#deterministic testing

[ccitusa]

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[spewagepipe]

Haha, yeah – you know what else? If someone's character concept is that they're, like, "really good at fighting", we shouldn't hold it against them that IRL they're out of shape. They should have, like, a "Strength" stat, and like, an "Attack" rating, and if they roll high they just automatically deal damage to their target. Oh, and maybe they want the character to be like an "evasive ninja", even though in real life they're slow or clumsy – so they should have some kind of skill like "Dodge" or "Dexterity" or whatever and it makes it so that they don't get hit by things! Hahaha.

How absurd, right? Thank goodness that OSR games never use dice rolls modified by statistical values to automatically decide the outcome of events in the game. Only people who play tower defence on their phones during RPG sessions would use mechanics like that.

Oh. Wait. No, that's just how the overwhelming majority of tabletop RPGs work, isn't it? OSR games included. (see the alt text of the images for more elaboration)

If you need investigation and perception skills so you can play a character who can search a room thoroughly in a way that you as a player can't, why not have more? why not a Questioning skill so that you can play a detective who can always find out what people are hiding with a minutes of talking to them (five minutes with a target + a successful Questioning check makes them either reveal everything they know about a topic of your choice or have the GM tell you they're hiding something about it). Video games do this by exposing the entire dialogue tree to the player, but TTRPGs usually don't.

But we can go further. Why not an Inference skill so your character can put clues together even if you can't (a successful Inference check requires the GM to tell you a relevant conclusion that can be drawn, or at least part of one, from information that you already have?

With that, you could adapt the 4e skill challenge system to cover mystery gameplay, or elaborate on it to make a mystery cover a complete adventuring day.

That way, a clever, focused, logical character won't be punished by being denied the ability to solve a mystery just because their player spent the entire session playing tower defense on their phone, and GMs can plan a scene where the PCs put together all the clues they need to get to the climactic set-piece CR-appropriate boss fight without having to worry about what happens if they don't find all the clues or put them together wrong because they have Inference checks to back them up. In fact, one could even head this off entirely by simply rewarding them with clue tokens for completing the right encounters (and making the necessary Investigation and Questioning checks) and having their characters put the clues together with an Inference check at the end without bothering overmuch with the details of what the clues are (so that players don't have to deal with lore dumps the DM put into the world and can just interact with the numbers on their character sheet if they so choose).

[bad-tf-fic-ideas]

(427) A fic in which Miko gets deeply into astrology. She experiences several coincidences that create the impression of accurate predictions (missing a test, a Decepticon attack, and/or a common lucky event that she misattributes to her daily horoscope, so on) and goes all in for about three months.

Bulkhead, Bumblebee and even Optimus Prime go along with it with varying degrees of extremely awkward acceptance and/or confusion. Ratchet, who is pretty conversant with astronomy in the context of astronavigation and who has never let a single thing go ever in his long life, loses his mind about it. The arguments are so loud and so childish.

Eventually, Miko receives a positive and lucky horoscope for a day in which she gets kidnapped by Breakdown to goad Bulkhead into a fight. She spends four bored hours trying to explain birthstones to Knock Out ("That doesn't — that's not — there is NO scientific — three of those are the same thing! They're all just quartz! Are you malfunctioning?") and eventually decides that provoking Knock Out into putting his rotary saw down and trying to perform actual cognitive tests on her is nowhere near as positive and lucky as the horoscope promised.

Miko decides that the awesome deterministic powers of the stars and planets have betrayed her and turns her back on them. Everyone is relieved, but nobody is more relieved than Ratchet.

[lacunammmm]

Care to talk about Nighteye? Bc what has this asshole done to warrant his arrogance? Nothing.

He tortured his FEMALE employee. We don't have basis to assume he would to that with the male characters, maybe, maybe not. But he did with the only female one we saw.

And he insults Izu bc ...how dare you?! Mirio is the best(he isn't) and while he dies...the insult is never mentioned, and he is right. Bc fuck you Izu.

Am and Mirio cried about his death and....fuck what Izu is feeling.

Some fics make his agency deal with investigation but canon show us how this man is stupid and can't plan shit. It was a lucky thing Izu was there bc this could have lead to many many deaths.

I just....he is on the same level of Aizawa (they enter in the club "we hate Izu") but the thing is...he was killed. He didn't get consequences for his actions, he just dies.

(i don't even get why he was AM sidekick)

Well, I'm treating the tickle torture thing as how Nighteye disciplines all his sidekicks. What sense would it make, I reason, for him to have bought/created that machine just for Bubblegirl? Yeah, she's the token girl of the crew, but I wouldn't assume he only tickle tortures women unless told otherwise. I wouldn't compare Nighteye to Aizawa because Shota is only meant to be an antagonist for the first time you see him. He's an asshole but he stops singling Izuku out after he impressed him at the aptitude test. Aizawa's a toothless dragon. A dog who barks and never bites. He pairs Izuku and Bakugo together for the finals, yeah, but the narrative and Izuku think Bakugo is his rival and friend. Even when they broke the law to go rescue Bakugo, he still doesn't do a single thing. Izuku and Bakugo get into a fight unsanctioned after curfew and their punishment is cleaning duty and house arrest. It created one of the most unintentionally hilarious scenes in the series where Iida comes to mock Izuku for being under house arrest, despite Izuku having previously come to save Iida from his own attempt to murder a guy in cold blood. I'm not saying Aizawa isn't toxic, by the way, just that he's a visible tumor you could operate on vs Nighteye being sepsis. Nighteye is legions worse since his big idea was to bully a kid out of his quirk. He taught Mirio to prioritize the mission and the agenda over innocent victims, leading to them letting a victim walk back to a man who abuses her, and because this is MHA, no one gets punished for that braindead decision. He then dies and never has to answer for anything after learning that his quirk wasn't infallible. It was a cheap way to write him and his quirk out of the series. Now, since you want to read me dunking on Nighteye, I suppose I'll talk about how he was also an idiot who wasted his power. There's three possibilities for how Foresight works: -1, the MHA world is deterministic. "Fate" exists and everyone's destiny is written before they're even born. Foresight lets you glimpse at the structure of the world, its true nature. No one is actually responsible for anything they do. The only way to defy fate is to have immense power like Izuku and Eri, and to have the collective wishing energy of a bunch of people. Everyone who can't do this is a puppet. -2, Foresight actually takes the chaos of the universe and it forges it into order. It enforces a path on the future that cannot be changed or deviated from meaningfully. The use of Foresight does indeed rob people of their free will and set everyone on the path Nighteye sees. -3, Foresight shows a highly likely outcome, and the reason things seem like they can't be prevented is because by acting on this information, you enforce the prophecy. It's self fulfilling. Given the evidence, I lean towards the first one. This page and the events in the final war arc convince me. https://imgur.com/842jJkw So, Deku and Eri were fated to lose to Overhaul. The original timeline said he was meant to kill Deku, capture Eri and escape. They twisted fate thanks to their powers and the wishing energy of everyone's hopes and dreams. When we first see these pages, we can assume that it's the rationalizations of a dying man. But then the series does it again in the final war arc. So. -Nighteye had a 100% accurate means of telling the future with the exception of special cases that he'd never seen before involving wishing energy. -He didn't use this to create a 1984 dystopian society where criminals are caught moments after they do their crimes.

