LastThursday

What gadgets, devices, things do you love that you own? I'm thinking usefulness, beauty, or sentimental attachment, and why? Here's my list: Sony eReader PRS-505 - old and was gathering dust in a drawer until I ressurected recently. But I always liked the look and physical weight and feel of the thing, it's such a good design. The software is dated and slow, but the fact I can store bookcases full of books still blows my mind. Modern readers' design are not a patch on it. Dell XPS15 laptop - seems corny because everyone has a laptop nowadays. Unfortunately the execution was dreadful, I've replaced its charging port, battery twice, and recently keyboard and the nice "soft touch" covering has disintegrated, and it's got Windows 10. And yet, despite all that it's so incredibly useful, carbon fibre, light, and got a powerful graphics card and processor. Everything is snappy and the aesthetic design is nice with it's aluminium casing. I love it and hate it. Galaxy mobile phone - what can I say? Just for Google maps alone it's proved its worth, I will never be lost again. It is a double-edged sword, because I can be contacted at all times (I remember a time before mobile phones). But the idea that a futuristic looking slab of glass and plastic in my pocket can bring up anything I like, contact anyone I like and, take me wherever I like, will never get old. Gold pocket watch - when I was a kid my dad had a simple pocket watch and I was always fascinated by it. I finally got my own one for my birthday from a now ex girlfriend a good 15 years ago or more. It's a thing of beauty with a gold cover with a small round window in it to see the time at a glance, and two clicks of the button first opens the front cover and then the back cover, like a butterfly, with the back side of the watch being completely see through, the cogs and wheels ticking and churning away. It's so incredibly anachronistic and I don't want to ever damage it, that I've had no excuse to ever wear it. If I ever do Victorian fancy dress, then I'll jump at the chance!

Pick up is not so different from advertising. In pick up you're advertising yourself in bite-sized chunks to whoever is willing to listen to your spiel. Most advertising is unsolicited, because it has to be, even if it's targeted. Is this conscious? Yes and no. No, because it's indiscriminate, maybe even harrassment at some level. Yes, because there are some who want your product. Because of that ambiguity most advertising has strict standards on what is acceptable. Who sets the standards for pick up? You do. But in essence you want to say "hi this is what you're getting, do you like it?", and you have to be attuned enough to understand what "no" means and walk away if not.

@Loveeee I don't believe you have a mind. Then again I'm just seeking attention, from a zombie.

So what are the words "hate", "hot" and "ladies" referring to then?

That's a start. We will beat the mysogyny out of you (metaphorically, mods don't give me warning points). Women don't "choose" to be hot as much as they don't "choose" to be ugly, or anything in between, all those judgements are in the eye of the beholder.

I feel strange mansplaining the following: Men and women are socially agreed constructs, if not consciously created. Biologically and in nearly all cases, there is a sharp enough distinction between men and women, that it's simple enough to apply the categories - because biological differences are one of the ways we define the ideas of "man" and "woman". But biology is not the only factor, there is also gender. Gender involves identity, expression, cultural norms, presentation, self-understanding. There are a very small minority of people who wish to take on different gender tropes than their biology suggests. (good we need diversity) It should be noted that "man" and "woman" are constructs and not god-given, and as such have to be socially agreed upon. I am a man not because of my biology, but because the label "man" is applied to my biological characteristics as well as my (learned) gender characteristics - after the fact. (I realise this is exactly what @Lila9 said, but I felt the need to mansplain myself)

It's unknowable until it happens. What's an almost certainty is that "you" are a hallucination, and the hallucination will dissolve, probably at physical death. It's an almost certainty you will have a physical death.

A few more good episodes

This is good series explaining how evolution is able to create complexity without a designer. The series is not complete yet. This is the original video that triggered the series above, interesting in its own right.

Seemingly, based on my intepretation of your post, you don't tolerate others' differences.

I have many thoughts while reading this and I don't know what is true. I quite like the idea of seeing things as the mind/body system, one affecting the other reciprocally. Thoughts (mind) trigger sensations in my body (lethargy), but my body also triggers thoughts in my mind (I'm depressed). States such as depression are then maintained by the system continually cycling between mind and body triggers. Therapy then involves interrupting the patterns of either one: do intense exercise, or talk about happy things. On the other hand mind is such a nebulous thing to grab on to. At least the sensations in and behaviour of the body are more overt. It could even be that mind is just an epiphenomenon of the body, and itself has no influence over anything; it's just a "projection" of the body's inner workings. In this case rumination about lack of control would just be embodied first and then projected into mind as a way to bring this to awareness (i.e. the body talks to itself). The first paragraph explains what therapy aims to do: break ingrained patterns in the system as a whole. The second explains why "just talking and thinking" can be largely ineffectual for many problems: because the problem is in the body, not the mind.

More accurately it should be truths not Truth. It's not like Truth is some fundamental substance filling the universe. It's about seeing the world as much as possible for what it actually is, with clarity. There are truths to be understood and accepted, and not obscured by beliefs, stories and ideas about how things should be. Some truths are in plain sight, but are hard to see - work needs to be done to uncover the truths.

don't they say ignorance is bliss? being smart breaks the magic of life by being shown the trick of how things actually work. being smart also means being aware of the bigger picture and how you lack choice and control in a lot things. that feeling of loss of control can give you depression. but being even smarter allows you to counteract being emotionally triggered by thoughts and circumstances and take back some control over your state.

