Stephen Pimentel
@StephenPiment
Followers
9,897
Following
1,731
Media
1,671
Statuses
103,033
Engineer and essayist: @palladiummag , @mansworldmag_ , @AntigoneJournal , @TheSideViewCo . Classics, political philosophy, governance futurism, AI.
San Francisco Bay Area
Joined October 2012
Don't wanna be here?
Send us removal request.
Pinned Tweet
The Disclosure of Hermes
The Circe episode in the Odyssey points to the root of Greek culture and philosophy.
A 🧵 on my essay for
@AntigoneJournal
.
6
38
123
In the United States, about 40,000 people were lobotomized, with the procedure reaching its peak of popularity in 1949.
Crazy how there can fads for radical surgical procedures that we later view as unneeded and harmful.
301
2K
14K
Listened to Lex Fridman interviewing John Mearsheimer.
The chief thing it convinced me of is that Fridman is a dimwit. Constantly repeating platitudes. Highly brainwormed.
207
80
2K
Winston Churchill's chief strategic goal was the defense of the British Empire.
If one looks at the British Empire in 1910, when Churchill was 36, and compares it to the UK at the time of his death in 1965, it is unambiguously clear that he failed in this goal.
144
155
2K
Students at Harvard now struggle to read The Scarlet Letter, a novel that was once one of those most commonly taught in high schools.
133
292
2K
@newrepublic
“We couldn’t catch Rufo committing plagiarism or anything actually bad, so we’ll shit on him for getting his master’s from Harvard Extension School, even though the latter is, you know, actually run by Harvard.”
16
44
2K
The operational definition of “fascist” is “whatever Western intellectuals don’t like.” This is an iron law, and there is no Indian exception.
17
363
2K
The Greeks had a word, ἀπειροκαλία, literally “inexperience with beauty.” It’s usually translated “want of taste,” “tastelessness,” or “shamelessness.”
Andrew Tate is an extreme example of this vice. BAP is the opposite.
48
79
1K
We had two shots at breaking out of the Great Stagnation: nuclear power and AI.
Climate activists effectively killed nuclear power (and our best hope of slowing climate change).
Now a strangely similar ideology is trying to kill AI.
48
163
940
VDARE has been shut down by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Key issue was their refusal to comply with subpoenas for emails that would have doxxed anon contributors. Important lesson here for anons and opsec when contributing to any publication, even good guys.
24
212
944
Their “capacities are different,” says the Harvard Dean and English professor, resorting to pathetic euphemism. She cannot bring herself to say the obvious: “They can’t read.”
18
73
908
The very opposite is true: current textbooks are mostly crap, and increasingly so.
Read old books, the older the better, going back to Homer.
It's time to say it again:
There is no need to read the classics because the textbook treatments of their ideas are perfectly sufficient.
Have you ever met a physicist who said that you should read Newton's Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica?
292
59
820
55
84
884
@FischerKing64
The difference is that historic empires did it in their provinces, not in their homelands.
Modern Western elites do it in their homelands — because they think of them as provinces.
25
51
705
This is rationalism in a nutshell: an autistic focus on the first-order consequences of one’s mental model (which one mistakenly deems clever), combined with an autistic inability to observe and weigh second-order consequences.
53
55
665
As Bukele has shown, this is an easy problem to solve, if one wants to.
U.S. elites don’t want to.
16
86
562
Many goods undergo deflation rather than inflation. The goods most subject to inflation (education, healthcare, housing) are those that receive the most federal subsidies.
Watching Home Alone and realized pizza has escaped inflation.
10 pizzas at $12 a pop—I think pizza prices may have actually gone down.
58
86
880
19
114
477
@GadSaad
Very revealing. American evangelicals in red states are among the strongest supports of Israel, stronger than many liberal Jews, and yet Gad nevertheless targets them. He can't let go of the imaginary coalition in his head.
7
14
455
@eshear
It's not important what I believe.
Why the Harvard dean of undergraduates, who is also an English professor, would report in print that her students cannot read The Scarlet Letter, even at a sentence level, is a more interesting question.
5
8
453
The Apple Lisa operating system (1984) was written in Pascal. It was an important milestone in Graphical User Interfaces and is now available as open source.
16
119
461
It’s working precisely as one should expect. If you tax something, you get less of it. If you subsidize something, you get more of it. If your expectations are different, that’s a you problem.
19
60
430
@EllaTravelsLove
This is not about an individual Harvard president; it’s about the institution itself.
And it’s not about antisemitism; it’s about the progressive ideology of regime elites.
21
29
430
@Steve_Sailer
What ludicrous scapegoating. Kotlowitz never explains what “resources” whites “used up.” He just strains to blame social dysfunction on those no longer there.
11
11
423
@paulg
I don't feel bound by any taboo on that. I'd be happy to say it if I thought it were true.
But I don't think it's true. At some emotional level, many find it deeply unsatisfactory to believe that Kennedy was killed by a loner, but I think it's actually the case.
50
9
409
@FischerKing64
Pervasive phenomenon in American culture. Middle class people want to “feel like” they’re being charitable, even when the assistance is visibly fake.
