Careercow Elon Reeve Musk - Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter owner + ex-paypal CEO. Manchild, sexual deviant, spergy autist with access to space travel

[Trombonista]

@Haftag has been threadbanned for 3 days. Let's get back to mocking Musk.

 

[AmpleApricots]

I just wanted to mention that it's incredibly funny to me that this ultra-wealthy spastic doesn't seem to own a single suit that fits him.

 

[karz]

As much as people complained about Big Brother spying on them, this half of America welcomed this surveillance with open arms.

Government surveillance? Come back with a warrant.
Corporate marketing surveillance that can be sold to the government? That's okay and completely legal, buds. The NSA and FBI have been buying your data for surveillance purposes for nearly 25 years.
None of these people are your friends. Stay informed.

 

[keep em' comin]

And how would that nullify my point?

"how would a list of republicans advocating with the marriage of children dispute my schizo theory that the LEFT are truly the bad guys between the two?"
(last post I dont wanna get thread banned)

Ive heard its been deboonked, but didnt he actually rp as his own kid? thats some sus ass shit.

 

[Drip Torch]

Government surveillance? Come back with a warrant.
Corporate marketing surveillance that can be sold to the government? That's okay and completely legal, buds. The NSA and FBI have been buying your data for surveillance purposes for nearly 25 years.
None of these people are your friends. Stay informed.

Beware of the man with one hand extend out to greet you and their other behind their back.

 

[Alex Hogendorp]

Elon Musk is the weirdest looking man in the entire world whose shape of his body is inconsistent. One moment, he'll look fine, another moment, he looks like his skin is falling off. That is fucking nightmare fuel.

 

[Omega Bruh Moment]

Nigger is wrong, SSRI are bad and people aren't told about the possible side effects before they are prescribed.

I think this is only partially the case.
The main reason why SSRI's is bad is not only because you aren't told of the side effects before being prescribed, it's because the doctors who usually prescribe them are being paid by the pharma company for how much they prescribe so they have a direct incentive to do it as much as possible without exploring other treatments, or even doing genetic testing that would show which medication is most likely to be beneficial for you. It's like they're throwing darts while blindfolded when it comes to the ones that's chosen for each patient.
However, even though it is overprescribed, this does not undo the benefits that the medication may bring. If your depression/mental illness is caused directly by a chemical imbalance in the brain, then yes it's going to be very beneficial for you. If it's caused more by psychological/societal factors, not so much. Elon doesn't care though. He wants a quick solution to any of his problems, and has a weak will, hence why he's abused drugs throughout his life.
Elon will have a problem with the same things that it's quirky and contrarian to have issues with(ie, culture war talking points from yesteryear). He does not have any convictions, he does not have any principles nor morality, his only focus is to maximize the grift. This is why he was the lefts/reddits darling for so many years before realizing which direction the wind changed so he could better angle his piss towards the right.
It's baffling how anyone will take health advice from him or RFK Jr considering just how batshit and manic their own track records seem to be.
Not to mention, this drug abusing sperg is now running around multiple federal agencies that aren't politicized and through illegal means is seizing access/gathering confidential information.
I think these factors make modern times far worse than it was in gilded age America. Could you imagine if Rockefeller, Carnegie, or Vanderbilt forced their way into the federal government and had their lackeys begin gaining access to all this information? At least back then, the response would be heavy and swift. For now I fear, there will be no consequence. Reading copes about how this will force Trump to curb him reminds me of "HERE'S HOW TRUMP CAN STILL WIN!" articles from 2020. Not gonna happen.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

"how would a list of republicans advocating with the marriage of children dispute my schizo theory that the LEFT are truly the bad guys between the two?"
(last post I dont wanna get thread banned)

Ive heard its been deboonked, but didnt he actually rp as his own kid? thats some sus ass shit.

please, according to a totally trustworthy tranny whore he rped as little red riding hood

different kind of autopedophilia

 

[EllenDrawsRapeOfHerHaters]

Elon Musk is the weirdest looking man in the entire world whose shape of his body is inconsistent. One moment, he'll look fine, another moment, he looks like his skin is falling off. That is fucking nightmare fuel.

