Wondermark

As illustrated in this classic comic: http://wondermark.com/601/

I am suddenly reminded of the sealion Wondermark (http://wondermark.com/1k62/). Anyway, "tech" was absolutely not built with group conversations, discussions, and debates. Debates are just ways to show off how smart you are. Tech was mostly built by people who went and did things, and if you didn't like what they were doing, you could either comply or leave. Which they discovered was a great way to get things done. So then they expanded that to every other possible realm which is why you have to "fit the culture" to work in tech. And why we're having this discussion.

I highly recommend wondermark in general. The “Sick Elephant” running gag in 2019 was a stroke of genius: http://wondermark.com/c1414/ And “in which there is quite the selection” runs through my head every time i go to the nice packie and try to buy a beer http://wondermark.com/515/

> How many examples would it take to convince you? Hundreds, at least. It's been a consistent conservative tactic for decades, to the point where it is unremarkable. Unremarkable does not mean acceptable. See also Trump's lies. Trump lies so often that it's not worth noting each instance. > And do you think it's possible for humans to claim they are being altruistic or inclusive, while actually being primarily hateful, deceitful, and destructive? Sure, and it's also possible to sea lion a discussion while claiming to be reasonable. http://wondermark.com/1k62/ I judge that based on outcome and intent.

http://wondermark.com/1k62/ I'm a big fan of the Socratic approach but when people use it as a cudgel they're usually less interested in the answer than in positioning themselves as the questioning authority for the emotional impact upon an audience. Watch a B movie with the sound off or a foreign language film with no subtitles; you may not be able to follow the plot that well but you can easily tell who is supposed to be winning or losing each scene by observing the characters' demeanor. Same dynamic often obtains in internet arguments.

I think the problem is some people don't just unfollow when they don't like tweets, they start a flame war. Worse, they will attack people they don't follow because one of their friend retweeted something for the sake of starting a flame war. Add to that the fact that 140 characters are not enough to put nuances and develop an argument, and you get an environment that fosters trolls. It's not limited to a specific way of thinking (i.e. SJW) http://wondermark.com/1k62/ This is a direct consequence of the way twitter works with everything public, retweeting, etc.

This [1] doesn't concentrate on kerning as such, but it is my favourite typeface-related comic strip. [1] http://wondermark.com/650/

This whole thread is just a great example of this comic: http://wondermark.com/1k62/

The plural of anecdote is data, so FWIW I'm exactly the opposite: not just for textbooks, but even for hardcover literature books I have right there in my bookshelf, I often end up digging up some PDF or Google Books version regardless. I guess I miss the scrolling/zooming, plus all the meta-textual, cross-referencing stuff like having multiple copies of the book in different sections side by side, easy access to references and definitions, etc. What one finds 'classical' is highly relative: remember Socrates famously despised books as a degrading and pernicious medium, for one [1]. [1] http://wondermark.com/socrates-vs-writing/

David Malki of the web comic Wondermark invented a game called "Restoration Hogwash:" http://wondermark.com/restoration-hogwash/ - http://wondermark.com/restoration-redux/ One player selects a catalog item and covers up the description; the other players each write a description that they think fits, and then everyone tries to guess which hilariously overwrought description is the original. One of his commenters pointed out that “There are 72 different items [in the catalog] which are described as being made from wood from ‘100-year old buildings in Great Britain’.” There must have been a sale at Home Depot. He ran a modified version on his blog in which commenters try to describe an item, and he showed them which other item they had actually described. Very funny stuff.

> I thought the OP was a joke, BTW. Well balls to you too, I guess? Or not. We're all just trying to have a good time here. And from the look of this thread, people are having fun. I think golfing fizzbuzz into an unreadable mess sorta misses the point, but most people here are software engineers because they love to code and build stuff. So let's enjoy the moment. > why on earth would one want to hire somebody who loves complexity for its own sake? You remind me of: http://wondermark.com/333/ It's not complexity for its own stake. I daresay the functional patterns tend to be simpler. Certainly moreso than things like Visitor or AbstractFactory. > To me, the following is the clearest way to express this (in C anyway). I suppose it says a lot about me! Your version is almost identical to the Ruby version I listed. And it's an appropriate solution for C.