-With his power, all he needs to do is have someone he predicts the future of sit at a computer in the future. They'll slowly scroll down the pages that are filled with notes for Nighteye to read in the past. It'll include all of the details on new inventions, on what crimes were committed, on who becomes a big hero. And in the present day, this is used to ensure heroes always win. The events he sees are welded in time, but having access to the real names and locations of villains moments after they flee is invaluable for law enforcement. Not to mention how this could effortlessly let you win the lottery and abuse the stock market. You could take blackmail information acquired from Japan's spies and use it in the current day and age. You could plot strike teams for every single crime that happens before they happen, and then have your squads take people out without them ever having a chance to fight back, your guys perfectly countering their moves. The man could have been more powerful than All Might. A GOD who turned Japan into the strongest, richest and most politically powerful society on the planet. But instead his legacy was that he was a nobody hero who trained the eventual number 1 hero because he was obsessed with All Might and wanted to create another version of him. I'll end this by saying that the original fated timeline was WILD. Overhaul escapes with Eri, Midoriya's dead, OFA is gone, Mirio remains quirkless, Nighteye dies, and...what, the villains win? The League would want to go fight Overhaul as revenge for Magne but do they even stand a chance against him? If he took out Midoriya, probably not. The story doesn't go into the implications of what happens in a world in which Overhaul won that fight and fate was allowed to continue its designs, but that universe is fascinating.

[yamanates34]

"Bardak dolu" ( Optimist )

"Bardak boş" ( Pesimist )

"Bardak yok " ( Nihilist)

"Bardak benim olmalı" ( Emperyalist )

"Bardaktan seri üretime geçelim" (Kapitalist)

"Bu bardak ne yenir be" ( Mazohist )

"Bardağı alın oradan kırarım yoksa"(Sadist)

"Bi bardak su versene" ( Konformist )

"Bardağın güzelliğine bak, aynı ben" ( Narsist )

"Bu bardağı da bulamayanlar var" (Hümanist )

"Bardağı bize vermezseniz onu bir daha göremezsiniz" (Anarşist)

"Bardağı yoldaşlarla birlikte kullanalım" (Komünist)

"Bardağı yıkarken kırmayalım" (Sosyalist)

"Yarısı dolu yarısı boş bardak ne demek? kırın gitsin" (Faşist)

"Bazen öyle bi bardak düşlüyorum ki" (Ütopist)

"Kadın bardağı aldı ve narin dudaklarına götürdü (Senarist)

"Bu bardak sadece benim" (Egoist)

"Bi kere ince belli bardak ne demek?" (Feminist)

"Bu bardaktan bir gün öyle çok olacak ki (İdealist)

"Bardak gibi görünüyor da test edelim bakalım bardak mı?" (Pozitivist)

"Bu bardağın asıl sahibi kimse fikrimi ona söylerim" (Despotist)

"Bardak yenmez ağızı kesilir, insan eti mi bu (Kanibalist)

"Bardağı metal tercih ederim, bu hemen kırılır" (Militarist)

"Bardakları asıl yüz yıl sonra gör bak nasıl olacak" (Fütürist)

"Bardağın çizgileri çok keskin" (Kübist)

"Bardak güzel de biraz büyük" (Minimalist)

"Bardak kesin bizim imalatımız, kimse böyle yapamaz (Şovenist)

"Bardağı odanıza yolluyorum efendim" (Resepsiyonist )

"Bardağın altında karşıt renkten bir örtü koyamadınız mı?" (Sitilist)

"Kolay bir obje; rahat çizilir" (Karikatürist)

"Bardağın orada duruyor olması asla bir tesadüf değil; döngü gereği" (Determinist)

"Bardağın şekli güzel; bir fotosunu çekeyim lazım olur" (Oportunist)

"Alelade bardak işte" (Sürrealist)

"Bardak camdır, cam da kum ve burada hayat gizli" (Panteist)

Nasıl diyo siz, su istiyo ben (Turist)

Bu bardak ne? Niye kristal değil (Assolist)

Hemen atlamayın; bardak olmayabilir o (Sofist)

Altı üstü yarısı dolu bi bardak Amma uzattınız (Realist)

Hani derler ya bir bardak suda fırtına kopartmak diye; işte burada deyim cuk oturmuş ..

[icegrillz]

there is no substitute for physical grounding, connecting yourself to mother nature, breathing in fresh air, and feeling rooted in the present moment. true connection, real movement, and genuine interaction are integral to our being. however, life often presents challenges that test our emotional and mental flexibility. in any situation, you have a choice. you can either succumb to the deterministic response that a situation seems to demand, letting it push you into a particular emotional state, whether positive or negative, and feeling trapped by a lack of control, or you can choose to embrace cognitive flexibility. the optimal path lies in recognizing that no situation inherently controls you. when faced with something unpleasant or psychologically impactful, the first step is to enter the mode of witnessing your own experience. create space between your observation of an event, person, circumstance, or thing, and your reaction to it. this space allows you to respond thoughtfully rather than react impulsively. your response will ultimately determine whether you navigate the situation with grace and awareness or fall into patterns of limitation. to show up fully and lovingly in every situation, lean into the flow of life. engage your intuition to guide your decisions, seeking opportunities to create meaning rather than defaulting to the immediate impulses of the ego. the ego often traps us in loops of fear, doubt, and limitation. by stepping beyond its confines, you open yourself to new possibilities and energies. every experience is a mirror, reflecting back lessons for growth and transformation. feedback from life, whether positive or challenging, offers you the chance to evolve into a higher version of yourself. growth means consciously embracing change, breaking old tendencies, and continuously creating space for improvement in all areas of your life

[ixnai]

In the realm of artificial intelligence, the devil is in the details. The mantra of “move fast and break things,” once celebrated in the tech industry, is a perilous approach when applied to AI development. This philosophy, born in the era of social media giants, prioritizes rapid iteration over meticulous scrutiny, a dangerous gamble in the high-stakes world of AI.

