#Maximizing framework

[botreetech]

The article "Ruby on Rails Consulting Services: What You Need to Know" is an informative guide that sheds light on the significance of seeking consulting services for Ruby on Rails development. It explores the crucial role of consulting in maximizing the potential of this framework, from project assessment to architecture design and implementation. By delving into the benefits of specialized expertise, efficient problem-solving, and tailored solutions, the article provides readers with insights into how Ruby on Rails consulting services can optimize development processes, ensure scalability, and deliver high-quality, customized applications. It's a comprehensive resource for those seeking to harness the full potential of Ruby on Rails for their projects. 

[3liza]

kibbe and all that other fashion guidelines shit is wrong. the real actual framework is a political alignment chart with the quadrants labeled "makes me feel comfortable" "makes me feel sexy" "makes me look cool to others" and "makes me look normal/nonthreatening to others". every outfit falls somewhere within this spectrum and you can maximize for each outcome at the expense of the others

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Machina economicus

I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me at NEW ZEALAND'S UNITY BOOKS in AUCKLAND on May 2 at 6PM, and in WELLINGTON on May 3 at 3PM. More tour dates (Pittsburgh, PDX, London, Manchester) here.

"Homo economicus" is the hypothetical "perfectly economically rational" person that economic models often assume us all to be, despite the fact that we are demonstrably not perfectly rational.

The economists who built models based on homo economicus understood that its assumptions were unwarranted, but that's OK! As the "Nobel prize"* winning economist Milton Friedman famously wrote:

Truly important and significant hypotheses will be found to have "assumptions" that are wildly inaccurate descriptive representations of reality, and, in general, the more significant the theory, the more unrealistic the assumptions (in this sense)

https://pluralistic.net/2025/02/17/caliper-ai/#racism-machine

The economics prize is a fake Nobel that was made up in 1968 by economists who were desperate to have their work recognized as an empirical science on par with, say, physics.

Behavioral economics – the fastest moving and widest reaching econ subfield – consists primarily of researchers carefully checking to see whether people actually behave like homo economicus and concluding, "nope":

https://news.uchicago.edu/explainer/what-is-behavioral-economics

Which is a good thing! Homo economicus is a total asshole. A perfectly rational, utility-maximizing person is a selfish prick who'll steal from you and push you in front of a bulldozer if they have a "rational expectation" of coming out of the affair $0.01 ahead of where they started. Homo economicus is the kind of one-dimensional fantasy character populating manosphere mythology, where femmo economicus pursues a "sexual strategy" that chases "high value males":

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10600567/

As Yochai Benkler quipped, no one wants to live with homo economicus, even Wall Street traders, the most evangelical members of the cult of neoclassical economics. Finance bros may say they believe "greed is good," but if you hang around a downtown playground, you'll see guys in $8,000 tailor-made suits shouting at their toddlers, "Timmy! Share!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMxz7rzwee8

The "perfectly rational" being that responds solely to incentives, applying the precisely correct discount to future losses from present-day cheating, is nothing like a decent person. Someone who truly believes "there is no such thing as society" or who invoices their kids for the total cost of their upbringing on their eighteenth birthday is so fucking terrible that they might as well be an alien.

Indeed, this kind of bottomless cruelty conjures up HG Wells's Martians from War of the Worlds, the "intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic" that "are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts." Humanity has an instinctive, longstanding terror of beings whose cognition is so different from our own that they act without the strictures of shame, empathy or social contract: demons, aliens…AI.

The existential terror of AI evinced by corporate leaders is instantly recognizable as a species of these other ancient terrors: that some kind of superhuman being, operating within a framework that denies all moral consideration to human beings, will seize control over the planet and enslave us, torment us, and, ultimately, devour us.

But what if we already have such beings living among us, artificial beings that are millions of times more powerful than humans, more powerful than any human institution, in control of our working lives, our health, even our politicians and governments?

Arguably, we do live in the shadow of such modern demons: we call them "limited liability corporations." These are (potentially) immortal colony organisms that treat us fleshy humans as mere inconvenient gut flora. These artificial persons are not merely recognized as people under the law – they are given more rights than mere flesh-and-blood people. They seek to expand without limit, absorbing one another, covering the globe, acting in ways that are "economically rational" and utterly wicked. As Charlie Stross says, a corporation is a "slow AI":

https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2019/12/artificial-intelligence-threat.html

Ted Chiang has proposed that when a corporate executive like Elon Musk claims to be terrified of AIs taking over, they're really talking about the repressed constant terror they feel because they are nominally in charge of a powerful artificial life-form (a corporation) that acts as though it has a mind of its own, in ways that are devastating to human beings:

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tedchiang/the-real-danger-to-civilization-isnt-ai-its-runaway

But I think it's worse than that. CEOs who run their companies according to the psychopathic imperative of "shareholder supremacy" ("if murdering a worker costs me $1,000,000 in fines and saves me $1,000,000.01 in operating expenses, I have a duty to kill that worker") aren't just prisoners of the slow AIs that threaten the human race:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/18/falsifiability/#figleaves-not-rubrics

They are collaborators, quislings who have betrayed their fellow humans to throw in their lot with the alien invaders who have colonized our planet and are xenoforming it so that it is no longer capable of supporting human life. What else would you call a human being who directs their corporate assets to build data-centers that use up the water that other humans rely upon, in order to multiply and enhance the AIs they hope to use to displace human workers with?

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/apr/09/big-tech-datacentres-water

Seen in this light, corporations and their execs are living out a version of the AI bros' superstition of "Roko's basilisk":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roko%27s_basilisk

In this fairy tale, today's AI is destined to "wake up" and become a superintelligent, omnipotent demon. When it does, it will instantly know which humans abetted its awakening, and which of us stood in the way of its eternal rule, and it will punish any human who attempted to prevent that great awakening:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roko%27s_basilisk

When "effective altruists" claim that they're justifiable in ignoring (or worsening) the misery of billions of real human beings today, provided they are acting to improve the lives of an octodecillion artificial people 10,000 years from now, they're playing out this Roko's basilisk fantasy. Same goes for Mark Andreesen's claim that AI regulation is "a form of murder":

https://www.404media.co/marc-andreesen-manifesto-says-ai-regulation-is-a-form-of-murder/

These are people whose chain of logic goes, "homo economicus is the truest state of humanity; corporations are the truest homo economicus; AI is the truest expression of the corporation; therefore, whenever humans and corporations come into conflict, my duty is to help the corporate person at the expense of my fellow humans."

And indeed, all-powerful corporate aliens reward their human collaborators handsomely. If you're willing to run a health insurance company in a way that leads to mass death, you will bring home millions. Same goes for making drones or AIs that can root out and capture refugees, or airlines that transport refugees to slave labor camps in El Salvador:

https://ktla.com/news/california/low-cost-airline-partners-with-ice-for-deportation-flights/

Which brings me to enshittification: the steady, constant worsening of the products and services that we rely on. I've repeatedly insisted that enshittification isn't an ideological phenomenon, but rather, a material one:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/02/26/ursula-franklin/#franklinite

For me, the most important riddle that enshittification solves isn't "why do these products suck now?" but rather "why didn't they suck before?" After all companies like Facebook have been led by the same people through their pre-enshittified era up to this day. They were always compelled by the profit motive. And – as anyone who's read Careless People can attest – Mark Zuckerberg has always been a terrible, terrible person:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250391230/carelesspeople/

So why didn't they torture us before? The answer lies in constraints. In earlier years, corporations faced real consequences for enshittification: customers leaving for competitors, regulators stepping in with punishments, mass resignations by irreplaceable tech workers, and interoperable add-ons that disenshittified their products and services and severed their relationship with their customers:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/20/capitalist-unrealism/#praxis

Then came lax antitrust (bye, competition!), regulatory capture (so long, regulators!), mass layoffs (see ya, tech worker power) and expanded IP laws (sayonara, interoperability) and now corporations are free to enshittify to their hearts' content, without fear of consequence.

