Misanthropic Nihilism, inc.

Model WIP

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 05:03:11 GMT

Things and whatnot.

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 10:29:24 GMT

TAFE is entertaining. I'm modelling and rigging a slamhound character thing that I doodled for one of my graphics assignments instead of modelling a house. :D

TAFE is a very productive place.

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 04:40:55 GMT

Hargh.

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 09:45:03 GMT

HOW DO I SHOT OPENID, I can't comment on Courtney's blog without one. This is most vexing.

Anywho, back from Adelaide, sadly. It was most exciting and full of people and cardgames. The existence and launch of DFORCE represents a CHALLENGE THAT WILL NOT GO UNIGNORED. TO THE TABLET, WHOOSH.

Adelaide

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 00:26:59 GMT

I am heading up in four minutes or so, and should be in the city around 4:30 - 5. Is it okay if I rock up slightly early?

\o/

Tue, 23 Feb 2010 00:25:33 GMT

(At the heart of the city)
At the heart of the city there is a building that looks down over all the rest.
(And the man in the tower controls it all)
And the man in the tower controls it all without raising a single fist.
It's like they gathered up the city, sold it to the Devil and now...
It's gone to Hell and they wonder how.

I'm going to come up to Adelaide Friday morning, since I don't have TAFE. I shall need an address for the house.

Apparently mules can reproduce, albeit rarely. This confuses me.

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 06:49:09 GMT

First off, fuck yeah Rainmeter and a random desktop wallpaper every 30 seconds. Embarassingly, I can't seem to remember the html tag for a hotlink (I thought it was a href src or something ;-;), so: http://i47.tinypic.com/107j0u9.jpg.

Secondly, hi Aaron and Hannah and Jacqui and maybe Alex if he's back yet, I have no idea, and also Hutchy if he exists again and Sara and Brendon and Courtney and Joel and anyone I've missed. I didn't end up coming up to Adelaide, as you can tell. I apologise for not letting you know, I have no excuse bar laziness.

TAFE orientation was yesterday. I got the first two weeks of graphic work out of the way and made an awkward 'you know who else liked dogs? Hitler!' joke. It's nice to have something to do during the week.

I am considering coming up to Adelaide for shits and giggles at some point when I have fuel money. Possibly for the housewarming, when is the cutoff date for expressions of interest?

The Protomen are an amazing band.

Sat, 30 Jan 2010 12:42:43 GMT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HP2NePWJ2pQ

My father worked the mines
'Til the day it took his life
Stolen from his only only son
And then stolen from his wife

And I swore upon his grave,
someday I would make things right.

So I learned how to bend steel
I learned how to make it move
And I watched as it withstood
all the hell we put men through

With hands of Iron
There's not a task we couldn't do.

They've waited so long for this day
Someone to take the death away
No son would ever have to say
"Father worked into his grave."

Tom, listen to yourself,
and listen carefully to me.
If you replace the working parts
you get a different machine.
The man who turns the wheels,
they will follow wherever he leads.
We've spent our whole lives searching for a way to make a better world.
Giving everything to them, asking for nothing in return.
Well here it is, a chance to take back everything we've earned.

They've waited so long for this day
(They waited for so long for this day)
Someone to take the death away
(There is no price they wouldn't pay)
No son would ever have to say
(For someone else to lead them)
"Father worked into his Grave"
(Don't turn your back on me!)

What will I become
With the things I will create
I never said that men should bow
I never said that men should break
I only want what's best

The one I love she works so hard
Works her fingers until they bleed
Some of the pain she endures
Would bring a strong man to his knees
I only want to help

Albert: You are a fool
Tom: You underestimate the character of men
Albert: Well they are weaker than you think
Tom: You think they'll surrender if you bind their working hands,
but they are strong!
Albert: Just wait and see.

We will build cities in a day!
(Men would cower at the sight)
We will build towers to the heavens!
(Men was not built for such a height)
We will be heroes!
(We will build heroes)

They've waited so long for this day,
someone to take the death away.
No son would ever have to say
"Father worked into his Grave."

Men sleep tonight with hands of bone
And will awake with hands of steel
With these hands we will destroy
And with these hands we will rebuild
And we will stand above the city
Rising high above the streets
From tops of buildings we will look
At all the lies beneath our feet
And we will raise our hands above us
Cast down shining in the sun
And with these hands that will not bleed
My father's battle will be won

Gah.

