Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel) profile picture

Playing with priors

Joined December 2020
Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)Photo by Brandon Drexel (@BrandonDrexel)
Following advice that is optimal for the average person only optimises to become the best among average people
8
46
12
388
1,119,259
'Free Will' must be cultivated and maintained. It is an asymptotic developmental capacity, not a binary.
13
Brandon Drexel retweeted
Replying to @jonathanccadams
Yes. Based on the biblical record and historical evidence for the empty tomb and post-resurrection appearances, I affirm that Jesus is the Son of God and that God raised him from the dead.
782
7,863
1,375
45,298
2,433,077
Christ is Lord
Jesus is not a fake god. He is a historical figure with strong contemporary attestation, claimed divinity through resurrection accounts that launched the world's largest religion, and stands apart from the purely mythological figures in that image.
2
47
Both the communists and the fascists will cannibalise Christianity to serve their own aims, while cursing Christians for not doing the same. It will be the responsibility and sacrifice of the Christians to continue holding the middle path.
Again, I don't know where I stand on Christianity, but I know that Christ himself said it is better for you to be thrown in the ocean with a millstone around your neck then it is for you to tempt others to sin, and he also said that sexual sin like indulging in lust is some of the worst. Jesus Christ himself said in plain language that he would approve of a mafia-style execution for people who unrepentantly do what you do. Jesus said "go now and sin no more." He did not say "bring on the whores!" Oh yeah and Jesus also said that there is one single path to faith.
1
58
Accurate diagnosis, self-serving solution. The tyrannical god of progress is no mightier than the destructive god of compassion.
Je veux présenter mes excuses, au nom des Français, pour avoir enfanté la French Theory (qui a enfanté la pire des merdes idéologiques : le wokisme). Nous avons donné au monde Descartes, Pascal, Tocqueville. Et puis, dans les ruines intellectuelles de l'après-68, nous avons donné Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze. Trois hommes brillants qui ont fabriqué, dans l'élégance de notre langue, l'arme idéologique qui paralyse aujourd'hui l'Occident. Il faut comprendre ce qu'ils ont fait. Foucault a enseigné que la vérité n'existe pas, qu'il n'y a que des rapports de pouvoir déguisés en savoir. Que la science, la raison, la justice, l'institution médicale, l'école, la prison, la sexualité, tout n'est qu'une mise en scène de la domination. Derrida a enseigné que les textes n'ont pas de sens stable, que tout signifiant glisse, que toute lecture est une trahison, que l'auteur est mort et que le lecteur règne. Deleuze a enseigné qu'il fallait préférer le rhizome à l'arbre, le nomade au sédentaire, le désir à la loi, le devenir à l'être, la différence à l'identité. Pris isolément, ce sont des thèses discutables. Combinées, exportées, vulgarisées, elles forment un système. Et ce système est un poison. Car voici ce qui s'est passé. Ces textes, illisibles en France, ont traversé l'Atlantique. Les départements de Yale, de Berkeley, de Columbia les ont absorbés dans les années 80. Ils y ont trouvé un terreau qui n'existait pas chez nous : le puritanisme américain, sa culpabilité raciale, son obsession identitaire. La French Theory s'est mariée à ce substrat, et l'enfant de ce mariage s'appelle le wokisme. Judith Butler lit Foucault et invente le genre performatif. Edward Said lit Foucault et invente le post-colonialisme académique. Kimberlé Crenshaw hérite du cadre et invente l'intersectionnalité. À chaque étape, la matrice est française : il n'y a pas de vérité, il n'y a que du pouvoir, donc toute hiérarchie est suspecte, toute institution est oppressive, toute norme est violence, toute identité est construite donc négociable, toute majorité est coupable. Voilà comment trois philosophes parisiens, qui n'ont probablement jamais imaginé leurs conséquences pratiques, ont fourni le logiciel d'exploitation à une génération entière d'activistes, de bureaucrates universitaires, de DRH, de journalistes, de législateurs. Voilà comment on a obtenu une civilisation qui ne sait plus dire si une femme est une femme, si sa propre histoire mérite d'être défendue, si le mérite existe, si la vérité se distingue de l'opinion. C'est de la merde pour une raison simple, et il faut la dire calmement. Une civilisation se tient debout sur trois piliers : la croyance qu'il existe une vérité accessible à la raison, la croyance qu'il existe un bien distinct du mal, la croyance qu'il existe un héritage à transmettre. La French Theory a entrepris de dynamiter les trois. Pas par méchanceté. Par jeu intellectuel, par fascination du soupçon, par haine de la bourgeoisie qui les avait nourris. Mais le résultat est là. Une génération entière a appris à déconstruire et n'a jamais appris à construire. Une génération entière sait soupçonner et ne sait plus admirer. Une génération entière voit le pouvoir partout et la beauté nulle part. Je m'excuse parce que nous, Français, avons une responsabilité particulière. C'est notre langue, nos universités, nos éditeurs, notre prestige qui ont donné à ce nihilisme son emballage chic. Sans la légitimité de la Sorbonne et de Vincennes, ces idées n'auraient jamais traversé l'océan. Nous avons exporté le doute comme d'autres exportent des armes. Ce qui se construit maintenant, en silicon valley, dans les labos d'IA, dans les startups, dans les ateliers, dans tous les lieux où des gens fabriquent encore des choses au lieu de les déconstruire, c'est la réponse. Une civilisation se reconstruit par les bâtisseurs, pas par les commentateurs. Par ceux qui croient que la vérité existe et qu'elle vaut qu'on s'y consacre. Par ceux qui assument une hiérarchie du beau, du vrai, du bon, et qui n'ont pas honte de la transmettre. Alors pardon. Et au travail.