And you’re a “bad person” if you point out the obvious way in which it’s fake.
7
17
384
Those who argue otherwise based on Britain’s “victory” in the two world wars are deceived by the surface of events.
14
5
367
@burkov
It’s even worse than that. The underlying model of Gemini is actually quite good. Google then deliberately skewed its output with prompt injection, as if executing an attack on themselves.
7
6
351
@rickperlstein
Which part is evil? The part where people who really have committed plagiarism face consequences? If Ruffo agreed that white males who commit plagiarism should also face consequences –– which he does –– is it still evil?
5
13
344
@FischerKing64
When female politicians keep inviting in sexually aggressive, foreign young men and calling it an ‘opportunity,’ it makes you think — maybe there’s something else going on here.
1
20
319
The book “Selective Breeding and the Birth of Philosophy” by
@costin_eats
has been a bestseller on Amazon. That’s remarkable for a lengthy work on the ancient origins of political philosophy.
A 🧵 on my review essay for
@mansworldmag_
.
6
52
320
Reddit warnings have changed into banning.
For upvoting.
27
56
284
Remember the journalists from Vox and elsewhere dumping on
@balajis
and others in tech concerned about coronavirus? Jokes about "handshakes?" Because, of course, journalists know that folks in tech are just self-involved idiots?
Yeah, those journalists were full of shit.
8
21
290
Paul Krugman now uses the phrase “white woman” as an insult.
What do you mean "we", white woman? Seriously, "America" hasn't given up on fighting Covid-19; Cuomo's NY, Murphy's NJ, Whitmer's MI haven't given up. It's *Republicans* who have given up.
799
595
3K
19
36
233
College tuition and medical fees are so high in the U.S. because, by government policy, supply is restricted and demand is subsidized.
Period.
The solution is to stop doing that.
The solution is NOT to do it even more.
13
44
271
Sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines serves a very simple purpose: it removes from Germany the possibility of abandoning the sanctions against Russia and turning the pipelines back on, as many German businesses were beginning to lobby for.
12
44
273
The obsession with secondary literature is one of the marks of the degeneracy of academia.
10
22
246
No one born after 1972 has been alive at a time when there was a man on the moon.
31
42
266
Some wish to live in poverty. That’s not how they narrate their desire; they use other words, full of resentment and projection. But the truth is that they wish to live in poverty.
BREAKING: An autonomous Waymo vehicle is intentionally set on fire in Chinatown, according to SF Fire. Firefighters said they got reports around 10 people were involved.
Waymo said “a crowd surrounded and vandalized the vehicle, breaking the window and throwing a firework …
379
372
2K
23
31
273
Reading slowly, you can read this entire thread in a few minutes. It contains a greater depth of insight than do most books on business, financial planning, and personal development.
6
45
245
@GadSaad
Gad's exact words: “By the way, your name is Roscoe Jethroe, you're from Arkansas.”
But he assures us, he wasn't trying to negatively stereotype Americans. Rather, “my Roscoe tweet was in reference to an average American in the Midwest who hates Israel for antisemitic reasons.”
7
4
239
Hospitals in Germany are refusing to treat Russians and Belarusians. These are persons who, by the very fact of residing in Germany, are unlikely to be supporters of the invasion. How long until internment camps are set up, as the U.S. did for Japanese Americans during WWII?
19
56
222
@amasad
The judge looked only at the outcome ex post, not the risk ex ante. This is the mental failure-mode of those who don't understand entrepreneurship.
3
11
242
Rod Dreher, in his bid to become the next David French, denounces Charles Haywood for failing to denounce wrongthink, while doxxing Haywood's (nonpolitical) business. Despicable.
9
9
216
"No one could have known" is the ass-covering evasion of "Not only did we not listen to the people who began raising the alarm in January, but we made fun of them."
Seeing a lot of “no one could have known” about covid19. We saw it happening in January. Mass deaths in China, then deaths in many other countries in early February. We knew it was in the US by end of Jan. While details and data were hazy, we had a global pandemic by Feb1.
52
111
667
13
61
229
@benlandautaylor
Yes, radiocarbon dating is calibrated by tree rings, because the latter provide integer values that can literally be counted. This requires finding fossilized trees that span many periods.
4
5
227
Francis Fukuyama does not know the meaning of “deontological.” It come from δέον, “duty.” It has nothing to do with “not being linked to ontology.”
27
17
214
@mcuban
@elonmusk
Safetyism (the preoccupation with subjective perceptions of safety) ruins everything.
Twitter already has simple features for blocking and muting. You don't have the hear from anyone you don't want to.
But no, that's not enough. People must be banned so you can "feel safe."
11
33
211
@DemetersP
This the cultural region in which science fiction has had the greatest penetration.
It would not surprise me if in other regions you get as high a frequency of different but analogous phenomena.
19
2
205
The media demonstrably do not “speak truth to power.”
They slavishly follow favored power, often centered in bureaucracies (e.g., WHO, CDC, FDA), while attacking perceived threats to their social status (e.g., tech).
