So here's my beef with ChatGPT. Even aside from the issues with plagiarism, cheating, people using it to fake the work that they absolutely need to be actually doing, &etc.

With the advent of the internet we've been in a situation where all the knowledge available to humanity could, conceivably, be made available to everyone at all times. We've had enormous public works built towards that purpose -- libraries, Wikipedia, archives, everything. But an increasing problem as the years have gone by has been the problem of sorting out the signal from the noise. Sorting out real, helpful advice from scams and snake-oil. Paths that lead to dead-ends as sources of information go down and don't come back up. Trying to figure out who's a real expert, who's even a real person in a sea of fake generated avatars. Distinguishing wheat from chaff, usable material from trash.

And the makers of ChatGPT -- and every other AI programmer who's now trying to jump on the bandwagon -- is looking at this problem and saying "You know what this situation needs? More noise. More fakes. More chaff. More dead-ends and empty shells. I think we have TOO MUCH useful information and real expertise. I think we should shake things up by adding more utterly contentless garbage to the mix." And they created an automated noise generator.

Just imagine being on the bank of a pond and saying "ah, this is a lovely pond, the fish and plants are so beautiful, I'm just having trouble seeing them through the silt in the water" and the person next to you says "I'm going to build a factory on the bank of this pond that does nothing but pour more dirt into it. All day. Every day. Nonstop." And then everyone else overhears them and says "Oh, what a fantastic idea! I'm going to create my OWN sludge-factory to get in on this action!"

you came back wrong and i am racked with guilt because i cannot bear to see you like this and i should have let you rest. i loved you so much that i defied death itself but i do not think either of us are happy

can you imagine how pissed luke would be if he learned that yoda used to do thousands of space samurai super backflips and chose to teach him how to fight in a boring way instead

Front: Don’t Bully Me Back: I Will Cry

[Telenovela music intensifies]

Today’s group chat discussion: Medb’s reaction to Dark Marie

3 seconds into dungeon meshi and they’re already living my dream. i love eating things I ought not in unfamiliar ecosystems

... Holy crap

At one point I speculated that Fandaniel's throwaway comment about Zenos being a case where Emet-Selch "finally succeeded" was about Zenos' corporeal aether being as dense as an Ancients'. Not his soul, but his body at least being 2x as dense as the average Source inhabitant (and 14x as anyone from a Shard).

One of the big reasons for the Sundering was that extremely aether-dense people can't interact directly with Dynamis. You can hear Meteion bc your aether is so thin. People turn into monsters bc Dynamis overwhelms and consumes their Aether.

What if Zenos cannot directly interact with Dynamis. At all.

What if THAT'S why everything seems dull and boring to him? There's a whole spectrum of emotion & feeling that he straight up can't feel because his booty too fat his corporeal aether is too thick. But he's still a sundered soul, so part of him still needs Dynamis to feel connected to other people (unlike the Ancients who seem fine?). But his corporeal aether blocks it. The same way that Zodiark's shield kept us from hearing the Endsinger for all those centuries (& by extension the whole universe really), Zenos' thicc aether literally prevents him from feeling connection to others.

This explains why he so easily no-sold the WoL. In addition to supernaturally thick aether, he's also mostly immune to our Power of Friendship crap.

... Mostly.

Because obviously the Ancients still weren't immune to the Endsinger, her effect was just different. They didn't turn into monsters, but their imaginations turned on them, causing their creation magic to manifest ravenous nightmares. In the same way, some part of the WoL's Dynamis was so potent that it broke through. And that's why he became so completely addicted to us. We're literally the only person with powerful enough Dynamis that he can feel any connection at all.

your honor my client should be at the club

finally turned the Ominous Grid of Letters into a game.

Conway's game of life simulation is happening, but additionally, there is an invisible 3 cell by 3 cell square Angel that is slowly moving across the board in a steady direction.

every step of the simulation, the Angel toggles the alive/dead state of the cells she covers, acting as an external influence on the regular Conway's life simulation.

find this Angel by noticing the abnormalities in the simulation, and click on her. it will let you know when you find her.

Do you have a favorite diagram from the manuscripts you’ve read?

Yes! Sir Issac Newton's model of the philosophers stone!

This image was from his personal notes, which have been in a private collection for years. But back in 2016, the manuscripts were put up for auction. They contain a vast amount of writing on contemporary alchemical theory, including this particular diagram, which depicts a theoretical structure of the philosophers stone.

Its an image from one of those wonderful cusps of history. Alchemy was still kinda the leader of the pack, and modern chemistry still had to prove its chops. It was an era when people regarded as serious philosophers and scientists had to contend with ideas we now consider nigh-magical and irrelevant.

You can see in the diagram how newton attempts to square the alchemical idea of the planetary metals as primary metaphysical forces, with the actual physical substances themselves, along with echoes of the theory of Jabirian equilibrium. You can tell Newton thinks of The Stone as this perfectly internally balanced substance, baring all natures and qualities. Like, if the world worked by alchemical laws, this is a damn good theory.

This diagram represents one of the brightest minds in human history giving deep and serious attention to an idea we now know to be entirely wrong. I find it intellectually humbling.

i think there should be at least one pokemon game where it is very strongly implied that the main character is a pokemon who's been isekaid & human-ified reverse mystery dungeon style

I finally have time to make American biscuits! Let's see how this goes :D

If you’re ever read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, you were probably a bit surprised by how common-sense Mr. Tzu’s advice was. Of course you need to feed your army. What idiot wasn’t feeding his army? The thing was, nobody had actually written this stuff down in one place yet. 

Think of Rhazes like the Sun Tzu of Alchemy. The Kitab al-Asrar is full of ancient occult wisdom like “make sure the room you’re doing alchemy in has windows so you don’t inhale metal fumes and die.” Rhazes assumes the would-be alchemist has access to five things: Literacy, technical knowledge, space, financing, and reproducibility. These standards would become so influential, people would quote Rhazes as an authority on alchemy and medicine well into the 17th century. 

Islamicate Alchemy, today on patreon.