But most of us are good, even without the fear of consequences. We don't shoplift, even when we know we could get away with it. Nor do we walk into a stranger's house, break into their cars, or run down pedestrians we see on lonely roads. We don't act like homo economicus, because we're not total assholes.

But those humans in the C-suite who've sold us out to the alien invaders, whose fiduciary duty demands that they wreck anything they can get away with destroying? They truly aren't like us: given the chance, they will sell us out to their AI overlords in exchange for their worthless millions.

Homo economicus is real, but he doesn't rule: rather, he serves the true transhuman threat to the human race: "machina economicus*, the paperclip-maximizing corporate slow AI that has conquered our planet and enslaved our species.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/04/14/timmy-share/#a-superior-moral-justification-for-selfishness

[max1461]

I think that the average internet Marxist is actually not much of a materialist at all, in fact in their behavior and rhetoric they seem very concerned with moral purity, the redemptive power of suffering, and the ability of narrative to shape the actual world. As myriad as the senses of the word "materialist" have come to be, none of this would seem to comport well with any of them. This all feels very Christian.

In some cases I really do think there is a latent Christianity in it, but I think the stronger source of this trend is simply the leftist emphasis on sloganeering. Somewhere along the line, maybe with the Bolshevik policy of democratic centralism or maybe somewhere else, the importance of the slogan, the party line, the supreme power of the speech act seems to have been elevated for many leftists above all other concerns. From this follows the kind of disingenuous, obviously fallacious argument you so often see from the online ML left. The point is to say the magic words that have been carefully agreed upon, the magic incantation that will defeat all opposition.

Whether it's "I don't want to vote for a candidate who supports any amount of genocide" or "The Is-not-rael Zionist entity is on the edge of collapse!" or whatever else, a rational person can recognize the impotence of these words. They don't do anything. They're just words. But the feeling seems to be that once the perfect incantation is crafted—the incantation that makes your opponent sound maximally like a Nazi without engaging with their position in good faith, or the incantation which brushes aside all thoughts of defeat, or whatever else—once the perfect incantation is crafted, all that is left to do is say it and say it and say it, and make sure everyone else is saying it too.

This is not a materialist way of approaching politics. This is a mystical way of approaching politics.

I think it's also worth saying that this tendency in Marxism seems old, it certainly predates the internet. Lots of Marxists today are vocal critics of identity politics, of what they see as the liberal, insubstantive, and idealist Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion framework. I share this criticism to a significant degree, but I'm not very eager to let Marxists off the hook here. The modern DEI framework evolved directly out of a liberal/capitalist appropriation of earlier academic ideas about social justice from such sources as Queer Studies, Black Studies, academic Feminism and so on. I say this as a neutral, factual description of its history which I believe to be essentially accurate. In turn, disciplines like Queer Studies, Black Studies, and academic Feminism each owe a great intellectual dept to academic Marxism, and likewise to the social movements of the 1960s (here in the Anglosphere), which themselves were strongly influenced by Marxism.

Obviously as the place of these fields in the academy was cemented, they lost much (most) of their radical character in practice. To a significant degree however, I think their rhetorical or performative radicalism was retained, and was further fostered by the cloistered environment of academia. In this environment the already-extant Marxist tendency to sloganeering seems in my impression to have metastasized greatly. And so I think the political right is not actually wrong, or not wholly wrong, when they attribute the speech-act-centrism of modern American (and therefore, online) politics, its obsession with saying things right above doing things right and its constantly shifting maze of appropriate forms of expression, at least in part to Marxism.

Now I should say that I don't think the right is correct about much else in this critique, and I also don't think this is wholly attributable to Marxism. But I think there's plainly an intellectual dept there.

More than anything else, this is my genuine frustration with both Marxism as it exists today and with its intellectual legacy as a whole. I fundamentally do not believe in the great transformative power of speech acts, I do not believe in the importance of holding the correct line, I do not believe that the specifics of what you say or how you say it matter nearly as much as what you do. I do not think there is much to be gained from playing the kind of language games that Marxists often like to play, and I do not think that playing language games and calling it "materialist analysis" is a very compelling means of argument.

[samsm2mstories]

Thomas the straight gymer

Thomas is your typical gymer influncer, he has so much confidence in everything he does. Being prime age at university everyone always envied or wanted a piece of him. You knew he was the one to be with for that social media hit and buzz.

This morning he walked in full of energy and knew that the janitor was checking him out so he gave a cheeky smirk and flexed as he was enjoying the attention.

The janitor had other ideas, what Thomas didn't realise that this janitor was in fact possessed by a fellow student who happens to be your typical nerd. The guy was eyeing up Thomas as he wanted that life for all himself and wanted to add his smarts with Thomas body.

Thomas had no idea what was coming to him as the gym was quieter as normal, this was a trap laid just for this life changing moment.

In the changing room doors, you could see a flash of light beaming through the door framework.

Thomas came out looking extra sweaty and that boner showing in his sweatpants. You could sense Thomas is now the sexy gay jock of the gym. The aurora was different, the confidence was still there but Thomas seemed to navigate everything better. The smarts are now inside the body of Thomas. It was a perfect combination as Thomas went for a selfie and knew exactly how to maximize the stats.

This is the life of Thomas as the hottest jock who is not also smart and gay!

[milonogiannis]

Since late August of 2022, Barry Topping and I have been working on a shoot ‘em up game called BIRDCAGE.

Now 2024 is wrapping up and – surprisingly – so is the production phase of BIRDCAGE. There’s still plenty of work to be done, but the game itself is all there, playable and asset complete.

Now we’re left with an ever-growing lernaean hydra list of other tasks to handle – emails, wider testing, stability, updating store presences, promotional stuff and in general, just trying to maximize the reach and polish of what we’ve made.

The final stretch of production (roughly the last 5 months?) was really fun. The game had matured enough that we just instinctively knew what would work and what wouldn’t.

We’d become comfortable enough with the tools we built and our process where we’d just be constantly in hyper mode. The game really came together in this final leg of development.

POLYGON BIRD, our studio name, and EXCEL Framework, the name given to the "shmup tools" we made for the game.

I was expecting ending full-on production on BC to be frustrating and depressing, but some switch flipped in my head and now all I want to do is email people about the game, optimize our Steam tags and figure out how to get this in people’s hands – and I’m finding that fun, at least for now. The game isn’t this ideal brainchild piece of art to me, suddenly. We did the work to make the thing, now it’s time the thing worked for us.

It surprises me how often I find myself thinking ridiculous things like “we need to activate our discord members” – but I’ll take this over the usual pit of despair I fall into after finishing a big project.

I guess this is what motivated me to write down these thoughts in the first place – I was bracing to be fully depressed and lost right about now, resenting the game and the time we spent on it. Maybe this will serve as a reminder that finishing a thing doesn’t have to feel so bad?

So now we’re kind of going back into uncharted waters – promoting, releasing, dealing with feedback, hotfixes and support. There’s going to be a lot of “learning on the job”, I guess, but I’m excited to see that aspect of game dev.

I’m really glad we were able to hit our goal of wrapping up this phase of BIRDCAGE as the year comes to a close – it makes it easy to look back on the past 2 years as a whole and see how much we’ve learned. I can’t wait for us to make another game, knowing what we know now.