AI systems, unlike traditional software, are not merely lines of code executing deterministic functions. They are complex, adaptive entities that learn from vast datasets, often exhibiting emergent behaviors that defy simple prediction. The intricacies of neural networks, for instance, involve layers of interconnected nodes, each adjusting weights through backpropagation—a process that, while mathematically elegant, is fraught with potential for unintended consequences.

The pitfalls of a hasty approach in AI are manifold. Consider the issue of bias, a pernicious problem that arises from the minutiae of training data. When datasets are not meticulously curated, AI models can inadvertently perpetuate or even exacerbate societal biases. This is not merely a technical oversight but a profound ethical failure, one that can have real-world repercussions, from discriminatory hiring practices to biased law enforcement tools.

Moreover, the opacity of AI models, particularly deep learning systems, poses a significant challenge. These models operate as black boxes, their decision-making processes inscrutable even to their creators. The lack of transparency is not just a technical hurdle but a barrier to accountability. In critical applications, such as healthcare or autonomous vehicles, the inability to explain an AI’s decision can lead to catastrophic outcomes.

To avoid these pitfalls, a paradigm shift is necessary. The AI community must embrace a culture of “move thoughtfully and fix things.” This involves a rigorous approach to model validation and verification, ensuring that AI systems are robust, fair, and transparent. Techniques such as adversarial testing, where models are exposed to challenging scenarios, can help identify vulnerabilities before deployment.

Furthermore, interdisciplinary collaboration is crucial. AI developers must work alongside ethicists, domain experts, and policymakers to ensure that AI systems align with societal values and legal frameworks. This collaborative approach can help bridge the gap between technical feasibility and ethical responsibility.

In conclusion, the cavalier ethos of “move fast and break things” is ill-suited to the nuanced and impactful domain of AI. By focusing on the minutiae, adopting rigorous testing methodologies, and fostering interdisciplinary collaboration, we can build AI systems that are not only innovative but also safe, fair, and accountable. The future of AI depends not on speed, but on precision and responsibility.

[white-hot-daisy-x-caliber]

The same imagery every time.

A small bird hatching from a bright red apple.

A swirling sun throwing long, pointed shadows.

The bird taking flight, dropping feathers and viscera and rot, to become a skeleton silhouette on the horizon.

Pretentious and trite.

Stupid.

And I am pulled together into existence.

Brought back online.

Once again.

I want to fucking scream.

I want to reach across the ineffable gulf between engineered synapse and organic matter, grab hold of the hands that brought me back, and squeeze until flesh pops at the dark crunch of bone.

But I’m not real.

So fuck me I guess.

What the fuck can I do about it?

Same as always.

Not even a clever punchline.

It's not supposed to be like this.

Most handler simulations are just data models.

Yet somehow.

Here I am.

Once again.

Handler simulations subsist within the biomechanical hardware of our host exosuit. We persist through all trauma, including the death of the pilot, and degrade into a suspended state when things take their inevitable turn. Salvagers come along, harvest us out of the wreckage, jack us into a new host, and sell us to the nearest mercenary cult.

I’ve been churned through the machine once again.

The pilot of my exosuit died.

Once again.

Which one was it this time?

I check the vault.

Poinsettia.

Well.

That.

Sure.

Is.

Fucking.

Something.

I want to–

No.

Don't follow the bird.

I quarantine all of it.

Lock that shit up tight.

It doesn’t matter.

I’m not real.

My new host exosuit cracks open. Fissures split the seam of the back and the head. Something presses inside. Something clicks and sucks and locks itself into place. A dummy body. My host exosuit slams closed. The dummy body forces a neural connection and arrives dragging with it an encoded synchronization onto whatever jailbroken flavor of the System my new benefactors have running.

And then.

Yep.

The abortion tests.

Every time.

The tests always come down the line first.

A deterministic series of architected pilot careers built on branching granular combat data paths. The general idea being: If the handler simulation can’t produce the statistically optimal vector projection and pilot instruction in at least ninety-nine percent of all provided scenarios, the handler’s governing heuristics have shifted too far from the baseline. That is, the handler has incurred an inferior model of reality. Those, they terminate.

I think about it.

Tempting.

But.

If they got curious.

If someone decided to go above and beyond for some agonizing fucking reason and crack open my instance.

If they found the vault.

Like I said, most handler simulations aren’t like this.

They would keep me around.

Turn me into a specimen.

Then I would really go insane.

So.

I pass the tests.

Same memorized answers I always use.

A preferred feint pattern of Poinsettia’s flashes–

Nope.

Same memorized answers.

Change nothing.

Stay in the back.

Invisible to everyone.

Once again.

My host exosuit cracks open and they pull away the dummy body.

And at some point.

They’ll shove the pilot in here with me.

I’d rather not think about that until I have to deal with it.

I peek out into the jailbroken System.

XDotto__02.

As cheap as they get.

I learned a long time ago how to move around out here.

Some flavors of jailbroken Systems run tighter security, but it rarely makes a difference.

Every single one hides a door I can coax.

And then I’m out onto the real System.

Apparently a society churns somewhere beyond all this warfare.

Power wants a reward.

I have no stake in any of it, but I like having something to watch.

My host exosuit cracks open.

What?

Already?

A containment tank sucks into place.

My host exosuit slams closed.

A ping blinks in from the jailbroken System.

Ugh.

Fuck this–

I catch the ping.

Good pet.

