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[faust]

So all you need to do to create arbitrary number mass out of nothing is to begin with a square, x*x, and shovel imaginary mass from one number to the other

Fun fact - that is pretty much how imaginary numbers were originally conceived.

A large amount of mathematical innovation is just "well this does not work, but look at all the cool stuff I could do if it did!"

[silverspawn]

Alas, this is the last chapter they've ever uploaded. Now I need to find someone else whose reading. But I'm afraid I won't find someone else whose this good at reading and has this nice of a voice.

[silverspawn]

*(1) who's (2) *who's

[silverspawn]

My brain sometimes does this funny thing where it couples songs to things that have zero connection to them because I happened to deal with both things at once

Hijo De La Luna was coupled to the ending of Harry Potter 7
Pull me Under was coupled to the start of the second chapter in Diablo II
Autotheist Movement was coupled to the ending of I wanna be the guy
And most recently, Litany from Arvo Part, which as far as I can tell isn't on youtube, was (weakly) coupled to the MTG deck I was playing.

Then whenever I listen to the song, I get vibes of the other thing. It's a very bizarre but cool experience. But my understanding of neuroscience totally predicts that this could happen because the brain just builds little models that remember sequences, and when it hears a,b,c, it says that d comes next

And I would say this at least proves the philosophical point that experience isn't comprised of the five senses and thoughts, although most people probably get that anyway. It's not like if you're having a bad day for no discernible reason, this is a product of sense data or thoughts. It's more like a twist or knot in your electromagnetic field.

[silverspawn]

Also this is probably just an extreme version of a phenomenon that happens all the time. Someone couples x to y where y is something about the context where they've dealt with x, and this instills x with a certain vibe. Vibes are extremely real things even if they're poorly understood.

[silverspawn]

Not sure why Rita Skeeter bothers interviewing Harry in the first place if she's fine just making up stuff he said anyway. But it's probably realistic?

[silverspawn]

Also, like, since Book 4 is probably the one I know the least well, I was surprised to remember how everyone outside his house hated harry after he was entered into the tournament

Not sure how realistic that is. I'm neither convinced everyone would just universally believe that he entered willingly, nor that they would all hate him for it. It feels like everyone with two brains cells to rub together should realize that the probability of him getting past Dumbledore's age line is low.

[Awaclus]

Also, like, since Book 4 is probably the one I know the least well, I was surprised to remember how everyone outside his house hated harry after he was entered into the tournament

Not sure how realistic that is. I'm neither convinced everyone would just universally believe that he entered willingly, nor that they would all hate him for it. It feels like everyone with two brains cells to rub together should realize that the probability of him getting past Dumbledore's age line is low.

But if everyone with two brain cells always rubbed them together in books, you couldn't have moments where the protagonist is unjustly discriminated against on the basis of their actions (that they didn't really do) even though their case for their innocence is so good. You would have to have circumstances where it's actually understandable for everyone to turn against the protagonist and there's just way too much emotional nuance there.

[silverspawn]

[presses virtual upvote button]

[silverspawn]

I've been sucked into the "expert on Y rates movies about Y for their accuracy" youtube wormhole



The expert here has no charm, which makes it one of the best ones I've seen. He's just keeping it completely straight and dry.

[silverspawn]

So one of the prayers in Litany is, "O Lord, implant in my the root of all good -- Thy fear in my heart." Does this literally admit that the only reason anyone does good things is because they're afraid of god, or am I misunderstanding?

[silverspawn]

When my sister god married, the priest literally said that they should love god because the love between people is not going to last. So your marriage is totally going to stop working, but you gotta sit it out anyway. It's only 50 more years until you can get to heaven, which is what this is all about

[faust]

my sister god married

Not sure if this was intentional but I love it.

[silverspawn]

hah no. Maybe a Freudian slip though.

[silverspawn]

as a man have I sinned
have Thou MERCY on me

as the God full of compassion
seeing the feebleness of my soul

[silverspawn]

[faust]

I have been exposed 

The pointless math I am dealing with looks even more ridiculous!

[silverspawn]

[silverspawn]

Is there a substantive for when you don't treat people equally? Some kind of -ism? The context is Primrose being annoyed by Karkaroff's blatant ?-ism where he openly demonstrates that his favorite student is Krum.

[silverspawn]

Today in the news: the median AI researcher is an idiot.

37 years until a 50% chance of human level AGI. 5-10% chance of Doom. 69% think we should prioritize AI safety more. And median chance that an "an argument given for an intelligence explosion is broadly correct", whatever that even means.

None of these numbers individually is that stupid, but there combination reveals that the underlying world model makes absolutely zero sense. Why would you trust AI safety folks on doing good work and on the intelligence explosion but then think they're completely wrong about the odds of success?

This is the result of treating it like a moral problem, or a social obligation. It's no longer the mature take to make fun of AI dangers, so now they give the new most mature answers, which are that of course safety is important Doom is low but not impossible.

[silverspawn]

5-10% chance of doom in the next few decades may be pretty spot on, though.

[Awaclus]

Is there a substantive for when you don't treat people equally? Some kind of -ism? The context is Primrose being annoyed by Karkaroff's blatant ?-ism where he openly demonstrates that his favorite student is Krum.

That's favoritism.

[Awaclus]

5-10% chance of doom in the next few decades may be pretty spot on, though.

I'd say it's more like 7-10%.

[silverspawn]

That's favoritism.

brilliant, thanks!

[silverspawn]

Not exactly music, but it's so good at what it does. No idea if it works without having seen the movie