Good work. You should do an instructable if you have not already. People who share their work make the internet (and the world) great. Always remember your maker rules: http://wondermark.com/tink8/

As usual, Wondermark said it best: http://wondermark.com/368/

My evaluation is that the original usage of the "sealioning" accusation was indeed as a generic dismissive, and its application was dishonest as well; I don't accept the term as a well-founded descriptor of troll behavior in the first place. If you look at the original comic[1], the sea lion follows the couple around in public, into their house, and even into their bedroom, without permission; that is what makes the sea lion's behavior bad (criminal, in fact). However, "sealioning" in practice refers to people responding to public internet comments with other public internet comments. To treat the latter like the former is dishonest. Furthermore, the sea lion is objecting to unsubstantiated criticism of his species, which is a form of bigotry. Imagine people searching Twitter for criticism of, say, their race or religion and arguing back at it. I suspect that 90+% of those who complain about "sealioning" would consider that behavior permissible and probably downright virtuous (and would add that the arguing-back need not be scrupulously polite). I'm frankly surprised that "social justice"-associated people managed to decide that objecting to speciesism was worthy of mockery. I think they just really wanted some term of disparagement for their opponents, and happily accepted this one when it appeared without analyzing it too closely. [1] http://wondermark.com/c/2014-09-19-1062sea.png

I disagree - the truth should never be harmed because lies are dressed in fancy clothes and the truth is a madman running through the streets in rags. I am totally fine with bad faith actors making ad hominem attacks since it weakens their argument, but responses made in good faith should keep it civil to not erode their own argument. By the way, I can sympathize with you somewhat as this can essentially lead to sealioning[1] and that is extremely common elsewhere on the internet. But with strong moderation and flagging mechanics that actually work quickly on HN obvious sealioning can be quickly called out and quashed. I understand that some folks get their jollies by making low effort arguments and forcing others to put thought and time into crafting a well formulated counter argument - this will happen on the internet and it can be depressing to realize it after the fact but I think it's still worth it to try and craft well structured[2] responses when you can. I don't actually disagree with this statement: > Falsehoods do not deserve equal footing to truth. and if I were running a talk-show called Hacker News then I wouldn't invite on folks with obviously racist viewpoints, but this is an internet forum where we can't pre-emptively screen participants. So I'd argue it's less about putting falsehoods on equal footing to the truth and more about making sure the truth of the truth isn't eroded by it coming out of a poor mouthpiece that biases opinions against it. If…

Frankly, intelligence is not very high on my list of attributes I value in people. Plenty of terrible people are intelligent. And although I'm not deeply versed on the collective works of Yarvin/Moldbug, I know enough from osmosis, and also that, a) dark enlightenment type discussions that I've witnessed on Reddit et al. over the past few years — which have seemingly morphed into today's alt-right — are downright nauseating in their toxicity, and b) "roleplaying" and/or "it was just a joke" is one of the most disingenuous and overused excuses on the internet today. I equally loathe Thiel's ideas, and he appears to be closely tied to the project. There's really not much wiggle room here, even if the tech is great. Tribalism. Is something like GNU equally tribalistic, then? Are we not permitted to shape the world by selectively choosing which personalities and projects will help us towards a better future? Tech by itself is worthless; it's the people who handle it and the social contexts in which it exists that make all the difference. As for debate, there's the sea lion principle[1][2]. Unfortunately, with some genres of ideas, prim and proper debate is simply impossible. You're pitting reason against waves of the unreasonable. It is a war of attrition and you will lose. It makes no difference to me whether any one particular person will "dig in to their beliefs and decide for [themselves]". I am personally not concerned with changing hearts and minds, but as a member of…