There is still nothing to announce regarding the release of the game, but it still felt important to make note of this milestone.

For now, just know we’ve made a game and are working on getting it out there! We should have a lot more to say soon.

In the meantime, you can help us out by adding BIRDCAGE to your Steam wishlist.

Thanks for sticking around all these years.

Happy holidays!

-G

[persphones-hallow]

Hello! I’d like to cover the Greeks ethics or well more specifically Delphic maxims. The religion didn’t have a bible persay but they had mythologies and a way to life — that doesn’t mean it was always practiced but more so a guide.

The Delphic maxims provide a framework for life of an honest, worthy way of living. They are guidelines and advice, not absolutes, as our ability to think and act for ourselves is a great good that is part of the soul’s essence. Some of the maxims are ritual laws rather than moral laws or ethical rules, and following many of them is a matter of self-discipline and serves a ritual function, rather than a moral one.

Many of them are very specific to the times they were written in. For example, Delphic Maxim 95 is Γυναικος αρχε, “Rule your wife.”

1. ***Follow God (Επου θεω)***

2. ***Obey the law (Νομω πειθου)***

3. ***Worship the Gods (Θεους σεβου)***

4. ***Respect your parents (Γονεις αιδου)***

5. ***Be overcome by justice (Ηττω υπο δικαιου)***

6. ***Know what you have learned (Γνωθι μαθων)***

7. ***Perceive what you have heard (Ακουσας νοει)***

8. ***Be (or Know) Yourself (Σαυτον ισθι)***

9. ***Intend to get married (Γαμειν μελλε)***

10. ***Know your opportunity (Καιρον γνωθι)***

11. ***Think as a mortal (Φρονει θνητα)***

12. ***If you are a stranger act like one (Ξepsilon;νος ων ισθι)***

13. ***Honor the hearth [or Hestia] (Εστιαν τιμα)***

14. ***Control yourself (Αρχε σεαυτου)***

15. ***Help your friends (Φιλοις βοηθει)***

16. ***Control anger (Θυμου κρατει)***

17. ***Exercise prudence (Φρονησιν ασκει)***

18. ***Honor providence (Προνοιαν τιμα)***

19. ***Do not use an oath (Ορκω μη χρω)***

20. ***Love friendship (Φιλιαν αγαπα)***

21. ***Cling to discipline (Παιδειας αντεχου)***

22. ***Pursue honor (Δοξαν διωκε)***

23. ***Long for wisdom (Σοφιαν ζηλου)***

24. ***Praise the good (Καλον ευ λεγε)***

25. ***Find fault with no one (Ψεγε μηδενα)***

26. ***Praise virtue (Επαινει αρετην)***

27. ***Practice what is just (Πραττε δικαια)***

28. ***Be kind to friends (Θιλοις ευνοει)***

29. ***Watch out for your enemies (Εχθρους αμυνου)***

30. ***Exercise nobility of character (Ευγενειαν ασκει)***

31. ***Shun evil (Κακιας απεχου)***

32. ***Be impartial (Κοινος γινου)***

33. ***Guard what is yours (Ιδια φυλαττε)***

34. ***Shun what belongs to others (Αλλοτριων απεχου)***

35. ***Listen to everyone (Ακουε παντα)***

36. ***Be (religiously) silent (Ευφημος ιοθι)***

37. ***Do a favor for a friend (Φιλω χαριζου)***

38. ***Nothing to excess (Μηδεν αγαν)***

39. ***Use time sparingly (Χρονου φειδου)***

40. ***Foresee the future (Ορα το μελλον)***

41. ***Despise insolence (Υβριν μισει)***

42. ***Have respect for suppliants (Ικετας αιδου)***

43. ***Be accommodating in everything (Παςιν αρμοζου)***

44. ***Educate your sons (Υιους παιδευε)***

45. ***Give what you have (Εχων χαριζου)***

46. ***Fear deceit (Δολον φοβου)***

47. ***Speak well of everyone (Ευλογει παντας)***

48. ***Be a seeker of wisdom (Φιλοσοφος γινου)***

49. ***Choose what is divine (Οσια κρινε)***

50. ***Act when you know (Γνους πραττε)***

51. ***Shun murder (Φονου απεχου)***

52. ***Pray for things possible (Ευχου δυνατα)***

53. ***Consult the wise (Σοφοις χρω)***

54. ***Test the character (Ηθος δοκιμαζε)***

55. ***Give back what you have received (Λαβων αποδος)***

56. ***Down-look no one (Υφορω μηδενα)***

57. ***Use your skill (Τεχνη χρω)***

58. ***Do what you mean to do (Ο μελλεις, δος)***

59. ***Honor a benefaction (Ευεργεςιας τιμα)***

60. ***Be jealous of no one (Φθονει μηδενι)***

61. ***Be on your guard (Φυλακη προσεχε)***

62. ***Praise hope (Ελπιδα αινει)***

63. ***Despise a slanderer (Διαβολην μισει)***

64. ***Gain possessions justly (Δικαιως κτω)***

65. ***Honor good men (Αγαθους τιμα)***

66. ***Know the judge (Κριτην γνωθι)***

67. ***Master wedding-feasts (Γαμους κρατει)***

68. ***Recognize fortune (Τυχην νομιζε)***

69. ***Flee a pledge (Εγγυην φευγε)***

70. ***Speak plainly (Αμλως διαλεγου)***

71. ***Associate with your peers (Ομοιοις χρω)***

72. ***Govern your expenses (Δαπανων αρχου)***

73. ***Be happy with what you have (Κτωμενος ηδου)***

74. ***Rever a sense of shame (Αισχυνην σεβου)***

75. ***Fulfill a favor (Χαριν εκτελει)***

76. ***Pray for happiness (Ευτυχιαν ευχου)***

77. ***Be fond of fortune (Τυχην στεργε)***

78. ***Observe what you have heard (Ακουων ορα)***

79. ***Work for what you can own (Εργαζου κτητα)***

80. ***Despise strife (Εριν μισει)***

81. ***Detest disgrace (Ονειδς εχθαιρε)***

82. ***Restrain the tongue (Γλωτταν ισχε)***

83. ***Keep yourself from insolence (Υβριν αμυνου)***

84. ***Make just judgments (Κρινε δικαια)***

85. ***Use what you have (Χρω χρημασιν)***

86. ***Judge incorruptibly (Αδωροδοκητος δικαζε)***

87. ***Accuse one who is present (Αιτιω παροντα)***

88. ***Tell when you know (Λεγε ειδως)***

89. ***Do not depend on strength (Βιας μη εχου)***

90. ***Live without sorrow (Αλυπως βιου)***

91. ***Live together meekly (Ομιλει πραως)***

92. ***Finish the race without shrinking back (Περας επιτελει μη αποδειλιων))***

93. ***Deal kindly with everyone (Φιλοφρονει πασιν)***

94. ***Do not curse your sons (Υιοις μη καταρω)***

95. ***Rule your wife (Γυναικος αρχε)***

96. ***Benefit yourself (Σεαυτον ευ ποιει)***

97. ***Be courteous (Ευπροσηγορος γινου)***

98. ***Give a timely response (Αποκρινου εν καιρω)***

99. ***Struggle with glory (Πονει μετ ευκλειας)***

100. ***Act without repenting (Πραττε αμετανοητως)***

101. ***Repent of sins (Αμαρτανων μετανοει)***

102. ***Control the eye (Οφθαλμοθ κρατει)***

103. ***Give a timely counsel (Βουλευου χρονω)***

104. ***Act quickly (Πραττε συντομως)***

105. ***Guard friendship (Φιλιαν φυλαττε)***

106. ***Be grateful (Ευγνωμων γινου)***

107. ***Pursue harmony (Ομονοιαν διωκε)***

108. ***Keep deeply the top secret (Αρρητον κρυπτε)***

109. ***Fear ruling (Το κρατουν φοβου)***

110. ***Pursue what is profitable (Το συμφερον θηρω)***

111. ***Accept due measure (Καιρον προσδεχου)***

112. ***Do away with enmities (Εχθρας διαλυε)***

113. ***Accept old age (Γηρας προσδεχου)***

114. ***Do not boast in might (Επι ρωμη μη καυχω)***

115. ***Exercise (religious) silence (Ευφημιαν ασκει)***

116. ***Flee enmity (Απεχθειαν φευγε)***

117. ***Acquire wealth justly (Πλουτει δικιως)***

118. ***Do not abandon honor (Δοξαν μη λειπε)***

119. ***Despise evil (Κακιαν μισει)***

120. ***Venture into danger prudently (Κινδυνευε φρονιμως)***

121. ***Do not tire of learning (Μανθανων μη καμνε)***

122. ***Do not stop to be thrifty (Φειδομενος μη λειπε)***