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:00:02 GMT

Whoops. I wasn't terribly clear in my last post, I'm not coming up today. If I come up at all, it will be next week, and I might be coming up and going back in the same day (it's for an appointment Mum has).

So.

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 07:40:22 GMT

I will possibly maybe be in Adelaide on Tuesday. Do we want to have tea or play cards or something?

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 10:12:23 GMT

Hi there. I have absolutely nothing to say except:

* I'm quite fond of Aaron, Hutchy, Jacqui, Hannah, Damo, Craig, numerous folk from Warhammer, etc. and I'm rather worried that I don't show it often. Self-reflection is a pain.

* It's fucking hot in my room despite it being cool outside. The window is open and so is the door but the heat stubbornly refuses to leave, like a guest you never invited and don't really like verymuch anyway.

* My workroom in the shed is full of flies.

* My shift key is sticky and broken and jammed from something, probably pencil shavings. Right shift is hard to use.

I thought this was interesting.

Sun, 10 Jan 2010 10:04:20 GMT

Janurary and a Metroid Prime review.

Wed, 06 Jan 2010 18:54:47 GMT

TAFE finally got around to replying, and class starts in Feburary. Cert 4 in IT probably isn't the most exciting certificate ever but it's probably better than sitting around staring at the wall. There's a bike in the shed, so trips to the TAFE campus five times a week should serve as an effective means of weight loss.

The previous paragraph was an experiment in not using 'I'. It's harder than it should be.

I really wish I could waffle on about stuff like Aaron does, but I honestly don't have anything much to talk about. So instead, in order to improve the content vomitted onto the airwaves every Friday, I am going to start posting reviews. Today's is Metroid Prime for the Wii.

It cost $80 off the shelf and it came with the other two games in the trilogy - Prime II: Echoes and Prime III: Corruption. Since this is my first venture into the brave, wild world of Metroid since Return of Samus on the original gameboy, the experience has been a little bit strange but not unpleasant. Metroid is an open-world FPS/adventure game that follows the adventures of Samus Aran, everyone's favourite bounty hunter. She rocks up at a crippled Space Pirate frigate in orbit around a planet called Tallon and wrecks some faces, only to discover that the pirates have their grubby claws deep in Tallon's crust and really shouldn't be allowed to keep them there.

After a bog standard spaceship chase cinematic you are deposited bleary-eyed and blinking in a vast, sprawling world covered in greenery. The graphics are smooth and really quite excellent, considering the Wii's graphic capability, and little touches like seeing Samus' face reflected on the inside of the visor in low-light areas go a long way towards making it an immersive and engaging game. The music, too, is a high point, with some really atmospheric pieces and cues for getting into combat or solving a puzzle.

The game basically revolves around progressing through the varied rooms and areas via your suit weapons and abilities - you start with nothing but a 'power beam' and some HP, and by the end of the game you're a walking arsenal. Room solutions range from shooting a coloured door with the corresponding suit weapon to turning into a sphere and rolling around a bunch of magnetized tracks on the roof, dropping bombs on your enemies' heads.

Hints and tips can be picked up by utilizing a 'scan visor', which locks on to interesting bits of stuff scattered around the game world and gives you a short textual description or bit of flavour text. Items like computers and switches also need to be scanned to activate them.

Despite the Wii motion sensor shittiness quotient, Samus controls smoothly and responsively. The pointer is certainly leagues better than typical consol shooter controls (which isn't saying much) and the inclusion of a lock-on system goes miles towards replicating the ease of using a mouse.

It's not a shining beacon of perfection, though - due to the nature of the game, you need to progress through many of the same locations several times, solving them slightly differently as you accquire new weapons and abilities. While the new gear makes it easier to navigate the rooms, and in a few situations allows you to crush the skulls of enemies that made your life a nightmare earlier in a very satisfying way, overall it feels like padding, as though the dev team couldn't think of enough rooms to keep you occupied. Thankfully, there is a hint system that points you roughly towards the next bit of gear, which cuts your wandering time down significantly.

Targetting, too, is a little bit of an issue. The engine appears to have a bit of trouble locking onto enemies that are very close to you - this is a bit of a pain when you are fighting bosses. However, this factor is minor, and given that Metroid is an adventure game over an FPS it's understandable that the dev team didn't focus on the combat.

The plot is really nothing exciting, but it's not actually bad and it doesn't detract from the experience - Metroid is, after all, a Nintendo game, so you really should know most of the story before it happens.

