The Ungoverned

Thoughts on man and his universe
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  • David Veksler

How cultural Marxism ruined PC builds Feb 17, 2019

How cultural Marxism ruins everything: Perhaps the most popular and well-produced technology commentary site on the Internet is The Verge. The Verge recently published a how-to guide for building a $2000 gaming computer. The guide was full of wrong and cringe-worthy information and was widely ridiculed by YouTube commentators. The Verge responded by calling its critics "toxic" and "racially motivated" and filed DMCA copyright infringement claims against YouTube commentators who used the video to explain why the information was wrong. The Verge first deleted all negative comments, then disabled all comments and votes on the video, then ultimately acknowledge that...

By David Veksler Vote1 0

The Fatal Conceit Feb 14, 2019

Imagine that planet Earth had a sister planet, like our Earth, but without any people. Imagine that you could magically transport humans and all their possessions to this planet, one at a time.How many people would you need to transport to create a standard of living equal to our Earth? Without a period of rebuilding knowledge and capital, I believe that the answer would be quite close to seven billion.Virtually all of humankind is integrated into a global web of civilization. The physical and mental bonds linking every human being together are just as essential to our survival as our technical...

By David Veksler Vote1 0

Welcome to the experience economy, where ownership is a hobby Feb 10, 2019

I love the awesome stuff you can get these days. I was born in Soviet Ukraine and grew up before the internet, before cell phones, before the smart-everything, connected-everything, disposable-everything era. Don't even get me started about groceries. My second favorite thing about the United States is Costco and their cheap five-pound strawberry crates, giant cheese wedges, and more. Ownership Is a Drag But as much I love stuff, I hate owning things. Ownership is a drag. As soon as I acquire anything, it begins to decay, get outdated, and lose its relevance to me. Every single possession is a...

By David Veksler Vote2 0

How egalitarianism ruined education Feb 6, 2019

Children should not be forced to memorize anything that does not serve a practical purpose. Education beyond basic social function should be "just in time" not "just in case." What is "practical?" That depends on the context of the child's abilities and socio-economic status, but it can be objectively answered. Plumbers don't need Shakespeare. A plumber is welcome to read Hamlet, but forcing him to spend 16 years in useless classroom rituals wastes both money and the most productive years of his life. The egalitarian myth is: if all children are given a proper education, they can all have an...

By David Veksler Vote3 0

Why Hollywood villains have become politically correct Feb 6, 2019

Why even Hollywood villains have become politically correct: According to the "nothing about us without us" principle of intersectionality, it is verboten to present racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, xenophobia, classism, etc without being a member of the victim group. As a result, creators not allowed to have their *villains* have such traits unless the writer/producer themselves are in the victim group. For example, the left forced Chinese-American writer Amélie Wen Zhao to withdraw her debut fantasy novel containing slavery because, even though Chinese immigrants experienced racism, they were not actually enslaved. The only evil which remains a fair target...

By David Veksler Vote2 0

Third-wave feminism is an assault on women’s rights Feb 6, 2019

If today's feminists stood for anything at all, they ought to support a woman's basic right to own her body. Yet today's "woke" feminists stand for precisely the opposite: In the West, the feminist movement won basic rights for women to enter into contracts, vote, and change the legal status of women from "property" to "human being." Faced with the victory of their original aims, modern "third-wave" feminists decided to redefine feminism by combining it with intersectionality. Intersectionality is the idea that society is dominated by "layers of oppression" such as racism, classism, ableism, ageism and many more. Equality before...

By David Veksler Vote1 0

Three Key Differences Between Traditional and Crypto Markets Jan 15, 2019

What is the real market value of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin? The numbers used to explain the performance of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are less meaningful than most assume. Cryptocurrencies are not exactly like stocks, and cryptocurrency exchanges do not work like traditional securities markets. As a result, many crypto-asset investment strategies based on conventional definitions of market share, capitalization, volatility, and trading volume are deeply flawed. Misleading numbers mean that cryptocurrency valuation and adoption is poorly understood, which creates a false perception by the media and investors about cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.  One implication of this analysis is that Bitcoin has...

By David Veksler Vote1 0

Will Bitcoin burn the planet to ashes? Not so fast. Dec 8, 2018

Environmentalists have recently become concerned about the impact Bitcoin mining has on global warming. Headlines such as "Bitcoin Will Burn the Planet Down. The Question: How Fast?" and "Bitcoin Mining Alone Could Raise Global Temperatures Above Critical Limit By 2033" suggest that Bitcoin is an unfolding environmental disaster. However, those panicking about crypto make three fundamental errors. First, they do not understand how Bitcoin works, second, they do not understand what mass adoption would look like, and third, they do not understand the problem Bitcoin is intended to solve. Regardless of your opinion on the danger of global warming, Bitcoin...

By David Veksler Vote7 0

Happy 10th birthday to Bitcoin! Nov 1, 2018

Happy birthday to Bitcoin! 10 years ago, Satoshi Nakamoto published a white paper for "a Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System" which would "allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution." Just a few short months later, the Bitcoin network launched on 3 January 2009. Bitcoin is the culmination of thousands of years in the evolution in money. It is durable, portable, divisible, uniform, and limited by design. Over the span of human history, money has taken the form of shells, salt, coins, banknotes, and fiat bills. While money serves a crucial...

By David Veksler Vote2 0

Is your “side hustle”​ holding back or advancing your career? Oct 24, 2018

I encourage people to develop a “side hustle,” but they are not suitable for everyone, and many people get hustles that do more harm than good. The proper function of a side hustle is not to earn a few extra dollars — it’s to grow your value proposition and train for a life of financial independence and entrepreneurship. Many people get a side hustle that distracts rather than enhances their career. Driving Uber at night or hosting Airbnb guests every night is not going to enhance your career unless your dream is to be a chauffeur or enter the hospitality...