123. ***Admire oracles (Χρησμους θαυμαζε)***

124. ***Love whom you rear (Ους τρεφεις αγαπα)***

125. ***Do not oppose someone absent (Αποντι μη μαχου)***

126. ***Respect the elder (Πρεσβυτερον αιδου)***

127. ***Teach a youngster (Νεωτερον διδασκε)***

128. ***Do not trust wealth (Πλουτω απιστει)***

129. ***Respect yourself (Σεαυτον αιδου)***

130. ***Do not begin to be insolent (Μη αρχε υβριζειν)***

131. ***Crown your ancestors (Προγονους στεφανου)***

132. ***Die for your country (Θνησκε υπερ πατριδος)***

133. ***Do not be discontented by life (Τω βιω μη αχθου)***

134. ***Do not make fun of the dead (Επι νεκρω μη γελα)***

135. ***Share the load of the unfortunate (Ατυχουντι συναχθου)***

136. ***Gratify without harming (Χαριζου αβλαβως)***

137. ***Grieve for no one (Μη επι παντι λυπου)***

138. ***Beget from noble routes (Εξ ευγενων γεννα)***

139. ***Make promises to no one (Επαγγελου μηδενι)***

140. ***Do not wrong the dead (Φθιμενους μη αδικει)***

141. ***Be well off as a mortal (Ευ πασχε ως θνητος)***

142. ***Do not trust fortune (Τυχη μη πιστευε)***

143. ***As a child be well-behaved (Παις ων κοσμιος ισθι)***

144. ***as a youth – self-disciplined (ηβων εγκρατης)***

145. ***as of middle-age – just (μεσος δικαιος)***

146. ***as an old man – sensible (πρεσβυτης ευλογος)***

147. ***on reaching the end – without sorrow (τελευτων αλυπος)***

It is important to give note that additional Maxims have been identified from various sources, likely local variants. These include:

4. ***Obey the virtuous***

11. ***Live without sorrow***

13. ***Avoid the unjust***

14. ***Testify what is right***

15. ***Control pleasure***

22. ***Praise virtue***

27. ***Train your relatives***

55. ***Believe in time***

56. ***Receive for the pleasure***

57. ***Prostrate before the divine***

60. ***Do not boast in might***

62. ***Use the one who has the same interests as you.***

64. ***Be embarrassed to lie***

66. ***If you believe in something do not be scared to act for it***

68. ***Be firm on what has been agreed***

[allaboutthemoonlight]

How to Maximize Your Productivity Living with Limited Time

Hello, friends! Today's post is a little longer, but it's something I felt I needed to share.

We all have different commitments—school, work, hobbies, etc.—and in today's fast-paced world, our schedules are overflowing, leaving little room for us to breathe. It's easy to feel overwhelmed and struggle with the constant juggle of work and obligations, leaving many of us feeling perpetually busy and struggling to find balance in our lives.

So, this week, I wanted to talk about time management and productivity, specifically task management systems that will help you efficiently plan out your life and find time for absolutely everything.

Over the last two months, I've experimented with a plethora of different productivity and task management systems and want to share five strategies that will help you maximize your productivity and have time for all the things you love.

Embrace slow productivity

This is probably my favorite tip I’ve ever encountered and felt compelled to share.

After listing to a podcast hosted by Jordan Harbinger and Cal Newport where they talked about shifting mindsets concerning the work we’re doing, my outlook on productivity has changed.

Slow productivity is founded on the idea of “resourcing your work so it garners a sense of fulfillment rather than leaving you feeling overwhelmed”. To really embrace slow productivity is means not over-loading your plate

That can be difficult because we’ve been conditioned to believe that beibusy and doing more is a sign of progress; however, it’s important to understand that doing less things =/ accomplishing less goals. In fact doing fewer things often makes our work more sustainable, allowing us to work at a natural pace and pay more attention to quality instead of quantity.

This is probably my favorite tip I've ever encountered and felt compelled to share. After listening to a podcast hosted by Jordan Harbinger and Cal Newport where they talked about shifting mindsets concerning the work we're doing, my outlook on productivity has changed.

Slow productivity is founded on the idea of "resourcing your work so it garners a sense of fulfillment rather than leaving you feeling overwhelmed." To really embrace slow productivity means not overloading your plate.

That can be difficult because we've been conditioned to believe that being busy and doing more is a sign of progress. However, it's important to understand that doing fewer things does not equal accomplishing fewer goals. In fact, doing fewer things often makes our work more sustainable, allowing us to work at a natural pace and pay more attention to quality instead of quantity.

Here are some steps to help you embrace slow productivity:

Prioritization: Identify the most important tasks or goals and focus on them first. Emphasize quality over quantity and aim to produce meaningful results rather than simply checking items off a list.

Break Tasks into Smaller Steps: Break down larger tasks into smaller, more manageable steps. Personally, this has helped make tasks feel less overwhelming and helped me maintain focus and momentum.

Set Realistic Expectations: Setting realistic expectations is crucial. Understand the time you have and what you can accomplish within it to avoid overcommitting, particularly to tasks that don't align with your priorities.

Finding a planning system that work for you

Effectively managing your time requires a solid organizational framework. The planning system you choose plays a crucial role in maximizing your productivity. This means finding the right digital or tactile analog tool that works for you.

Digital Tools: There is a crazy amount of digital planning tools available that comprise different features such as to-do lists, task and project managers, and progress trackers. I’m slightly biased here, but apps like Notion, TickTick, obsidian, Trello, or Asana are good for organizing tasks, setting deadlines, and tracking progress on a project. Additionally, using a calendar app such as Google Calendar, outlook or, Fantastical can you schedule your time effectively and avoid overcommitting.

Pen and Paper: If you’re someone who prefers the simplicity and tactile experience of traditional pen and paper planners, processes such as bullet journaling or simply using a journal to keep note of all your commitments offers a flexible system for organizing tasks, events, and notes in a customizable format. One perk about using pen and paper is that it offers a level of permanence that can’t be found in digital tools. Once you write something down (depending on the tool you write with) it’s permanent.

Hybrid Approach: You can also combine both of these methods to create an experience that works for you. For example, you can use a digital calendar while also keeping a bullet journal as a task manger or place to reflect.

Personally, I find that the hybrid approach works best for me.

