Sounds like a twist on an Aboleth

I mean if you actually read it, basically every point you made except transfiguration is addressed in the conversation Harry has with a goblin at Gringott’s. And transfiguration is addressed later in the book, it’s actually a really crucial plot point. Long story short, no, you can’t just summon more without the philosopher’s stone, which is exceedingly rare.

The angle taken, that from currency to time turners the setting is poorly constructed, is valid. Incidentally, HPMOR Harry suffers due to his “I’m so much smarter than everyone” hubris multiple times throughout the story. Once the story really gets going, Yudkowsky doesn’t really shy away from pointing out when Harry’s absolutist rationalism comes across as childish, impractical, or straight up unethical.

The whole basis of that scheme was the different relative exchange rates in the muggle and wizard world. There are I think 17 silver sickles to 1 gold galleon, but in the muggle world gold is more like 50 times the value of silver. The plan was to take a galleon to the muggle world, melt it down and sell the gold, use the proceeds to buy silver, bring that silver back to the wizard world and have it minted into 50 sickles, and trade those sickles for about 3 galleons.

Like many scenes in HPMOR the author is mostly just roasting Rowling for lazy world building. He didn’t have to build a world where everyone else was stupid, the point is that Rowling’s wizarding world already fulfilled that requirement.

If you think the Democrats will change without serious challenges to their hegemony, then you really haven’t learned.

Correct. Not sure what that has to do with voting for 3rd parties with no chance of winning though. That’s not even close to a serious challenge, and all it does is strengthen the hegemony of the actual fascist party.

This country is an aircraft carrier, not a canoe, and the only way it drastically changes direction in a short time is if someone starts blowing holes in the bottom of it.

A perfect illustration. Politics is slow. It may seem like things are moving quickly in this administration, but the groundwork to get to this point took generations of propaganda and power concentration. Even if by some miracle, a leftist third party won the White House, they wouldn’t have the foundation necessary to actually do anything. The push to the left is going to be a slow process, and the first several election cycles are going to look a lot like milquetoast liberalism.

It’s almost as if corrupt sociopaths are drawn to positions of authority regardless of stated values, and a vanguard party is no exception. Church, State, HOA, offer a crumb of power and bastards will say anything they can to snatch it up. The value of an organizational system has very little to do with its aspirations, and everything to do with the obstacles it erects to obstruct corruption. Build a dictatorship of the proletariat, and the proletariat will be abandoned by the dictatorship.

It is not, it has a tower agitator and works great.

Maytag has one good model too.

Very poetic, but most of these guys are numbnuts. Yes, smoke and mirrors is the intent, but I sincerely believe that the majority of the people you can get into this movement are straight buffoons. Nepo babies playing geopolitik. Obviously there are influences behind the scenes, but these idiots are just too chaotic to stick to the evil plan. I played a low INT goblin fighter based on that premise once, super fun to play, not so much for the rest of the party if they were actually trying to do something.

Extreme strictness is a form of abuse. These symptoms are particular, though not individually exclusive, to strictness. As long as you “behave” you avoid the material effects of the abuse. Other forms of abuse typically have fewer “rules” that can be used as safeguards.

Can we try not to criticize him for this? Let’s just let it happen. The enemy of my enemy certainly isn’t my friend, but they’re useful.

Yeah shrooms are way more likely to give you the ability to think through legitimate problems than generate spontaneous bad ideas. Still though, give it some thought when you come down.

I think putting myself down does help me. I was raised by a narcissist intent on making me their reflection. I put myself down to counteract 18 years of narcissistic conditioning. Granted, if you weren’t raised to be a narcissist you probably shouldn’t do it. I’m an edge case.

Thanks, I curated my vibe to repel basic-ass bitches.

Also the real big ones frequently take the back door. Training can rearrange the corridor.

My baseline circadian rhythm doesn’t let me get sleepy until the sun starts coming up. In a bygone era, I would’ve been the guy tending the fire and watching over the camp until the early birds got up. In the modern era, night shift jobs are generally terrible. I strategically drink to fall asleep at a somewhat reasonable hour, so I can participate in modern society.

But I’ll grant there may be a purely semantic argument that the system itself is immune to corruption, in the same way that a starving person doesn’t have to worry about food poisoning.

Yeah that’s what I was alluding to, hence “technically”. You’re correct that power is inevitable, and your system not prescribing power only limits its ability to moderate that emergent power.

Guess that kind of depends on whether you’re going for “sublime serene harmony” or “the unfathomable might of God”. I think the church kinda nailed it on both fronts, choirs for the first and pipe organs for the second.

This scene from Mr. Nobody is a great example of the first, which seems a bit more what you’re going for.

Been-a-while On-the-pot

Two points:

“I have to go to a place” actually has its own semantic implications. It’s a modern construction, deliberately vague to imply intentional mystery or semi-sincere shame.

“How flies the time” ironically makes the speaker sound more well-versed in English, like a stuffy old professor.