These days he's helping to remediate polluted waterways

https://cottagelife.com/general/this-toronto-professor-took-...

The heavier weights of League Spartan would be a good match.

What I find funny (only not really) is the wildly different interpretations of this film people have, for many they seem to be primed by other things to see in it what they want.

Basically skeptical of common forms in modernity, that is very clearly the intention. However, I have also seen that in extreme far-right communities this film represents how Jewish people control the world... somehow I don't think that is what Carpenter was going for.

Alas, once your works are in the wild it is out of the creators control in how they end up being used.

My dad pitched this movie to me when I was a kid, as he was a Carpenter fan.

Beyond the somewhat "obvious" message (for a grown up) it's just an eminently entertaining movie.

What do they say about those who see through ideology.

"They live" was a cult classic, and great fun if you were a Roddy Piper fan.

Other entertaining films =3

"The Great Dictator" (Charlie Chaplin, 1940)

https://archive.org/details/the-great-dictator-disc-01-title...

"Day the Earth Stood Still" (1951)

https://archive.org/details/day-the-earth-stood-still-1951

"Invasion Of The Body Snatchers" (1956)

https://archive.org/details/invasionofthebodysnatchers1956_2...

"The Man in the White Suit" (1951)

https://archive.org/details/the-man-in-the-white-suit_202105

"The Twilight Zone" (1959)

https://archive.org/details/the-twilight-zone-1959-s-01-e-00...

https://archive.org/details/the-twilight-zone-1959-s-01-e-00...

https://archive.org/details/the-twilight-zone-1959-s-03-e-15...

https://archive.org/details/the-twilight-zone-1959-s-03-e-15...

> Each blocked ad gets a single phrase, picked at random from the list.

The least it could do was classify images to some categories with a small vision model smh. They stopped using AI too soon.

If AR ever makes it big, I think we have the first ad blocking idea already fleshed out. Would be kind of fun to see.

A $500 app for those $1000+ glasses which shuts people off from reality and create the impression for others that they look into their eyes (while in fact looking at a rendering of your eyes).

There's some irony in here somewhere...

Is the pervasive advertising not bad enough already that you want to waste time and energy inventing fake advertising using plagiarism bots?

I can't offhand thing of a worse idea in the context.

The blog post was from 2015

https://proceduralgraphics.blogspot.com/2015/04/they-live-ad...

Nice pitch. I'll stream it right away!

I've been watching Andor as a instructional manual recently and this seems like a good addition to the reality based manuals out there.

Idiocracy, War INC etc.

spoiler https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN8Z7y_QcwE

And Duke Nukem.

I came here to kick ass and deploy microservices... And I'm all out of ass.

And I am all out of bubble gum.

A very good alternative to this vibecoded slop.

> extreme far-right communities

Extreme libertarian seems a more apt description for those groups since they severely distrust government often also criticizing Trump and Netanyahu for example.

What if it wouldn't get done otherwise?

(Genuine question as we're all trying to figure this shit out)

I'd say it's got more than a bit of documentary, considering current progress in terraforming.

That's so obnoxiously stupid and annoying, wow.

There is a good video that this cool philosopher made, I can't remember the name.. zazik?

Edit: Slavoj Žižek. As always, phenomenal and humble take.

"I’m already eating from the trashcan all the time, the name of this trashcan is... ideology"

Slavoj Žižek on "They Live" (The Pervert's Guide to Ideology) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVwKjGbz60k

"Automated Incompetence" is probably better than "Artificial Incompetence" since the incompetence is 100% real.

"Content Not Available Content not available in your region.

"Learn more about Imgur access in the United Kingdom"

The irony!

Seems not to be available in europe "The uploader has not made this video available in your country"

Are you writing code in a computer instead of using pen and paper? Preposterous!

That “kick ass & chew gum” line has been hugely borrowed, reused and parodied many times throughout the following decades since the release of this movie.

In fact the whole movie is almost a parody of itself now due to how many scenes have since become a meme.

I came here to shitpost and deploy microservices... and github is down.

Interacting with a computer in natural language is much more human than typing in special codes and punctuation.

A lot of them are very concerned about restricting the rights of others

I have not clicked, but recently I was suggested a video whose title was more or less: “everybody thinks 1984 agrees with them”.

Meanwhile I've personally found myself completely unable to take it seriously due to the subliminal messages being "marry and reproduce" and "consume". Like people need sinister brainwashing to fall in love, have sex, or engage in hedonistic consumption. These are base biological urges that have existed regardless of societal economy for millennia! By casting it as something from a sinister conspiracy it makes the creator come across as someone completely insane from being so swallowed by their ideology. The sheer ridiculousness of it it brings to mind the "Mortal Engines" series and its incredibly dumb basic premise and the critical panning that it received. The lesson being, that just because something is an allegory or metaphor doesn't prevent it from being so incredibly stupid that it completely derails the message it is trying to send. Imagine if the billboards instead said.