I really, really like the game so far, even if wandering through the same areas six time is tiresome, and I'm quite pleased that when I finish off Prime I have two more games to get through before the need for a new diversion becomes pressing. 8/10

gargh

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 21:52:18 GMT

Jesus scrotumballs I should not be up before nine. This is strange and unnatural.

I have a résumé to post.

Obama 4 prez

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:23:36 GMT

What the fuck, Nobel committee. He hasn't actually -done anything yet-.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091009/ap_on_re_eu/eu_nobel_peace

I think I get it now.

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 17:03:50 GMT

If you have two objects, A and B, which both produce a product through entirely seperate methods, but the products are identical... A and B are basically equivalent. The method by which they arrive at their product is essentially irrelevant.

If I'm reading this right, does this apply to human/machine intelligence?

EDIT: I don't quite understand why semantic/syntactic differences are so bloody important to these people. An algorithm is an algorithm, regardless of the language it's expressed/interpreted in.

Musings on the technological singularity.

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 16:50:22 GMT

I really hope Singularity happens before I die. Hell, I hope it happens at all. In my perfect world Google is actually the fetal stage of an integrated planetary intelligence and we'll all be pootling about on hoverchairs before the year is out. However in my perfect world I can fire steel-cutting lasers from my nipples so perhaps it's a little far-fetched.

Someone suggested to me the other night that Singularity is atheist heaven. Personally I think he is full of shit. Singularity is a theoretical date - a point of no return, as it were (HA HA IS THIS AN IRONIC STATEMENT I HAVE NO IDEA) - which may or may not occur, essentially regardless of the input the individual makes. In my really truly horribly uneducated and biased opinion, the individual is meaningless to the technological Singularity. When and if it occurs, the average Joe's conduct will be irrelevant - they will benefit from the technology or be destroyed by it along with everyone else. Whereas Heaven is either a place or a state (I'm leaning towards state) that is reached by hard work/following the rules and is in itself a goal.

The two are only similar in that both potentially promise Utopia. The important difference is that Heaven is an outright Utopia while Singularity is merely a point after which Utopia may or may not be possible! I am making no sense nor am I being coherent. I should probably go to bed.

I hate the Chinese Room thought experiment because people who accept the underlying shitty ideas are incapable of percieving the glaring flaws that arise because of them. If a computer can't be said to 'understand' information because it is merely applying rules to data, how do you suggest a human brain does it? I suspect I'm missing the point of the whole experiment, possibly due to mild retardation, but why do people keep using it to state that strong AI is impossible? Even if it were 100% true in every way, WHAT IS STOPPING US FROM DEVELOPING COMPUTERS CAPABLE OF EMULATING THE HUMAN BRAIN!?

Oh oh, also, the people who argue that transhumanism is bad because it 'ignores the two-thirds of the world without electricity' can go fuck a cactus. Singularity is the beginning of a process, not an abrupt change, and if you seriously think that the new and exciting technological developments promised by exponential intelligence won't change the entire world, please strangle yourself.

1:45am.

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 16:30:49 GMT

I'm feeling melancholy and reflective this fine 7 degree Celcius morning, so I though I might make a somewhat melancholy and reflective post to summarise the past few months.

Nothing major has happened, but a huge number of small things have. Chief among them is that Mum has passed the assessment required to get her license back - we're currently waiting on it to arrive in the mail. This means two things; one, I won't need to drive Mum around anymore and two (carried on from one) I can leave Mount Gambier.

A month ago I would have jumped at the chance to get out of this lonely shithole (meaning no offence to Damo or Glenn or anybody else I like down here). But on reflection it would be a bad idea to leave Mum here to look after the property by herself. The lawn is monstrous and requires cutting at least once a fortnight and the house itself is moderately sized. So I think I need to stay here for now.

Words can't describe how much I wish it weren't the case. I would very much like to get back to Adelaide (at the very least) to abuse people and start studying again, as well as heading north to visit Elea and Warbo sometime. But for now it looks like TAFE in Mt. Gambier SA.

Fucking hooray.

Addendum: I would like to apologise to everyone I've ever dealt with informally for being an arrogant, pompous, pretentious, hypocritical prick with no functional debating skills or internal consistency. It isn't much, but I think it's necessary to add that every time I've been a prick or insulted you or belittled your opinions I've soundly thrashed myself in my head for it later.

