The begger is humble, for their behaviour may grant them a desire. When there’s nothing to gain or lose, then you will see how people truly behave

I walked towards the supermarket and near the entrance was a beggar. This is nothing surprising, it’s a common scene these days. As per usual, I would ignore them and continue my shopping. However, this day a beggar asked me to buy something for him. He started off very polite, very reserved and humble. “Hi, excuse, could you please buy something inside the supermarket for me…” His body language was pleading, although standing up, he kept himself low, almost like a bow as he was speaking. Before he got into his reason, I cut him off and said “sorry, I can’t do that.”

  His entire demeanor instantly changed. Gone was the meek, quiet, and trying to act as pleasant beggar. Now, it was the aggressive beggar, “Why the fuck not?” he yelled. How amusing just how quickly he changed. How amusing how entitled he was. Why should anyone help anyone else where there’s no connections or relations? Why did he believe he was so entitled that I should fork out my finite funds for his needs? Even more so when there’s government funded homeless shelters and food in there. In that moment, after my rejection, and possibility many other rejections, his true self appears.

  If someone has something to gain by acting in a certain way, it’s not their true selves. Like the advice to watch how others treat waiters to judge them. Even if we treated a waiter like shit, they would still need to serve us regardless, after all, that’s what they’re getting paid for. Nobody has anything to gain by treating a waiter well or badly.

  So if you wanted to find out someone’s true self, observe how they handle rejection from someone where they have everything to gain and nothing to lose. Observe how they dress, act and react when asking for that request. Compare that with a baseline of how they usually act to others and then we can see just what type of person they truly are.

Although, do this with much caution, ignorance is bliss after all. Do you really want to know which of your friends treat non-important like shit? Especially when, in your mind, they’re a “nice” person? Do you really want to know exactly what would happen if you became that non-important person? Nobody wants fake friends, even more so if they’re well hidden. But what if all your friends are fake, what if you have zero “real” friends. All because you wanted to test people and see what they’re truly like.

  People need their own privacy. Workplaces talk a lot of bring your “authentic” self in and this is the dumbest marketing scheme of the century. People are weird, they’re strange in so many different ways and sometimes, it’s better to know their front and keep it that way. A friend of yours might be perfectly fine to hang out with, until you realise they’re a hardcore anti-waste person and just dumpster dived for food before meeting you. Sometimes, it’s best not to know someone’s weird and wacky authentic self and just know the person they show you. As long as they’re not taking advantage of you, then ignorance is bliss my friend.

Accountabliity Partners must know and understand you properly. They must be able to hit the truth about WHY you want to change.

I always see posts on Reddit asking for an accountability partner. Someone who you tell what you want to do so they can keep you accountable and on track with that goal. There’s even paid accountability groups, where everyone keeps each other accountable to whatever task they wanted to do. This all sounds great in theory. But, in practice it’s a lot more nuanced then just telling a random stranger on the internet what you want to do and magically expecting that you’d do that.

  The theory of accountability partners is that you, a social animal, care about the consequences of not going through with your word. However, people lie. Others don’t care about people in general. Words are the wind, just because you say something doesn’t mean you give a damn about going through with it. In the end, running away from those people, those groups, is always an option.
Online Universities (Unis) have an abysmal completion rate. Everyone starts the course then completely forgets about it. Physical Unis have layers of accountability, but they have real external punishments as well. In a course, friends would ask about how you went with the latest assignment. Nobody wants to be the person so constantly says they haven’t done it. Or in classes, the tutor would ask about your progress on the coursework. Again, do you really want to look like a dud?

  Normally, this is good enough to compel people to move forward. There’s a social shame and stigma attached to someone who does nothing. Except, for me, I just ran away. I ran away from the friends I made so I’d never need to talk about coursework. I stopped attending classes so the tutors could never ask me about assignments. I ran away, then failed that course.

  Just having someone to ask about your progress isn’t enough. Ben, on the the Charisma on Command podcast, talked about when he was hesitant to approach a girl in a bar. His friend tried multiple ways of convincing him but nothing worked. Until he touched upon who Ben saw himself as. A charismatic guy who runs the Charisma on Command Youtube channel. Could he really call himself someone charisma and teach others if he didn’t approach this girl? That was what compelled him forward. Not his friend being by his side, holding him accountable just by listening and watching him. It was holding him accountable to who he sees both his current and his future self to be.

