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On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chShow nested quote +At some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: Show nested quote +And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: Show nested quote +But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view.
Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR.
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On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR.
I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs.
Otoh, I did enjoy watching heads explode at the RNC when he said he was proud to be gay.
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Canada11350 Posts
Bit of a tangent, but which part of the subtext? Because the only reason use of the palantir is dangerous is because Sauron got a hold of one of them, but even then, once the rightful king appeared, control was wrested from Sauron.
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The subtext of powerful objects/power itself being an inherently corrupting and uncontrollable force.
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On July 31 2018 04:06 ticklishmusic wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR. I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs.
Is it possible that something like LoTR can also inspire people who think the wrong people won out? Or more to the point farv clarified, that his read was they were flawed in ways he isn't?
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On July 31 2018 02:07 NewSunshine wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 01:57 brian wrote:On July 31 2018 01:52 NewSunshine wrote:On July 31 2018 00:50 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 00:37 IyMoon wrote:On July 31 2018 00:33 Plansix wrote:I just want to point out that there is a section of the country that is literally so on fire that it is creating its own weather system and our federal government is so busy with Trump’s BS that they can’t pay attention to that. On July 31 2018 00:32 Mohdoo wrote:
I think their plan right now is to get the supreme Court pick and take it to the very end. His existing relationship with Trump makes me think they've already talked this through. A lot depends on how much info comes out before that point. Trump may be too toxic to even get his supreme Court pick depending on how things go. Considering the spending bill fight they have in September and how much document production is going to be needed just to confirm the pick for the high court, I’m not sure the Senate is going to be able to pull it off. I don't think it really matters, I would not bet on the dems picking up the Senate Government shut downs matter, which is what Trump is threatening right now. I don't think anyone has shut down the goverment 60 days before a election. They already shut down the government this term. Whether they do it again matters little to me. They have their distorted agenda, and have already proven they're willing to betray the core principles of our systems and shut down the government in order to get exactly what they want. This is a drop in the pan for me. this could apply equally against those in both the red and blue camps; and if this shutdown doesn’t matter to you i have to ask what any of them meant to you at all? and why then is a second shut down of less importance than the first? Don't jump to conclusions. I said this hypothetical shutdown matters little to me, because I already have a particularly dim view of Trump and his cronies, in part because of the first shutdown they caused. I don't know exactly how you read that and conclude that the first shutdown didn't matter to me. My point is that, yes, it's terrible if they do it again, but it's like a murderer killing a second person. I already knew they were a murderer, and am not going to treat them all that differently for doing it again. It doesn't mean I view them favorably.
i didn’t, that’s why i asked the questions instead. my first point was simply that your criticism, perfectly valid, can easily be read in either direction. which isn’t to say anything more than that- but i like to read liberally biased things so i was hoping for something we could blame republicans for ^^
then as for the analogy, i guess i understand and just disagree. if congress killed someone again i’d like it to be big news. i didn’t say anything about the first shutdown and simply translated ‘matters very little,’ to ‘doesn’t matter.’ i’m gonna say that’s pretty fair..
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On July 31 2018 04:14 farvacola wrote:
The subtext of powerful objects/power itself being an inherently corrupting and uncontrollable force.
Yes. It is a valid reading that all of Middle Earth would have been better off if the palantir, like the rings, had never been made. That no matter how pure the intent was in making them, they were powerful tools for the “enemy”.
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On July 31 2018 04:15 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 04:06 ticklishmusic wrote:On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR. I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs. Is it possible that something like LoTR can also inspire people who think the wrong people won out? Or more to the point farv clarified, that his read was they were flawed in ways he isn't?
Maybe getting a bit offtopic, but:
I mean, isn't that the real subtext? Making you think that of course people before you were the wrong people, but you, you really could do so much good, if you only used my power... I always understood the main point to be about not falling for the "you are better than those before" spiel.
I could also see him as just being self aware, and not oblivious in the naming.