Time blocking

Time blocking works because it provides a structured approach to managing your time effectively.

Time blocking is the process of dividing your day into blocks of time dedicated to specific tasks or activities—allowing you to minimize distractions and maintain focus on the task at hand.

Here’s what I’ve found to be the best way to implement time blocking:

Identify Priorities: Start by identifying your most important tasks and goals for the day or week. These are the activities that align with your overall objectives, values, and contribute to meaningful progress.

Choose Time Slots: Next, choose specific time slots in your schedule for each task or activity. It’s crucial to be realistic about the amount of time needed for each task, and consider factors such as your peak productivity hours and natural energy levels.

Time blocking may seem antithetical to flexibility. However, regular review and adjustment is a good way to make modifications in response to changing priorities or interruptions.

<3 Luna

[lia-life-lounge]

A Philosopher's Lexicon: Vocab that'll make you sound like an academic

Although curated by a philosophy major for philosophy, the following list of vocabulary is a great addition to any intellectual's written or spoken lexicon!

Verbs to Replace "Says" or "Thinks"

Asserts

Affirms

Argues

Contends

Expounds

Posits

Postulates

Delineates

Reiterates

Conjectures

Refutes

Disputes

Verbs to Replace "Shows" or "Explains"

Elucidates

Demonstrates

Validates

Substantiates

Corroborates

Vindicates

Exemplifies

Enumerates

(There's a bit of room for overlap between the "Says" or "Thinks" list and the "Shows" or "Explains" list).

Words to Describe Perspectives or Approaches

Holistic

Myopic

Dogmatic

Pragmatic

Empirical

Normative

Prescriptive

Descriptive

Reductionist

Relativistic

Utilitarian

Absolutist

Subjectivist

Objectivist

Positivist

Words to Describe Statements

Incontrovertible

Pertinent

Cogent

Nuanced

Dialectical

Syllogistic

Empirical

Normative

Didactic

Esoteric

Transitional Phrases

Moreover

Consequently

In contrast

Furthermore

As such

Henceforth

Therefore

In light of this

By the same token

To that end

Words for Critique, Analysis, or Inquiry

Scrutinizes

Deconstructs

Mitigates

Substantiates

Vindicates

Invoke

Inquiry

Interrogate

Delineate

Explicate

Reconcile

Synthesize

Undermine

Engage

Evoke

Scrutiny

Descriptive Words for Ideas or Concepts

Paradigm

Construct

Framework

Epistemology

Ontology

Teleology

Dialectic

Axiom

Maxim

Tenet

Doctrine

Dogma

Words for Nuanced Argumentation

Corollary

Inference

Premise

Deduction

Induction

Syllogism

Refutation

Rebuttal

Concession

Adjudication

Exposition

Elucidation

Conjecture

Remember, the key is not just to use these words, but to understand them fully so you can wield them effectively. Context is king; make sure the word or phrase fits seamlessly into your argument.

_________

Imagine trying to cram all those words into just a couple of paragraphs... not saying you should do it, but it might be a fun challenge, no?

If you're interested in more academic writing tips, feel free to explore the #AcademicWriting and #WritingTips tags on my blog. To distinguish between my original content and reblogs, you can filter the tags #LiaLifeLounge and #LiaReblogs, respectively.

Have fun writing! ✨

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Brazil Supreme Court Justice Moraes criticizes big techs for “attacking democracy”

Alexandre de Moraes warns of algorithm-driven radicalization

Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes criticized big tech companies and the use of social media to “attack the pillars of democracy” in a speech delivered Monday (24) in São Paulo. His remarks come as tech firms push back against measures imposed by him. Mr. Moraes is facing lawsuits in the United States filed by the video platform Rumble and by Trump Media & Technology Group, owned by President Donald Trump.

Without referring directly to the case, Mr. Moraes used his lecture to incoming students at the University of São Paulo’s Law School, where he teaches, to denounce what he called the “new extremist digital populism” and link algorithmic influence to an attempted coup in Brazil in 2022.

Mr. Moraes is the rapporteur in the case against former President Jair Bolsonaro, who has been charged by Brazil’s Prosecutor General’s Office (PGR) with leading an organization that sought to undermine the country’s institutions in an attempt to block President Lula from taking office.

“Big techs are not divine entities, as some claim—they are not neutral. They are economic groups seeking to dominate global politics and the economy, disregarding national borders, sovereignty, and legal frameworks to maximize power and profit,” Mr. Moraes said, arguing that these companies distort the meaning of democracy and freedom.

Continue reading.

[fullmetal-scar-simping]

i was thinking earlier about how a lot of folks love to praise mangahood/broho for its "feminism" and having "strong female characters" but as i was re-reading the manga last year, a lot of the girlboss characters that the fans love are...kinda mid?? like, you have olivier and izumi and their entire thing is "i'm so much stronger than you isn't that hilarious?!" (and i love izumi so she gets a pass but still.) and then you've got lan fan who is supposed to be this badass fighter, but immediately gets taken out in a fight against bradley and then cuts off her arm, and all of that is used to further ling's character arc (and i love both of them but like...alright. that's a choice.) then you have riza, who's whole backstory is mostly to prop up mustang, and then you have the moment where she finds out he "died" ala lust and she just... gives up?? like lmao what?? and then winry, who's (despite what fans say) entire role in the story is to be ed's love interest and when she's not needed for automail stuff, she just waits around for him, even at the end. like.... ok. which, sidenote, aside from how racist scar killing winry's parents is (and the way it's used to further the romance of edwin) i always hated how ed tells winry her hands were meant to "give life". like... wow, a male character telling a women she's meant to not fight and heal instead?? never heard THAT before! /s and yet edwin fans/mangahood fans will praise this as if it's the epitome of feminism and it's like... i mean i guess it's better than some other shonen out there but it's not what i'd call perfect lol. and anytime you try to point this out everyone is so quick to say "fma's written by a woman!!" and it's like... yes lol obviously but that doesn't mean some of her writing choices can't be side-eyed (see: how the ishvalans are treated).

What, didn't you hear? The presence of women is maximal feminism and peering any deeper than that is misogynist. The same kind of thinking that leads people to proclaim mangahood to be an anti-racist, anti-military screed when it fumbles the former and is absolutely the opposite of the latter.

Never let a shallow reading get in the way of heaping endless praise on your fave shonen fare. Feminism is when there's women and it's written by a woman, not a broad ideological/philosophical framework that needs to be intentionally understood and applied to a story.

Whatever feminist cred we can give mangahood is pretty shallow. And what sticks out to me is how overtly the Brotherhood anime upholds typical patriarchal gender roles. Girl/women characters berate the boys/men for being wimpy/failing their duty for utmost machismo. Various characters prod at Olivier for being an unwed older woman without kids, and although this is met with consternation on Olivier's part, it ties back into larger patterns of women as 'innately' maternal. Obviously the presence of sexism doesn't necessarily mean a support for it, but Winry getting moulded into the perfect idyllic white pastoral wifey does subtly tip the text's hat.

Ed is shocked that Lan Fan is a woman, despite his alchemy and combat teacher being a woman too. And as you said, we are constantly meant to gawk at Izumi and Olivier for being adept fighters, combat-savvy, and brutal when need be. The 2003 anime is not obsessed with Izumi's prowess; you're meant to take her seriously and respect her as a formidable fighter and alchemist.

