Eh, I try. I think I succeed more often than not, but most bad people think they’re good, right? I try to calibrate against the broader society as a whole, but it often seems like society isn’t really aligned with goodness anyway. So here I am, trying to suss out the good parts of society and align with that, and trying to suss out the bad parts and follow my own moral compass there. But again, bad people probably generally think they’re good, so it’s a bit of a conundrum innit?

Minimize harm to others, and try to help as much as you can. Except sometimes harming bad people somewhat is good, and sometimes help is counterproductive.

I’m confident that I am a person. I try to emulate what good is like. Life is hard.

I make a habit of buying and gifting Illuminatus and Prometheus Rising whenever I find them for cheap

I mean, there is a canon story

Yes the benevolent dictator archetype only really works in fiction. Philosopher kings have been suggested as the most efficient form of government for thousands of years, but the difficulty is in finding them in the real world. We could never fully trust any would-be tyrant.

I read that comment completely differently. The “socialism” in “Sorta like socialism” is supposed to replace “free markets” in the previous comment.

“They” only want “socialism” when it’s corporate bailouts. Privatized profits, socialized losses.

And I’m not as sure it’s the citizens he protects so much as the city itself

I think he’d consider that a distinction without difference. The city is the citizens.

He’s either at least been partially responsible for some killings and will let people die when it benefits not so much himself, but the proper functioning of the city.

The “proper functioning of the city” is a state of relative harmony and peace between the citizens. Most of those that found their end at his direction were rather opposed to the “proper functioning of the city”.

what does that society do when that person is inevitably gone?

I surmise that much of his efforts in building the integrity of the city, and its institutions, might be said to constitute an inoculation of sorts against any “greedy and clumsy” successors.

People have already mentioned Foundation, Stranger in a Strange Land, Discworld, Gurren Lagann, and Hitchhiker’s Guide, so I’ll add The Illuminatus Trilogy. It taught me a lot about how organizations tend to shake out, among other things.

I’ve been thinking again about what type of ruler Lord Vetinari is.

He’s basically a benevolent dictator. He adopts the role of a tyrant for pragmatic reasons, but he seems to sincerely care about the well-being of Ankh-Morporkians.

If the women didn’t find you handsome, they should at least find you handy

https://youtu.be/PzySkYQNDlI

I assume they hate the panic around trans women on women’s sports teams

Or that God is putting off reclaiming him as long as possible

I made accounts on dating apps to find semi-casual FWBs, who inevitably wind up in monogamous relationships and thus need to be replaced.

Zero cost:

• Running
• Yoga
• Bodyweight exercise

Zero cost if you have a library card:

• Reading (fiction)
• Reading (non-fiction)
• Online discussion

Price of pencil and paper:

• Writing (creative)
• Writing (journaling)
• Drawing

Fairly cheap:

• Music (playing)
• Music (listening)
• Painting

Is this what monogamy is like?

Looks like a Polish thing, pulpety w sosie koperkowym.

My father was pretty draconic. No time for friends, no time for extra curriculars, no time for homework (he didn’t believe in public education, which caused its own problems), because there was always something to do: my chores, my siblings’ chores, home improvement projects, random “educational” outings that were mostly just me sitting in the car. Not to mention the verbal and physical abuse, leaving me on the side of the road to “scare me straight”, making me live in a tent in the backyard for a while.

I tried to be the bigger person after I moved out and practice hippy-dippy radical forgiveness. Unfortunately, he’s a malignant narcissist and even when he realized he had no leverage anymore and had to behave, he was still a really really bad influence. The more time I spent with him, the more his traits rubbed off on me. I had to cut him off entirely because it became too much.

Oh hey we’re complements. I needed to call a friend to help set up my email, but I can at least get you started on pretty much any hardware store question

Pretty hard to predict. 10,000 years ago humans were just starting to figure out agriculture, animal husbandry, and pottery. Today, technology is advancing exponentially. If we keep up this trajectory, we’d basically be gods with unfathomable control over ourselves and our environment. If something interrupts this trajectory, we could find ourselves back in the stone age, or extinct.

Wait like right up front? What I’m talking about is like 3/4 of the way through, after you’ve flipped over. Did you start face up? I always start face down.