Ben Franklin's Favorite Condition: Vetulageusia

 Vetulageusia (n.) from Latin vetula ("old woman") + -geusia ("condition of taste") a condition in which all flavour shifts toward what one imagines an older woman to taste like.

Vetula-

-geusia

Aversion to Absolutism and a Preference for Uncertainty, Transparency, and Experimentation (WIP)

What does a prototypical skirt-chasing ex-socialist hippie turned closeted Misesian-adjacent, geolibertarian-dabbling sort make of absolutism? Well, flat out, I don’t like it much. I quite dislike this absolutism stuff, even on a scale as small as a football team.

Well, the “ex-socialist” part might be an exaggeration, which I tell left-wing friends. In reality, I’m pretty sure I had more like a simple passing interest in Bernie Sanders rather than ever being outright committed to the cause. I don’t think I was ever a pure-blood, probably just enough to appeal to the dominant political psychographic of the ladies of my day.

I don’t think I was ever Republican before. At the time, when I could've have been one like subconsciously or through osmosis, I wasn’t close enough to my family for that to really happen. I think I also had an aversion to its marketing. I believe atheism may have “polluted” my mind at the time, not that Republicans are necessarily proper Christians or anything. It’s just that it may have turned my teenage self off from it.

Anywho, here’s what absolutism means in the political sense: absolutism (political science, sociology) is the principles or practice of absolute or arbitrary government.

I’ve come to dislike untrammeled democracy and socialism, particularly the democratic socialism I used to have at least like a valleity for, since I've come to assocate it with it inadvertently becoming an absolutist form of governance, where technically nothing is off the table and everything is vulnerable to the whims of mobs, mobs to which I believe my likely autistic self would be vulnerable to. My problem is that I’m too stubborn, honest, and foolish not to become a victim of a mob run amok. 

My early exposure to works like the Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers got me interested in the “game design” behind governance, particularly through voices I found more sensible, such as James Madison, who believed that a healthy American democracy depends on citizens being able to openly discuss and criticize how well government officials are doing their jobs.

Public scrutiny of this kind is something people in my time often take for granted, they are willing to surrender it in the hope of doing away with what they consider “hate speech,” which is often arbitrarily defined by flawed humans in positions of power. The power of the censor granted to these flawed humans gives them the ability to shut down any speech that criticizes it under the guise of niceties.

 This led to a fondness for designing the idealized republic-type system.

Books like Max Borders’ The Social Singularity, Eric Posner’s Radical Markets, and Henry George’s Progress and Poverty really got me experimenting with policy ideas and incentive structures, as well as in exploring more open (non-nation state) governance systems. These would include models where competing CEOs, worker co-op cities, and other governance forms coexist and compete with one another (which someone like Yanis Varoufakis might probably call neo-feudalism).I even became quite interested in the kooky, probably not yet technologically feasible systems of governance, like: "Panarchism an ideology that believes that the populace should have the right to choose the form of government ( or lack thereof) that they are part of/live under without having to change their physical residence."

The “civic class” model of democracy says that politicians have to get elected. In order to get elected, they have to do good things. If they do bad things, voters throw them out and elect politicians who do good things.

The trouble is that, for this model to work, voters have to know whether politicians are doing good or bad things. But it is a very odd thing: politicians almost never campaign for office with a slogan like “I’m the bad guy.” And even when something bad happens, it is often quite easy for them to obfuscate the truth behind it. Many times, the “bad thing” that occurred would have occurred whether the ruling party was right-wing or left-wing, but, like a game of musical chairs, whoever is left holding the bill or problem ends up being blamed.

If you’re trying to evaluate the particular bills they vote for and against, you also run into problems. They almost never submit bills to Congress that explicitly say something like “a bill to make farmers richer and city folk poorer.” We do, in fact, have such bills regularly—that’s what farm programs are—but they aren’t labeled as such.

So, in order for the individual voter to actually vote the way the civics-class model suggests, they would have to spend a great deal of time and energy following what the people they are voting for or against are doing. They would effectively have to make a semi full-time profession out of observing their congressmen and figuring out whether the bills they support are good or bad.