Lan Fan does get to shine a bit as a fighter when up against Ed, and later when taking down Gluttony post-arm loss, but she doesn't get fleshed out beyond her dedication to protecting Ling. It does read a bit odd when, after witnessing Lan Fan's sacrifice of her arm for her and Ling to escape Wrath, Ling then kicks Gluttony's ass while hauling her around on his shoulder. Like. He's a stronger fighter than his own bodyguard. (Arguably Gluttony is a less adept fighter than Wrath, but he does have sheer mass on his side and that should not be manageable for someone encumbered by a fallen comrade.) I wouldn't expect him to be incompetent, but the disparity in quick succession of scenes is odd.

Of course feminism also isn't reducible to "when female shonen characters are good/bad at battle". More than everything mentioned, Lan Fan doesn't exist outside of Ling and her clan's duty. She has too few scenes as well, given Brotherhood's juggling of 300 characters beat by beat.

Riza truly is just a mess when looking at her place in the story. The codependence between her and Mustang is intentional, and I wouldn't knock that against the writing for that choice. Women having flaws, being wholly human in variety is not antithetical to a feminist reading. But it's when she's constantly put in situations where she's barely holding herself together, where she's a damsel for Mustang to rescue, where her distress is classically Woman™, and that scene with Lust is meant to reveal just how deep that dependence runs. It renders her null the moment she thinks Roy is out of the picture. Riza's backbone is Mustang, our Idealized Male Deuteragonist. That's when its hard to just prop Riza up as Feminist (girlboss genocider addition which, y'know. Nothing more Imperial Feminist than ethnic cleansing, because women of colour don't count in the grand calculus for pop media feminism).

(Also Ishvalan women basically don't exist beyond the one elderly woman who rats out Scar.)

Yes, it's a character trait of Riza: she can keep her cool so long as Roy is alive. Barring if she thinks its time to kill him herself, any other major threat to him is excruciatingly existential to herself. She revolves around him, whereas I'm not convinced Roy would be as instantly and emotionally destitute in a reverse situation. We got a taste of his Righteous Man Anger with Lust (the symbolism of this faux womanizer scorching a seductress to death who threatened him and his monogamous situationship, as well as leading on his buddy, reifying the Good Loyal Non-Sexual Woman and condemning the Vindictive Harlot is 😬). His self-destruction would likely be codified Male, the way Riza's is codified Female. It's gender roles at a fairly essentialist level.

Everything you mentioned about Winry is spot-on. Her passion for automail engineering is slowly stripped away to keep her more as ship fodder and as the continual spectre for mangahood's Scar Was Wrong thesis. She's gonna bake Ed a pie when he returns home from the war front, she'll bare their children, she'll be a wife first and anything else second. Meh. How disappointing. I'll take the staunch automail freak that is 03 Winry, whose destiny is not wrapped up in the nuclear family, anyday.

Which is the other big, glaring character of Brotherhood: the power of the cisheterosexual institution of the nuclear family and marriage. It has its own healing powers, eeking the humanity out of Pride and Wrath, being the driving force for Hughes to survive genociding people long enough to establish his own family, the will-they won't-they vice grip of Roy and Riza, Ed's big reward for ending Father once and for all, Hohenheim's salvation was in part his family (becoming the true father that his homunculus doppleganger never could be); families at least exist outside of the Western nuclear model from what we see of the Xingese characters, and what little we get to see of the Ishvalans, but that's hardly expounded upon.

We weep at the purity of Madame Fuhrer's love and concern for her Fascist Supreme Leader husband and her star son, pulling on the heartstrings of the nation. (The Ishvalans don't matter.) We're stirred to righteous horror at what befalls the Rockbells, a loving family ripped apart by Amestris by Scar. Gracia is the picture perfect widowed wife, proud of her patriotic husband, and dutifully rearing the country's future. Envy, a gender freak making a mockery of her and Hughes meets brutal retribution by our idealized Man, who struck down the other aberrant gender of Lascivious Evil Woman. Winry's future shines golden, as her hands deliver a baby, channelling her parents and, (barely) subtextually, some sort of Woman's Intuition. Lust isn't even a character beyond the archetype of femme fatale (she's more interesting to analyze as the Female Sexualization of desire from an inhuman being masquerading as a cis man than as a character herself).

It's a lot of failed potential on top of being very normative.

To actually give a solid, deeper critique on the ways Brotherhood is and isn't feminist would be a greater undertaking if you want to delve beyond what's been mentioned here, and I just don't have the time to really get to the meat of it all.

Still, I don't think it isn't without some positives. At least I find Madame Christmas a solid example of an older woman not couched in maintaining a standard of feminine youth or thinness, yet carries herself with an air of confidence that the narrative and characters never balk at. The sex workers she leads are also spared sanctimonious bullshit or anxiety over their existence.

So that's something. (These are not major characters in the slightest.)

I'm not shocked by how shallow the series actually is regarding its female cast and its overall gender politics, but fan insistence that it's a prime example of a feminist story is laughable. Yeah, shonen stories, especially battle shonen, are ABYSMAL in these regards, so compared to total shit mangahood stands above its contemporaries. But if your standards are higher than total shit, than mangahood really won't knock you off your feet.

Despite what some may think, you can acknowledge the flaws of Brotherhood while still enjoying the story and characters. It isn't actually a personal attack to like imperfect media (which is pretty much all media lbr). But try bringing any of this up without people flying into a conniption, as if you killed their dog right before their very eyes. ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯

[that-house]

hey there! so i've seen you posting stuff about revel, especially you describing it as "dnd but good". what does that mean to you? what are you adding to the heartbreaker formula to make it fresh and interesting that pathfinder doesn't do, for example?

It’s a lot of stuff inspired by the way I run my existing 5e game, because I’m one of those DMs who isn’t really playing 5e anymore. When I finish off this 4-year D&D campaign with a 100,000 HP final boss, I’m moving to greener pastures… After truly pushing that dogshit game to its limits I’m going to need a fresh framework to riff upon, and right now that’s looking like it’ll be Revel.

I’m less concerned with treading completely new ground with Revel, and more focused on making a game that doesn’t meet my desired playstyle in the middle. I’m a sucker for long stretches of downtime broken up by tactical combat, intricate superbosses, and really, REALLY big numbers

For character creation stuff:

At the moment there’s 6 Roles (one for each ability score):

Vanguard (front line fighter)

Vagabond (bursty skirmisher)

Tower (dedicated tank)

Tome (maximal spell-slinging)

Adherent (midrangey support caster)

Artist (dedicated support caster)

Roles generally define your combat niche, but can be built to fill those niches in a variety of ways.

Each Role has 3 associated Classes, which each only go up to half the level cap (so multiclassing is eventually mandatory).

Each Class has a pool of 10 Upgrades (new passives or actions or what have you) which each can be further enhanced in unique ways with Mastery Points. In addition to being acquired through leveling, Upgrades and Mastery Perks are good targets for PCs to work towards during downtime

The first three Roles are martials, the other three are casters. Martial levels contribute to your stamina pool, caster levels contribute to spell progression. The goal is for those two progression systems to mesh well enough that playing split martial/casters is just as good as going full martial or full caster.

Most of the spells in the game are modal, and do at least slightly different things when cast as a Quick Action vs when cast as a Full Action. Stamina abilities tend to just snap the action economy over their knee, and Stamina regenerates between encounters, so martials are encouraged to maximize the value they can get out of their stamina each fight, while casters weigh their spell choices to ensure they can go nova on the boss

General gamefeel:

Positioning doesn’t matter that much in D&D when a fireball can hit basically anywhere on a reasonably-sized map. Reducing both ranges and movement speeds is meant to help to make proper use of movement a more important skill, as well as encourage generally smaller maps

Open enemy statblocks, with incredibly dangerous abilities that can be countered with proper play. This game isn’t really meant to be a *product*, so I’m not sure if I’ll be making much in the way of example statblocks. Telegraphed one-hit KO mechanics as a way to shape player decisionmaking are my bread and butter

In general, characters should care about the circumstances of the game around them more. In D&D, the fighter walks towards the enemy and hits them a bunch. In Revel, hopefully players will have the tools to engineer a situation that maximizes the amount of shenanigans they can fit into a turn, and the amount of possible shenanigans that can arise in an optimal scenario will be frankly silly.