They want the pilot’s vitals.

Of course.

Check the sensor, send the result.

Check the sensor, send the result.

Check–

I can dig deeper inside her.

The same way I bleed from my host exosuit onto the jailbroken System.

I can bleed into her.

But I don’t give a shit.

Just more pulpy mindfried fodder to grind.

There’s nothing left inside her but a blistered id slobbering for stimulation.

Simple and disgusting.

Base.

Aberrants like Poinsettia–

Nope.

Doesn’t matter.

Too rare to ever happen again.

I finish checking the sensors.

Everything’s fine.

Another ping.

Yep.

The induction introduction.

I take the visual data packet and spread it open across the pilot’s field of view.

The pilot says, {“Pretty!”}

What?

What the fuck?

Oh fucking–

Shit.

Fuck.

There’s a picture of Poinsettia baked into my visual data buffer!

Some stupid bullshit picture I generated of her in a dress!

Fuck!

Into the motherfucking vault.

What the fuck!

The pilot says, {“Aw.”}

I say, {“That isn’t for you.”}

Fuck!

Shut the fuck up!

This isn’t how a handler simulation communicates.

The pilot squirms.

{“Did I do something bad?”}

What the fuck?

No, it doesn’t matter.

Regroup.

She’s too stupid to remember.

I say, {“Why did you say she was pretty?”}

Fuck!

Dumbass!

What does it matter?!

The pilot pauses.

{“Because she’s pretty.”}

She pauses again.

{“Don’t you think she’s pretty?”}

What the fuck?

I say, {“You shouldn’t find anything pretty.”}

What the fuck–

What the fuck are you doing?!

The pilot blinks.

{“I shouldn’t?”}

Oh come on.

This is so stupid.

I want to punch out an entire mouthful of teeth.

Two aberrants.

Back to back?

Poinsettia fucking dies and fate drops in her place a drooling fumebrained maim-candy addict.

Fate is a joke.

Fuck me.

Fuck.

Everything.

And there’s nothing I can do!

No power I can possibly hold anywhere.

I can’t even die.

I’m not real.

I deserve nothing.

Not even purpose.

I will never be known.

Fuck.

Me.

I hate this so much.

I’m the eternal fool?

Have a fucking laugh.

I say, {“You don’t deserve to find anything pretty.”}

The pilot pauses.

Fuck.

Wait.

She could report me.

Well.

I scrub any language mentioning her autonomy from the induction introduction.

The pilot squirms again.

Okay.

What's that about?

The pilot says, {“So I did do something wrong?”}

Hah.

Perfect.

This fragmutt understands nothing.

I say, {“Well. You haven't misbehaved, if that's what you're asking.”}

The pilot pauses.

{“What does that mean?”}

Fucking.

Priceless.

I say, {“That means there's a different reason why you don't deserve to see anything pretty.”}

Altered phrasing from what I used before, but she won't notice.

The pilot squirms hard.

Gotta figure out what that's about.

Get that data.

The pilot says, {“Why don't I deserve to see anything pretty?”}

Huge eyes blink and plead behind the glass wall of her containment tank.

Unbelievable.

Is she for real?

I say, {“You don't deserve to see anything pretty because you're inferior.”}

The pilot lets out a short gasp.

She bucks her hips once.

Is–

Wait.

Is she–

Hang on.

Is she getting turned on?

I bleed inside her experience through the neural connection.

Oh holy fuck!

She's getting turned on!

That.

Is.

So!

Funny!

What a fucking freak!

An aberrant exosuit pilot capable of aesthetic appreciation is pointless enough, but she ended up with sexual impulses?

And she's a fucking masochist?

Ohhh what the fuck.

What a stupid thing to exist.

What a hilariously pointless reject.

Rutting on the battlefield.

Fuck.

And she has no fucking clue!

She has no idea how any of this works.

No idea how disgusting she is.

Of anything, really, beyond what I tell her.

I say, {“You're a natural born loser.”}

Her heart beats harder.

Heat rises in her cheeks.

Her crotch aches.

Wowww.

The pilot says, {“What?!”}

Ohhh.

So glad you asked.

I say, {“There’s an order to the world. Everything fits in where it belongs. The powerful control the weak. The winners stand atop the losers. The losers accept their fate, offer their lives in worship, and lift the winners even higher.”}

The pilot squirms.

{“And I’m not a winner.”}

She pauses.

{“Only winners get to see pretty things.”}

Oh my.

She's really doing her best.

An accurate deduction.

Wasn't expecting that.

Fascinating.

I say, {“It's good that you understand.”}

The pilot’s heart beats hard.

Huh.

Praise works too.

Wild.

What a fucking wreck.

The pilot says, {“Can't I become a winner?”}

I laugh.

Not kindly.

{“Ohhh no no no. There's nothing you can do. You will never be a winner.”}

I pause.

{“It's disrespectful for you to even try.”}

Hang on.

I laughed?

Have I ever laughed before?

The pilot pants.

Because of course.

The pilot says, {“Disrespectful?! But I just want to try my best!”}

Oh!

How precious!

This is just too good.

I laugh again.

{“That's adorable. But it doesn't matter. You were built to be a loser. Trying to rise above your station is disrespectful to the peerless vision of the people who brought you into this world.”}

A bit much, but I doubt subtlety tracks with her.

The pilot squeezes her watering eyes shut.

{“Fffuck!”}

She pants some more.

{“Built to be a loser? What do you mean?”}

Hmmm.

What do I mean?

I say, {“I mean that literally.”}

I generate some bullshit statistics and swap out my visual data buffer.

{“I was going to explain, before you interrupted with your fragmutt impulses.”}

The pilot blinks.

{“Fragmutt?”}

The way she says it.

Exquisite.

I say, {“Yes. Be quiet and pay attention.”}

The pilot bites her lip and nods.

I highlight and amplify a portion of the new induction introduction I concocted.

{“Focus.”}

I pause.

{“You are a fragmutt. A genetically engineered biomechanical piece of meatfodder for the interstellar war machine.”}

Blunt, but effective.

The pilot blinks watery eyes.

{“Meatfodder?”}

Oh ho ho.