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On July 31 2018 04:44 Evotroid wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 04:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 04:06 ticklishmusic wrote:On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR. I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs. Is it possible that something like LoTR can also inspire people who think the wrong people won out? Or more to the point farv clarified, that his read was they were flawed in ways he isn't? Maybe getting a bit offtopic, but: I mean, isn't that the real subtext? Making you think that of course people before you were the wrong people, but you, you really could do so much good, if you only used my power... I always understood the main point to be about not falling for the "you are better than those before" spiel. I could also see him as just being self aware, and not oblivious in the naming.
I would presume so, but I'm only a superficial fan, if that. I've seen the movies more times than I'd admit anywhere but here and read The Hobbit but presume pretty much anyone with an opinion on LoTR here knows better than I do.
EDIT: Falling demonstrated below why I don't pretend to really understand this stuff.
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On July 31 2018 04:36 brian wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 02:07 NewSunshine wrote:On July 31 2018 01:57 brian wrote:On July 31 2018 01:52 NewSunshine wrote:On July 31 2018 00:50 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 00:37 IyMoon wrote:On July 31 2018 00:33 Plansix wrote:I just want to point out that there is a section of the country that is literally so on fire that it is creating its own weather system and our federal government is so busy with Trump’s BS that they can’t pay attention to that. On July 31 2018 00:32 Mohdoo wrote:
I think their plan right now is to get the supreme Court pick and take it to the very end. His existing relationship with Trump makes me think they've already talked this through. A lot depends on how much info comes out before that point. Trump may be too toxic to even get his supreme Court pick depending on how things go. Considering the spending bill fight they have in September and how much document production is going to be needed just to confirm the pick for the high court, I’m not sure the Senate is going to be able to pull it off. I don't think it really matters, I would not bet on the dems picking up the Senate Government shut downs matter, which is what Trump is threatening right now. I don't think anyone has shut down the goverment 60 days before a election. They already shut down the government this term. Whether they do it again matters little to me. They have their distorted agenda, and have already proven they're willing to betray the core principles of our systems and shut down the government in order to get exactly what they want. This is a drop in the pan for me. this could apply equally against those in both the red and blue camps; and if this shutdown doesn’t matter to you i have to ask what any of them meant to you at all? and why then is a second shut down of less importance than the first? Don't jump to conclusions. I said this hypothetical shutdown matters little to me, because I already have a particularly dim view of Trump and his cronies, in part because of the first shutdown they caused. I don't know exactly how you read that and conclude that the first shutdown didn't matter to me. My point is that, yes, it's terrible if they do it again, but it's like a murderer killing a second person. I already knew they were a murderer, and am not going to treat them all that differently for doing it again. It doesn't mean I view them favorably. i didn’t, that’s why i asked the questions instead. my first point was simply that your criticism, perfectly valid, can easily be read in either direction. which isn’t to say anything more than that- but i like to read liberally biased things so i was hoping for something we could blame republicans for ^^ then as for the analogy, i guess i understand and just disagree. if congress killed someone again i’d like it to be big news. i didn’t say anything about the first shutdown and simply translated ‘matters very little,’ to ‘doesn’t matter.’ i’m gonna say that’s pretty fair..
My point also has a lot to do with my conception of this administration, and the fact that they read like one-dimensional comic book villains. At this point, I'd be much more surprised to learn that they did the right thing, instead of the wrong thing. I hold them in contempt for every bit of their egregious behavior the same as you.
But I also don't want to come off as unduly harsh, as you're just asking me to clarify a position. So I'm sorry if that came across.
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Canada11350 Posts
On July 31 2018 04:14 farvacola wrote:
The subtext of powerful objects/power itself being an inherently corrupting and uncontrollable force.
Sure. But I don't think naming your company after the palantirs is missing the point or something secretly devious. If you think to when the seeing-stones were first set up- gifts from the elves- and where the high king can communicate with his entire realm, it's a rather cool concept, and I suspect that's what he's going for. They are more like the silmarils where great evil came about over the silmarils, but they aren't really inherently corrupting.
The palantir's aren't in and of themselves a corrupting force. The only reason they corrupted Denethor and Saruman because Sauron gained access to one of them and in this particular case he is the corrupting force. Your subtext exists, but I don't know that the palantirs are the best candidate for them. Though there are other themes connected with the seeing-stones.
