Marc Adler
@marc__adler
Πόλεμος πάντων μὲν πατήρ ἐστι, πάντων δὲ βασιλεύς, καὶ τοὺς μὲν θεοὺς ἔδειξε τοὺς δὲ ἀνθρώπους, τοὺς μὲν δούλους ἐποίησε τοὺς δὲ ἐλευθέρους.
Maybe people who deny the existence of qualia don't actually experience qualia.
Was just informed by my daughter that "clanker" is a derogatory term for any device that runs on AI.
After today's Sunday crossword puzzle I'm never going to look at Marisa Tomei the same again.
This site's like a bus where you strike up a conversation with other passengers and they're smart and know a lot and the conversation is interesting but there's a psychotic homeless woman in the back screaming that Sydney Sweeney is a Nazi.
"Nothing communicates that feeling of infinity better than stupidity." (Ödön von Horváth)
Friendly reminder that you're trapped in a place you'll never escape.

Tolstoy on what constitutes art: it's that tiny little difference, that slight modification, that minor tweaking, that makes art art. And it can't be taught.



There's a Japanese site that aggregates only bad news about the economy: fukeiki.com There's a certain type of ruthlessness in Japanese culture that's underappreciated.
Stephen Mitchell's translations of Rilke are faithful by not being faithful, in the way Borges meant when he said he wants his translators to translate what he meant, not what he said.
It seems ChatGPT prioritises colloquial sense over rhythm. Take the first sentence for example. Mitchell’s translation is much more faithful to the German, opting for ‘came […] in the night’ rather than the conversational ‘arrived […] at night.’
Finally got a moment to go through those LRBs I've been meaning to get to


"Tradition is the living faith of the dead, traditionalism is the dead faith of the living." — Jaroslav Pelikan.
It seems ChatGPT prioritises colloquial sense over rhythm. Take the first sentence for example. Mitchell’s translation is much more faithful to the German, opting for ‘came […] in the night’ rather than the conversational ‘arrived […] at night.’
I showed my wife how replacing "but" with "and therefore" sometimes clarifies causal relationships ("he proved to be a violent and ruthless b̶u̶t̶ and therefore extremely capable leader") and now whenever I use "but" she corrects me to "and therefore."