It's because he takes steroids and doesn't work out.

 

[Dang dirty Pidgeons!]

Think the difference is malice, a biological agent and weapon are different just in the names alone, a agent can be used without malicious intent but a weapon cannot, guarantee trump and/or elon is gonna blame the woke left over how bad it gets if it does happen tho.

I mean, I gave you an edearing autistic because biological weapons are always agents, but if you just meant that they won't use something known as a preexisting weapon, you are probably right - I'm pretty sure that designer virals are a thing by now - the problem I see here, like with the half assed, new designer vaccines - they still don't know what the hell they're doing: the responsible conspirator would use something tried and tested while taking the chance of having to explain how this known agent got free, but for sekricy's sake I can see potential, more retarded shadowy figures pushing for some newfangled designer covid - on the assumption they can sell it as run of the mill natural flu evolution - and that backfiring by mutating in the field or something, making it an unintended black death 2.0.

Yes, I am afraid of having even more retards at the helm since this administration hit the scene.

Basically: If they tell us le hezbollah send anthrax envelopes, we're fine.
If it's again like: "Oh noes! Where did it come from? It's super chicken pox!", we may be fucked.

 

[Matzo Nazi]

So now that Trump voters let Elon hitch his wagon to their horse, a South African tech fag who wants to neurolink everyone gets to have unfettered access to all of our treasury servers. Cool cool cool. Since that includes tax payments, I wonder if the IPS tax documents are available to Elon... we better hope he never finds this thread! He says he wants to cut 1 Trillion from the budget by the end of this weekend, which would be pretty much all of social security, medicare, veterans payments, etc. Also by cut, he just means prevent the payment from going out, which is illegal as fuck but who cares anymore? If Trump was doing this, I'd be less mad, because he has voters to answer to, but seriously fuck this foreign piece of shit coming into this country, gutting it, and gloating about it like the petulant drug addict he is.

 

[brazilsucksdick]

Elon took kf down this morning i will not falter in this belief no matter what information is shown to me

 

[Executive Petrel]

We are very likely to see another Covid-like situation in the next four years, I bet my ass its gonna happen.

Elong will create a vaccine that causes autism because he envys the neurotypicals.

 

[Laughing Putin]

Elon Musk is the weirdest looking man in the entire world whose shape of his body is inconsistent. One moment, he'll look fine, another moment, he looks like his skin is falling off. That is fucking nightmare fuel.

Now imagine how badly his brain is deteriorating.

 

[829393030]

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1885582076247712229

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1886102414194835755

It's amazing. How can Elon be this dumb? Can he not even ENTERTAIN the idea that those people ultimately work for US interests?

Even your shittiest 110IQ overconfident liberal midwit thinks it's fine to finance this or that "moderate rebel" group. The US spends PITTANCE on those people and it gets a return, 50x. This money doesn't just "dissapear", it has a very good purpose in maintaining American power. Even foreign aid is, quite simply, buying power. The US wants vassals, not stable neighbours they can't easily exploit. Same thing applies to the Ukrainians, to separatists and green parties all over the world. The EU would never be as fucked as it is now without American-backed retards telling them to kill nuclear. USAID and the NED are tools of American power, they are not wasted. The NGO blob funded with American taxpayer money keeps countries all over the world mesmerized by the idea of an all-good America.

At this rate, Assad will be back in power by the end of the month when the money dries up.

 

[Agamemnon Busmalis]

It's because he takes steroids and doesn't work out.

I wonder if that's why he has no balls as well.

 

[AmpleApricots]

I'm amazed at the soft power loss the US will experience in the next years. Never thought it possible, honestly. With other powers rising to the top, I guess we will find out if democracies were just a temporary abnormality in human history that lead nowhere.

 

[Hollywood Hulk Hogan]

View attachment 6931032

For a retard who claims to fight tyranny and loves America, you'd think he'd be against a South African illegal immigrant taking over the federal government

 

[Standardized Profile]

Here are the current lawsuits involving DOGE and Musk's infiltration of the government. It's not really funny "autistic man pays people to play video game" stuff, but it is amusing in its own bleak way. Things are moving quickly on social media and I haven't been saving things until now, so I apologize in advance for not having copies of everything.