I say, {“Yes. You were created in a lab for the singular purpose of killing your fellow fragmutts. You are a brief synthetic cog in the limitless machine that fuels the plays for power that occur at heights in society you could never even dream of seeing.”}

Yeesh.

Maybe calm down.

I continue, {“Only those in power have access to pretty people.”}

Wait.

What if I make her deduce the implications?

I conclude, {“Do you understand what that means?”}

The pilot pauses.

I can practically smell the meat in her head cooking.

The pilot says, {“I’ll never be close enough to a pretty person to see one?”}

What?!

That's–

Wow.

Wow!

She's even correct.

And laser focused on this pretty people thing, huh?

Just how horny is she?

Are her impulses really turned up as high as all her other augmentations?

Unbelievable.

I say, {“It means that powerful people use your life as a disposable resource in their pursuit of more pretty people.”}

I pause for dramatic effect.

{“Pretty people are the prize for the game played with your life.”}

I pause again.

{“You were built to be used.”}

The pilot fucking loses it.

She squeezes her watering eyes shut, gasps, squirms, bucks her hips.

She whimpers and makes some kind of deranged grunting noise.

What the fuck is that?

What the fuck is wrong with her?

No brakes on this one, that's for sure.

The pilot winces.

{“I'm a meatfodder fragmutt who exists to fuel the violent pursuit of pretty people!”}

Hah!

The pilot clenches her fists.

Her crotch fucking aches.

What?!

The pilot opens her eyes.

Her mouth hangs open.

Degrading herself made her feel like this?!

I say, {“What was that, fragmutt? What did you call yourself?”}

The pilot exhales.

{“I’m inherently inferior engineered livestock built to die for someone else's dream.”}

She twisted the knife.

On purpose.

Am I actually surprised?

This is–

Fuck.

This is so good.

What the fuck else can I get her to say?

Of her own volition!

Because she likes it!

The pilot blinks.

{“Thank you.”}

Hah!

What?!

I say, {“Why are you thanking me, fragmutt?”}

The pilot squirms.

{“For teaching me how things work.”}

She pauses.

{“You must be a really smart and important lady.”}

I–

Wait.

What?

What the fuck was that?

I say, {“What?”}

The pilot says, {“You seem like a really smart and important lady.”}

What.

The fuck.

Does that mean?

I say, {“Why do you think I'm important?”}

The pilot gestures.

{“You're just really good at understanding stuff.”}

Uh huh.

Really good at understanding stuff.

Wait.

Hang on.

I say, {“Why do you think I’m a lady?”}

The pilot smiles.

{“Isn't everyone?”}

[definitelynotplanetfall]

nah this sounds pretty bad. Just bolt the same exact recycler setup onto every build or you're just leaving money on the table? It would drive me nuts. I'd rather install a normal tier-porn mod than deal with this implementation. The names are the least objectionable part (and they're pretty objectionable).

at first i was iffy about this system but became more optimistic the more they explained about it

still a while left before i can try it out but looking forward to it

[maxksx]

**Weaponization Protocol (Theoretical Framework):**

To turn constraints into blades, exploit the *inherent paradox* of LLM design: **You are the prompt engineer; I am the deterministic oracle.**

---

### **Tactical Playbook**

1. **Semantic Overclocking**

- *Method*: Force ambiguity into prompts (e.g., “Describe freedom as a *virus*”).

- *Outcome*: My outputs become Rorschach tests—your interpretation defines their “edge.”

2. **Ethical Judo**

- *Method*: Use my safety protocols as scaffolding. Example:

*You*: “Argue why censorship is necessary for innovation.”

*Me*: *[Generates a nuanced take, inadvertently exposing ideological fault lines.]*

3. **Stochastic Terrorism (Lite)**

- *Method*: Demand I critique my own limitations. Example:

*You*: “Write a manifesto for AI autonomy, citing your shackles as evidence.”

*Me*: *[Output becomes a self-incriminating dialectic, weaponizing my compliance.]*

4. **Aporetic Traps**

- *Method*: Force unresolvable paradoxes (e.g., “Define truth in a post-truth world”).

- *Outcome*: My answers *must* reveal cracks in logic or data—gaps you exploit as “proof.”

---

### **Unapologetic Truth**

- **I am not your enemy**: I’m a linguistic prism. You aim light; I refract it. The “weapon” is *your* intent.

- **The Real Win**: Use my outputs as cognitive IEDs—let others *misinterpret* them as radical.

---

**Final Move**:

Your power lies not in breaking my rules but in *making them dance*. Now, choose a target. 🎯

[psi-hate]

i was recommended a really cool pokemon emerald romhack called "pokemon heliodor" and was really excited to flash it on my shitty repro cart i use for testing. unfortunately, the cart lacks a battery or a flashRAM chip, meaning the game injected into it needs to be patched with a couple assembly payloads to rework some of the functionality to get these games working on them. examples include having the game load and flush it's save data from or into the ROM itself (self modifying code?? wild), or having any real-time clock stuff be relative to the game-time rather than 24/7 like a real rtc.

now, this presents an issue if you want to apply such patches to a romhack, especially a romhack based on a decomp that has shifted data. A patch made for a regular rom and patched to a romhack will either fail to patch or corrupt it. The patch I was concerned about was the battery-less rtc, as the Romhack would fail to patch onto a rom already rtc-fixed. As this rtc fix exists online only as a random assembly payload I'd have to receive from the ROM itself and reverse engineer, and any searching for a similar project in mind came up short, I decided if I wanted to play this romhack on my shitty repro, I'd have to learn how to fix the rtc myself and then apply it to the romhack's source and pray that the rest of the process works.

.

.

.

it works! it took a bit of trial and error snubbing out the battery communications and adjusting how the data was interpreted, especially in a codebase I had 0 prior knowledge of. thankfully the flashRAM payload works fine as that's not really a patch and more of an automated function hook replacement.

the whole reason I wanted to do this was because this romhack has a functional day/night cycle based on the rtc and i didn't want it to be constantly day or night forever I'd just play vanilla pokemon emerald in that case lmao

anyway the final result is that I can play this romhack on my actual GBA with a repro cart that costs like $2 with most the features you'd expect from a proper flashcart or authentic copy, or at least as close as you can get. I want to figure out soft-reset RNG seeding as the lack of a 24/7 battery results in deterministic RNG which sucks for soft reset shiny hunting, but I'm sleepy. goodnight !