  The correct type accountability partner must know who you see your current and future self as. Then and only then could they hold you accountable. There will always be times you falter and slack, after all, if it was easy, did you really need someone to constantly hold you to your word? Your partner’s true moment to shine is during those lulls, to re-invigorate yourself by holding you to who you wish to become. To align your current actions with your identity.

  Take myself as an example. After reading experiences at Nazi concentration camps, the Communist Revolution and the resulting mass incarnation or massacres from the Gulag Archipelago in Russia and The Great Leap Forward in China. I wondered, take everything away from a man, what does he have left? Let’s say we were in that same position. We lost everything. Our homes and possessions, family, friends, community and are locked up in hard labour. What do we have left? To me, the only thing I had left was my word. Hence, I define myself as a man of my word and will go to great lengths to keep it like that.

  However, yesterday, I said I’d fix my sleeping schedule. I’d wake up early in the mornings to take steps to will this world to my image. Yet, I failed. Instead, waking up midday and, yet again, nothing could be accomplished. My hypothetical accountability partner hold me against that. How I said I was a man of my word, yet what do my actions tell the world? They would provoke me into action to be who I define myself as. That is to get up and get ready early in the mornings, to will my world into existence, instead of sleeping half of it away. So, it isn’t perfect, but better than nothing.

General Intelligence training doesn’t exist, knowledge is domain limited and has extremely limited transfer.

You know those human benchmark tests? The ones that ask you to memorise a sequence of numbers, or the order of blocks flashing. These give the impression of testing our intelligence, or skills. A higher score means we’re more intelligent than others, or have some greater aspect somewhere in life compared to those with low scores. However, what would these tests actually do? The only thing it helps with is getting really good at the test itself! Why? Because knowledge, generally, is non-transferable. Being skilled at memorising numbers or flashing patterns doesn’t translate to anything else, besides extremely similar tasks.

  This is even true in cooking and baking. Although they’re so similar, you’re making food to eat, both require a diverging skillset, even if you’re a masterchef at cooking dinner, that might not be so for desserts like pudding. I would deem myself decent enough at cooking, however, the first time I made pudding it was burnt. Only immediately similar skills transferred over, not the overall skill of being good at cooking.

  Writing non-fiction vs fiction is another example. To write non-fiction isn’t overly difficult, just research a bunch and spew out words on a page, that’s exactly what my blog is. Even if we could write non-fiction perfectly fine, that doesn’t mean writing fiction is suddenly easy. Check out my fiction novel, Love, Life and Board games, https://www.scribblehub.com/series/115029/life-love-and-board-games/, it fucking sucks. Seriously, I cringe just thinking about that single chapter. Even for something as similar as writing, intelligence is non-transferable.

  An IQ test isn’t exactly an intelligence test, it measures how quickly we discover and apply the pattern. Ie new job, how fast do you learn. Getting proficient at an IQ test, which you can study and learn, doesn’t suddenly mean you’d pick up everything quickly, nah, you just get really good at performing IQ tests.

  So any time you see shit like benchmark tests or the like, just do it for fun, but don’t take it seriously. Even though the study of intelligence is rather depressing, that there’s no single activity we can do to improve intelligence across all domains. Understanding these restrictions means we won’t waste time on silly tests and, instead, focus on a domain, trying to figure out which skills become transferable to the next role and which ones need to be learnt.

  Otherwise we’d become the Peter Principle, promoted to position of least competence. As people demonstrate skill in their job, they’d get promoted up and up. But, as they climb up, the skills they mastered for their current role doesn’t transfer over to the next. There’s a world of difference between being a programmer and a manager. Thus, eventually, they’re promoted until they don’t show enough competence to be promoted again. Hence they’re promoted to the position of least competence.

With money, a city is luxury and attractions. Without money, a city is a walled garden.

There’s a fair amount to do in the city. Many food places. You could go on meetup and socialise with those new to the city. You could enjoy the markets. Fine foods. Gelato or fish and chips by the harbour. Scenic seaplane tours or a cruise to nearby islands. So so much to do, yet so little time to experience them all. That is, if you had money. $20 meals. $10 drinks. $10 gelato. $200 for seaplanes or $150 for cruise tours.

  What’s a city without money? When your budget allows for a single meal out each week, with no entree or drink. You walk around and see all the sights, the things to do, only to come upon the sad realisiation that they’re walled off to you. Look at that awesome cruise, or that magnificent museum. Both of which you can only stare upon at a distance. Wishing. Hoping to go. So desperate, you want to befriend a rich old couple for a boat cruise..