Unless you're Aaron.
Fuck you Aaron.
(<3)

I'm trying to force myself to start working again (never heard this before, have we), though by work I mean doodling and painting rather than any actually moneymaking. Getting a job down here is harder than I expected, due to my age and the fact that every single job that my skills are suited to requires previous experience in the field. The abbatoir is always there, but I think I'd rather gut myself than another creature.

I really really wish I had passion for anything at all. Fucking hell, I was disappointed to read a study suggesting that global nuclear war is survivable. Maybe it's just the hour speaking, but I'm having an awful lot of trouble caring about anything at the minute.

Garrghgh emo Livejournal blogging. I'm going to stop now.

Would Blade Runner meets Neuromancer meets film noir meets a detective story starring Bruce Willis a la the Fifth Element make for an entertaining read?

I believe Ms. Bastock and Ms. Rochow may enjoy this link.

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 16:12:54 GMT

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/cat_congress_mired_in_sunbeam

FUCK YOU, THE INTERNET

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 22:02:07 GMT

<+Lofn> http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b305/legacy163/n530395747_1249837_9368.jpg
<+GodotIsWaiting4U> Lofn: That is not you.
<+GodotIsWaiting4U> No way.
<+Lofn> >_>
* +GodotIsWaiting4U was under the impression that Lofn was female.
<+Lofn> 'tis.
<+Lofn> Oh ffs.
<+Lofn> I HAVE A PENIS, THANK YOU.
<+GodotIsWaiting4U> Well, it's still a highly amusing picture, anyway.
<+Ralith> Lofn: you too? :D
<+Rhaegar> lofn is now a girl.
<+Rhaegar> in my mind
<+Rhaegar> forever
<+GodotIsWaiting4U> Also, from this day forth, LOFN will stand for Lord Of the Female Ninjas.
<+Ralith> I approve
<+Reki> lofn is a lesbian :V
<+Lofn> ...
<+Lofn> I object.
<+Reki> We can vote if you like
<+Lofn> ;-;

AS YOU MIGHT BE AWARE

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 02:12:49 GMT

.. I will be in Adelaide on the 18th, leaving on the... uh. 21st? 22nd? Mum has a couple of assessment things and I need to clear the rest of my shit out of my house.

Hum de dum.

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:14:26 GMT

So now I live in Mt. Gambier again. Hoorah.

I finally got my Centrelink money today, then immediately spent it on the $200 of rent I had built up and a $200 locksmith bill.

I need a job.

WH40K: The story so far.

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 07:31:00 GMT

For the eyes of the Ethereals: battle report from the front lines of the P'ol Whitestone Canyon District.

The past two kai'rotaa have been long and bloody, with numerous conflicts being fought against the approaching ranks of the Imperial forces as they butcher a path through the Coalition forces.

Our first contact with the dogs of the corpse-Emperor occurred several rotaa ago, in a small box canyon. A scouting force of Kroot and Fire Caste warriors led by Shas'vre T'au'Kais intercepted a raiding party there, and due to a string of poorly planned and executed attacks were slaughtered to a man.

The second clash with the Imperial troops came barely six rotaa later, in similar surroundings; taken unaware, the Fire Warriors and their pathfinders wasted no time in falling back - after losing ten warriors in the Gue'la opening salvo, they thought it best to preserve lives and armour and retreat. Reports indicate that a round of faulty munitions had been shipped to the Fire Cast camp during the previous kai'rotaa, and played a pivotal role in their defeat.

Incensed by the senseless deaths of his brothers-in-arms, Shas'vre P'ol Kles'tak led a brave but suicidal attack against the skulking Imperial dogs. During the early stages of the battle, his strict gunline and ordered salvos decimated the enemy, cutting down almost an entire squadron of the 'Terminator' troops. However, growing impatient, P'ol Kles'tak led a personal charge towards the entrenched Imperial troops without waiting for air support. This, of course, ended in a massacre; in defying the tenets of Mont'ka, he turned his face from the Ethereals and was justly cut down.

The hulking Gue'la are vicious, heavily armed and armoured - in close quarters, a single blow from their leaders can fell even a Broadside. I advise utmost caution and adherence to the tenets of Mont'ka - do not, under any circumstances, allow their murderous commanders within melee range.

~ Por'lo T'au Kais, assigned to the entourage of Shas'o P'ol M'yen'or'es.

For reference.

Tue, 19 May 2009 13:02:28 GMT

EDIT: false alarm.

Fri, 01 May 2009 02:19:25 GMT

For those that don't know and care, this article is referring to my Dad.

I can't think.