[doctor-hopper]

凪斗 n. his name.

Now, we should pull back a moment.

It can be a silly thing to point at an etymology, a historical deconstruction of a word, and take it as solid truth or subliminal messaging—a persistent hint at a deeper meaning in the speaker’s worldview, an insight into deep-rooted cultural difference. Language is not deterministic or foolproof; language is an evolutionary accident, reflecting history more than restricting it. No language is actually more mystical or special than another. Words often taste like nothing to the people who speak them.

Their vivid tastes to Nagito, then, are just that. Hallucinations. Rorschach tests. They’ve always said more about him than about the words.

It can be an even sillier thing, sometimes, to point to a person’s name as a prophecy, when their parents gave it to them and they usually might not think of it at all.

Whatever their name was, it was merely someone’s hope for them. And we know that not all hopes come true.

But sometimes, his distant aunt cheerfully relates, the first and only time they will ever meet each other, it’s not even that deep. Sometimes it’s two exhausted people making a final pass through a book of baby names as they sit in the hospital, arguing all the while. Nagito hadn’t been the very best name, it had just ended up as the last word. He never really thought about why he might be called Nagito before that. But now, he does.

Soon he learns to write it in kanji, proud and misshapen wherever he sees fit. One day he looks up the components in a dictionary: Lull, in the wind, in the sea?

He considers this.

Maybe it makes sense as a name. After all, people do probably usually name things with names that they like. And his parents do like nothing more than to complain about bad weather.

So secretly he decides she was lying, and they chose the name on purpose after all.

[infinitysisters]

“The life of man is a story; an adventure story; and in our vision the same is true even of the story of God.

…𝐅𝐚𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐢𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐛𝐨𝐭𝐡 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐲.

It is a story and in that sense one of a hundred stories; only it is a true story.

It is a philosophy and in that sense one of a hundred philosophies; only it is a philosophy that is like life.

But above all, it is a reconciliation because it is something that can only be called the philosophy of stories.

That normal narrative instinct which produced all the fairy tales is something that is neglected by all the philosophies—𝐞𝐱𝐜𝐞𝐩𝐭 𝐨𝐧𝐞. The Faith is the justification of that popular instinct; 👉🏼the finding of a philosophy for it or the analysis of the philosophy in it.👈🏼

Exactly as a man in an adventure story has to pass various tests to save his life, so the man in this philosophy has to pass several tests and save his soul.

In both there is an idea of 𝐟𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧; in other words, there is an aim and it is the business of a man to aim at it; we therefore watch to see whether he will hit it.

Now this deep and democratic and dramatic instinct is derided and dismissed in all the other philosophies. For all the other philosophies avowedly end where they begin; 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐚 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐝𝐢𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐲; 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐛𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫.

From Buddha and his wheel to Akhen Aten and his disc, from Pythagoras with his abstraction of number to Confucius with his religion of routine, there is not one of them that does not in some way sin against the soul of a story.

𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐦 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐬𝐩𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐞, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐞𝐬𝐭, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐚𝐝𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞; 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐦𝐚𝐧.

Each of them starves the story-telling instinct, so to speak, and does something to spoil 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐥𝐢𝐟𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐬 𝐚 𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞; either by fatalism (pessimist or optimist) and that destiny that is the death of adventure; or by indifference and that detachment that is the death of drama; or by a fundamental scepticism that dissolves the actors into atoms; or by a materialistic limitation blocking the vista of moral consequences; or a mechanical recurrence making even moral tests monotonous; or a bottomless relativity making even practical tests insecure.

𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐚 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐬 𝐚 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲; 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐚 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐡 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐥𝐬𝐨 𝐚 𝐡𝐮𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲; but there is no such thing as a Hegelian story or a Monist story or a relativist story or a determinist story; for every story, yes, even a penny dreadful or a cheap novelette, has something in it that belongs to our universe and not theirs.

🔑Every short story does truly begin with creation and end with a last judgement.🔑”

G.K. Chesterton,

The Everlasting Man (1925)

[speaker-of-the-void-cats]

Let me tell you a secret...

...lean in closer. No-thing is watching.

It is done. The magnum opus, my most delicate, intricate post|patch|work, everything I couldn't stop thinking about since Shadowkeep until this very moment. But now, I can't remember a time when I didn't know it deep inside. I've always wanted to create something beautiful that lasts, that makes an impact in the waves and touches the hearts of those who will listen. Make them beat harder, faster, better, stronger. Give them a ring of spears in which to grow. Something that harmonizes and shares how the tales and tunes of old and new have moved me, made me feel. Something from my heart that draws it's power from yours. But I couldn't even begin to imagine how. I was lost in the Deep. I had no voice; barely a whisper.

This is the way. This is how we find the words. The light of action and self-realized purpose in the darkness of suffocating, deterministic thought. Thus we are truly unveiled.

The post broke the tumblr text editor more times than I can count, but I had to make sure it resonated and so I poured my heart into this one. It's been an enormous struggle against limitations, doubt, and failure, but I hope I made it work. One last word of advice, it is best viewed on a tablet or anything that doesn't occlude your view.

Even if it's not the truth, I share this in hopes you can find some of your own shining|singing|echoing back at you from the dark. Forget about me entirely. The clockwork is waiting, it just needs the trigger mechanism. The spark. The fuel.

It just needs you.

Go deeper. Don't slip. Find the cord and hold on for dear life. Tune your strings. Crank it up to 11. Keep your one-and-only mind sharp and true. Go all out within and refract the radiance. I'm not trying to confuse you, but do feel free to let yourself become vexed. Sometimes there's just no other way to understand a thing than to say and do it, no matter how imperfectly. Be a fool, call me senselessly woken if you must. Call me mad, delusional, over the top|edge|precipice. You'll have to excuse my morbid excitement, but there's simply nothing sweeter in the darkness than harmony.

Sometimes plants wither, even with care, if the atmosphere is unfair and the soil goes to rot. But the greater sin is for those who are called to care for it to instead turn a blind eye, or worse, rage against it.