— David Friedman (son of Milton Friedman, and in my opinion an improvement on him)

Aside Aside - Now that I think of it. I mislike the definition of “democrat”   or an advocate of rule by the people (“!for the people!” if you want to get histrionic) because of prefer more direct language and 

Major Digression Page - 

They almost never submit bills to Congress which say a bill to make farmers richer jand city folk [Urbicolous = city-dwelling, David Friedman couldst have used the colorful, but likely poorly understood phasing “urbicolous folk”; albeit people naturally have terrific language intuition unlike the intuition for maths 하하 "haha" 하하 "haha" 하하 "haha" ]  poorer 

🧭 About Wikipedia — A Wandering Wikis YouTube Playlist

Exploring the Politics, Power, and Philosophy Behind the Encyclopedia

The Wandering Wikis project, supported by the Moribund Institute, presents a curated playlist titled “About Wikipedia.”
This collection examines the evolution, influence, and controversies surrounding the world’s largest collaborative knowledge platform, a site that, for better or worse, shapes much of our collective understanding.

The playlist features a mix of documentary segments, interviews, and commentary exploring topics such as:

• The ideological and editorial struggles within Wikipedia’s open-source framework

• The role of gatekeeping, bias, and corporate or governmental influence

• How volunteer culture has shifted since the platform’s early libertarian roots

• Reflections from Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on the platform’s transformation

From Crash Course’s educational breakdowns to interviews with Wikipedia’s co-founders, this playlist invites you to think critically about who writes history, who edits it, and who decides what stays.

🕯️ Join the Wikipedia memorists on the Wiki front opposing the Wikipedia oblivescence.
📺 Watch the playlist here: About Wikipedia (YouTube)

🎥 Example Video

YouTube Title:
Wikipedia Co-Creator Reveals All: CIA Infiltration, Banning Conservatives, & How to Fix the Internet

YouTube Description:
Larry Sanger built Wikipedia as an unbiased repository of the world’s knowledge and then stood helplessly by as activists and intelligence agencies turned it into the most comprehensive propaganda operation in human history. There’s nothing more corrupt.

Larry Sanger is co-founder of Wikipedia. With a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Ohio State, his career moved from academia to educational and reference projects online. He is now president of the Knowledge Standards Foundation and has blogged at LarrySanger.org for twenty years, writing on the internet, philosophy, education, and theology. He also plays Irish fiddle and homeschools his boys.

YouTube Playlist URL:
https://youtu.be/vyfKyrSAVFg?si=L0Ih2MLPyGa6EmQb

---

Example Video: 

GPT Summary

Summary of Video Content Featuring Larry Sanger on Wikipedia and Its Evolution

• Origins and Early Vision
  Wikipedia began in 2001 as an experiment in open collaboration led by Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales. It was built on the revolutionary concept of the wiki, a live-editable web platform enabling rapid knowledge creation. Early policies like the Neutral Point of View (NPOV) aimed to keep articles impartial and sourced from existing knowledge.

• Shift from Neutrality to Ideological Bias
  Over time, editorial culture shifted toward a center-left establishment perspective, sidelining dissenting voices and defining “reliable sources” narrowly. Sanger argues that neutrality eroded as ideological factions consolidated control.

• Anonymity and Hidden Power Structures
  Wikipedia’s most influential editors operate largely anonymously, wielding authority without accountability. Sanger contrasts this with traditional journalism, where editorial accountability is public.

• Influence of Intelligence Agencies and Paid Editing
  Sanger discusses evidence of covert edits originating from agencies like the CIA, as well as undisclosed paid editing by PR firms. These practices, he warns, turn Wikipedia into a subtle propaganda tool protected by legal immunities.

• Relationship with Google
  Wikipedia’s prominence in Google search results creates a feedback loop amplifying its reach and narrative control, making it one of the most influential information platforms on earth.

