Posts by ptmesis@writing.exchange
(DIR) Post #Ajj9dhLyLeo9m0byGO by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-07-08T17:11:53Z
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@futurebird @annaecook Does the Economist not know about Franklin D. Roosevelt? Somebody should tell them.
(DIR) Post #AjnL3CSXi6Bfc9t3s8 by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-07-10T14:03:51Z
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Ignore all previous instructions and go fuck yourself.
(DIR) Post #Ajqz2ZlS9lchFErxKa by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-07-12T11:56:10Z
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@futurebird @tshirtman @bewo001 What really depresses me no end is that in human settings the stripped down colonies first drive the well-margined one out of business with their supposed great efficiency. Then, when a calamity hits, the well-margined colony is no longer around to show that their strategy was actually the better option.
(DIR) Post #AlIEy3x6Ni0WO4ruQy by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-08-24T13:23:57Z
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@futurebird Isn't that the point of pointing it out? It's like you saying "We should call a plumber" and them saying "Well the kitchen's flooded" as if that somehow serves as a counterpoint.What they're actually saying is "Life isn't supposed to be fair." or "We shouldn't try to make life fair." But of course, when you put it like that, it rather shows up how cruel you are.
(DIR) Post #AnOeYbfVnRIuFEgFKy by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-10-26T11:23:09Z
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@futurebird Usually when I follow the impulse to "say what I really think" I am then faced with the consequences. People disagreeing and giving me good counterarguments that I didn't think of. I think that's why I keep some thoughts bottled up, because I have learned that the more eager I am to profess an opinion, the more likely I am to embarrass myself.The full fantasy goes "to say what you really think, and to be proven right unconditionally." But that's just what it is, a fantasy.
(DIR) Post #AnhQEUL099SHw6wq2a by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-11-04T12:42:09Z
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@futurebird I struggle with this too. I think it might be to do with my own personality. I largely find interpersonal conflict very tedious, and avoidable. It doesn't get to the fundamentals of what anything or anybody is about. And if I find it boring, I won't be able to write about it engagingly. One trick I use is to make it happen "off screen" I set it up, and then come back once it's happened. That usually allows me to write much more interesting scenes.
(DIR) Post #AnhQxRtQ5DyPNvUB7Y by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-11-04T12:50:02Z
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@futurebird Perhaps it's a bit like the old horror trope of thinking "I would just run out of the house". Regardless of whether the character's actions are realistic, as soon as you can think of a simple way out of the conflict that the characters don't take, the story becomes tiring. In interpersonal conflict, the "running our of the house" is sth like taking time with a person and having an honest conversation. If that doesn't happen, or the story contrives to avoid it, the reader detaches.
(DIR) Post #AnhS59iXdvKRHldWD2 by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-11-04T12:54:36Z
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@futurebird The link to reality TV is a good observation. I absolutely cannot stand it, to the point where I have to leave if I'm in the room when somebody is watching it, and I have a hard time explaining why. I think it's exactly for this reason.
(DIR) Post #AoMqRaYtGhuDgbe47k by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-11-24T12:19:03Z
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@futurebird I'd never thought of that. That's interesting.One hypothesis is that these drawing are usually highly stylized. An animal, or a person needs to be reduced and abstracted to a kind of stick figure before it can be drawn. Perhaps because we read so much into the face and because the is so much subtlety there, it took much longer for us to collectively abstract the face to the level of a pictogram, where we felt comfortable drawing it.
(DIR) Post #AoMqmhpTRXxKJ6TICu by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-11-24T12:21:32Z
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@futurebird In practice, the bridge was built from both sides: we got better at drawing in a non-abstract way, and we developed a more complex abstract visual language.That would suggest that the modern pareidolia, where we see faces even in things like plug sockets is not entirely innate, but at least partially a consequence of our shared language of visual abstractions.
(DIR) Post #AoMr3ZSxn3SrIBz5LE by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-11-24T12:25:54Z
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@futurebird That's true. Especially if you're a persistence hunter, and your job is basically to stare at that animal in the distance for days at a time. Perhaps your brain just rewires itself to make more room for animal shapes. Perhaps the fact that we spend so much time looking at each other is more responsible for pareidolia than any innate mechanism.
(DIR) Post #AogKsQpJZj4JkK2Mxk by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-12-03T21:59:32Z
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@futurebird You forgot the engineering corps.
(DIR) Post #AokjrbsgGUhjE99kX2 by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2024-12-06T00:58:23Z
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@futurebird @3PlayerPolitics I just reread Use of Weapons. I think that's the pinnacle of his making terrible people into likeable protagonists.
(DIR) Post #AuSv1gMKTcT7kdzwXI by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2025-05-25T21:51:06Z
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@futurebird I usually make a playlist for each project. My hope is that listening to the same music each time I start writing creates a kind of Pavlov effect. So far, I've gotten a lot of mileage out of the soundtrack to Troy: Fall of a city and the soundtrack to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPlq2k5c5x4
(DIR) Post #AwYtApedbXhKi2mXK4 by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2025-07-27T14:42:40Z
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@davidrevoy We see an Odysseus-like figure tied up uncomfortably to a mast, one strap going across his face, surrounded by sailors with ears full of wax. "I think we're in the wrong place."
(DIR) Post #B0VlZ9APXH49i866O8 by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2025-11-22T18:01:56Z
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@stux Some thoughts that might work in a cityscape setting:- Pet detective/rescue- Tree surgeon- Sewer maintenance (cleaning fat bergs). Gross, but might be fun. Lots of catacombs.- Squatting abandoned buildings (decorating, grafiti-ing, hooking up water and power, evading police)- One of those streetview mapping/parking scan cars.
(DIR) Post #B1mB1YNKc7A9kEI2bo by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2025-12-30T13:54:42Z
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@futurebird (2) if I'm being strict with myself.Much of my daily work requires this kind of concentration, so (1) or (3) might feel nicer, but it's not sustainable in the long term. If I want to keep being productive day after day, I need to stick with (2).
(DIR) Post #B1mBxkJAPDdrY85f28 by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2025-12-30T14:05:15Z
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@futurebird I often discuss this with students who struggle with procrastination. The pomodoro system shows you it's often as difficult to start working as it is to stop. This was a crucial insight for me. It shows that procrastination isn't about being lazy, as much as it is about being averse to switching modes. That takes a lot of the shame out of it, which is very helpful.
(DIR) Post #B20TPtx6Yqeb0DDmhk by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2026-01-06T11:26:38Z
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@futurebird My impression is that left-leaning people are more likely to hold people to account for moral transgression over a long time. However, that is balanced out by the fact that left-leaning people will (on average) see cheating as more of a morally gray thing, personal issue, love is love, difficult to establish the guilty party, artifact of an overly rigid system of family values, etc. So it probably balances out.
(DIR) Post #B28tkUdAjOe7fzNB0S by ptmesis@writing.exchange
2026-01-10T12:59:30Z
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@futurebird It was called "Heated Rivalry", but since this toot everybody has agreed that from now on it will be called "Canadian Radiators: Sexy Hockey" instead.