There are three DOGE cases that are essentially the same, some group trying to get representation in or invalidate DOGE for its lack of viewpoint diversity, particularly from sectors DOGE will purportedly regulate: "Trump’s executive order renames the U.S. Digital Service as the U.S. DOGE Service (Department of Government Efficiency) and reestablishes the office under the Executive Office of the President. [Plaintiff] sued, arguing that the order violates the Federal Advisory Committee Act, which bars the delegation of decision-making authority to private citizens without public access. The suit asks the court to enjoin the operation of DOGE unless and until it complies with the FACA’s requirements."

Spoiler: Court Listener links

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69559444/public-citizen-inc-v-trump/

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69559476/lentini-v-department-of-government-efficiency/

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69559460/american-public-health-association-v-office-of-management-and-budget/

One of the cases is about DOGE's failure to produce records requested under the Freedom of Information Act. It was alleged in some of the other complaints that DOGE is using Signal to get around Federal record keeping requirements, so DOGE might be technically correct. There are no responsive records because they don't maintain any.

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69559509/center-for-biological-diversity-v-office-of-management-and-budget/

The complaints offer a good summary of DOGE's evolving role. Trump originally promised DOGE would be an advisory body outside the government, a way for business experts to bring a new perspective to Federal spending, and to reduce fraud and improper payments. Even before it formally existed, it was asking Federal employees to provide information about wasteful programs. Then DOGE people started talking about using it to reduce the size of the government (i.e. the number of government employees, not the power of the government or the scope of its activities). Even then, they promised they would only provide recommendations to the President. After coming into power, Trump hollowed out USDS and housed DOGE within it. (USDS was a small team created within the Executive Office of the President to enhance online government services after the Obamacare fiasco.) Ultimately, DOGE has been more of an operational body than an advisory one. The executive order placed DOGE teams in every agency. DOGE staff are working with appointees from Musk's companies to undermine those agencies and access huge amounts of protected data for some purpose that has not been fully disclosed. It is exerting its power directly on and in the agencies, not going through the executive order process as was previously claimed. I'm not saying they don't have the support of the White House or the President in doing this, just that they lied about both what they would do and how they would accomplish it.

Then there is the aforementioned OPM case. I thought it was a Privacy Act violation, but apparently PIAs are a requirement of the e-Government Act, not the Privacy Act, so I was wrong there. "The Office of Personnel Management announced it was testing a new system to email all civilian federal employees from a single email address, HR@opm.gov. Individuals claiming to be OPM employees subsequently posted online that the emails were being stored on an unsecure [sic] server at OPM. Plaintiffs, employees of executive-branch [sic] agencies who received 'test' emails from HR@opm.gov requesting information, sued." I think there are still probably Privacy Act violations, which are a cause of action for maybe a couple million affected persons. It's possible a lot of interesting stuff will come out in discovery. The complaint seems to be based on this anonymous post on Reddit, which if true suggests there are a lot of juicy emails:



A "massive email list of all federal employees" would include classified information such as the total number of glowies assigned to an agency, and possibly their true name and employer if they are under cover. If DOGE really does have a list of all Federal employees, they almost certainly broke security regulations and possibly criminal laws to assemble it.

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69582338/doe-v-office-of-personnel-management/

The hr@opm.gov address was used to send out two test emails that were so bizarre and unprofessional most recipients thought they were a phishing attempt. The typical government employee will never interact with OPM, except maybe as a repository for their personnel records or to set up their retirement annuity. The address was later used to send "please quit" emails promising dubious sometimes contradictory benefits: you will get to telework until September 30th, you will be on administrative leave until September 30th, you can take your dream vacation, if you stay you might lose your job anyway and then you get nothing, we promise this is legal, etc. They were apparently modeled after a similar email sent to Twitter employees after Musk's takeover there. Amusingly, one of them said the key to American prosperity was moving people out of low-productivity public sector jobs into high-productivity private sector jobs, essentially telling every recipient their work was worthless and they should an hero their careers. These emails were not received with enthusiasm, so OPM directed agency heads to send similar messages from their accounts. That resulted in a lot of hostage video style emails, "OPM has directed me to send this to you. The emails you have been receiving from them are real and can be trusted," etc.