By David Veksler Vote2 0

Why democracies fail Oct 17, 2018

A civilization is created by its best people: the best scientists, engineers, generals, statesmen, etc. This happens because a meritocratic society of some sort is required for a civilization to arise. In a democracy, the control over the fate of a civilization is handed over to the average voter. The problem with this is that the average voter was never capable of creating his civilization, much less understanding how it functions. Civilizations are necessarily the creation of their very brightest members: they represent a stretch of the human potential to a new plateau. They can only maintain their peak achievement...

By David Veksler Vote0 0

Why I prefer to live in a small apartment with a family of four Oct 16, 2018

People are shocked when I tell them that prefer living in a one-bedroom, furniture-free apartment with my wife and two kids, even though I can pay cash for a McMansion or two in the ‘burbs. Why do most people need more space? Consider my closet: When I decide what to wear to work in the morning, every shirt in my closet is a good option. I’ve gotten rid of anything that for whatever reason is not a viable choice. Most people have filled the majority of their closets with clothes that don’t fit, aren’t stylish, too old, etc. My shirts...

By David Veksler Vote4 0

How to apply evolutionary biology to extend your lifespan Aug 31, 2018

Here is the actual reason we grow old and die. Are you ready? It's brutal: Let's say there is a 2% chance that any given primitive human will die from external events each year. He might get eaten by a bear, starve to death, have a bad fall and get left behind by his tribe, get clubbed in the head, lost in the woods, etc. We can get the probability of not having been killed by an external event as (chance of being alive)^(age) For example, at age 10 that is .98^10=81%, age 30 is 54%, 70 is 24%, 100=13%....

By David Veksler Vote8 3

A Libertarian case for a civic duty to support open immigration Aug 31, 2018

1: Nations don’t have rights. Only people have rights. 2: People have a right to exclude others from their property for any reason. They have no right to exclude people from other’s property or to prevent their association. 3: In the case of infrastructure, public or private, the proper policy is to allow all peaceful people to access it freely. 4: Therefore, all States ought to have a policy of Open Immigration: no restriction of the free movement of labor. Passports and citizenship should be eliminated from our laws and vocabulary. The free movement of peaceful people across borders is...

By David Veksler Vote4 2

What if we paid for restaurants like we pay for school? Aug 15, 2018

Sending my daughter a Montessori school costs about $15,000 per year. We have two daughters and plan a third child so we may be paying $45,000 per year for some time to send three kids to private school. The cost is worth it because I do not believe that public schools are capable of preparing children for success in life. My own experience as an honors student in a "quality" public school made me hate learning, failed to prepare me for college, and was a miserable social experience. I don't mind paying for my children's education. What I mind is that...

By David Veksler Vote8 0

Censorship vs community standards: classifying content moderation on the Internet Aug 8, 2018

The following hierarchy attempts to classify different levels of content moderation (or censorship, depending on the context) in order to encourage a more productive discussion on how social networks ought to regulate content. Six Levels of Internet Content Moderation Level 1: Anything goes Examples: email before spam filters, darknet networks Level 1 networks have no content filtering whatsoever. Many networks start out this way during the development/testing phase. Level 1 networks must inevitably evolve to level 2 as they become popular in order to deal with spammers. Level 2: Content which disrupts core functionality prohibited Examples: Bitcoin, modern BitTorrent aggregators,...

By David Veksler Vote3 0

Seven reasons why Facebook is wrong in their censorship of CodeIsFreeSpeech.com Aug 5, 2018

Seven reasons why Facebook is wrong and dishonest in their censorship of Code Is Free Speech dot com:   1: Code Is Free Speech dot com only hosts free and publicly-available information (how to build a weapon using a 3d printer) and does not sell any prohibited products or services. 2: The website is protected by both the first amendment (freedom of speech) and the second (freedom to bear arms). Prohibition of the information on the site is unconstitutional. As a business, Facebook is not bound by the U.S. Constitution, but as an American company, it ought to respect it....

By David Veksler Vote7 1

Against “gender-neutral parenting” Jul 25, 2018

Parents have a responsibility to teach their children gender-normative behavior for the same reasons that they ought to teach their kids good manners. Manners, customs, and fashions serve to create a social environment in which the behavior of other people is predictable and facilitates cooperation. While many aspects of culture can vary dramatically without any social impact (ethnic foods, dance outfits), there needs to be a consensus on other aspects of optimal social function. Some manners are arbitrary whereas others have an objective basis. For example, greeting others is objectively important for conflict avoidance, whereas whether we shake hands, or...

By David Veksler Vote4 0

Is Bitcoin a help or a hindrance to criminals? Jul 16, 2018

From my Quora answer: The way this question is phrased is problematic. Are pencils useful to criminals? They can be used to write down schemes for robbing banks, kidnapping letters, etc. What about guns? Weapons give criminals an edge in committing crimes. Of course, pencils and guns can be used against criminals as well. Most people would agree that it’s a good idea that weapons exist (even if you think that only the policy and military should have them) -- otherwise, the strongest bullies could force their will on everyone else, and society would collapse. So what you should really ask is...

By David Veksler Vote3 0

How many cryptocurrencies will survive the infancy period? Jul 11, 2018

Reposted from Quora: The best way to estimate how many cryptocurrencies will survive the infancy period is to look at other markets. For example, how many social networks survived the infancy period? Facebook has 63% market share: If you use a stricter definition of “social network” to mean “feed-based platforms based around personal profiles” Facebook has over 99.8% market share. Google+ and Diaspora are well under 1%. What about Search Engines? Google has 87% market share. What about Desktop Operating Systems? Windows has 82%. What emerges from looking at these and other markets is that network effects lead to a...

By David Veksler Vote3 0

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