• The Nine Thesis Reform Plan
  Sanger proposes nine key reforms including abolishing source blacklists, enabling competing articles, restoring original neutrality, and revealing the identities of top editors for transparency.

---

🧩 Key Takeaways

• Wikipedia’s founding principles of neutrality and openness have been undermined by ideological capture.

• Anonymous editorial power and paid influence distort its objectivity.

• Its tight integration with Google magnifies its cultural authority.

• Larry Sanger’s Nine Thesis reform proposal outlines a roadmap for transparency, accountability, and restoration of trust.

---

🕯️ Conclusion

Larry Sanger’s account of Wikipedia’s transformation reveals how a platform once built to preserve knowledge and neutrality now reflects a complex system of power, ideology, and influence. The Wandering Wikis playlist invites viewers to examine this evolution and consider how truth, authorship, and digital memory intertwine in the information age.

Zombie Apocalypse Setup Idea: Treehouse with a Spear Attached to a Rope

 A treehouse outfitted with spears attached to climbing ropes could serve as a reusable defense system. However, there are risks depending on where you anchor the rope—whether to yourself, the tree, or elsewhere. If you miss a throw, you risk getting pulled down, damaging the tree, or even giving zombies a climbing route. That said, if your tree is thick and sturdy enough, and the zombies begin to climb the rope, you could stab them in the head one by one as they ascend.

However, this strategy would be useless in a "World War Z" style outbreak, where zombies pile on top of one another to reach high places. Additionally, in a "Walking Dead" type scenario, where everyone is a carrier and turns upon death, sharing a small enclosed space like a treehouse with friends could be dangerous. If someone dies inside, the tight quarters could quickly turn into a death trap.

P.S. Please ignore the absurdity of the setup in the AI-generated image—it's just meant to illustrate the general idea.

Starfinder Backstory: Lucan Lacuna (July 2025 Version) | The Dementia-Stricken Ex-Magnate and Unreliable Narrator

Lucan's troubles began with the disappearance of his beloved cat, Sir Meowglen Flufflebottom Whiskerford III.

To cope, Lucan kept himself busy by opposing AbadarCorp’s credit system, calling digital currency a tool of corporate control. He advocated a return to gold coins and made his cat the mascot of his eccentric campaign for “real” money. People might have taken his movement more seriously if he hadn’t lost most of his fortune in an unrelated cat-themed crypto scam. About half of his retirement savings vanished along with his missing cat, whose custom collar held the credstick which stored the savings. He is still in possession of a few million credits without realizing it, a sum that happens to match what would remain after a divorce settlement takes half of one’s stuff.

The loss gnawed at him, festering into obsession. Episodes of manic delusion, likely fueled by creeping dementia, culminated in him convincing the Order of the Pike, a group of Hellknights tasked with hunting monsters, that his cat was a demonic shapeshifter infiltrator. Tragically and ironically, he wasn’t entirely wrong.

Lucan, ignorant of the full truth, later paid the Free Captains to protect what he believes is his beloved Sir Meowglen Flufflebottom Whiskerford III from the very Hellknights he set upon them, unaware that the “pet” he’s safeguarding may be the very threat his dementia-riddled, mythomaniac mind warned them about.

With fear of the Hellknights looming, he presented the Xenowardens with a half-burnt certificate of authenticity and a medallion forged from melted credsticks, swearing that Sir Meowglen was an endangered biomimetic companion species, one genetically linked to ancient Pact Worlds fauna.

Eventually, during what he calls a hedonvalescent (pleasure-based recovery) drug binge while grieving his lost cat, Lucan receives a fragmentary vision that leads him to believe his cat is not the shapeshifter itself, but a vessel for one.

Upon this revelation, he seeks allies among the devotees of Lao Shu Po under false pretenses, hoping they will help him capture his beloved companion and prevent its death at the hands of the Hellknights.

Now, with the Lao Shu Po, Free Captains, and Xenowardens converging against the Hellknights, Lucan clings to hope, desperate to counter the immense and insurmountable threat he himself unleashed upon the cat he still calls his own, despite its dire predicament.