  Thus, a city is simply the embodiment of sadness. Everywhere your eyes reach is somewhere you can never touch. The city, the central hub that has access to nearly everything. Cuisines of the world. Tourist attractions for days. Music and Arts. Everything someone could want. But not for you, the poor beggar.

  Then what is the city to a poor man, one without funds? The only source of enjoyment would be a few places without admission fee, usually funded by the government. Beyond that would be nature and hikes. These usually aren’t common in larger cities, for by necessity they sprawl outwards and consume all in their sights. Not even mountains are safe. I write this as I live upon a mountain, 145 meters above ground level, where everywhere my eyes can see is a mountains filled with houses on the edges of the summit.

This ongoing capitalist society has divided society, between those who have funds, and can afford luxuries and enjoyments that money brings. And those who have nothing, where not even nature is safe anymore. Welcome to our world.

Chinese government mandates stories to conform with acceptable Chinese Communist values, thus making anime boring. Boring anime = no watchers = no money = dead industry.

Japanese wares used to be seen as low quality, garbage where the only redeeming factor is the cheap price. But, overtime, their production quality rose higher and higher until today. Where Japanese goods are known for it’s high quality.

 The same story is playing out for China, they used to produce absolute garbage, but it was cheap so everyone bought it. As time goes on, as more money flows in, manufacturing processes are improving to a point where the only low quality products are from dodgy suppliers.

How does this relate to anime you ask? Anime is following the very same trend, it started off as hot garbage and nowadays, it’s decent. Still seen with a stigma of low quality, but evidence of improvements is obvious. The 3D animations isn’t pixar quality yet, the 2D animations still haven’t perfected the art as of now. However, it’s only a matter of time.

 Then, isn’t it strange to say the Chinese anime studios may collapse? After all, the trends are obvious, the population and thus money is free flowing. What could possibly stop such a giant? Itself, yes that’s right, China itself could cause the collapse of Chinese anime. You see, the Chinese government has been ramping up it’s socialist policies and propaganda. Games like Playeruknown’s BattleGrounds required changes to “support the Chinese communist values.” That’s a real story by the way. But people aren’t going to sit there and watch propaganda. Given ones free choice, people will always gravitate towards the most interesting stories and forcefully embedding communist into stories isn’t interesting.

The extreme ramp up of imbuing stories with acceptable Chinese Communist values will reduce the enjoyment of stories. Without people activity enjoying the underlying stories, there’ll be no money to be made in Chinese anime. No money means no talent, no training, no researching the latest techniques. So the Chinese government, by making stories boring due to forceful propaganda, may cause the anime industry to die before it truly blooms. The novel industry is another target, with some post-apocalyptic stories had to revise the year of the demise because of the Communist Party’s 5 year technological superiority plan.

Chinese government mandates stories to conform with acceptable Chinese Communist values, thus making anime boring. Boring anime = no watchers = no money = dead industry.

Japanese wares used to be seen as low quality, garbage where the only redeeming factor is the cheap price. But, overtime, their production quality rose higher and higher until today. Where Japanese goods are known for it’s high quality.

 The same story is playing out for China, they used to produce absolute garbage, but it was cheap so everyone bought it. As time goes on, as more money flows in, manufacturing processes are improving to a point where the only low quality products are from dodgy suppliers.

How does this relate to anime you ask? Anime is following the very same trend, it started off as hot garbage and nowadays, it’s decent. Still seen with a stigma of low quality, but evidence of improvements is obvious. The 3D animations isn’t pixar quality yet, the 2D animations still haven’t perfected the art as of now. However, it’s only a matter of time.

 Then, isn’t it strange to say the Chinese anime studios may collapse? After all, the trends are obvious, the population and thus money is free flowing. What could possibly stop such a giant? Itself, yes that’s right, China itself could cause the collapse of Chinese anime. You see, the Chinese government has been ramping up it’s socialist policies and propaganda. Games like Playeruknown’s BattleGrounds required changes to “support the Chinese communist values.” That’s a real story by the way. But people aren’t going to sit there and watch propaganda. Given ones free choice, people will always gravitate towards the most interesting stories and forcefully embedding communist into stories isn’t interesting.

The extreme ramp up of imbuing stories with acceptable Chinese Communist values will reduce the enjoyment of stories. Without people activity enjoying the underlying stories, there’ll be no money to be made in Chinese anime. No money means no talent, no training, no researching the latest techniques. So the Chinese government, by making stories boring due to forceful propaganda, may cause the anime industry to die before it truly blooms. The novel industry is another target, with some post-apocalyptic stories had to revise the year of the demise because of the Communist Party’s 5 year technological superiority plan.