I recognize that this is certainly a minority view given how influential the film is. But I just plain cannot unsee it, like a Lovecraftian revelation and that ruins it for me from the start. Short of thinking Jodie Foster is talking to you through screens, it is very hard to look like an outright unhinged anti-Reaganist given the many legitimate things to object to about the man and his policies. Even if you agree with some of it, you can easily see where others would reasonably disagree. But this 'basic urges are part of a sinister conspiracy' sort of message? This managed to do it.

It's interesting right? Now there's too much distrust of authority and also not enough. Even the word "skeptic" is sometimes used to refer to people who "do their own research" and doggedly latch on to wild conspiracy theories.

Avoiding groupthink is another slightly different positive spin on (my read of) the underlying message. There's such a thing as toxic individualism too, but if there's a "bad" way to be a free-thinker then you could say it usually has a pretty limited blast radius for society in general and it isn't a contagious kind of madness either

To be fair, some people will always default back to "the Jews" any opportunity they get. That's not specific to this movie.

We'd all be better off for it. I don't want you to take a shit on the table and call it dinner. Even if you don't cook.

> somehow I don't think that is what Carpenter was going for.

Same deal with the Starship Troopers movie. When Helldivers first came out, it was really incredible to see how many people truly didn't get the irony.

I think this is false dichotomy. It's been a while since actually empowering and encouraging humans was considered normal and attempted at scale. But not that long. How quick we forget. I think it's worth getting back to.

It wouldn't have. I put this off for 11 years, the joke wasn't worth the manual effort required

AI is amazing at jumping into an unfamiliar codebase, it was probably 20 mins total work

That's how most people feel when presented slop btw

And the massive irony that it the clothing brand "Obey".

Slavoj Žižek ?

The human world is full of special codes and obscure gestures that only have meaning if provided in the right sequence to the right people. Computer programming being documented and formalized makes it more accessible than many social circles.

Imagine writing this comment on 2013 Hacker News with a straight face.

> Basically skeptical of common forms in modernity, that is very clearly the intention. However, I have also seen that in extreme far-right communities this film represents how Jewish people control the world... somehow I don't think that is what Carpenter was going for.

Say what you will about claiming that the Jews secretly control the world like the aliens in the 1988 John Carpenter movie They Live, the people making this claim are certainly not obeying, conforming, or refraining from questioning authority.

I think we can agree that this is not something anybody will actually use, but rather an homage to "They Live", and IMHO, letting this be done by AI is in contrast to the basic premise of the movie.

So telling someone to make a table for you is more human than making it yourself, because you're using natural language instead of saws and hand planes?

Source?

Yes, thats the point of the movie - human beings' most banal desires can be and are weaponized against them.

That you reject the entire premise of the movie because you can't "get over" this particular aspect, just means you've got your own loaded revolver in your pocket.

> marry and reproduce

I left that out deliberately, as I think they are a good thing

Yes, I am aware of the irony of trying to manipulate people via messages

The system isn’t static. Anti-authority is not countered by authority, or the same kind of authority. It’s countered by co-opting anti-authority.

So.. a lot of this is "negative polarisation" combined with "exactly wrong". People see something bad happening, or come to distrust a piece of mainstream belief/reporting when it gets caught in a contradiction or turns out on subsequent evidence to be wrong. That is the healthy side of skepticism.

The problem comes in this causing people to do one or both of:

- immediately flip to believing the direct opposite, without evidence that's true either (most things are not excluded-middle)

- immediately imprint on the first non-mainstream source they find and start treating it as gospel

> but if there's a "bad" way to be a free-thinker then you could say it usually has a pretty limited blast radius for society in general and it isn't a contagious kind of madness either

It absolutely can be contagious. Sometimes that's for the good, sometimes bad, quite often the mixed result of getting to the right place only after a fraught disruptive time. Martin Luther, originator of the listicle, was correct in a lot of the theses but also started the domino chain for some of the most lethal wars in Europe. VI Lenin was right about the problems and wrong about the solutions. And so on.

If it was a basic biological function then the marketing department wouldn’t exist.

>wild conspiracy theories.

Do you know the difference between a conspiracy "nut", and a rational person?

For a "conspiracy nut", understanding that there is sufficient incentive (also implies a lack of deterrent) for X to do Y is proof enough that X is doing Y.

For a "mainstream" person, that is not enough. They require real, solid proof to consider that X is doing Y.

Note that this is about deciding their own behavior, and not about handing capital punishment for X.

I ll let you decide who is smarter...

The joke wasn't worth 10+ hours manual work

What's the premise of the movie? I thought it was about psyops.

(Also interdimensional shapeshifting reptilians.)

"Say what you want about the tenets of national socialism, at least it's an ethos" -- The Big Lebowski, another influential film to many people.

> the people making this claim are certainly not obeying, conforming, or refraining from questioning authority.

