Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1h

These guys (and they’re *always* guys) are either hardcore anarchists or hardcore libertarians. They’re committed to Rationality, which is to say that anyone who disagrees with them is either unreasonable or too stupid to see their brilliance. They’ve read one philosophy book and misunderstood it.

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1h

Peter Thiel is that annoying-ass kid in your Intro to Philosophy class who thinks they have it all figured out and are just in the room to have their brilliance confirmed. They’re in every intro class, are universally insufferable, and think failure to understand their gibberish is your fault.

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 2h

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

1

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1h

Peter Thiel is that annoying-ass kid in your Intro to Philosophy class who thinks they have it all figured out and are just in the room to have their brilliance confirmed. They’re in every intro class, are universally insufferable, and think failure to understand their gibberish is your fault.

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 2h

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

He describes the plot of Watchmen, a 1986 graphic novel involving superheroes grappling with moral questions about humanity against the backdrop of impending nuclear war:

The antihero Ozymandias, the antichrist-type figure, is sort of an early-modern person. He believes this will be a timeless and eternal solution – eternal world peace. Moore is sort of a late-modern. In early modernity, you have ideal solutions, ‘perfect’ solutions to calculus. In late modernity, things are sort of probabilistic. And at some point, he asks Dr Manhattan whether the world government is going to last. And he says that ‘nothing lasts forever.’ So you embrace the antichrist and it still doesn’t work.

Thiel later finds biblical meaning in the manga One Piece, discussing how he believes it represents a future where an antichrist-like one-world government has repressed science. He believes that the hero, Monkey D Luffy, represents a Christlike figure.

In One Piece, you are set in a fantasy world, again sort of an alternate earth, but it’s 800 years into the reign of this one-world state. Which, as the story unfolds, gradually gets darker and darker. You sort of realize, in my interpretation, who runs the world and it’s something like the antichrist. There’s Luffy, a pirate who wears a red straw hat, sort of like Christ’s crown of thorns. And then towards the end of the story, transforms into a figure who resembles Christ in Revelation.

Thiel, along with a researcher and writer at Thiel Capital, explored these ideas at greater length in an essay for the religious journal First Things earlier this month.

1 2

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1h

Tell me you’ve never met Presbyterians without telling me you’ve never met Presbyterians.

1

Reposted by Jake Wright

Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 10h

if you’re not Catholic, let me real quick tell you about the breathtaking audacity of bringing the monstrance with him

a monstrance is a big bedazzled gold ornament with a round glass window in the middle where you put a consecrated wafer, usually the bigger ceremonial one and not the bite-size

4 100 600

Reposted by Jake Wright

Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 10h

found exactly the one use of “evil recoils in the presence of Christ” I am willing to sign off on, HOOOOOOOOLY SHIT

Father Larry did not come here to fuck around

Rich Raho @richraho.bsky.social · 17h

Chicago priest Fr. Larry Dowling describes procession to ICE facility: “No one had the courage to speak directly to us. No one from Homeland Security could stand in the presence of the Monstrance holding the Blessed Sacrament. No wonder. Evil is repelled, recoils in the presence of Christ.”

23 800 3.2K

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 12h

I don't care if you work in the ICE cafeteria.

Hague.

Popehat Agitates And Irritates @kenwhite.bsky.social · 13h

Also: if you work for ICE, even if you’re not one of the ones arresting citizens or tackling 15-year-olds or zip-tying kids together and segregating them by race, you’re part of the mechanism making it happen, and you should suffer long-term social and post-regime-change consequences.

Ari Cohn @aricohn.com · 14h

Some weirdo on Twitter has been absolutely melting down for like 36 straight hours because I posted:

When this is over, do not forget what ICE did, and what ICE is. And do not make room for them in society. Make sure they know that they are, and will continue to be, reviled and beneath contempt.

2 5

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 16h

I'm saying this as someone who genuinely *loved* Tron: Legacy. Ares underwhelming at the box office is simple.

It's a nostalgia play, but Ares is the third Tron movie. The THIRD.

If Tron was part of your childhood, you're pushing FIFTY. This is not a "blow the doors off the theater" demographic.

Charlie Jane "Lessons in Magic and Disaster" Anders 🏳️‍⚧ @charliejane.bsky.social · 18h

I'm perplexed at watching pundits in the trades struggling to explain Tron Ares' disappointing opening.

Was it covid? Do people just not like science fiction? etc. etc.

The main reason is pretty obvious: Tron isn't a popular franchise. Nobody's interested in nostalgia for a failed 1980s project.

5

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 16h

He's weirdly understated on 30 Rock. Like, so understated it's a bit unnerving.

3

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 17h

Humans go to the Grid: Dope AF

Programs come to the Real World: Dopey AF

5

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 17h

Also, the moral of every single Tron movie is "please be as precise as possible when giving programming instructions."

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 17h

Of all the movies I've ever seen, Tron: Ares was certainly one of them.

2

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 17h

Like Michael Sheen eating so much scenery in Legacy you'd think it was part of a balanced diet.

2 9

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 17h

Of all the movies I've ever seen, Tron: Ares was certainly one of them.

2

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

Were there any inflatable frogs?

1 1

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

Is that a baseball game or an anti-ICE protest?

1 2

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

Or anything, really. Passing your grading off to AI is simply deciding that your students’ work isn’t worth engaging with. And if that’s how you feel, why on Earth are you in a classroom?

John Warner @biblioracle.bsky.social · 2d

I strongly urge everyone to not just read this warning from @marcwatkins.bsky.social, but heed it, and be vocal and forceful pushing back against using AI to grade student writing. This must be anathema if we're going to have a world where learning means something. substack.com/inbox/post/1...

The Dangers of using AI to Grade

Nobody Learns, Nobody Gains

substack.com

1 16 60

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

My 5YO was playing Minecraft on the Xbox, casually pulled up Spotify, threw on some music, and went back to Minecraft like it was second nature. FIVE.

5

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

Can I add to this quickly as an NTT?

Yes it’s scary and everything being described in thread is real. BUT MANY OF US ARE OUT HERE DOING THE WORK ANYWAY because it’s the right thing to do. The fact that we, the least protected, are showing this kind of bravery while many admins don’t is infuriating.

5

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

Pull up your pants.

5

Reposted by Jake Wright

Lauren MacIvor Thompson @lmacthompson1.bsky.social · 1d

Our classrooms are not safe for us or regular students. Our universities canot be relied upon to protect us. You have to keep speaking up about this. Faculty already are, but we need folks who aren’t in academia raising the alarm for everyone else. The End.

7 87 490

Jake Wright @bcnjake.bsky.social · 1d

I want whatever the columnist who thought “The man who wrote ‘The Ballad of Ira Hayes’ and made the video for ‘Hurt’ was deeply square and never countercultural” is smoking.

6