Keurigs are actually pretty convenient when you’re only making one cup. The trick is to get one of the reusable filters and just use whatever coffee you like.

That’s another big reason to practice for sure, but I think it’s a stretch to call that belief.

This is a pretty broad question, it really depends on what you mean by “believe in religion”:

1. Believe that a particular holy book is literal, historical truth.

2. Believe in the moral teachings of a particular holy book and follow its practices.

3. Believe in the existence of a universal higher consciousness (God)

1 is a vocal minority, and the reasons have been sufficiently explained elsewhere in this thread.

2 is much more common, and can derive from a number of reasons. Cultural identity generally determines which holy book (and interpretation thereof) you follow, but the attraction to moral framework is deeper than cultural identity. Having a set of guidelines to inform moral behavior, and a method of alignment and focus (prayer) is very valuable.

3 is a metaphysical consideration, and pops up even in 2024 because consciousness is still a mysterious phenomenon. Every explanation leads to roughly the same conclusion: if consciousness is an emergent property of complex interconnected systems, then it stands to reason that the most complex interconnected system (the universe) is more likely than not to be conscious; if consciousness is some external force that complex systems can “tune into” like a radio, then it stands to reason that “consciousness” permeates the universe; if consciousness is something else which defies scientific description, then it stands to reason that there exists some agency to dictate the rules.

Those are, broadly, the rational explanations of consciousness of which I’m aware, and they all imply a universal consciousness of one variety or another. If you can think of another I’d love to consider it.

If you meant something else by “believe in religion”, let me know.

I play GURPS and my son is also named math

I think the pronunciation, specifically the blending of the end of “upside” and beginning of “down”, turns it into one of those compound words that your brain interprets as an independent word, rather than a combination of its composite parts.

Frankly I’ve accepted it, minimized my interactions with the database(s), and don’t worry about it. “They” don’t have anywhere near the capacity to meaningfully process all that raw data for every person. Sure if you’re popping up red flags left and right you’ll get assigned to someone who will scrutinize you more thoroughly, but as long as you’re boring (in a traceable capacity) no one has the resources to go over all your messages with a fine-toothed comb.

If you don’t like being in a database, don’t interact with systems that lit you in a database. Drop social media, get rid of your phone, stay off the Internet. There are steps you can take to avoid extensive records in “the system”, but people generally don’t like taking them because “the system” has fun content they don’t want to miss. If you want to have your name and eat it too, just be boring.

Breakfast in America is always a fun album to play for people, because you get “Wait, this song is Supertramp too? And it’s the same album??”

I disagree here because I don’t think they’re really underrated at all. They’re fantastic, and generally rated as fantastic by most people who’ve listened to them. Maybe they’re not as popular as they could be, but they’re still pretty darn popular.

They’re aspects of the same thing: decentralization/federation. The idea of Web 3.0 is to transition from massive centralized services to distributed federated services. The Fediverse is on the social media side of things (displace entities like Facebook), crypto is on the finance side of things (displace entities like Bank of America), NFTs are supposed to be on the distribution side of things (displace entities like Ticketmaster).

Reflecting on your mistakes lets you learn from them and not repeat them. Reducing the number of mistakes you make is good for survival. Sorry, this is a feature not a bug.

Lemme just turn my tooth into a jellyfish real quick

Is this a JoJo reference?

The woo-ey aspects are actually pretty interesting. Since the mechanism relies on focusing your subconscious, belief is crucial. If you don’t believe in your goal, and the efficacy of the method, your subconscious won’t buy-in, and without subconscious buy-in it flat out doesn’t work. Subconscious buy-in is the mechanism. You can’t try to consciously trick the subconscious, it’s in there with the one trying to trick it. You have to really believe.

A lot of people can’t believe that it’s internal. They don’t think that ability could possibly be in them anywhere, so in order to cultivate the requisite belief they have to attribute the mechanism to some kind of external woo. So even if the woo isn’t real, belief in the woo can be integral to the mechanism working.

That’s part of it, but not all. The world is a vast and complex place, you cannot possibly engage with, or even notice, the majority of the information available to your senses.

Your subconscious mind filters out information which isn’t significant to you, and draws attention to information which is. This is why when you get a car, it suddenly seems like everyone got that same make and model. That model didn’t become more popular, you just now have a reason to notice what was already there.

The Law of Attraction is one incarnation of the intentional exploitation of this psychological phenomenon. By attaching significance to some goal, and reinforcing that significance, you train your subconscious mind to notice opportunities in service of that goal.

More of a “Whoops” guy myself

Duh?

I don’t understand this deliberately pessimistic perspective I keep seeing around AI development that stubbornly ignores every other technological development in history. Even just considering the singular transformer architecture, we’re still seeing significant and novel improvement. In just a couple years we’ve watched the technology go from basic predictive text to high quality image and even video generation, now to real time robotics control.

The transformer architecture is incredibly powerful and flexible. The notion that the basic technology staying the same is an indication of stagnation is as ridiculous as if you said the same of transistors half a century ago. Most of the improvement we see in the near future will be through recursive and multi-modal applications, meta-architechtural developments that don’t require the core technology to change at all.

It’s still very much AI for a while. The current incarnation is still in relative infancy, and will only continue to get more capable and disruptive. We’re starting to see the integration with robotics, this is only going to become more significant with time.

It’s likely that the next big thing will be a consequence of AI.

To be fair, the manifesto notes some very valid observations. The conclusions, and definitely the praxis, may be wrong but the core idea that modern civilization is at odds with human nature has only gotten more obvious since it was written. An-cap is absolutely not the answer, and would definitely make things worse, but there is a valid question.