Archived threads in /lit/ - Literature - 15. page

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>when you borrow book from the library and feel the sweet rush of consumerwhoredom for free and think that reading them on a Friday night will distract you from being an ugly loser
>tfw a few hours later the consumerwhore rush has worn off

Ubik, Bleeding Edge, and Umbrella were the books.

Will I enjoy them or will I read about 70 pages of one of them tonight, pause to think, then realise all the Chads and Staceys are outside having fun while I'm too ugly and beta to even have friends and that I should have spent my evening learning programming instead of being a consumercuck ?

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What does /lit/ think of Hunter S Thompson?

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Hey /lit/, I'd like to know a little more about the differences between the recent versions of the paperwhite and I can't find any website describing them in details on google.

The only thing I know is that before 2013 the resolution was 221 PPI or something, and the most recent ones got 330PPI.

While browsing e-bay I noticed that there were two different paperwhite kindles, the AO0456 version and the AO0504 version, but they don't explain exactly how they differ from one another. I assume nothing really changed, because the prices are roughly the same, but I'd like to know if there's some difference in terms of hardware, since all kindles work the same when it comes to software.

Which version do you have and which would you recommend? Have you ever tried a different version?

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Anyone read this?

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which book helped you (directly or indirectly) the most to make piles of money?

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*Sigh*

You neanderthals don't seem to understand what I mean when I say that I want to end my conscious existence without killing myself.

Let me try and explain on a level that you will hopefully understand.

Take the image on the left. It is a canvas that consists of 948 pixels horizontally, and 900 pixels vertically. Now, if you zoom in close enough onto the canvas, you will see each individual pixel that makes up the canvas. Each individual pixel contains a solid colour.

Let's grid the canvas and give each pixel a letter and number. The first pixel, which is the upper-left most pixel, is 1A. To the right of 1A, you have 1B, and so on.

I open up the image in paint. I zoom in close enough as to where I can see 1A. I select the colour picker tool, and click on 1A. I now have 1A's colour stored in my palette. I can then use Window's screenshot tool to take a screenshot of this colour in the palette. Now, if I go onto Google and search 'colour to bitcode converter', I can find a tool that will allow me to upload the image of the solid colour and get its respective bitcode.

I can do this for every single grid box until I have all of the bitcodes that constitute the image.

1A = 01010110
1B = 01011011

And so on. Now, if I get each single bitcode and paste all of them into notepad, what will I get? I will get an arrangement of bits. This is all the image is. An arrangement of bits / 1s and 0s.

So, how does this relate in any way? Because I am the image, and my parts are the pixels. Just like an image is an arrangement of bits / 1s and 0s, I am an arrangement of atoms.

Now, what will happen if I were to change each bitcode bit by bit? What if to 1A's bitcode (01010110) I replace the last 0 with a 1, causing it to become 01010111? What happens is that I will get a different colour. The overall image will look different with each change of bitcode. Eventually, with enough bitcode changes, I will end up producing an entirely objectively different image.

And the same goes for my brain. If enough of the parts which constitute my brain are altered, I will eventually lose my personal consciousness and I will be replaced with somebody else, just like an image is replaced with something else by changing pixel by pixel. So, if I find a way to alter my brain enough, somebody else will come to replace me, and my personal consciousness will enter non-existence. From my family's point of view, I will still completely exist and nothing will change. My point of view, however, will cease to exist.

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My girlfriend just broke up with me. Give me some lit you should read in this situation.

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So I have these great concepts for books and screensplays but in my opinion im not a writer.... because if i was id hurry up an start writing wouldnt I? So im asking yall what are the necessary steps to take when youre writing a book or screen play? Scifi to be exact... and if i find afyer following these steps im still not as into writing my ideas as i should how do i go about finding someone to write them?

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Is egoism the only way to happiness?

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Within the last 2 weeks, by complete accident I read 3 things that happened to tackle the same theme: in particular the idea that you can't be a part-time artist/part-time businessman, and in general the idea that artists are corrupted by contact with the "real world". Even more in general, trying to sell the "ascetic ideal".

The first is JR, I don't think I need to go into more detail on this one.

The second is Helen DeWitt's The Last Samurai. There are multiple angles on the issue presented here. On the one hand you have commercial concerns directly impinging on artistic ones. On the other hand you have a more nebulous fear of getting involved in the "family business" as it would be corrupting.

The third is a lecture by Ralph Waldo Emerson titled "Man the Reformer". Emerson draws out a quasi-primitivist position, recommending that everyone be a farmer as a solution to the world's problems. But he highlist the artist in particular as damaged by contact with the modern world:

>This is the tragedy of genius,--attempting to drive along the ecliptic with one horse of the heavens and one horse of the earth, there is only discord and ruin and downfall to chariot and charioteer.

Instead:

>Let him be a caenobite, a pauper, and if need be, celibate also.

So...what do you think about this? In my view it's completely and utterly wrong. Let's split the issue into two:

1. Art is corrupted by commercial concerns.
2. The artist is corrupted by contact with commerce.

There are many historical cases that contradict these points. Shakespeare is the big one: a successful businessman, he wrote plays that had to succeed financially. When he left London, he stopped writing.

And just think about how much great art was painted or written or composed on commission.

There's also many superb artists who had day jobs: Kafka, Pessoa, Eliot, Dickens.

On the other hand, how many ascetics have been great artists? Getting involved in the hustle and bustle, living a real life, seems like a necessary ingredient to me. Thoreau could only take Walden so long. Even an anarcho-primitivist "recluse" like Pynchon lives in Manhattan!

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>puts down a toni morrison novel
>cracks open the latest new yorker
>downloads an npr podcast
>goes to a free summer concert series
>gets hair cut at place that serves whiskey, like back when real men shaved with straight razors
>wears an untucked gingham shirt not over a t-shirt and over-polished menswear wingtips
>waits three hours for a text from the new small plates pop-up restaurant
>orders the second least-expensive malbec
>tries to watch all the oscar nominees each year
>cannot believe how good the new rap album is
>goes to a coffee tasting
>orders a kindle and hard copy of the latest kwame ngobongo novel but listens to it on audiobook during commute to his new marketing job
>goes to four spinning classes a week
>talks about how busy life as a creative is
>buys a groupon for hamilton
>lives in new york city

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What would you do if you were The Invisible Man?

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Is there a chart for African literature? I mean REAL African literature, not merely people of african heritage or Europeans living in Africa or safe westernized stuff like Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Every part of Africa is fine, I'm interested in having an expanse in my knowledge of their different cultures.

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Serious question /lit/
You all go for Nietze this and Nietze that.

Has any of you actually read Ecce Hummus?
Like, wtf is wrong with you?

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http://kgycm2bjsc75u4ac.onion/