(These were reportedly written by a non-Fed, they don't use the right jargon.)

OPM has also been collecting lists of probationary employees from agencies. Probationary employees can generally be fired for performance or conduct with no appeal. The theory is that OPM is going to direct agencies to fire all their probies. I'm not sure they have that authority, but that's the rumor. Probies do have the right to appeal termination for partisan political reasons, and there will probably be a number of such cases. Stephen Miller has basically admitted they're doing a political purge, OPM is in a position to make that happen, and OPM is Elon. If someone with no negative performance reviews or counselings is suddenly fired under performance/conduct, they might have a colorable claim. These appeals usually fail, but if a few thousand are filed, something interesting might happen.





I don't know this Mario Nawfal guy, apparently he's an Australian cryptobro living in Dubai. Here he is celebrating with Elon:

Spoiler: Elon's boys in government

A new Wired report has identified six of the DOGE twinks. Wired is paywalled so I'll quote it from Reddit [archive]:

WIRED has identified six young men—all apparently between the ages of 19 and 24, according to public databases, their online presences, and other records—who have little to no government experience and are now playing critical roles in Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) project, tasked by executive order with “modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity.” The engineers all hold nebulous job titles within DOGE, and at least one appears to be working as a volunteer.

The engineers are Akash Bobba, Edward Coristine, Luke Farritor, Gautier Cole Killian, Gavin Kliger, and Ethan Shaotran. None have responded to requests for comment from WIRED. Representatives from OPM, GSA, and DOGE did not respond to requests for comment.

Akash Bobba interned at Meta and Palantir. He appeared on a podcast, which has been deleted:


Edward Coristine may have been involved in a stock scheme. I'm not sure this is him, but it sounds like something a techbro catamite would say:


Luke Farritor won a cash prize for using AI to decipher a scroll from Herculaneum. That's actually pretty cool. But I'm sure there's something in his background, or he wouldn't be in this group.


Gautier Cole Killian had a YouTube channel and a personal site, both deleted:

His personal site was archived:

Spoiler

Cole Killian
Posts Tags Categories Projects
My name is Cole. Here's some quick info.


Memetics adjacence:

• Utilitarianism, effective altruism, rationalism, closed individualism
• Absurdism, pyrrhonian skepticism, meta-rationalism, empty individualism

Some of the books which have influenced me:

• Rationality: A-Z
• Gödel, Escher, Bach
• Superintelligence
• Gaming the Future
• Inadequate Equilibria
• Spiritual Enlightenment

Recommended Posts:

• SBF, Pascal's Mugging, and a Proposed Solution
• Book Review: Spiritual Enlightenment
• Don't be a Maxi

Find me:

• github
• email
• twitter

Spoiler: Don't be a Maxi

Don't be a Maxi​

Thoughts
Jul, 30 2022
Thanks to prateek for discussions and feedback which led to this post

The History of Maxi​

In the land of crypto, the term “Bitcoin maxi” was termed in 2014 to describe those who think that “an environment of multiple competing cryptocurrencies is undesirable, that it is wrong to launch ‘yet another coin’, and that it is both righteous and inevitable that the Bitcoin currency comes to take a monopoly position in the cryptocurrency scene”.
At the time the term wasn’t meant so much as a pejorative, but instead as a way of categorizing someone’s beliefs. The idea at the time was that bitcoin maxis had a rational thought process for believing as such.
Since then, however, the term has become a pejorative. The term “bitcoin maxi” has come to be used to describe those who believe, with a certain closed-mindedness or lack of imagination, that bitcoin is the most superior cryptocurrency. It’s used to describe those who are incapable of changing their mind on the subject.
Some other ways to think about the change in meaning are:

• The term went from describing those who “believe in” bitcoin maximalism to describing those who “believe in believing” in bitcoin maximalism.
• The term went from describing those who believe in bitcoin maximalism as a means to an end, to those who believe in bitcoin maximalism as an end in itself.

