Well, they did think of this. George Washington himself wrote about being weary of factions becoming too strong so that exactly this could happen. Madison also wrote about it and so did Jefferson. He actually suggested that this is the entire reason the judiciary needed to not be factionalized.
I think ultimately their interpretation boils down to that the mechanics needed to take over should have the bar as high as possible for the time. And then as time went on, these protections were eroded. The democracy has in fact been able to reign in really bad presidents before and quiet down large factions. So relying on good will and good duty is a recent thing.
Things have only gone off the rails entirely in the last 50 or so years. But I’d argue that George Bush did a ton to result in this. Keep in mind, executive orders were not meant to be used this way. They’re currently being abused to hell and that’s a loophole the same way that pardoning yourself as president is a loophole.
These loopholes are intentional because it’s sort’ve a “if you can’t keep these powers in check as a populace, it’s your fault” type of mechanism.
Hot take: Futurama doesn’t need to be in its golden age to still exist and a lot of younger people like myself are getting to see the show in a way that appeals to modern pop culture references for the first time.
Despite how many people feel about this previous season, it had its moments and it still exists in a niche that I’d argue is almost entirely untouched by most animated tv nowadays. I will absolutely take Futuramas half-hearted attempts at clever writing over the now modern “it’s so gross/crass it’s funny” style of things.
Can I rewatch older seasons? Sure. But again, a lot of season 1-5 are before my time. The characters are still great, voices are great, it’s just the through line plot that’s suffered in the new season. Specifically that gets highlighted in the Dung episode where the quips are funny, the situation is funny, but the overall plot is kind of uninteresting to me and it’s lost that cleverness. Fix a few things about an episode like that and it’d be right at home in the first series.
I bet they’re thinking about covering up a big political scandal before an election with an illegal hush money payment. Or maybe they’ll scheme to use fake electors to prevent the verification of the election. Maybe target the vice president to use political power incorrectly. Or maybe they’ll break into our capital building to stop the election from being verified. Or maybe they’ll promote Russian misinformation campaigns.
Anyone who thinks they won’t be interfering in the election is bananas. They’ll start declaring it fake and rigged a full 2-3 months before it even takes place and the Russian bots will help them do it.
I don’t think most cheats are just for the fun of the game. Most cheats get developed to sell to the huge Asian markets of cheaters. It’s fairly normalized in China and somewhat Japan to cheat in games. And then they get sold to everyone else as well.
Then after the cheats are sold, TF2 and CS2 become vulnerable to bots and idling. Many of the drops you get in those games can be sold, often for a very low price but multiplied by a thousand, it’s worth it for cheaters. And valve doesn’t much care so long as their game reviews are positive because it inflates the player counts of the games and also they can ban the accounts, take away items, and then the cheaters will spend more to get them back on a new account.
Alternate theory: The human brain is reacting to unfamiliarity and not alien features. We strongly associate Uncanny Valley with things not-quite human but it’s my thinking that it’s a tribal thing. Nowadays we see a ton of faces of all variations but I bet when we were hunter gatherers, we only saw features of our own tribe. The moment you meet another tribe, I’d bet this response is to create fear of the unrecognized human. It’s also probably there as a punishment mechanism for us seeing faces in everything.
The times that the uncanny effect hit hardest is when you think something is human or is a face potentially before finding out you’re wrong. So that’s my basis for thinking its there to keep us from being mistaken.
Good points on the saturation thing. My experience in the vr space is that most companies aim right at the middle of all of those goals and fail as a result. The price ends up lower, but not low enough. Software is supported, but not enough. Software is targeted but then turns out underfunded.
In my opinion, Sony should have created a headset targeting $300-$400 and then focused not on just making random good VR games but play off of existing titles.
The reason that works so well is that many people have a favorite PS5 game, why not offer 3D models viewable in VR? Or the maps? Or a shot minigame mode with small bits of content for a low price? These things are relatively cheap to do but have a huge impact on gamers wanting to get into VR.
Resident evil is a great example of this. The Horizon game less so. Either way, use those titles all the time to your advantage. Try to get a VR camera mode in more 3rd person games. Promote VR movies and streaming maybe.
You still have this issue though of pivoting out of a catch-22. No software, no gamers, no money, so no software or hardware. The way to break out of that is by maintaining a library of games and adding to it over time as adopters get on board. This is why them ditching PSVR1 killed the second headset. Build that library to a tipping point like SteamVR and Meta are working on, don’t abandon it.
