Hey Ozarck, are you still interested in trying to buy that limb-vat? Right now would probably be a good time to met IC if you still want to try and do that.
I'm still interested, but I think the rug has been pulled out from under us with Xan.
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I kinda want to take at least partial credit for this abomination anyway, as it was based off a permutation of an idea I proposed in tinker: essentially an exosuit that carried spares. that got modified into a suit pretty much made of spares, which then ...
Xan himself is kinda (in some aspects) becoming more human. And that's actually somewhat more scary than the alternative.
That explanation I can understand. And yes, it's actually far more scary - Fridge Horror-scary.
Humans are by nature fairly honest beings, and typically find lying uncomfortable. Of course, many people get broken from the norm via trauma, long term stressors, or unusual birth situations and find lying natural and "right" somehow, so we have that weird mixture of honest, dishonest (people who are normal but overcome their discomort), and pathological liars. I believe honesty is more naturally human, but philosophers are divided.
I can accept that approach. As for me, well, I'd say (at this point of life and reasoning) that 'conveying information' in general is naturally human. And some cultures/mindsets approve of conveying correct information (i.e. value honesty - very often by itself), while others approve of conveying incorrect information instead (i.e. value lies - as means towards some goal, almost always). Fun thing? Some (rare, specific, secondary) cultures approve conveying meaningless information (i.e., neither truth nor lies - for some, most often not specified, reasons), like abstract paintings, Zen koans or Internet "crazy randomness".
All in all, I'd say, most people being honest means overall victory of truth-valuing cultures (which is a commendable thing, I admit) rather than anything else - though I am open to agreeing to disagreeing here.
Often the societies that value incorrect information are really putting another value ahead of truth: loyalty to family, honor, saving face, politeness. And as or meaningless inormation: Zen Buddhism favors this in philosophy as a part of the path to nonbeing. One could argue, however, that most, if not all, cultures value nonmeaningful information, in the form of emotive language, and in the form of music. Music in particular is not really designed to carry information, but to evoke a mood. Of course, back when oral societies were the norm, songs did convey important info. even so, much of music is there for reasons other than the "meaning."