My shortlist: VirtualBox - computer in a computer VirtualDub - quick and simple video editing, conversion and effects FontForge - design new or manipulate existing fonts Upscayl - AI image enhancement ChatGPT/Deepseek - (free version obviously) mostly for coding or philosphising Google Maps on mobile - probably the most mindblowing

I don't know what you mean 😉

Correlation is not causation as they say. Never trust anything on video in any case. The wizard with his cutlery is most likely using induction heating to melt the metal. Notice how its the thinnest parts that melt first.

@Oppositionless I reckon he's got some gizmo up his sleeve.

Rationality is done by minds. It's coherence, cause and effect, B because of A, explanation, narrative, science. Rationality is a subset of reality though, everything else is irrational until proven otherwise. Existence itself is irrational, qualia are irrational, consciousness is irrational, whether others are conscious or not is irrational, electrons are irrational.

Why is it always metal cutlery? It's almost certainly a trick. I want to see pencils snapping, biros bent into pretzels, paperclips straightened out, matches catching alight, something with more imagination! And, I want to see all that without the thing being touched. I want the guy to wear a T-shirt, none of your wizardy long sleeves.

When I play Chess online I have two separate accounts. Originally I had just the one account with my name on it, clearly a male. I've played many thousands of games on each account. Out of curiosity and because I'm sometimes a devilish imp, I decided to create a female version of myself (CharlotteHarper if you want to play me on chess.com!). It's probably against their rules, oops, go me. Typically as these things happen I started to get the higher rating on the female account, and so I ended up playing mostly with that account. What did I notice between the two accounts? The difference was like night and day. To keep up with the charade and for testing purposes I always accept all friend requests on both accounts. Currently Charlotte me has 1488 "friends", Guillermo me has 7 - and of those, three of them I actually know. The female account gets plenty of private messages daily, some of them hilarious and eye opening. The male account has hardly any messages. The female account often gets chat requests in the middle of a game, I very rarely answer, but if I do and if things get too flirty I have to bat them off and say "I have a boyfriend" or "I'm married" or I talk about what their country is like to visit or some such shit to put them off. Now don't get me wrong, I know that what I'm doing is deception, and that's why I mostly ignore 99% of messages, but the imp sometimes wins. Don't trust anyone on the internet kids. Here are some of the amusing messages Charlotte has had on there, bearing in mind that I've had no previous contact with these people, and the only thing they've got to go on is a picture of Charlotte Harper (AI generated). The shit women have to put up with! "Hello, could I send you money just to please you? Thank you" "are you a girl or an angel 💕" "its Daniel from India .. but living in canada" "Let’s play. I want to lower my competition" "Sorry, you need to play more accurately." "Hello, for more information and friendship, you can send me a message. Here is my email address: xxxx. See you soon!" "My name is Kenneth I know this might sound a bit bold since we’re just meeting, but I wanted to be honest from the start. You caught my attention not just because you're beautiful, but because there’s something calm and confident about you. I didn’t want to let the chance pass without saying something. I’d like to get to know you better, not just from a distance but in a more intentional way. If you're open to it, I'd love the opportunity to take you out sometime and see where things could go. No pressure just genuine interest and respect." "May I get to know you better?" "You beautiful girl in world" "You are the most beautiful girl I have seen" "I need to ask u something important" "I watch your game not bad, bit I noticed some few things maybe I can assist" "I want to be friends. Can we talk on WhatsApp?" "You seem like someone I’d love to get to know better" "🌹🌹🌹" "I love you" "I didn't mean to disturb you. But your smile is amazing" "Hello sweetie 😘" "hi dear lets play" "hello pretty girl!" "Wow, your smile is radiant!" "Hello dear , how you doing pls i need your help" "Good Evening Dear Sweet Friend" "My Queen!😍" "Hi beauty" "are you single" "Your smile is as bright as the sun" "Are you a model? You're very pretty!" "Do you have insta?" "UR NUDES PRICE" "Hey Charlotte. How old are you and where are you from?" "wow how beauti,, you.." "Pass me your instagram" "By the way, your beauty is impressive" "If I could disappear and be transferred from one place to another, I would definitely come to you." "Longing, you know how my penis is right" "I want to be your husband"

I think it'll be good to get out things that arise and put them down in written form. I have so many lost thoughts and ideas, and some of them were very good.

Enlightenment is a dripping tap, not Niagra falls.

Yes yes, but by telling us "think about what you're doing" you're encouraging the very thing you're arguing against. Your advice is just self-help in disguise.

@CARDOZZO you asked us a sensible question, we open up and give you genuine answers, you castigate us for those answers. We've got to start from somewhere, as normies, and go from there, there will be people at many different stages here. And, the work isn't done on this forum, which is an informal chaotic place, it's done IRL. Anyone looking in here will get a very distorted shallow picture of what's really going on. A stage turqoise saint isn't going to announce their presence at all, they will look and sound normal.

Funny you should say that, I have vivid dreams and good recall. I used to maintain a dream diary for a while. I stopped because I was waking in the middle of the night and making quick notes of my dreams, but that was making me tired in the day. I need a better system. What do you think can be realised from dreams?