7
51
193
@restoreorderusa
Indulging in the "punch a Nazi" meme is telling on oneself. It is straightforwardly a leftist declaration of a friend/enemy demarcation.
It is quite obvious that the target is not Nazis, who barely exist. The target is always something else, which is being falsely labeled Nazi.
3
11
192
At some deep psychological level, Western elites yearn for stagnation. Oh, they talk about “survival” with apocalyptic rhetoric. But it’s about stagnation.
16
23
200
Have there been Randomized Control Trials showing that FDA regulation is a net benefit?
No?
Then in the idiom of public health officials, "there is no evidence that" FDA regulation is a net benefit.
5
35
197
@FischerKing64
Great description of how business corruption is synergistic with DEI ideology.
19
8
206
Centralized "big science" communities more likely
to generate non-replicable results
5
71
168
@naval
This is a huge entrepreneurial opportunity: offering credible, secure credentialing of skills, knowledge, and capabilities, unbundled from how they were acquired.
8
37
186
I wrote a short piece for
@palladiummag
on one aspect of the COVID-19 pandemic:
Effective Pandemic Response is Not About Preparation
10
61
188
The Little Typer
By Daniel P. Friedman and David Thrane Christiansen
Foreword by Robert Harper
Afterword by Conor McBride
An introduction to dependent types, demonstrating the most beautiful aspects, one step at a time.
0
66
191
@bronzeagemantis
Yes, current “elites” in power are strikingly incompetent. Example: Claudine Gay as president of Harvard is not an anomaly; she is quite representative.
4
10
192
The sophon lock imposed by the FDA must end. Before the pandemic, it greatly slowed advances in medicine. Now, it is costing lives.
9
50
185
Musk fired 80% of Twitter employees, and the app still functions.
What percentage could be fired at the average non-tech company?
The average health insurance company? The average university?
22
5
176
Φύσις κρύπτεσθαι φιλεῖ (B123)
– Heraclitus
Always difficult to translate Heraclitus, but:
"Nature likes to remain encrypted."
8
15
169
@FischerKing64
Great example of why sentimental humanitarianism is actively evil.
At the end of Wormtongue’s smooth words, there is a knife in your belly.
1
7
179
The article by
@L0m3z
in
@firstthingsmag
is a moderate, measured, and constructive treatment of its topic. But instead of engagement, even critical, some respond with ideological scare talk.
9
11
165
@0x49fa98
There are no “adults in the room.” These people are not in contact with reality.
For a long time, it seemed as if they were cynical and thought we were stupid.
That may be so, but the larger truth is that they are stupid.
1
2
168
Reproducibility - not peer review - is at the heart of the scientific method. Peer review can actually detract by magnifying cognitive bias.
2
80
177
Every business must now assess refusal-of-service as a fundamental risk. (There is zero reason to assume the targets of this trend will remain limited to "them.") On-premise will get renewed attention.
6
29
161
November 17, 2019
Think about what you are seeing here. And what may well come next.
I have been saying for years now that what we are really in is a world wide low grade revolution of a previously unknown type. The idea that Chile, Iran, HK, Lebanon, Paris, Netherlands, etc are unrelated is off.
201
561
2K
4
22
166
@FischerKing64
I used to dislike Eisenhower because he was merely competent.
Boy does mere competence look good now.
4
6
166
Hanania is reduced to aping Aella.
This is rationalism in a nutshell: an autistic focus on the first-order consequences of one’s mental model (which one mistakenly deems clever), combined with an autistic inability to observe and weigh second-order consequences.
6
12
162
@Paracelsus1092
It is irritating to have your theories proven wrong, especially when they have a strong political valence.
2
3
164
@pmarca
@dwarkesh_sp
Peer review was never about advancing science. It was originally about filtering incremental advances in a stable paradigm. Later, it became about status allocation within institutions.
3
10
155
@clashreport
I usually don’t care about other people’s odd religious beliefs, but I’d rather not have to experience World War III because of them.
5
11
156
Peter Brimelow announcing the shut down.
2
24
152
No good literature exists within the present Overton Window.
9
15
142
Excellent 🧵 summarizing Ted Kaczynski.
* His diagnosis (points 1 - 10) is correct.
* His solution (points 11 - 13) is wrong.
* His observation (point 14) is correct and points to a better solution.
3
15
138
Skepticism toward ancient records that later turn out to be true is a trope of modernity. Example: the very existence of Troy was doubted by modern historians until it was excavated in the 1870’s.
The history of science has a lot of "There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy" moments, but none quite so perfect as the scientific community refusing to believe ancient accounts of rocks and metal falling out of the sky.
3
25
142
6
34
151
@HCIT_TN
This is not even close to true. Canterbury Tales are in Middle English. Scarlet Letter is in modern English. Completely different matters.
2
0
144
This is not only true; it is right and just that it is true.
People pay you according to how valuable they find your work, not how hard you find it. Basic fact of life many don't understand.
6
189
384
0
36
148
We use Leonid Brezhnev as a symbol of gerontocracy, but Brezhnev died when he was 75.
Joe Biden is 81.
7
19
150