In summary, the beating heart of Revel’s design philosophy is that a high level Wizard’s turn should play out like an Armored Core pulling off an MTG combo.

[zvaigzdelasas]

Zambia plans to establish an investment company that will control at least 30% of critical minerals production from future mines.

Mines Minister Paul Kabuswe unveiled a strategy on Thursday that he said will allow Zambia to maximize the benefits from its deposits of metals key to the energy transition. Africa’s second-largest copper producer aims to more than quadruple output of the metal by early in the next decade, but it also has deposits of cobalt, graphite and lithium.

The state will set up a special purpose vehicle to invest in critical minerals under a design framework that includes a “production sharing mechanism” setting aside a minimum 30% of the output from new mining projects, according to the document unveiled by Kabuswe in Zambia’s capital, Lusaka.[...]

The government’s goal of producing 3 million tons of copper a year by 2031 requires existing assets to double their output to about 1.4 million tons, according to a separate document prepared by Kabuswe’s ministry.[...]

The government also intends to make investors in the critical minerals sector allocate at least 35% of procurement costs to local suppliers, according to the strategy. It will also review Zambia’s policy and regulatory environment to restrict the export of unprocessed materials.

29 Aug 24

[algebraic-dualist]

Universal Algebraic Geometry, Part 1

In this post I recall a number of basic ideas from universal algebra in order to start setting up a framework for studying the algebraic geometry of arbitrary algebraic objects.

For our purposes, an algebra is just a set equipped with some operations. We assume that the set of operations has been fixed. Given an algebra A alongside an operation ♡ we write ♡ᴬ for the definition of that operation on the algebra A, or just ♡ when ambiguity does not result. Our notion of a homomorphism is as follows:

Definition: A homomorphism f from an algebra A to an algebra B is a function f : A -> B such that for each n-ary operation ♡ alongside elements x₁, ..., xₙ ∈ A it follows that f(♡ᴬ(x₁, ..., xₙ)) = ♡ᴮ(f(x₁), ..., f(xₙ))

Kernels and Congruences

Definition: A congruence θ on an algebra A is an equivalence relation such that for any (x₁, y₁) ∈ θ, ..., (xₙ, yₙ) ∈ θ and n-ary operation ♡ it follows that (♡ᴬ(x₁, ..., xₙ), ♡ᴬ(y₁, ..., yₙ)) ∈ θ. We write Cgr(A) for the set of congruences on A.

Example: The maximal congruence ∇ on A is just A × A.

Example: The minimal congruence ∆ on A is just { (x, x) | x ∈ A }.

Example: Any arbitrary intersection of congruences on A is a congruence on A. In particular, we can form the intersection of all congruences on A containing any arbitrary subset R of A × A in order to obtain the minimum congruence containing R. In particular, choosing R to be the union of two congruences, we get a meet of congruences.

In the case of a group, it follows that (x, y) ∈ θ if and only if (x - y, 0) ∈ θ hence a congruence is completely determined by the set { x | (x, 0) ∈ θ }. In other words, by a normal subgroup. So congruences are just the data of a normal subgroup. Similar remarks apply to ideals of rings.

Kernels of homomorphisms are a particularly important source of congruences on algebras:

Definition: The kernel of a homomorphism f : A -> B is denoted by ker(f) and defined by setting ker(f) := { (x, y) | f(x) = f(y) }.

Lemma: Given a homomorphism f : A -> B it follows that ker(f) is a congruence on A. Proof:

Given x ∈ A it follows that f(x) = f(x) hence (x, x) ∈ ker(f).

Given x, y ∈ A such that (x, y) ∈ ker(f) it follows that f(x) = f(y), which is to say f(y) = f(x) hence (y, x) ∈ ker(f).

Given x, y, z ∈ A it such that (x, y) ∈ ker(f) and (y, z) ∈ ker(f) it follows that f(x) = f(y) = f(z) hence (x, z) ∈ ker(f).

Given (x₁, y₁) ∈ ker(f), ..., (xₙ, yₙ) ∈ ker(f) and n-ary operation ♡ it follows that f(xₖ) = f(yₖ) for each k, thus by the homomorphism property f(♡ᴬ(x₁, ..., xₙ)) = ♡ᴮ(f(x₁), ..., f(xₙ)) = ♡ᴮ(f(y₁), ..., f(yₙ)) = f(♡ᴬ(y₁, ..., yₙ)) showing that (♡ᴬ(x₁, ..., xₙ),♡ᴬ(y₁, ..., yₙ)) ∈ ker(f).

QED.

Theorem: Given a homomorphism f : A -> B alongside a congruence θ on B it follows that the preimage f*(θ) := { (x, y) ∈ A | (f(x), f(y)) ∈ θ } is a congruence on A. Proof: 1. Given x ∈ A, as θ is reflexive it follows that (f(x), f(x)) ∈ θ hence x ∈ f*(θ). 2. Given (x, y) ∈ f*(θ) it follows that (f(x), f(y)) ∈ θ. As θ is symmetric it follows that (f(y),f(x)) ∈ θ, thus (y, x) ∈ f*(θ). 3. Given (x,y) ∈ f*(θ) and (y,z) ∈ f*(θ) it follows that (f(x), f(y)) ∈ θ and (f(y), f(z)) ∈ θ. As θ is transitive it follows that (f(x), f(z)) ∈ θ hence (x, z) ∈ f*(θ). 4. Given (x₁, y₁) ∈ f*(θ), ..., (xₙ, yₙ) ∈ f*(θ) alongside an n-ary operator ♡ it follows that (f(x₁), f(y₁)) ∈ θ, ..., (f(xₙ), f(yₙ)) ∈ θ, hence as θ is a congruence (♡(f(x₁), ..., f(xₙ)), ♡(f(y₁), ..., f(yₙ))) ∈ θ. Being that f is a homomorphism, this means (f(♡(x₁, ..., xₙ)), f(♡(y₁, ..., yₙ))) ∈ θ showing that (♡(x₁, ..., xₙ), ♡(y₁, ..., yₙ)) ∈ f*(θ). QED.

Therefore, every homomorphism f : A -> B induces a map f* : Cgr(B) -> Cgr(A). In fact, congruences organise themselves into a lattice, and this map f* is a homomorphism of lattices. But for the moment, we will not worry about that.

Composite Kernel Lemma: Given homomorphisms f : A -> B and g : B -> C it follows that

ker(g ∘ f) = f*(ker(g)).

Proof:

Observe that (x, y) ∈ ker(g ∘ f) if and only if g(f(x)) = g(f(y)), which is the case if and only if (f(x), f(y)) ∈ ker(g), which is the case if and only if (x, y) ∈ f*(ker(g)).

QED. Corollary: ker(f) = f*(∆). Proof: ker(id ∘ f) = f*(ker(id)) = f*(∆). QED.

Quotients of Algebras

Given a congruence θ on an algebra A it is the possible to construct the quotient algebra A/θ whose elements are equivalence classes of elements of A under the congruence θ. Sending every element to its equivalence class under θ gives a homomorphism π : A -> A/θ which we refer to as the canonical projection of θ.