Sony could’ve done a lot of things to help this push honestly and they did nothing. It’s like none of these companies even know how to exist in experimental spaces anymore and it shows big time.
The things you’re describing are not science. This might seem nit picky but the scientific method as we know it today require that peer review and require methods of reproduction. Whether you can reproduce results is a different story.
The entire difference between research and science is whether or not you engage in the process of peer review and review often requires method of replication. So you usually can’t have one without the other. If you aren’t trying to have your paper reviewed by your peers, that’s fine, but that isn’t science.
To address the gatekeeping, I get it. We shouldn’t be using the word to demean people who do valuable research but don’t strictly engage in the scientific process. That’s really not important to do. However we should all be interested in preventing the scientific process from being muddied to include every R&D process under the sun. That’s all research, not science, and we call them separate things for a reason.
Well even then, if the content was there, people would buy it even at its ridiculous price. You have to consider there is a massive amount of PlayStation users so if only 1% of their playerbase has enough money for this, that’s still a ton of people compared to current VR numbers.
So I stand by saying the price is a barrier, but not a problem or dealbreaker. The real issue is just that PSVR1 people are no longer getting support, PSVR2 has few games since they don’t include the previous library. And why buy a PSVR2 if you know they’re going to lock your games into that specific headset? Sony put all that money into hardware and has zero idea how to exist in markets that aren’t already growing, so this was inevitable
I mean I think VR has a bright future but it won’t be until Meta can gain some serious traction with their headsets that we get some really good games on other platforms.
Now Meta would assume this is a win but they’re just going to generate temporary traction for themselves and then people will move elsewhere as Valve and Sony are better at both software and hardware. They’re letting Meta do the expensive part, the R&D, for them. Then all of these players plan to swoop in and steal their business. You’ll watch it happen in 6-10 years.
I really wish that people would pile on Sony for not having PSVR1 games be compatible with the second headset. I would consider buying their headset just for PCVR and the entire PSVR1 library plus the PSVR2 stuff. At that point if you also own a PS5 like I do, that opens up a lot of games and rivals what Meta is doing.
I think PSVR2 is dead in the water unless Sony invests a lot into it. Great PC headset but otherwise no. I really think Meta is doing an okay job with their library, so if you aren’t super worried about Meta having personal data on you, bite the bullet there. Otherwise you’ll be stuck with the stagnant SteamVR offerings which only have a worthwhile longer experience a couple times a year.
You’re close. The real truth is that most average people do not like to date too high above their perceived range of attractiveness. This bears out in many studies but people are attracted to 8’s and 9’s but won’t date them and instead mostly date people that are more normal 5,6,7’s.
Then we look at the opposite side of the coin, 9’s and 10’s don’t even want to date each other. And for good reason. Extremely attractive people often cross a line into narcissism or being too busy to hold a relationship.
So two factors: 1. Most people aren’t extremely fit and so don’t want to date people whose lifestyle does not match their own, we’re all also slightly insecure. 2. Extremely attractive partners tend not to be good partners. The more people that are attracted to you, the less that date you. Also that’s out of fear of competition and effort so it’s not worth it.
This is exactly why I think Valve is primed to bring Steam Machines back. They’re already working on making a full functioning Linux OS, Steam OS. They have a huge library of games that regularly go on sale that you can now play on a handheld. Your save games sync across platform. Your Steam Machine would support existing controllers from either Xbox or PlayStation. I mean at this point they would be silly NOT to make them again.
Really good points here but also I just want to add that Skyrim is very unlike any other game I’ve ever played. Whereas Fallout is shooting, which I’ve played a million times in other games. When I look at the other factors, Fallout has them in spades. Great enemy designs, good locations, great story depth, and the world and themes are phenomenal.
But at the end of the day you’re right, your interaction with the world is mostly just guns. That’s why people find such enjoyment with melee runs in Fallout I think. Guns just aren’t as engaging but also they kind of encourage you keep your distance from the enemies. Whereas in Skyrim, unless you’re playing with a bow, you’re directly interacting with the enemies up close and personal.
My advice is basically just to go play fallout and try it with a melee build and maybe ditch the companions. Or maybe find mods that try to add things to the playstyles.