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On July 31 2018 04:46 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 04:44 Evotroid wrote:On July 31 2018 04:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 04:06 ticklishmusic wrote:On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR. I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs. Is it possible that something like LoTR can also inspire people who think the wrong people won out? Or more to the point farv clarified, that his read was they were flawed in ways he isn't? Maybe getting a bit offtopic, but: I mean, isn't that the real subtext? Making you think that of course people before you were the wrong people, but you, you really could do so much good, if you only used my power... I always understood the main point to be about not falling for the "you are better than those before" spiel. I could also see him as just being self aware, and not oblivious in the naming. I would presume so, but I'm only a superficial fan, if that. I've seen the movies more times than I'd admit anywhere but here and read The Hobbit but presume pretty much anyone with an opinion on LoTR here knows better than I do.
The story of the Hobbit was written before LotR and the world had not been fully fleshed out in Tolkien’s mind at that point. Later editions of the Hobbit had parts added to reference the ring more clearly.
Tolkien served in WW1 and his son served in WW2. Both of those wars impacted his world view on war and heroism, though he never really talked about it publicly. But the mechanical, all consuming nature of Mordor and Uraki more closely resemble the industrialized warfare of his era, which the heroes fight against. LotR also has overtones of Christianity(Tolkien was super Christian), with the villain being a fallen, corrupting angle that promises the power to rule justly and fairly, only to use those gifts to corrupt the land. And the power of the meek(hobbits) influence the world by carrying the burden as far as they can bear.
A lot of these subtexts are lost on tech nerds like Pet, who only see magic items from D&D that someone else could have used if it wasn’t for the bad guy. They watch Blade Runner and see the bright lights of the cyber city and flying car, while missing the oil fields on fire in the background and that the future is built on the back of growing slaves in a vat.
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The corrupting influence of powerful items in LotR doesn't only regard their users/owners, it also implicates non-owners and those who become aware of some great power owned by someone else. Further, it's not only about corruption per se, rather that accessions to power, regardless of form, attract negative consequences without regard to the intentions of those who end up wielding them. As a general rule, you can't really go wrong with "the cooler the item, the more likely the owner does bad stuff/bad stuff happens to the owner" when it comes to LotR. If anything, the uncontrollable aspect takes precedence over the corrupting influence as a general theme, but the two go hand in hand.
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On July 31 2018 04:56 Falling wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 04:14 farvacola wrote:
The subtext of powerful objects/power itself being an inherently corrupting and uncontrollable force. Sure. But I don't think naming your company after the palantirs is missing the point or something secretly devious. If you think to when the seeing-stones were first set up- gifts from the elves- and where the high king can communicate with his entire realm, it's a rather cool concept, and I suspect that's what he's going for. They are more like the silmarils where great evil came about over the silmarils, but they aren't really inherently corrupting. The palantir's aren't in and of themselves a corrupting force. The only reason they corrupted Denethor and Saruman because Sauron gained access to one of them and in this particular case he is the corrupting force. Your subtext exists, but I don't know that the palantirs are the best candidate for them. Though there are other themes connected with the seeing-stones.
Sauron is a freaking fallen angle who teaches the races of middle earth to magic magical items that end up ruining them. He offers them power and then destroys them with it. He is a faceless, corrupting force that manifest by preying on the weaknesses of those he touches. Even the powerful wizards of Middle Earth(also angles of sorts) avoid being corrupted by avoiding using the items of power. The elves deal with Sauron’s gifts by almost never using them.
Palantirs are another example of a powerful item built with the best of intent, but that is quickly turned to a weapon of evil because no one asked what would happen if the enemy obtained one. An item so easily corrupted that it only takes one of them falling into the wrong hands to make them to risky to use. It says a TON about a tech company if they name themselves after them. That it’s founder is either arrogant or ignorant.
