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ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

Not at all. The woke thing is not liberal universalism, because it is actively hostile to any competing ideologies or definitions. That makes it explicitly anti-libertarian.

ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

So obesity rates haven’t increased dramatically? If that’s your argument, I’m afraid you’re simply misinformed.

And no, there are plenty of videos of normal people that have nothing to do with “the fashions of the motion picture industry.” Millions of video clips are available right now online.

ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

It is a pretty common thing for researchers to study. Here is one:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S17436...

ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

Diet, sedentary jobs, lack of walkable cities, and (for better or worse) removal of shame culture. If you’ve spent any time in east Asia, you’ll notice that being overweight is strongly looked down upon by society at large. This shaming doesn’t exist in America.

ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

Wokeness is essentially a New England Puritan movement with some minor modifications. Even the sources (Ivy Leagues) are the same. If you view it through this lens, the lack of tolerance and crusader zeal becomes very apparent. It is perhaps the exact opposite of libertarianism.

Edit: some Puritan libertarians do not like this comment :)

ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

No, actually testosterone levels have been dropping, sperm counts have been dropping, and American men are vastly more obese and overweight than they were even 50 years ago. That is a change.

Just watch one of those old “Berlin in the 1920s” or “NYC in the 1970s” videos. You’ll quickly notice the almost complete lack of overweight people.

ceilingcorneron How did American “wokeness” jump from elite schools to everyday life?

This is fairly obvious if you read fashion magazines. It is presented constantly in the same way that bell-bottoms or skateboarding shoes used to be. Which doesn’t mean that it’s all made up, but it does certainly appear to be amplified by the media.

ceilingcorneron Wikipedia Is Trying to Transcend the Limits of Human Language

People in France or Japan or most other countries don’t default to the English language version of Wikipedia.

ceilingcorneron Wikipedia Is Trying to Transcend the Limits of Human Language

Sounds like it imported an outdated database of global geography / politics.

ceilingcorneron Wikipedia Is Trying to Transcend the Limits of Human Language

English native speakers (myself included) seem to have a real issue understanding that languages vary and aren’t all interchangeable collections of sounds. I blame the lack of bilingualism.

ceilingcorneron Wikipedia Is Trying to Transcend the Limits of Human Language

If more language editions relied on Abstract Wikipedia as the central source of truth, then this dominant point of view could replace alternative perspectives. But Vrandečić countered that each volunteer community could decide for itself whether Abstract Wikipedia should be used as a baseline.

That sounds about as likely as “every country can decide whether to be affected by English-language media.”

This drive toward constant universalization is scary and it’s only going to make Wikipedia even more of a Western worldview project. We need to be heading in the opposite direction. You can be certain that China or India or whomever else will block Wikipedia rather than let western NGOs continue to define the narratives in their respective countries.

ceilingcorneron Renaissance executives agree to pay around $7B to settle dispute with IRS

Nowhere did I say that “objectively useful = beneficial to society.”

This is obvious if you consider another example. Imagine a marketplace for hitmen. Clearly some people would pay for such a thing. Does that make it useful? Maybe? Does that mean we should think it’s a good thing? Probably not.

ceilingcorneron Renaissance executives agree to pay around $7B to settle dispute with IRS

Yes, one can’t really blame the individuals themselves. Especially when the incomes are double or triple that of academia.

It is a deep structural problem.

ceilingcorneron Renaissance executives agree to pay around $7B to settle dispute with IRS

To quote Margin Call, “The money is considerably better.”

[When a rocket scientist is asked why he joined a Wall Street firm.]

ceilingcorneron Renaissance executives agree to pay around $7B to settle dispute with IRS

No, that isn’t what “objectively useful” means.

