slatestarcodex

Probably what *this* should be called.
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:27 pm

the 'posession of 1000 or more marijuana plants with intent to distribute' carried a minimum sentence of 10 years and the 'posession of a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking' carried a minimum of 5 years consecutively so the judges opinion on how dangerous he is only counted for 1/16th of the sentence

e: the case number is 4:12-mj-00303 USA v. Morales

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Ashenai » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:29 pm

okay but both of those minimum sentences are bullshit though

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Ashenai » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:33 pm

he should have gotten the case thrown out on the basis of this is total bullshit

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:37 pm

he also got some weapons charges dropped in the plea agreement:
A gun safe in the garage contained 27 firearms including three unregistered NFA firearms -- two short barreled assault rifles and one short-barrel shotgun...Officers also found a number of explosive devices and approximately 9000 rounds of ammunition in the house

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by pterrus » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:38 pm

I think it's a good reminder that "line goes up" is not the point of crypto and is more like an unfortunate side effect that happens to be getting all the attention because of course it is.

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Ashenai » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:39 pm

I agree, line goes down is just as important. why no love for line goes down

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by pterrus » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:40 pm

The thing about currencies is you don't want the line to go anywhere in a hurry.

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Blissful » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:44 pm

Ashenai wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:39 pm I agree, line goes down is just as important. why no love for line goes down
they made The Big Short movie all about love for line goes down
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:49 pm

the guy in the big short said you shouldn’t be happy about line goes down

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Blissful » Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:52 pm

Rylinks wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 1:49 pm the guy in the big short said you shouldn’t be happy about line goes down
some other guys in it said you should though, so its impossible to tell if line going down is good or bad
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Crunchums » Fri Dec 09, 2022 2:46 pm

Jeb Bush 2012 wrote:
Crunchums wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 5:22 am i don't think he's saying you should be optimistic about crypto, he's saying that you should be less than infinitely hostile towards crypto. motte bailey potential here though for sure. but like i am super hostile to crypto because it's mostly scams, so what are we even arguing about here
“more optimistic” if you prefer. the point I’m making that “not a proven ponzi” is a very low bar, and “only a few % of these projects are proven ponzis” is a strong condemnation of it, and certainly doesn’t imply there’s anything worthwhile in the ecosystem
well depends on the value of the projects if they actually do what they are trying to do (which he doesn't talk about), but yeah i feel you here
Crunchums wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 5:22 am i'm confused - if crypto lets you send money to russian emigrants or w/e where the regular financial system wouldn't, isn't that the crypto financial system helping you? am i confused about our terms here?
money =/= the financial system. when people talk about the crypto financial system recreating the traditional financial system but worse in every way, that means crypto banks/investment funds &c
shrug ok
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Jeb Bush 2012 » Fri Dec 09, 2022 3:12 pm

Ashenai wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:05 am I don't think you should send people to jail for 16 years no matter how "scary" they are, if all they did was grow/sell weed and own weapons
I agree the sentence should be shorter, but grenade launchers are illegal for a good reason and we shouldn’t have to wait until someone fires them to put them away if they decide to illegally acquire them

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Skeletor » Fri Dec 09, 2022 4:51 pm

i agree with a lot of these criticisms of the article except that some of them seem to imply that the article indicates you should buy crypto, which i didn't see it indicating anywhere. the conclusion i saw was to be less than infinitely hostile to crypto
wow, [you]. that all sounds terrible. i hope it gets better for you

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Khaos » Fri Dec 09, 2022 4:55 pm

can i keep being infinitely hostile to proof of work crypto

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Fri Dec 09, 2022 4:57 pm

no

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Khaos » Fri Dec 09, 2022 6:19 pm

ok but can i infinitely approach that level of hostility

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Crunchums » Fri Dec 09, 2022 6:20 pm

always toeing the line
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Jeb Bush 2012 » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:40 pm

Skeletor wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 4:51 pm i agree with a lot of these criticisms of the article except that some of them seem to imply that the article indicates you should buy crypto, which i didn't see it indicating anywhere. the conclusion i saw was to be less than infinitely hostile to crypto
I think the article suggests that if you are worried about authoritarianism in the us you should buy crypto. certainly crunchums seemed to take that from it, which is why I was arguing against that idea

and "don't be infinitely hostile to crypto" is the bailey here, he certainly tries to paint dismissal of the worth of crypto finance and the ecosystem of crypto projects as unreasonable even though that doesn't necessarily entail being infinitely hostile to crypto