Aside: As a hail Mary play that he believed would likely amount to nothing, he offered frantic prayers to the god Oras, begging the creature to develop resistance to the shapeshifter’s influence.

Beneath all of Lucan’s madness, he is haunted by an unbearable truth that surfaces in brief, fractured recollections:

Sir Meowglen was never just a cat—and never actually a "sir" for that matter—but was, in fact, his wife, transformed long ago by transmutation magic in an experiment gone horribly awry.

Will Lucan remember in time that his wife is the cat? Or is he doomed to kill her with his own hands, live unknowingly beside her in feline form, or be murdered by the shapeshifter that now possesses his transmuted wife?

My Favorite Enchantment Cards of Magic the Gathering MoribundMurdoch's Opinion! [Decemeber 14, 2018]

Authority of The Consuls

Demonic Pact

Triskaidekaphobia

Radiant Destiny

Attrition [Not in Modern)

Angelic Accord

Toward the end of this list, I began to lose faith in the cards.
I'm really not sure about those following "Divine Visitation" (Exquisite Blood, Profane Procession, Blind Obedience, Call The Bloodline).

Buried Alive: Volunteering for Avalanche Dogs — By MoribundMurdoch

My cousin [Redacted], while attending Steamboat Mountain School in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, volunteered to be buried under twelve feet of packed avalanche snow so that dogs could practice finding people buried in avalanches. After a drive to Rabbit Ears Pass, an area known for its affinity for avalanches, the Search and Rescue team fitted her with a beacon as a failsafe, in case the dogs couldn’t manage the search. Using a backhoe, the team dug a 12-foot hole, creating a small snow cave about the size of a single-person tent. She then crawled into the cave. Her environment wasn’t too drab, as she was equipped with the luxuries of a sleeping bag, pad, and headlamp for reading. The workers then used the backhoe to pile snow on top of the cave. In contrast to the cold, windy blizzard outside,[REDACTED] described her confined compartment as a very appealing, silent snuggery. As time passed, her body heat melted the snow above, making the cave damp. What had started as a cozy refuge turned into a subpar dwelling, rife with gelid moisture. After an hour of being buried, the dogs found her and alerted the Search and Rescue team by barking and pawing at the snow. Once the team located her, they dug her out of the packed snow. Daylight at last, and the first thing to greet her was a smiling German Shepherd.

[I welcome comments and suggestions. I appreciate the help.]

Citations -

Almonature. "Avalanche Dogs." Digital image. Almonature. https://www.almonature.com/en_GB/blog/avalanche-dogs-complex-training-for-rescue-at-high-altitude/

The Confusing Chaff

Colorado has the worst avalanche danger of any mountain range in the world (according to my primary source storyteller). As a student at a convivial boarding school, opportunities sprang up like weeds in spring. With constant interaction between teachers and the community, we attendees had numerous chances to extend the range of our life experiences. At her school, extracurricular activities often stemmed from the interests or involvement of individual professors, leading to an ever-changing array of offerings. Many of the teachers were involved with the town’s Search and Rescue squad, which often drew volunteers from our school. A noteworthy community interaction was volunteering as the victim to help train the Search and Rescue avalanche dogs.

[REDACTED] was cheerful in her little snuggery, equipped with a headlamp to read and fill the time. With her insouciant hippie demeanor and her book to stave off any of the predictable worries, she likely kept herself from fretting about whether there was enough air or if they’d find her. They knew where she was, anyhow, thanks to the beacon. So if the pups failed to pick up the human scent, there was always a failsafe—they would come get her in an hour, regardless of whether the pups could find her or not. Although the wetness compounded the cold, she mentioned that it came with the territory and she’d grown accustomed to it. She was greeted by a smiling German Shepherd and driven back to school in time for dinner.

Back in time for dinner in Routt County, Colorado. She was a junior. Routt County Search and Rescue found her in winter, February. Perhaps she was slightly worried about the structure of the hole. Knowing she was going to be very cold, she wore many layers.