Wealthy people pay for this engineering because it helps maintain and increase their wealth. That’s about it. There is zero societal benefit from something like a CDO.

ceilingcorneron Renaissance executives agree to pay around $7B to settle dispute with IRS

The amount of human capital that has gone into financial engineering is depressing. Thousands of brilliant minds who are designing complex financial products instead of useful technology.

ceilingcorneron Surveilance bill rushed through Australian parliament in 24 hours

This was covered by Plato 2,500 years ago. But we don’t learn about that ancient outdated stuff anymore, as it isn’t beneficial for the economy.

ceilingcorneron Surveilance bill rushed through Australian parliament in 24 hours

Democracy is rule by the media. This has been a criticism of it for hundreds of years.

ceilingcorneron Surveilance bill rushed through Australian parliament in 24 hours

Being a gray man is probably the realistic solution for most people.

ceilingcorneron Surveilance bill rushed through Australian parliament in 24 hours

Crime rates have been going down for decades in the Western world (including Oz). Yet governments continue to pass surveillance laws to “fight crime.”

If that doesn’t highlight their true aims, I don’t know what else does.

ceilingcorneron Seeking advice: Cush job without much learning

While lotta stuff you can learn by studying that you won’t learn on the job. Why not use your free time and go through some higher level CS stuff?

ceilingcorneron Stripe: Thinking Like a Civilization

Sure but for some of these stories, the provider is clearly just incompetent. I’ve read of PayPal holding $100,000 for 6+ months with no reason given or response. That goes far beyond an anti-fraud measure.

ceilingcorneron Stripe: Thinking Like a Civilization

Whether it’s paypal, stripe or whomever else, it’s completely absurd that they can just hold your money hostage for indefinite period of time for no reason.

ceilingcorneron Mob justice is trampling democratic discourse

That’s kind of how the media works. Invent problems, harp on them for weeks, then either move on or offer your own new “commentary” about solutions. All while making big bucks off the advertising eyeballs.

ceilingcorneron Ask HN: It seems like everyone is getting rich?

No, I’m basing my predictions on a thorough study of history and the phases of civilizations. There are several deep cultural and structural problems with both the US and the EU, and I find it difficult to not see this continuing.

And as far as I know, millennials are economically worse off than their boomer parents.

ceilingcorneron Ask HN: It seems like everyone is getting rich?

I’m not basing my prediction on the doomsayers, more on general decline of the Western world overall. There are too many issues piling up and to my mind, this will eventually cause some serious economic problems. But I’m not an economist, so I don’t take my word for it.

My broader point is simply that the rich today are succeeding in a system which might not be stable in a few decades.

ceilingcorneron Fake animal rescue videos have become a new frontier for animal abuse

If I found an animal on the side of the road, I don’t think the first thing I’d do is whip out my camera and record it. So these types of videos always seemed inherently fake to me

But I’m not a big social media user, so maybe it’s normal to immediately record anything out of the ordinary?

ceilingcorneron Ask HN: It seems like everyone is getting rich?

Personally I am trying to be more self-sufficient. Growing food, cooking common items from scratch (like bread), learning how to repair things, etc. And so I put money into items that are both durable and help further this goal of self-sufficiency.

A safety razor and a 1,000 pack of blades is a recent purchase. Properly maintained, it will last forever, which will come in handy when Schick razors are $25 each.

I’m not sure how that scales up to $50k or $100k but it’s a starting point.

This subreddit is a good place to get ideas: https://www.reddit.com/r/BuyItForLife/

ceilingcorneron Ask HN: It seems like everyone is getting rich?

I originally wrote 5-10 but didn’t want to seem too ominous. But yeah, I’d bet on some serious issues in the latter end of the 2020s.

ceilingcorneron Ask HN: It seems like everyone is getting rich?

If it is any consolation, we will probably experience massive inflation in the next 20-30 years. Those with primarily financial (and not physical) assets will be hardest hit. At some point the economic wizardry will hit the fan.

But on a less depressing note, I suggest paying less attention to the areas where people are “getting rich.” Money isn’t the measure of true value and you will rarely find a correlation between wealth and wisdom.