22 Comments
User's avatar
Ural's avatar

as a 16-year-old high school student, this was the most enlightening thing i have ever read

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salon23's avatar

yeah, because you are a stupid teenager

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Interested Reader's avatar

I've read the entire article and I agree. Politics is garbage. 99% of it is manipulation of our primitive brains. After reading this, I am now a fan. I would be very interested to read "How To Get Clean" if it was published. Please consider publishing it soon, and get well.

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Meditations on Moloch's avatar

Germ theory of politics is a great term!

I am going to steal that ^^

I usually use the metaphor of political thermodynamics, I have found that quite a lot can be explained not only by analogy to evolution, but also statistical mechanics in physics :)

Great post!

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Sebastian Jensen's avatar

Nice name.

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Jon B's avatar

Here I am, stumbling on this almost half a decade later. This poast is timeless.

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The Brothers Krynn's avatar

The best essay I've seen in some time. Just spitting facts. Politics is utterly unimportant at this point. Art matters more.

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CommunityCollegeDropout's avatar

I can't define "based" but I know it when I see it. Based poast.

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Russell Walter's avatar

Did you end up writing the follow up essay?

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Max's avatar

No 😅. This is kind of a follow up but not in the vein of what was originally promised. Just a clarification/update on the position. https://minordissent.substack.com/p/h1b-and-the-entropy-of-victory

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Joe Katzman's avatar

Useful and very incomplete is the best way I can describe this.

Your thought experiment asks about percentage upside, and what’s still left over to do. Very good question. “After communism, then what?” also has a non-utopian downside variant, though, which can be far more than 10% difference to your life. It has often been 100%. As Taleb noted re: investors, “rational” models that fail to take total loss and exit into account aren’t rational.

Addressing the “you’re not just a bugman who lives for itself, you are also legitimately part of larger things with corresponding duties, which you can neglect but not discard” deficit here is a whole other article.

The huffers and addicts DO need to read your piece.

AND they’ll be gravely damaged if they stop there. Much as the Red Pill is a necessary waypoint but a poor stopping place.

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botox hobo's avatar

i read this article a few months ago and whenever i get too involved in politics i remember this and go back to re-read it. it's really good and really thorough and really a cleansing piece of writing.

TY

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jvbz's avatar

Have always felt this way but couldn’t put it to words nearly as well

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Max's avatar

Pro tip: just use way too many of them and eventually by random chance some will be coherent and useful 😂

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Art Huh's avatar

One of your biggest hits, thank you. So, Tech —> Cult —> Pol —> Addictions/Madness? Each step up the ladder extracts dumb and gay addictions out of the cool things and outsourcing labor can be dangerous to the primitive mind?

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Nathan Keller's avatar

Saving your dats for tomorrows read. Be it said Hal Hartley has a new film in the works. So we have that going for us...

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Steve's avatar

What’s wrong with video games? They are video versions of puzzles, and a 2 way communication, as opposed to television or videos on the internet or disc.

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Hali Reiskin's avatar

lots of conclusions as statement of fact not supported by the evidence. Not a cross substantive analysis but a fun read nevertheless. Whatever helps you sleep at night, Elder.

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Roscoe's avatar

always’ ***

always’ has been

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John Doe's avatar

Akshually the cotton gin prolonged slavery by making it more profitable.

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