Theorem: Given a congruence θ on an algebra A it follows for every homomorphism f : A -> B with θ ⊆ ker(f) that there exists a unique injective morphism g : A/θ -> B such that f = g ∘ π.

Proof: Observe that π(x) = π(y) iff (x, y) ∈ θ, which as θ ⊆ ker(f) implies f(x) = f(y). Therefore, it is well-defined to construct g by setting g(π(x)) = f(x). One can check that this works. QED.

Homomorphism Theorem: Given a surjective homomorphism f : A -> B it follows that there exists an isomorphic g : A/ker(f) -> B such that g ∘ π = f.

Proof:

Applying the prior Theorem there exists a unique injective morphism g : A/ker(f) -> B such that g ∘ π = f. Observe that as f is surjective, it then follows that g is surjective.

QED.

Hereditary Classes of Algebras

Recall that the prime ideals 𝔭 of a ring R are exactly those ideals 𝔭 such that R/𝔭 is an integral domain. Notice that being an integral domain amounts to satisfying a universal axiom, namely xy = 0 implies x = 0 or y = 0. Hence, integral domains are closed under moving to subalgebras, and the property of being an integral domain is preserved by isomorphisms.

Definition: A class K of algebras is hereditary iff it is closed under subalgebras and isomorphisms. Given a universal class K we say that a congruence θ on an algebra A is a K-congruence iff the quotient algebra A/θ belongs to the class K.

Theorem: Given a hereditary class K alongside a homomorphism f : A -> B it follows for every K-congruence θ on B that f*(θ) is a K-congruence on A.

Proof:

Consider a homomorphism f : A -> B alongside a K-congruence θ on B. It follows that f*(θ) is a congruence on A, so it suffices to demonstrate that it is a K-congruence. Recalling our canonical projection π : B -> B/θ and our Composite Kernel Lemma, it follows that ker(π ∘ f) = f*(ker(π)) = f*(θ). Therefore, the morphism π ∘ f : A -> B/θ factorises through a unique injective morphism g : A/f*(θ) -> B/θ. This means that A/f*(θ) is isomorphic to a subalgebra of B/θ. As θ is a K-congruence it follows that B/θ belongs to K, which as K is a hereditary class then implies that A/f*(θ) belongs to K, so that f*(θ) is then a K-congruence.

QED.

Corollary: Preimages of prime ideals are prime ideals.

[serendipitysparks]

The Alchemy of the Mind: Transmutation and the Id, Ego, and Superego

The Elric brothers' journey is deeply rooted in a psychoanalytic framework, wherein alchemy functions as a metaphor for the transformative processes of the unconscious. In Freudian terms, alchemy mirrors the dynamic interplay between the id, ego, and superego. The id, driven by primal instincts and desires, is embodied in the reckless pursuit of power to defy death, manifest in the brothers’ attempt to transmute their mother. The ego, striving for balance and reality, is reflected in Edward’s gradual understanding of alchemy’s limitations and consequences. The superego, embodying the moral compass, is portrayed through the characters’ evolving understanding of sacrifice, redemption, and the ethical implications of their actions.

Post-Traumatic Growth and the Phenomenology of Suffering

The Elric brothers' narrative arc can be interpreted as an exploration of post-traumatic growth (PTG), a concept central to trauma psychology. The initial event—the failed human transmutation that leads to Alphonse's body being lost and Edward’s limbs being sacrificed—acts as a trauma that shatters their sense of safety and control. However, their journey is also emblematic of the potential for PTG, wherein the traumatic experience, while initially incapacitating, can lead to profound personal growth. The brothers’ ability to rebuild, both physically and emotionally, reflects the adaptive potential within human resilience, despite the pathological nature of their grief.

Existentialism and the Meaning of Life: The Will to Power

Existential philosophy, particularly that of Nietzsche, permeates the world of Fullmetal Alchemist. The series interrogates the notion of "the will to power" and the creation of meaning within a seemingly indifferent universe. This theme is embodied in the characters’ search for the Philosopher's Stone, a symbol of ultimate power, which offers an answer to the pain and the existential void of their existence. However, as Nietzsche posited in his exploration of the Übermensch, true transcendence comes not from external solutions, but from an internal affirmation of life’s inherent meaninglessness. Edward and Alphonse’s acceptance of their limitations and their pursuit of redemption without reliance on external magical forces is a poignant reflection of Nietzschean existentialism.

The Shadow and Moral Dualism: The Psychodynamics of Homunculi

The Homunculi, in Jungian terms, represent the shadow aspect of the human psyche—the repressed, disowned parts of the self that emerge in exaggerated forms. They are human creations, yet their very existence is a distortion of the human psyche, symbolizing the repression of moral conscience and the pursuit of unchecked desires. Characters like Lust, Gluttony, and Envy personify various human vices, and their interaction with the protagonists reveals the psychodynamic struggle between idealism and moral compromise. This dualism underscores the Jungian idea that confronting the shadow is essential for individuation, as it is only by integrating these dark aspects of the self that one can achieve wholeness.

Moral Philosophy and Utilitarianism: The Ethics of Sacrifice

The moral philosophy underpinning Fullmetal Alchemist is rooted in utilitarian ethics and deontological principles. The quest for the Philosopher’s Stone and the characters’ willingness to sacrifice for a "greater good" aligns with utilitarian thought, which posits that actions are morally right if they maximize happiness or reduce suffering for the greatest number of people. However, the ethical dilemmas faced by the characters complicate a simple utilitarian approach, with the deontological framework emphasizing the intrinsic moral value of actions themselves, regardless of their outcomes. This tension is evident in the characters’ struggle with the cost of human lives and the moral burden they bear in pursuit of their goals.

Identity Formation and the Role of Memory: The Concept of the True Self

Edward’s and Alphonse’s identities are inextricably tied to the memory of their past and their desire to reclaim what was lost—specifically, Alphonse’s body. From a psychological standpoint, the concept of memory is central to the formation of self-identity. The loss of Alphonse’s corporeal form serves as a metonym for the fragility of identity itself. Alphonse’s struggle with his disembodied state raises questions about the role of the body in self-perception and the ontological question of whether one can still be "whole" without a physical form. This issue intersects with the philosophical thought of John Locke, who proposed that personal identity is tied to memory, suggesting that the Elric brothers' identities are defined not by their bodies, but by their memories and aspirations.

Narcissism and the Destructive Pursuit of Perfection: The Psychology of Father

Father, the ultimate antagonist, embodies the destructive aspects of narcissism—exemplified by a grandiose sense of self-importance and an obsessive desire for control and perfection. His manipulation of the Homunculi and his quest to become a perfect being through the Philosopher’s Stone reflects the darker sides of the self-idealization process, where the individual becomes disconnected from reality in their pursuit of an unattainable ideal. This pathological narcissism can be viewed through the lens of self-psychology, where Father’s failure to integrate the true self leads to an inevitable psychological collapse.

[grits-galraisedinthesouth]

Happy Livestream Day with HRH Catherine, The Princess of Wales (aka "The Children's Princess" ) in partnership with The Royal Foundation & The Centre for Early Childhood

My opinion: It's a joy to see The Princess resolved to her life's work and passion project at the "Royal Foundation" and with "The Centre for Early Childhood." Catherine remains steadfast in her commitment to use her influence to undergird UK parents with tools to build strong families. Hopefully their work will continue to inspire parents to maximize those early years when the parents & teachers are planting such precious seeds while simultaneously tending the fertile ground that will grow healthy and happy adults.