In the former case, the bitcoin maximalism was something grounded in reality. Bitcoin maximalism was thought to make sense because it would mean a better outcome for the world in one way or another.
In the latter case, the end is no longer grounded in reality. It is completely cyclical! Bitcoin maxi because bitcoin maxi because bitcoin maxi because… You get the idea.

Zooming in on the Transformation​

This transformation of meaning is pretty interesting. A natural thought is to wonder, why did it take place?
My thinking is that originally the term was used with the former less pejorative meaning because people thought there was a chance that bitcoin maximalism was a rationally defensible position.
Then, over time as the bitcoin maxi position fell to more and more faults, the term came to be used with the latter more pejorative meaning. People no longer saw bitcoin maximalism as a defensible position, and thus came to see bitcoin maxis thinking illogically and with a closed mind.
Why would people stick around with an indefensible position? Well, humans aren’t exactly the best at changing their minds; they like to stick to cached thoughts whether it be because of ties to their identity, community, sunk costs, etc.

Generalizing​

This phenomenon is not specific to bitcoin. What is the general pattern here?
Looking at the transformation that took place for bitcoin and the term’s current usage, we can generalize “maxi” to be a label for something which while typically supported as a means to an end, is instead supported as an end in itself.
An example of usage outside of crypto could be to describe a “vegan maxi”:

• A vegan is somebody who is plant-based as a means to an end. That end is typically some combination of animal ethics, environment, and health reasons. They are plant-based to the extent that it serves these goals.
• A vegan maxi is somebody who is vegan as an end in itself. They are vegan in order to be vegan. Their actions become disconnected from their impacts on animals, the environment, and health. Hypothetically, were it discovered that being vegan is worse for animals and the environment, vegan maxis would continue to be vegan.

The Problem With Being a Maxi​

The issue with being a maxi is self-evident. It implies irrational thinking which has lost its tethering to reality.
While one originally took on a belief to serve some purpose, it has since (for one reason or another) lost its connection to that purpose. And yet they continue to hold the belief!
The other day I was discussing the idea that “code is law” with a friend and we had to remind ourselves that the point of “code is law” should be something greater than itself. This helped us to frame our discussion in a lens more conducive to thinking.
All this to say that when evaluating beliefs, it’s worth thinking about whether they are maxi beliefs that no longer serve their original purpose. If so, you’d be best to rid yourself of them.

Spoiler: Book review (life is a dream, morality doesn't exist, our guy is an enlightened atheist)

Book Review: Spiritual Enlightenment: The Damnedest Thing​

Jan, 20 2023

I. Overview​

“Spiritual Enlightenment: The Damnedest Thing” is the first in a three part Spiritual Enlightenment series by Jed McKenna.
It’s quite unlike any other book I’ve read before. I came across it as it was recommended by a friend and appears on Naval’s recommended reading list. This review can’t do it justice, so I recommend picking up a copy for yourself. That being said, on with the review.
The premise of the book is to help you understand what it’s like to live life as an “enlightened” person and offer some advice for getting there if you so desire. The person in this case is Jed McKenna, the author of the book. It is written in a secular and no BS style which makes it a fun read.
Here are some of the ways he describes enlightenment:

• I’m defining spiritual enlightenment as truth-realization and that doesn’t require anything but purity of intent.
• Enlightenment is about truth, not about becoming a better or happier person.
• Enlightenment is the unprogrammed state. That’s a scary place to go.
• The enlightened view life as a dream.
• The enlightened don’t operate at the level of belief.
• Most people who claim to be enlightened and show the way, are not enlightened and pointing the wrong way.

II. On Becoming Enlightened​

As far as becoming enlightened goes, his suggestion is to apply a technique called Spiritual Autolysis.

Autolysis means self-digestion, and spiritual means… hell, I don’t really know. Let’s say it means that level of self which encompasses the mental, physical and emotional aspects. Put the two words together and you have a process through which you feed yourself, one piece at a time, into the purifying digestive fires.