On July 31 2018 05:04 farvacola wrote:
The corrupting influence of powerful items in LotR doesn't only regard their users/owners, it also implicates non-owners and those who become aware of some great power owned by someone else. Further, it's not only about corruption per se, rather that accessions to power, regardless of form, attract negative consequences without regard to the intentions of those who end up wielding them. As a general rule, you can't really go wrong with "the cooler the item, the more likely the owner does bad stuff/bad stuff happens to the owner" when it comes to LotR. If anything, the uncontrollable aspect takes precedence over the corrupting influence as a general theme, but the two go hand in hand.
Elven cloaks and bread seem like the dopest, most useful items in that world. Travel light and be able to sleep in the open, hidden from sight.
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On July 31 2018 05:03 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 04:46 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 04:44 Evotroid wrote:On July 31 2018 04:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 04:06 ticklishmusic wrote:On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR. I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs. Is it possible that something like LoTR can also inspire people who think the wrong people won out? Or more to the point farv clarified, that his read was they were flawed in ways he isn't? Maybe getting a bit offtopic, but: I mean, isn't that the real subtext? Making you think that of course people before you were the wrong people, but you, you really could do so much good, if you only used my power... I always understood the main point to be about not falling for the "you are better than those before" spiel. I could also see him as just being self aware, and not oblivious in the naming. I would presume so, but I'm only a superficial fan, if that. I've seen the movies more times than I'd admit anywhere but here and read The Hobbit but presume pretty much anyone with an opinion on LoTR here knows better than I do. The story of the Hobbit was written before LotR and the world had not been fully fleshed out in Tolkien’s mind at that point. Later editions of the Hobbit had parts added to reference the ring more clearly. Tolkien served in WW1 and his son served in WW2. Both of those wars impacted his world view on war and heroism, though he never really talked about it publicly. But the mechanical, all consuming nature of Mordor and Uraki more closely resemble the industrialized warfare of his era, which the heroes fight against. LotR also has overtones of Christianity(Tolkien was super Christian), with the villain being a fallen, corrupting angle that promises the power to rule justly and fairly, only to use those gifts to corrupt the land. And the power of the meek(hobbits) influence the world by carrying the burden as far as they can bear. A lot of these subtexts are lost on tech nerds like Pet, who only see magic items from D&D that someone else could have used if it wasn’t for the bad guy. They watch Blade Runner and see the bright lights of the cyber city and flying car, while missing the oil fields on fire in the background and that the future is built on the back of growing slaves in a vat.
I'm not so sure they "miss it" as they think their way will be better and more righteous or just the harsh reality we must face. Granting I can't really speak to what's "there" in terms of the LoTR story.
That it’s founder is either arrogant or ignorant
I'm leaning toward arrogant.
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On July 31 2018 05:12 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 05:03 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 04:46 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 04:44 Evotroid wrote:On July 31 2018 04:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 04:06 ticklishmusic wrote:On July 31 2018 03:41 Plansix wrote:On July 31 2018 03:21 IgnE wrote:Peter Thiel was interviewed by a German publication and was asked about a bunch of stuff, including his support for Trump: www.weltwoche.chAt some point, you described that the last presidential election felt like an apocalyptic battle. What exactly did you feel was at stake?
There are these essays by a person called Michael Anton. They are all written pseudonymously because he felt it was too dangerous to write names. One of them was titled “The Flight 93 Election”. Flight 93 was one of the four flights that was hijacked after 9/11 but it was the one where the passengers took over, they charged the cockpit – plane still crashed. And it was like that it felt that the country had been taken over and it was on a catastrophic trajectory, that people were going to try to charge the cockpit. It didn’t mean that they would be able to ride the plane or the ship or whatever the metaphor is, but “we’re gonna try”. So I do think that “The Flight 93 Election” is a powerful metaphor and, emotionally, that certainly resonated with me. He felt that the Flight 93 Election was a powerful metaphor for the last election, but it's not clear exactly why he felt that way. I thought that Anton was more a liberaltarian (classical Machiavellian liberalism) than the Thiel kind of libertarian with a tinge of cyber anarchism. Thiel's comment here: And the answer is?
