Bay 12 Games Forum

Hooleeey sheeeet.

Auto turret mode. Apparently doesn't have the same limitations as holding down right click.

Dropped a t3 base in like 15 seconds. So many missiles. It... it's ridiculous. Deliciously ridiculous.

E: Incidentally, best way to get blueprints? Best way to get blueprints. Blow them stations up, cruise on through the wreckage, reap the technology gleefully.

Eesh, I can't get over it. Unfiltered apple juice is really, really good. It's just... for some reason, it just tastes better than the filtered stuff. It's like someone actually liquefied a slice of apple and poured it down your throat.

And the color is entirely separate from that shade that apparently bothers people about filtered apple juice. Looks pretty much exactly like apple sauce, the unfiltered stuff does. Just... liquid.

Definitely going to have to get more of this stuff~

That bit did make me wonder if that's the bit of internalization that seems to make it so difficult for so many people to just ask for directions (/help) and suchlike.

More power t'folks with that attribute, I guess, but I'm pretty glad I've been stripped of it. Being able to ask for staff help without hesitation has saved me much time and headache

You'd... be a bit better off using a different word, then. Or, even better, using separate words for the objective and subjective aspects. Physical property is probably the closest word we've got to that former bit, in concept. Though that doesn't particularly mean it's close in any meaningful way. I'd almost say axiom would be closer, really, if you were aiming for something more fundamental, but looking for objective axioms is a bit of a fool's quest.

Value requires an observer, something to evaluate it. Things that can be valued is either utterly subjective (completely conditional to the concept system it's being considered through -- even truth values, ferex, depend on the logic system they're being applied within*) or infinite (and thus effectively meaningless, as you can't differentiate it from anything else).

*Wait, no, no. I think that may be a terrible example. Though I'm not sure. My somewhat tired mind is trying to tell me that a "truth value" and a "value" are fully separate concepts.**
**Which may be part of the problem if there's two or more conceptually distinct sorts of value running around. Hrm. Tired, think later.

Probably depends on the why, how, the when/where, and the who. I mean, there's a lot of different ways and reasons to kill someone, and who they are changes things up, as can the situation involved.

But seriously, I've got no clue. I've never really had much luck with dream interpretation. Mine tend not to fall into any particularly normal pattern, unfortunately(?). So the standard "It might mean this" just... doesn't really fit. My subconscious mostly seems to like to world build, and prefers a neat story to anything else, including my own wishes. Mumblemutter. One day I'll have one of those falling dreams or somethin'. Or standard social anxiety!dream or whatever. That day is not yet here!

And then mostly what Wrex said. While it amuses me, I've often been fairly well convinced it's bunk, or at least so heavily dependent on individual factors (up to and including brain structure) that generalizations are mostly useless~

I love Finnegans Wake.

Nothing wrong with that.

D'you have a preferred performer?

"Why should I stay alive? Because I want to.
Why do I want to? <Personal reason>."

At which point it breaks from "why should" to "why do", and you go from metaphysics/ethics to aesthetics. Which is a bit fuzzier, if even more fundamental.

As for this:

I can just as easily say that because it is impossible to determine whether a kind of objective value doesn't exist, we ought to act like it does (in fact, that is the gist of my original post, though I tried to go a bit farther than that).

Basically, nope. You can check the atheism/theology thread that was back a bit for the latest round on why that doesn't work. It's in there... somewhere. I actually forget the specifics of it (and have forgotten them like a dozen dozen times, bleh), but that line of reasoning's been functionally thrown out of philosophy for a long, long while now.

And... well, yeah. The goal is presupposed by the system itself (and to an extent, vice-versa). Its existence relies on the system, which is (one of the reasons) why it (and values relating to it) is not objective.

But, again, if that's not what you're talking about... then what are you talking about?

If you're looking for an objective base for personal desirability (i.e. "What goals should I have"), I'll probably just wave vaguely toward the existentialists and their denouncement of attempting to absolve oneself of personal responsibility (via appeal to the objective). What's important to oneself is subjective in relation to what one desires and what systems one participates in. As for determining what one desires, well, if there's anything less objective than that I'm not quite sure what it is, y'know?

Ah. If you're the only person that necessarily exists, then you're the sole arbiter of value, unless there's some other, non-human (or at least non-self) entity capable of prescribing worth -- and it's very easily argued that any such entity is a self-delusion you're using to avoid taking responsibility for said arbitration. Everything in that situation is pretty much subjective. Descartes copped out by assuming the existence of God.

As for the second bit, increasing your chances of survival etc., etc., that's still subjective, but it's of a different sort of subjectivity. It's subjective related to the system it exists within*; within the context of survival, to use the example, there will be a strict set or sets of actions which increase the chance of survivability (the increase actually depends on two factors, but getting into that would take a lot more text and hopping on a different computer, heh), one of said sets which "don't be a jerk" will exist within. "Don't be a jerk" has no value outside that system related to survival (well, barring other systems in which "don't be a jerk" has a positive or negative influence); which is to say, on some level, it does not matter and certainly it is not of objective (i.e. existing outside of all systems) importance. Even within the system re: survivability, it may have differing degrees of value depending on other factors, so it's not necessarily a positive thing (regarding survivability) -- it can vary in worth depending on environmental factors (such as society), desired time frame of survival, and many other things.

I guess what it'd boil down to, from my direction, at least, is that if you're looking for objective worth, you're not going to find it, period. You can find the most effective and efficient course of action or influence (though there may be several entities occupying that "spot", so to speak) within a particular system, but that's the best you're going to get. You can get logical necessity based on a set of assumed axioms, (which is subjective, because those axioms are fundamentally invented, generally for the purpose of making something comprehensible to human minds) but you can't get logical necessity for the axioms themselves, in other words**. That's also quite entirely sufficient for just about any sort of project you want to accomplish, I've found, and considerably more reliable than arbitrary assertions of objectivity.

*It's possible that this sort of subjectivity is as close to objective as it gets, though...
**You would seem to be looking for the latter sort; reason to believe that the axioms exist and have prescriptive value outside of your own creation. I'd posit that they don't.