In my experience racists tend to just latch on to different authorities to blindly follow and obedience and conformity are even more strongly enforced. I've had long discussions with racists over the "rebel" identity they see in the confederate flag who shortly after demonstrated incredible amounts of boot-licking when it came to police. Most of the racists I've meet were very dedicated to hierarchies, a select set of social norms, old-fashioned gender roles, etc. and conformance was absolutely seen as mandatory.

They absolutely conform; by what mechanism do you think they all happened to pick the same bundle of labels and beliefs?

That argument could be taken to any extreme at the end of the day. They Live, at its core, is a commentary on unrestrained capitalism. You could fault OP for using a Google browser. You could fault OP for using a Microsoft cloud repository. The line may be blurrier than one thinks...

I would say yes, conversing between two humans, maybe even collaborating, is more human than a solitary human using inanimate objects.

> telling someone to make a table for you is more human than making it yourself

That's a bad comparison. You have to compare crafting a table manually to doing it via CNC.

Not sure you can purely talk about "is the motivation likely?" and end up with qanon stuff. This leaves out motivated reasoning coming from the rube, plus a bunch of other things like narratives that are sufficiently fun / scandalous /surprising

The difference is that one follows the collective/reactive order of things, and the other doesn't.

"Everyone knows" is the greatest conspiracy of all. Its quite possible to be a 'nut' simply by referring to what "everyone knows" ... this is a thought-stopping meme designed to end challenge to authority, since "everyone" is the ultimate authority.

Looking at conspiracy nuts joining ice and gleefully celebrating unidentified armed goons abducting people, i think they more likely think, well, i would do y, so they must be doing it against me.

And let's also not forget that keeping wildlife, an amphibious rodent, within the city isn't legal either.

But it's not The Federal Authorities™, so they don't think it counts as conformity.

A "mainstream" person can also consider past evidence of A, B and C doing Y and assume that X is doing Y too without any evidence about Y.

Consumption and love/sex are things we tend to do naturally, but marketing just ramps it up to a level we probably wouldn't reach if we weren't forced or manipulated into it. Just about anybody can fall in love, but marketing can pressure you into thinking that not falling in love and being with someone means you've failed at life and marketing can fill with you anxiety if you aren't in love, or haven't had sex, or you've had sex too early, or not early enough, or not often enough, etc. Naturally they've got all kinds of things to sell you to help.

> Do you know the difference between a conspiracy "nut", and a rational person?

The former is trivially manipulated, can be made to believe anything by appealing to their inherent obvious biases, and will double down on their beliefs even when presented with irrefutable proof to the contrary. The latter can detect false dichotomies, understands answers are often nuanced instead of black and white, and is capable of changing their mind when new evidence comes to light.

I like The Big Lebowski, it has some fun lines, but John Goodman's Walter Sobchak doesn't have a monopoly on the English phrase "Say what you will about X".

And indeed apparently the line was in fact "say what you want about the tenets of national socialism", not "say what you will about the tenets of national socialism" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_29yvYpf4w).

I remember a conspiracy nut telling me "the truth", saying not to believe what the media told me, and do my own research. And then proceeded to point me to a few conspiracy influencers that were telling him what to think. It was very ironic.

Of course, choosing to stand up to the man together with those like minded makes you the real conformist. A deep philosophical conundrum for the prepubescent.

Even if the table collapses down badly instead of doing a proper one with a good set of tools?

Basket weaving is more human than conversation. Language is entry level artificial man.

Any argument can be taken to any extreme. This is why it's a popular rhetorical tactic, called "appeal to extremes".

"Mainstream" people will also look at past evidence that A, B and C did Y, and say something like "that was N years ago, surely nobody would do this today".

Of all the phenomena in modern life a person might have anxiety about, the kinds of sex they are having (or not having) seem like the thing most relatable to their hunter-gatherer ancestors tens of thousands of years ago, long before the invention of marketing.

Yes, these categories are sometimes simply separated by what they considers as "irrefutable proof".

The second half of the line was also relevant, since the claim of Jews controlling the world was specifically a Nazi one.

See “The Final Experiment”.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Final_Experiment_(expediti...

In particular the “Reactions” section.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Final_Experiment_(expediti...

You’ll find this bit:

> Alabama pastor Dean Odle suggested that Satan created a fireball to act as a false Sun.

That is cuckoo cuckoo bananas to a point only “conspiracy nut” applies.

So, why did you use it in this case?

So you consider calling something "ironic" an extreme position? On a more general note, you will find that many people are uncomfortable with the idea that AI will replace human work, especially when it relates to art, which this project in question references.

But there are many more tech things we take for granted that could be seen as ironic as well. I think I never saw this movie but being a young adult and an Internet nerd in the late '90s early -00s I remember perfectly how many people were negatively discussing it because it was dehumanizing, destroying personal relationships in flesh and a long etc. And while the future turned out to be not so good as some early adopter thought, it also never turned into something so bleak as detractors said it would.

And I think the same will apply here, with GenAI.