconditionally and directly subsidize the production we need/want (like art).




  • If anyone’s interested in a hard sci-fi show about uploading consciousness they should watch the animated series Pantheon. Not only does the technology feel realistic, but the way it’s created and used by big tech companies is uncomfortably real.

    The show got kinda screwed over on advertising and fell to obscurity because of streaming service fuck ups and region locking, and I can’t help but wonder if it’s at least partially because of its harsh criticisms of the tech industry.