My judgement certainly is that there is a lot more truth on the Trump side than on the, let’s call it Google Propaganda, the alternative where everything is just automatically getting better. Certainly, one of the experiences throughout the western world is that the younger generation, for the most part, does not expect to have lives as good as those of their parents. We can say they are wrong, they don’t understand anything about their lives. But, again, the common-sense, anti “political correctness” intuition is that you trust people’s common sense, you trust their judgements and that judgement is an incredible indictment of our elites. just seems to be way too general in contrast to Anton's very specific description of where he thinks the country is going and why we have to charge the cockpit. Then Thiel says that he supports Trump out of a libertarian foreign policy perspective: But I still think of myself as philosophically quite libertarian: I do believe in a smaller government, free markets, socially moderate positions, less interventionist foreign policy… I would actually strongly defend president Trump on libertarian grounds. I know lots of libertarians would not agree with this. The dimension that is always very important is the foreign-policy one from a libertarian point of view. Yet more fuel to my feelings that Peter Thiel is a mediocre human that happens to have billions of dollars and wants the government to get out of his way. And he named his data analytics firm Palantir. That has always made me wonder if I have it wrong and he is a genius that is fooling everyone or just another tech bro that failed to graps the very not subtle subtext of the LotR. I think he's a pretty big LotR fan because he named a couple of his PE/VC finds Valar Ventures and Mithril Capital. But I agree he probably missed, ignored or has a very twisted interpretation of the entire subtext about Palantirs. Is it possible that something like LoTR can also inspire people who think the wrong people won out? Or more to the point farv clarified, that his read was they were flawed in ways he isn't? Maybe getting a bit offtopic, but: I mean, isn't that the real subtext? Making you think that of course people before you were the wrong people, but you, you really could do so much good, if you only used my power... I always understood the main point to be about not falling for the "you are better than those before" spiel. I could also see him as just being self aware, and not oblivious in the naming. I would presume so, but I'm only a superficial fan, if that. I've seen the movies more times than I'd admit anywhere but here and read The Hobbit but presume pretty much anyone with an opinion on LoTR here knows better than I do. The story of the Hobbit was written before LotR and the world had not been fully fleshed out in Tolkien’s mind at that point. Later editions of the Hobbit had parts added to reference the ring more clearly. Tolkien served in WW1 and his son served in WW2. Both of those wars impacted his world view on war and heroism, though he never really talked about it publicly. But the mechanical, all consuming nature of Mordor and Uraki more closely resemble the industrialized warfare of his era, which the heroes fight against. LotR also has overtones of Christianity(Tolkien was super Christian), with the villain being a fallen, corrupting angle that promises the power to rule justly and fairly, only to use those gifts to corrupt the land. And the power of the meek(hobbits) influence the world by carrying the burden as far as they can bear. A lot of these subtexts are lost on tech nerds like Pet, who only see magic items from D&D that someone else could have used if it wasn’t for the bad guy. They watch Blade Runner and see the bright lights of the cyber city and flying car, while missing the oil fields on fire in the background and that the future is built on the back of growing slaves in a vat. I'm not so sure they "miss it" as they think their way will be better and more righteous or just the harsh reality we must face. Granting I can't really speak to what's "there" in terms of the LoTR story. I'm leaning toward arrogant.
I used to think that, but the more nerdy people I talk to about series like LotR the more I believe that people like that series never read into the subtext of what it is all about. They just think the magic items were cool.
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On July 31 2018 03:02 Jockmcplop wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 02:55 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 31 2018 02:38 ticklishmusic wrote:
It's really obvious that Israel attempts to influence the US in many ways - some public, some covert, etc. but it's clear we're not adversaries. The entire Israel does terrible things which we tolerate/ implicitly support is kind of another debate. Why should being allied with active ethnic cleansers and them influencing our elections be more acceptable than Russia? I can totally understand that people accept it because of a difference in methodology and results. That makes perfect sense, although it is something worth talking about. I can't understand the attitude that they are allies so its ok. You can't judge actions that way at all. P6 accuses me of conspiracy theories (or accuses Chomsky of conspiracy theories, it wasn't clear) - but I don't see any conspiracy theory here. No-one has alleged a conspiracy,and contrary to Chomsky, I am merely noting that the difference in perception of the actions of Russia and Israel isn't always logical or rational in its basis, and talk of alliances proves that. Alliances are made between governments to accomplish strategic goals that often have little to do with the populations, or the democratic principles of either country. I just posted this article as a discussion point, I certainly don't agree with everything Chomsky says (his output is getting more suspect the older he gets), but when it comes to foreign influence on domestic politics, I don't think what Russia have done is out of the ordinary compared to even US allies, except in its methodology.