All you have to do is write down what you know is true, or what you think is true, and keep writing until you’ve come up with something that is true. While it sounds pretty friendly at first, Jed describes it as a painful process:

It’s actually a painful and vicious process, somewhat akin to self-mutilation. It creates wounds that will never heal and burns bridges that can never be rebuilt and the only real reason to do it is because you can no longer stand not to.

Anyone headed for truth is going to get there over the ego’s dead body or not at all.

The thinking is that by actually questioning the truth, you will start to realize that most of what you believed to be true is actually false. And this can very quite painful.
Jed says that after going through this process long enough, you will wind up with the answer that there is no truth. But Jed emphasizes that being told the answer is very different from computing it yourself. Only in the latter case will you actually experience a change in the way you perceive the world.

If you want to benefit from knowledge, you have to own it for yourself and the only way to do that is to fight for it. Emerson said “No man thoroughly understands a truth until he has contended against it.” Having the answer isn’t enough. You have to do the math.

Here are examples of things that you can’t really know to be true:

• That you weren’t born 5 seconds ago
• That anybody else actually exists
• That you will wake up tomorrow and experience the rest of your life
• That the laws of physics will continue functioning in the next minute
• That morality is real (i.e. that good and bad exist)

While many of these examples are ideas that people will have considered, most people haven’t taken seriously the possibility of them being false. The typical reaction is to see one of these ideas and dismiss the possibility of their being false as silly, ridiculous, or impossible.
A powerful idea is that of Descrate’s Evil Demon:

This evil demon is imagined to present a complete illusion of an external world, so that Descartes can say, “I shall think that the sky, the air, the earth, colours, shapes, sounds and all external things are merely the delusions of dreams which he has devised to ensnare my judgement. I shall consider myself as not having hands or eyes, or flesh, or blood or senses, but as falsely believing that I have all these things.”

To reiterate: for all you know you are in a dream and nothing that you believe to exist actually exists. What if it’s the case that every good thing you perceive yourself as doing is actually something bad at the base layer of reality? How can you possibly exclude this possibility? (Fun fact about Descartes is that even after presenting this idea he claimed the ability to prove the existence of god.)
Overall, this way of seeing the world resembles Pyrrhonian skepticism. Just because something is the type of thing which gets remembered as true does not make it true.
One thing Jed emphasizes is that you can’t rely on a teacher to hold your hand the entire way. You’ve got to find your way on your own with purity of intent. Society is designed such that the passive action is that of the blue pill. If you want the red pill, you’re going to have to actively seek it out yourself.

The first rule in this business is that you are on your own. Ego clings to a teacher like a drowning man clings to a log.

Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.

III. “Emptying Somebody Out”​

Jed talks about how you need to “empty somebody out” before they can be “filled back in”. If you dismantle somebody’s false preconceptions too quickly, they’ll simply scurry back to wherever they came from. This means retreating to whatever semantic stopsigns they have been filled with in the past.

A semantic stopsign or curiosity stopper is a meaningless, generic explanation that creates the illusion of giving an answer, without actually explaining anything. Semantic stopsigns destroy curiosity, giving surrogate answers and stopping the search for truth prematurely. Can preserve incorrect beliefs for a long time, insisting on following cached thought without rethinking anything. A tool of dark arts and an important part of any anti-epistemology.

I don’t have enough experience in real life with the difficulty of unmooring people from their semantic stopsigns to really understand it, but it seems to check out. Jed offers a peace of advice here:

Just a little heads up, Jolene. People don’t like to have their version of reality fucked with. Try it if you still need to get it out of your system, but prepare yourself for unpleasant results.

Many athiests today scoff at religious people for believing in unfalsifiable ideas, but Jed levies this same argument against athiests and sees it as just another religion. Some of the largest sources of semantic stopsigns today are religion and athiesm.

The genius of athiesm is that it feigns not believing in a higher power, but really you are still believing in something else, be in humanism or nationalism, etc.

Religion is the opiate of the masses.

Socrates used to call popular beliefs “the monsters under the bed” - only useful for frightening children with.

Possessing the ability not to see truth, now that’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.

