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ceej @ceej.online · 43m

the disastrous refusal of the self-styled silicon valley technokings to keep anyone in their lives capable of questioning their increasingly incomprehensible politics has lead to a crisis of thinking so severe that a fifty-eight year old man believes something is important because he knows about it

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 3h

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.

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 2h

Siri is there a word for a guy who rises to international power and says stuff like this

Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 3h

lmao

In his last lecture, Thiel also responds during the Q&A portion to a question about potential 2028 presidential candidates and whether they are antichrist or katechon. When asked about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Thiel says that he worries about there being a “woke American pope”– Pope Leo XIV – and a “woke American president”, creating a “Caesar-Papist fusion”. He goes on to talk about Ocasio-Cortez in relation to Thunberg:

One of the ways these things always get reported is, I denounce Greta as an antichrist. And I want to be very clear: Greta is, I mean she’s maybe sort of a type or a shadow of an antichrist of a sort that would be tempting. But I don’t want to flatter her too much. So with Greta, you shouldn’t take her as the antichrist for sure. With AOC, you can choose whether or not you want to believe this disclaimer that I just gave.

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 4h

What if we kissed in front of the unnecessarily horny T. Rex display

An artist’s lovingly imagined idea of two tyrannosaurus rexes fuckin doggy style, rendered in both replica fossils and a detailed drawing. This museum is for children. My son asked how fighting helps them make baby dinosaurs. We told him to ask a paleontologist, specifically the one who set up this exhibit

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Joe Kassabian @jkass99.bsky.social · 2d

Because when you burn down a house and nobody ever rebuilds it, someone is still forced to live in the ashes

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 3d

Thatcher was born 100 years ago and her reign feels a lifetime away. Why is her effect on the country still so huge? | Martin Kettle

Today’s politicians need to learn that she is not the answer to contemporary problems, says Guardian columnist Martin Kettle

www.theguardian.com

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 5h

People really do look at their phones a lot less in a place where news happens at a “local morning paper” pace

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 18h

It’s very nice! Gijon is. I’m not sure about the Burger King

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Kevin J. CREATURE @kevinjkircher.com · 4d

"Make cities safe and fun for kids to run around and play in" is a pretty good guiding light for urban planning

Brent Toderian @brenttoderian.bsky.social · 4d

“In a city once choked with cars and infamous for its traffic snarls, Paris has pulled off a remarkable turnaround…the French capital has officially become Europe’s best city for children to walk, cycle, and move around independently.” Via @momentummag.bsky.social

A victory for FAST leadership.

Paris Pedals to the Top: How the City of Light Became Europe’s Best for Young Cyclists

The French capital has officially become Europe’s best city for children to walk, cycle, and move around independently

momentummag.com

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 19h

Do you think this is where he lives

Photograph at night of the fanciest fucking Burger King I’ve ever seen, three stories of Edwardian era construction, with the letters B U R G E R K I N G illuminated from below like an apparition

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Scott Fright @scw.bsky.social · 21h

Franz Kafka writing Steam reviews

Steam review that reads “game is good but im some bugs”

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timothy faust @tbone.malware-virus.biz · 23h

Been saying this

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 3d

Tenancy in common. A group of people buy and split a multi-family home

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 3d

DO YOU KNOW ANYONE WHO WANTS TO DO A TIC IN SF?

Put me in touch!!!

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Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 3d

Apparently the Boston delays were due to runway construction and the authorities are attributing them to the shutdown for political expediency lol

Butt Praxis @buttpraxis.bsky.social · 4d

Can a situations understander tell me if my international flight out of Boston tomorrow is likely to happen or

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Ted McCormick @tedmccormick.bsky.social · 3d

The basic structure of so much commentary, some in the guise of academic study, reduces to:

(1) generative AI products are detrimental to the goals of education

(2) therefore, the goals of education must change.

Without the tacit axiom that AI has authority behind it, that just doesn’t follow.

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Ted McCormick @tedmccormick.bsky.social · 3d

A striking thing about articles I’ve read claiming to “study the effects” of generative AI on student writing skills and consumption of information is that (1) they nearly always find the effects are negative and (2) most “conclusions” are still written assuming that we must use AI, for some reason.