I'm with you on this and have been trying to drill into it pretty much since the Russiagate stuff started. I'd be hard pressed to synthesize a sensible summation of the argument for why it's okay for allies or that the nature of how they did it is especially nefarious relative to our operations in Russia and around the world.
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Manafort earned more than 60 million dollars lobbying for Russian minded Ukrainians between 2005 and 2014 according to new court filings. What kind of service does he offer that his salary would be worth it? And why would he work for Trump for free if he is that good?
President Trump's campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, earned more than $60 million working for Russia-backed Ukraine politicians, special counsel Robert Mueller said in a new court filing Monday.
Mueller said government prosecutors expect to prove that Manafort earned the money and failed to report a significant percentage of it on his tax returns. The filing is the first time a tally of Manafort's earnings in Ukraine has been revealed.
“No ‘pay stubs’ or ‘paychecks’ reflect that income, rather, the invoices and bills submitted by various consultants provide proof on that issue,” he said in the filing.
“Accordingly, to prove that Manafort earned that much income, the government must be able to show the extent of the work that he performed for Ukraine.
Mueller is fighting Manafort’s request for the court to exclude more than 50 trial exhibits that relate to his political consulting work in Ukraine between 2005 and 2014.”
source
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On July 31 2018 05:10 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 04:56 Falling wrote:On July 31 2018 04:14 farvacola wrote:
The subtext of powerful objects/power itself being an inherently corrupting and uncontrollable force. Sure. But I don't think naming your company after the palantirs is missing the point or something secretly devious. If you think to when the seeing-stones were first set up- gifts from the elves- and where the high king can communicate with his entire realm, it's a rather cool concept, and I suspect that's what he's going for. They are more like the silmarils where great evil came about over the silmarils, but they aren't really inherently corrupting. The palantir's aren't in and of themselves a corrupting force. The only reason they corrupted Denethor and Saruman because Sauron gained access to one of them and in this particular case he is the corrupting force. Your subtext exists, but I don't know that the palantirs are the best candidate for them. Though there are other themes connected with the seeing-stones. Sauron is a freaking fallen angle who teaches the races of middle earth to magic magical items that end up ruining them. He offers them power and then destroys them with it. He is a faceless, corrupting force that manifest by preying on the weaknesses of those he touches. Even the powerful wizards of Middle Earth(also angles of sorts) avoid being corrupted by avoiding using the items of power. The elves deal with Sauron’s gifts by almost never using them. Palantirs are another example of a powerful item built with the best of intent, but that is quickly turned to a weapon of evil because no one asked what would happen if the enemy obtained one. An item so easily corrupted that it only takes one of them falling into the wrong hands to make them to risky to use. It says a TON about a tech company if they name themselves after them. That it’s founder is either arrogant or ignorant. Show nested quote +On July 31 2018 05:04 farvacola wrote:
The corrupting influence of powerful items in LotR doesn't only regard their users/owners, it also implicates non-owners and those who become aware of some great power owned by someone else. Further, it's not only about corruption per se, rather that accessions to power, regardless of form, attract negative consequences without regard to the intentions of those who end up wielding them. As a general rule, you can't really go wrong with "the cooler the item, the more likely the owner does bad stuff/bad stuff happens to the owner" when it comes to LotR. If anything, the uncontrollable aspect takes precedence over the corrupting influence as a general theme, but the two go hand in hand. Elven cloaks and bread seem like the dopest, most useful items in that world. Travel light and be able to sleep in the open, hidden from sight.
Before his corruption by Morgoth (Melkor), Sauron was also a maiar (demigod) of order and perfection. So take that how you will.
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How do Pro-Russia Ukrainians just have 60 million to dump into a single political operative lobbying in a foreign country?
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EPT