> What's the logic behind that distinction? If a child stumbles into a pond and drown, or is mauled by a wild coyote, will you let them die on the basis of non-interference? Great point, you got me there. All life forms being equal, then yes if I adhered to my own system I suppose I would have to silently watch a child get mauled by a coyote. Obviously, I wouldn't take it that far, so perhaps there's more criteria to the decisions than I'm admitting or able to even dig out of my psyche at the moment. I'll think about this. Your other points about utilitarian math are well-taken, and perhaps I misunderstood you there. > If I follow that logic and extend my caring to insects, I should care about all insects. So if you care about starving children, and apply the same rules you apply to children to insects, you'd be donating a lot to charity, basically. Makes sense =]. So once again, my live-and-let-die attitude towards insects is at odds with my "help unfortunate members of humanity" "morality." Another good point (granted, I don't donate much to charity, but if I did, I would probably donate to poor/starving people as opposed to insect charities). > I'm a dumb ape who tries (and even maybe succeeds) to be logical sometimes, my moral 'system' is a hodge-podge of intuition, rule-based and consequentialist thinking, I don't claim I have found a fully logical moral system. This is probably the most coherent, self-aware moral system I've heard. Most people try to ascribe…

Unsurprisingly, your reply has demonstrated typical leftist techniques, such as selective omission, dismissal, and strawman, complete with the standard condescending attitude. > Your example quotes Schneider as recommending honesty, explicitly, while admitting the utility of simplifying the story for the public. Not really an example of what you were claiming. False. This is an example of selective omission and dismissal. Let's look again at what Schneider actually said: "We have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have....Each of us has to decide the right balance between being effective and being honest." The last sentence, speaking of a balance, implies that being honest is not effective, and being effective requires being dishonest. He says that each scientist has to decide for himself how dishonest he is justified in being in order to "get some broad-based support, to capture the public’s imagination...getting loads of media coverage." You couch his words as "recommending honesty," while he actually recommended dishonesty, believing that it is justified by "the risk of potentially disastrous climatic change." You see, when it comes to honesty, it's a binary: you're either honest or you're not. Anything less than 1.0 is dishonest. A scientist ought to be ethically obligated to be completely, 100% honest--because this is what the public expects, and because, since he is a human with…

> I quit energy drinks cold turkey https://wondermark.com/c/389/

> I haven't seen any. Could you give me an example? Sure, here's a few: https://wondermark.com/c/1062/

I generally like it, too, but on my iPhone that very first sentence puts a spotlight in the lack of an 'fl' ligature in the word, "influence". Now I'm reconsidering my resolve to look for AI slop - my enthusiasm for topography is getting in the way. https://wondermark.com/c/650/

did u just mansplain mansplaining lmao Thank you for sea lioning techbros though this was beautiful. https://wondermark.com/c/1062/

This was predicted 16 years ago: https://wondermark.com/c/377/ (Honourable mention to https://wondermark.com/c/782/, from 14 years ago)

Oh, you're sealioning. It's cute that you think we don't recognise it for what it is. https://wondermark.com/c/1062/

> Sealioning (also sea-lioning and sea lioning) is a type of trolling or harassment that consists of pursuing people with relentless requests for evidence, often tangential or previously addressed, while maintaining a pretense of civility and sincerity ("I'm just trying to have a debate"), and feigning ignorance of the subject matter. It may take the form of "incessant, bad-faith invitations to engage in debate", and has been likened to a denial-of-service attack targeted at human beings. The term originated with a 2014 strip of the webcomic Wondermark by David Malki, which The Independent called "the most apt description of Twitter you'll ever see". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning The comic strip in question is actually adorably absurd: http://wondermark.com/1k62/

Someone apparently once built a 200 horsepower steam-powered trombone: https://wondermark.com/true-stuff-the-steam-trombone/

As a counterpoint, people acting in bad faith can continue asking questions. It's usually known as "sealioning" https://wondermark.com/c/1k62/

"Sea Lion" comment/question. It's a distraction. http://wondermark.com/1k62/

You're not even replying to the right person, dude. He didn't say it. I did. It comes from this: http://wondermark.com/1k62/ Look at what that thing is saying, then look at what you said. *PERFECT MATCH*. You really have no idea how much people hate this, do you?