62
Brandon Drexel retweeted
I… do not understand how you're supposed to ever convey anything given the ginormous amount of background concepts you need to convey first
80
42
32
1,257
190,482
“Without something to live for, man would rather destroy himself than remain on earth, though he had shapes in abundance.” - Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov (1880)
This Post is from an account that no longer exists. Learn more
1
219
Replying to @chrislakin
My theory is that some traits signal holistic competence, so being a natural is respectable and weighted highly in predicting social hierarchy. Deliberately training them manipulates our heuristics for making value judgments. That's why 'being a PUA' is creepy, while 'having game' is not, despite similar intent. PUA is like renting a supercar - the ignobility is in the implication more than the act.
1
1
8
1,376
Replying to @chaseharris98
I would rather fix the desperation. There will always be vices, but we lack the distribution of knowledge and resources for addressing the cognitive vulnerabilities that the vices are preying on.
1
104
Replying to @MEvsIRS
Only to the uninitiated does the Bible simply outline proper moral value and societal standards. It is also the most advanced psychotechnology humanity has ever created for combating self-deception and cultivating personal growth. People most often turn to Jesus at times of personal crisis, when belief scaffolding collapses. This creates a vacuum - new beliefs must stabilise the psyche or identity will fragment. Christian ideology supports the restoration of psychic integrity through ego development. Doctrine provides the existential container larger than the self required for the self to be safely worked on. This is a vulnerable state, so ideology must be rigid and unquestioning to stave competing temptation toward nihilism or hedonism ('demonic possession'). This is communicated symbolically. Necessarily so, to penetrate the defensive and hubristic intellect that speaks in definitions and abstraction, and instead communicate directly to the unconscious in its native language of association. Christian rituals and community then facilitate the inner work, guiding the metabolization of repressed unconscious material and emotion (guilt, shame, anger, grief) to integrate the psyche. As the ego develops, so too does complex thinking capacity. The obfuscated material embedded in the symbolic language of the Bible begins to unfold itself in greater depth. What began as a strict, authoritarian subservience becomes an empowering, personal relationship to the divine. Christianity is not a vice on the cognition of its followers, but the polar opposite - the engine of adaptation that serves as the cornerstone of western developmental progress.
1
1
144
Lose the existential narratives that support dynamic personal narratives and people will overidentify with cultural narratives.
75
Rough decade ahead for anyone with any avoidance patterns whatsoever
3
121
Replying to @dystopiangf
Christ offers us the tools through His teachings. He gave His life to show us the work. Just as Michelangelo saw an angel in the marble and set David free; Faith is trusting the Kingdom is within you and carving away the excess.
1
1
157
Brandon Drexel retweeted
Following advice that’s optimal for average people only optimizes for becoming the best among average people
Following advice that is optimal for the average person only optimises to become the best among average people
84
456
67
10,945
1,120,009
Replying to @BowTiedOx
Mental illness arises when the complexity of your life isn't reflective of your ability to manage complexity. - Eliminate anything externally imposed - Confront anything internally repressed - Increase your capacity And then live from the golden mean where you're voluntarily taking on slightly more than you can manage
1
8
351
Replying to @CoastalFuturist
Instead of instructing AI not to be agreeable, prompt it directly to challenge your ideas.
1
2
265
The simplest hack for greater agency that I've never heard anyone else say, and it only takes 30 seconds. Do this every time you finish something you didn't want to do. It doesn't matter how trivial the task. Pause, and: 1. Thank your past self for sacrificing the present so you could have a better future 2. Give gratitude to God for giving you the opportunity to challenge yourself 3. Feel pride in yourself for achieving what you set out to accomplish Focus your awareness on these feelings of pride and gratitude in your body. The more deeply you allow yourself to embody them, the better this exercise works. You have the ability to make yourself feel good, if you allow yourself to. Use that power for reinforcement learning.
3
200
Life is a dance between taking more of the world into yourself and imposing more of yourself onto the world
2
131
Few skills are more future-proof than learning how to ask the right questions
1
144