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:43 pm

Assuming that there is a threat of authoritarianism in the United States, it seems helpful to buy crypto before the authoritarians shut down your bank account

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Crunchums » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:44 pm

Jeb Bush 2012 wrote:
Skeletor wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 4:51 pm i agree with a lot of these criticisms of the article except that some of them seem to imply that the article indicates you should buy crypto, which i didn't see it indicating anywhere. the conclusion i saw was to be less than infinitely hostile to crypto
I think the article suggests that if you are worried about authoritarianism in the us you should buy crypto. certainly crunchums seemed to take that from it, which is why I was arguing against that idea
i still think it's reasonable to hold some crypto as a hedge against catastrophic things happening in the US (either in general or to you in particular) because there are some scenarios where it would be a good thing to have done
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Khaos » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:47 pm

i think if you're afraid of your money losing all of its value all at once you probably should do the opposite of buy crypto

can't you just buy another currency if you're worried about the USD specifically crashing

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Crunchums » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:49 pm

Khaos wrote:can't you just buy another currency if you're worried about the USD specifically crashing
where am i holding that money? if it's in a bank account that has some of the same vulnerabilities. but it's true that if the dollar explodes or something it would be kinda weird to expect bitcoin to be the new things instead of like canadian dollars or something
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Khaos » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:51 pm

Crunchums wrote:where am i holding that money?
somewhere where it isn't easily stolen

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Jeb Bush 2012 » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:54 pm

Crunchums wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:44 pm i still think it's reasonable to hold some crypto as a hedge against catastrophic things happening in the US (either in general or to you in particular) because there are some scenarios where it would be a good thing to have done
I think if you're worried about like, all US assets becoming worthless I'd rather have a) money abroad b) idk gems or something if you can't do a). I also don't think this is a reasonable thing to be preparing for in the current US, it requires much stronger conditions than being worried about the health of american democracy (I found his attempt to insinuate hypocrisy particularly annoying here for this reason)

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Fri Dec 09, 2022 7:58 pm

drastic currency inflation and government measures to expropriate hedges against currency inflation often walk together. If you predicted that the US would break the gold standard, holding your wealth in gold might seem like a good idea but whoops, FDR signed an executive order saying you must turn over your gold to the government at a set rate.

so the resistance of bitcoin to government control is pretty relevant in scenarios of drastic inflation imo

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Rylinks » Sat Dec 10, 2022 3:20 pm

Crunchums wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 8:16 pm https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2022/12/02 ... lease-day/ fun

(also still curious to see Rylinks respond to my last post)
I kind of forgot about this but here's a relevant twitter thread

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Crunchums » Sat Dec 10, 2022 3:42 pm

a 104 tweet thread, eh
1. I read a moderate amount of philosophy of ethics, and my considered opinion is that the "big three" (utilitarianism, deontology, virtue ethics) are all bad. All of them other than virtue ethics are *very* bad.

2. The reason Virtue Ethics is better than the others is that it at least admits to the complexity of the problem. Ethics is among the most complicated and poorly understood domains we have, and even far simpler and clearer domains cannot be reduced to simple decision rules.

3. Virtue ethics at least starts from the premise "What if we treat ethical behavior as if it were like any other skilled practice, and look at how people learn and develop such practices?", which is the only starting point that can possibly work.
not very compelling to me
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Jeb Bush 2012 » Sat Dec 10, 2022 3:43 pm

look at that guy without virtue

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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Crunchums » Mon Dec 12, 2022 2:46 pm

4: A common response to my post on cryptocurrency is that while there are some theoretical and actual good uses for cryptocurrency, the vast majority of existing crypto has nothing to do with this and is pointless (or mostly-pointless) speculation. I agree with this perspective, and wanted to do so publicly in case my last post sounded too rosy.
(https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/open-thread-254)
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Re: slatestarcodex

Post by Ashenai » Mon Dec 19, 2022 7:18 pm

Zvi wrote:I wanted my game, Emergents, to have the players chat with each other. Yeah, no. That’s not remotely legal in practice, letting people talk to each other.

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