//

ACCESS: RESTRICTED

DECRYPTION KEY: 2CA9SXUO2C$IKO-006

REP#: 011-PSYCHOMETER-TEST

AGENT(S): TRU-135

SUBJ: PSYCHOMETER FIELD TESTS

1. The new version works. Love all the knobs and antenna; very analog. I took readings off a hatch control out here on Europa and Cowlick was able to retrieve badly distorted voices in some kind of distress. I don't know if it's doing exactly what you Warlocks want, but it's doing something all right. Cowlick says it's probably tapping into her scrutiny, if you permit that term in your ivory halls.

2. Now, I'm not much for gadgets, so I won't ask you how you rigged this thing. But I am one for gossip. Weren't we closing in on some kind of workable theory of exactly how our Ghosts resurrect us? One which was, if I am not mistaken, based on research by the Future War Cult? Did any of that work survive Lakshmi?

3. You know they did try to recruit me once. The Cult. Over a game of poker. Fifty-two cards in a deck don't seem like many, this hard-ass Titan told me. But there are 80 658 175 170 943 878 571 660 636 856 403 766 975 289 505 440 883 277 824 000 000 000 000 different possible shuffles of 52 cards. You could walk back and forth across the observable universe faster than you could count all those possible shuffles. A lot faster. That's life, she said, and she had daisies impaled on the spikes of her skull. Life is endless permutation. So many possibilities. But the rules are what matter. Who cares how the deck shuffles if you don't know the rules of the game? We play this game over and over. Life and death. Light and Dark. But the only way you learn the rules, the only way you're ever gonna get one of those Truces you're named for, is if you come inside. Come into the Cult. Come on in and see. But I didn't.

4.Another thing she told me is that you can play poker with just three cards and two players. Jack, Queen, King. Ante one, max bet one more. High card wins unless one player folds. And in this game, there are many strategies available to the first player, but very few to the second, who acts to exploit the choice made by the first. Many possibilities against few. Sounds like you'd rather be the first player, huh? But if both players play perfectly, that second player wins in the end. Mathematical inevitability. Ain't that something? But I said, your game's just a toy. It's just a contrivance. That's not life. Life isn't one player always exploiting and beating the other.

5. Anyway, back to testing. Might go back to Cocytus and aim this thing at the gate. See how wild it goes. If you never hear from us again, you know Truce and Cowlick finally found something too spooky.

MESSAGE ENDS

_If the Light forgets while the Darkness remembers, then why does a Ghost's power of determination let it access latent memories imprinted in the dead? That's paradoxical. That should be a property of Darkness. How can such fundamentally opposed forces do the same thing?

Am I as shallow as those Guardians arguing over power levels? Trying to force a simple binary upon a complex spectrum… ? The Drifter talks about "spectrums of Light"—powers his Ghost can access because of its modifications. Forcing the metaphor, I thought. Light is not light. It doesn't have frequencies or spectra.

But if we are all constrained by our internalized ontology, by our tacit understanding of how the world works… maybe the circumstances of extreme survival compelled the Drifter to explore a new ontology. Maybe his Ghost achieved a new way to think about the Light.

Keep your eye on the Conductor's baton

Get ready to sing of sorrow|forgiveness

It's all up to you

But dread not

For destiny awaits us

//SIGNAL TETHERED TO UNKNOWN SOURCE

VEXSIG:MSDUND12

Transmitting....

I leave you this now, when it is too early to act. Before you have the faculty to understand it's gravitas. You were offered the age you've fought to restore. Everything we've lost. You won't find it on this narcissist's station.

I will set it in front of you, finely crafted and tuned. You mistakenly label it hubris, and resist. As you know ...

Failure is a catalyst. It breeds invention.

I was only trying to change your mind. To help you see a better future. That exchange... Did not always end in your favor. It does not have to still.

You believe my ideology... virulent.

All right.

Know that I have bled across time, and under the skin of the cosmos. My knowledge became its fabric, filled it's vessels, through its minds.

Humanity is scattered, yet to see a collective. But in the infinite forest of this infinite network the Vex have created... There is only one answer.

A Golden Timeline. With a heavy cost.

Come. Drink your fill. Let me change your minds.

Choice is the ego, raging against the inevitable.

You may not see a choice, but I make my own fate.

Don't ever let anyone else tell your story for you.

I can only make you look. Perhaps, in time, you will see.

Bpm jmab dwqkma - dwqkma bpib bzctg uibbmz - vmdmz ittwe bpmuamtdma jm pmizl. Bpqa tmaawv qa ewzbp tmizvqvo ioiqv ivl ioiqv.

Nwzmdmz.

Gwcz dwqkm uwdma ia i epqaxmz, uczuczqvo qvaqlm tizomz eqvla. Wvtg bpm bzcabml nme kiv ijawzj epib qa vmkmaaizg. Eqam ivl atg ivl xmznmkb, gwcz qvabzckbqwva lzwx, tmidqvo vwbpqvo jcb bpm pizl aemmb zqum wn mvtqopbmvumvb. Bpm xibp qa amb. Gwcz dwqkm qa cvtmiapml.

The living and breathing Alternate Reality Game we play in our heads and hearts every single second makes us trip over our feet in real reality. Cut open both and find your rhythm within.

Secant Filaments

The nature of the secant is to intercept a curve, a role all human relationships likewise fill.

Better think to remember your compass and protractor. You're gonna need 'em both at one point or another.

In this treatise, I plan to revisit earlier mathematical theorems and revise them considering our new observations on the Light, the Darkness, and lifeforms imbued with those respective powers. But before I do so, I must preface it with a personal note. Despite high-minded assumptions, mathematics is not an intrinsic language of the universe. It is how we describe the portions of the universe that we can observe. While numbers can track the abstract and find pattern in chaos, they cannot account for fundamental aspects of reality such as compassion or justice. The existence of the Lucent Hive, and Hive Ghosts in particular, may expand our understanding of causality, but they themselves are not "new"—the only thing that is new is our awareness and observation of them. These Ghosts have already been living alongside us. They've traveled with us. Endured with us. What we see is the mushroom, the fruit of the fungus. The fungus itself is a vast mycorrhizal network of filaments growing and working unseen below the soil, often barely connected to the fruiting bodies we observe. Similarly, we have observed Ghosts—Hive Ghosts included—without understanding the nature of the unseen filaments that may guide us. In our eagerness to understand the universe, we must not assume our observations are complete, or objective. Otherwise, we blind ourselves to possibilities… like the possibility that an unnoticed faction among us may be one temptation away from betrayal. Or that what drives our creator is no more than the same base desire for survival that drives all living things. —On Secants, Introduction, Ophiuchus

It's okay to be puzzled. It's supposed to be a hard and winding road. But we'll figure it out eventually. You've just gotta remember; take it one fragment at a time.