“It’s all contradictions. Whitman said, ‘Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes.'”

IV. Enlightenment and Rationality​

While reading the book I kept making connections between Jed’s point of view and that of the rationality community - both have a strong desire to rid themselves of false beliefs.
Rationalists like to follow the Litany of Hodgell: “That which can be destroyed by the truth should be”. Jed has his own similar expression: “Destroy everything. Burn it all. Nothing false will survive. Nothing true will perish.".
I think Jed takes it one step further than the rationalists. In some sense the rationality community is clinging on to the semantic stopsign of bayes rule and empiricism, while Jed lights even those on fire and declares truth as non-existent.

V. Living as an Enlightened Person​

One interesting aspect of the book is that you got to learn about how Jed, an “enlightened” one, goes about living his life.
His lifestyle is relatively simple. He lives in a house and mainly just hangs out without trying to satisfy some higher purpose. He watches TV and plays video games like a normal person. People who are trying to become enlightened will stop by occasionally and ask him to offer them guidance, and he’ll help when he feels like it.

I play video games, read books, watch movies. I’d say I probably blow several hours a day that way, but I don’t see it as a waste because I don’t have anything better to spend my time on. I couldn’t put it to better use because I’m not trying to become something or accomplish anything. I have no dissatisfaction to drive me, no ambition to draw me. I’ve done what I came to do. I’m just killing time ‘til time kills me.

The thing I like about this description is that it is consistent with the view of “nothing matters” and perfect tranquility. Sometimes people will suggest that you can be both perfectly free from desire and work on improving the world, but those properties seem contradictory. If you are free from desire, why would you do anything or help anyone? You might do something “just because why not”, but there’s no actual “reason” for you to do anything at that point. You might as well go meditate in a cave.
He also describes what it’s like for him to interact with other people:

I have a very distinct impression of life as a stage drama, and I find it endlessly mystifying that anyone truly identifies with their character.

I can’t stand in line at the grocery and carry on a normal conversation if it gets much past the weather. I can’t go to a bar and have a beer and shoot a game of pool because I can’t pretend to share the experiences and interests of the other patrons. There’s no commonality.

The main idea here is that he has become so separated from the memes and beliefs that inhabit other people, that he has begun to lose the ability to communicate. The ability to sympathize and communicate comes from shared programming, but he no longer shares the same programming. He started to see himself as somewhat of an alien compared to other people.
At one point one of his students, Arthur, is asking for guidance on becoming enlightened and “the path with heart”. Their conversation is interesting:

“Let me state it plainly, Arthur: I don’t do heart. To the extent that I advocate any path, it is a path without heart, devoid of compassion, totally free of any thought for others whatsoever. The thinking is simple: Wake up first. Wake up, and then you can double back and perhaps be of some use to others if you still have the urge. Wake up first, with pure and unapologetic selfishness, or you’re just another shipwreck victim floundering in the ocean and all the compassion in the world is of absolutely no use to the other victims floundering around you. Resolve your own situation first, and then maybe your compassion will translate into something of value to others. I suppose that sounds cruel or unspiritual or whatever, but it only works the way it works. Make sense?”
Arthur nods thoughtfully. “It sounds like you’re saying I may not even want to think of helping others once I myself am liberated.”
“I don’t know. Maybe, maybe not. Depends on how you’re wired, I suppose. You see what I do, this teaching thing, right?” He nods. “Maybe you’ll do something like this. Maybe you’ll teach. Or, maybe you’ll go back to building bridges and just keep it to yourself.”

This supports the idea that there is no rhyme or reason to what you do afterwards. You just choose something to do arbitrarily.
Here’s another passage that helps understand how Jed lives his life. He doesn’t try to fake being some mindful happy spiritual teacher:

Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh says that there are two ways to wash the dishes. The first is to wash the dishes in order to have clean dishes. The other is to wash the dishes in order to wash the dishes. I do it in order to wash the dishes, but since I spend maybe an hour a week in this attempt at mindfulness, I figure it’s best not to make myself out as being a real in-the-moment kind of guy. Many very bright people seem to agree that there’s a great deal to be said for mindful action, but except for an occasional stint at the kitchen sink, I’m not one of them. Nor do I think of myself as one of those simple people who takes pleasure in the little things. In fact, if I can get back upstairs before Chris or anyone else snags me for some conversation, then I’ll be spending the rest of my evening with Lara Croft battling our way together through perilous Himalayan monasteries in search of the Dagger of Xian.

Having learned a bit about how Jed lives his life, it’s clear that he sees the world very differently from the average person. It’s reasonable to say that those who become enlightened become “insane” by the standards of society.

VI. The Point of Life​

One passage in particular stuck with me after reading this book. Jed was at a campfire with some of his housemates when one of them, a pretty sincere guy named Brendan, asked Jed what the meaning of life is. Brendan tossed out the question casusally in a way suggesting that he considered it unanswereable, so Jed let it go at the time.
Later on when the discussion moved to a more philosophical one, Jed brought it back up.

“Okay Brendan,” Jed says. He looks startled to be singled out. “What’s the answer to your question?”
“I, uh, I don’t know. What question?”
“The meaning of life. Didn’t you ask me what the meaning of life was?”
“Um, well yeah, I was just, uh, joking. I didn’t really expect…um, an answer or anything.”
“Why not?” I address my comments to the whole group. “Why shouldn’t we ask what the meaning of life is? Hell, shouldn’t that be, like, the first thing we ask? Why should that of all questions be a joke? What are we, livestock? How can we do anything until that most fundamental of all questions is answered?”

Brendan’s treatment of the point of life matches the way I see most people treat it, while Jed’s response showed me how ridiculous this is.
As an example, sometimes I ask people what the point of life is, and the most common answer is “42”. “42” is a joke answer to the question and reinforces the meme that it deserves to be treated as a joke. But how can we do anything until that most fundamental of all questions is answered?

VII. Should You Try to Become Enlightened?​

A natural question is: What kind of person becomes enlightened? Should you try to become enlightened? Here’s Jed’s view:

I would advise anyone who didn’t absolutely have to leave to just head back in and enjoy it while it lasts. The good and the bad. The white and the black.

As far as his own journey, he describes it as follows:

I started struggling with cogito ergo sum in my early teens. Throughout my teens and into my twenties I wrote short stories and essays that were trial assaults on the nature of reality, which helped me bring my thinking into focus.

I like happiness as much as the next guy, but it’s not happiness that sends one in search of truth. It’s rabid, feverish, clawing madness to stop being a lie, regardless of price, come heaven or hell.

I severed all ties—no job, no friends, no family—and had only a few possessions. I did nothing else. I had no other thought. I went for long walks, thinking, pounding away at whichever door I was stuck behind at.

When I myself went through this experience I knew it was immense. I knew it was uncommon in the extreme. I knew it was the supreme accomplishment beside which all others paled to insignificance. I could look at or listen to any person and know instantly that they hadn’t been through it. And yet, I wasn’t to know for years that it was enlightenment.

With that, I guess it’s up to you where you take things from here.

He deleted his Twitter account and recreated it under the same name last month, so previous tweets are not available. He also deleted all his Github contributions, but left his photo up:

He's had some etiquette instruction; he holds his glass and plate with one hand while leaving the other free to shake hands. If the picture is not flipped, he's left-handed.

Gavin Kliger has a Substack, I guess if you want to know about him you can read it.

Ethan Shaotran is another San Francisco AI guy. He was a Harvard senior while running an AI startup in 2024. Congratulations on graduating and/or dropping out, Ethan! [link|archive]



I've found a a lot of what they're trying to hide, but I haven't even started to read it all yet. Most of it's technical stuff and self-promotion. I'm already getting off topic for the Elon thread; I may have to start one on our new overlords.

 

[karz]

A new Wired report has identified six of the DOGE twinks. Wired is paywalled so I'll quote it from

If I'm reading this right, Elon has (at least one) Indian and several ballwashers volunteering for him at DOGE, compiling a list of Federal civil service employees to fire.
Pack it up boys, we're in the era of the FedJanny. And they're working for free.