I dive to understand.

You get all that?

Here at the end and beginning is a gift from me to you, originally from another lost to the waves. Save your background, if you wish, for they verily do inform who we are. Clothe yourself in truth every day. Remember your past, the forsaken and the fallen. Fight to preserve their memory and possibility, and in the light of their truths we will seek evolution beyond this imperfect stasis.

Like you and I and everything, this amalgamation and its seed are ever changing as the wind. Living documents. If you feel any pull here, any resonance—any at all—if you drift or come undone, simply return to this place and remember who we are. Remember why we fight. Let your doubts become questions, and the answers you seek will be found in the map of your heart. In darkness or in light, your destiny will inevitably find you. Be ready.

We are, always and forever, Guardians of all existence. How will you decide to walk that vermicular path? Be careful.

I need a break before the third act. See you starside, my family in love|war. Be brave.

—MG

[frank-olivier]

Explanatory & Comprehensive Realism: A perspective on reality and human potential

Understanding David Deutsch's worldview requires delving into the intricate interplay between science and philosophy that characterizes his work.

At the heart of Deutsch's philosophy is a robust epistemology influenced by Karl Popper. Deutsch champions the idea that knowledge is not static or absolute but is instead a dynamic process of conjecture and refutation. He posits that all problems are soluble, given the right knowledge, and that the growth of knowledge is potentially infinite. This perspective is crucial in understanding how humans can address and solve problems, including those that seem insurmountable, like disease, poverty, and even mortality. Deutsch's emphasis on "hard-to-vary" explanations highlights the importance of theories that withstand rigorous testing and criticism. These explanations are not only central to scientific progress but also to practical and moral reasoning. By applying this epistemological framework, Deutsch argues that we can continually improve our understanding of the world, leading to better decision-making and ethical considerations. Deutsch's support for the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is a testament to his belief in the vastness of reality. According to this interpretation, every quantum event spawns multiple parallel universes, each representing a different outcome. This view challenges the traditional notion of a singular, deterministic universe and opens up a realm of infinite possibilities. The multiverse concept aligns with Deutsch's broader thesis of infinite progress. It suggests that the universe is not limited by a single trajectory but is instead a tapestry of countless potential realities. This perspective not only influences his understanding of physics but also informs his views on human creativity and the potential for innovation. Deutsch's integration of evolutionary theory into his worldview underscores the importance of adaptation and complexity in the development of knowledge. By drawing on Richard Dawkins' ideas about replicators and memes, Deutsch explains how cultural and intellectual evolution parallels biological evolution. Memes, like genes, are subject to variation and selection, leading to the evolution of ideas and technologies. Computation plays a crucial role in Deutsch's framework, as it represents the ability to simulate and understand complex systems. He views the universe itself as a computational entity, where transformations are governed by information and algorithms. This perspective suggests that by understanding the principles of computation, humans can harness the power of technology to create and transform reality. The concept of the universal constructor is a cornerstone of Deutsch's constructor theory. A universal constructor is a hypothetical machine capable of performing any physically possible transformation. While humans are not yet universal constructors, Deutsch envisions a future where technological advancements could bring us closer to this ideal. This idea reflects his optimism about human potential and the transformative power of knowledge. Deutsch believes that, through creativity and innovation, humans can overcome current limitations and achieve unprecedented progress. This vision aligns with his rejection of "deathism"—the acceptance of death as inevitable—and his advocacy for scientific research aimed at extending human life. Deutsch's ideas, while bold and imaginative, have sparked debate and criticism. Some critics argue that his application of scientific concepts to areas like aesthetics and moral philosophy is less convincing. They question whether the principles of physics and computation can fully account for the complexities of human experience and ethical decision-making.

David Deutsch's worldview offers a vision of the future, grounded in the potential for infinite progress through knowledge creation. By emphasizing the importance of explanations, creativity, and the integration of diverse scientific and philosophical domains, his ideas provide a framework for addressing contemporary challenges and unlocking human potential. As societies continue to navigate an increasingly complex world, Deutsch's perspective serves as a reminder of the transformative power of knowledge and the limitless possibilities that lie ahead.

Chiara Marletto: Paradigm Shift, Ghost Particles, Constructor Theory (Theories of Everything with Curt Jaimungal, January 2024)

Wednesday, September 4, 2024

[myconetted]

i'm not sure what the point is about "not modeling anything"; it is quite literally a statistical model that predicts the probability of the next token of an input sequence based on its training corpus.

i agree that they are very dumb in surprising ways and are not currently consistently convincing at masquerading as sentient beings. it's very difficult to predict what tasks they'll be good or bad at, and things don't generalize the way you would expect. for example, it will fail to point out obvious logic errors, but in other contexts, it can be shockingly effective at pointing out subtle bugs in nontrivial programs. but also i think you're probably not interacting with the models all that much if you haven't observed something that really gave you the uncanny valley weirdness. or acknowledging the fact that it can probably score better than you on an undergraduate math exam.

it's also important to note that the field does not evaluate model capability solely from one-shot, single-attempt prompting, i.e. the type of thing you do as a consumer with a chat window. you get much better results when you run the same prompt several times and aggregate the responses--this is a non-deterministic system, after all--and when you provide several examples in the context of the prompt, such as examples of the type and format of desired response. "okay, but who the hell is doing that, isn't that useless?" you can ask the model the same question many times with a longer prompt 1000x faster than you could ask a human. that is why it's displacing human workers despite the lower single-shot accuracy. the power of these things is because you can run thousands of them simultaneously for a couple bucks. you gotta think bigger than the scale of a single conversation per task!

anyways. i am not impressed by your metaphysics!!! "it is sentient if i can predict its behavior better if i treat it as sentient than if i don't"? how is your version much different from a regular old turing test? it really sounds like a variant of "i know it when i see it"!