Other people already gave most of the answers, but

Parks. Go for a walk. Play a game with folks (Frisbee, soccer, whatever). Ride a bike. Read.

Meetups. I go to a tabletop RPG one. That’s not unique to cities, but I can walk to this one and there are probably more people attending than you’d find in a less populous area. I also used to go to a basic neighborhood hangout one. There are many others.

The library is free. Many books and other media to enjoy.

This city has beaches. It’s $3 for the subway ride there , or if I was really broke I could ride a bike.

There are free museums. I don’t go that often but they’re interesting.

But also

And to make it worse many of them probably have a 1 bedroom apartment so its not like you can sit in there all day long (at least i cant).

I realize im still spending money by being in my house out of town, but still, at least things I buy are owned by me, and im not paying someone else every time I want to do anything. If I want to stay at home all day I have tons of stuff to occupy my mind without going nuts.

I don’t think I accept this premise. I stay home in my one bedroom without any more trouble than when I lived in the suburbs. A computer full of games doesn’t need a lot of rooms. I have plenty of entertainment here. I don’t see what’s stifling about a one bedroom. Maybe a tiny studio I could see. But even so, when I lived in a whole house it’s not like I went skipping from room to room.

I memorized my friend’s phone number. It’s because she’s a lawyer, and that seems like a good number to have memorized.

A lot of people struggle to read, and it’s kind of sad. https://features.apmreports.org/sold-a-story/ was an interesting post about it (available as a podcast and transcripts).

That said, some people really just do wallow and the slop and that’s an embarrassment.

I will admit when doing something like buying from an evil corporation that I’m making a trade off. I won’t pretend it’s fine. I try to acknowledge it.

It’s impossible to live in the modern world without participating in exploitation. This phone was probably made in ways that hurt the environment and labor. But I need a phone to participate in modern life. So I got one, and try to hold onto it as long as possible.

I think there’s a big difference between trying, and acknowledging tradeoffs and shortcomings, and just refusing to engage. “But I like it” is refusing to engage. I would respect “I know this milk comes from cruelty to cows, but I don’t care about cows” more. At least it’s honest.

Poor emotional regulation. Poor long term planning. Disregarding facts for emotions.

I imagine most people who are rewilding their lawn are doing so for environmental reasons, which I consider more valid than mere personal preference. If someone was doing so for mere aesthetics, maybe.

With respect to murdering, there is a social contract or a legal “contract” that says you absolutely can’t, so this argument obviously doesn’t work.

That’s kind of the point. The reason why you don’t murder isn’t merely because you like it. There are actual reasons. Personal preference alone is not sufficient to override reasons like social contracts and laws and stuff. So if one side of the argument is “this is good for the environment”, the other side saying “but I like it” should not be compelling.

It is compelling to some people when they consider stuff like the environment non-issues on the same level as personal preferences. Those people are assholes.

Conservatives would hate it so it’s probably a good idea

“Oh my god having a lawn isn’t murder you’re being dramatic!” - some small-minded buffoon who doesn’t understand analogies.

So many people seem to really struggle with analogies. Sometimes I think they’re just responding to the emotional content, and not following the reasoning at all

One of the things that bothers me more than it should is people responding to actual problems with “but i like it”.

You say something like “a ‘basic’ lawn like that is bad for the environment in many ways, in addition to being labor intensive.”

They respond with something that amounts to, “But I like it.”

That wasn’t the question! If someone likes murder that doesn’t justify it, right? Because if so this conversation would take a very abrupt turn. So we can infer that there must be some other justification. Probably, “I don’t care about other people”, which remains an insufficient justification for murdering a whining selfish prick.

The damage to trust in the US’ institutions and government is tremendous, and will not likely be repaired in our lifetimes.

Well, off the top of my head, while it would be nice to live in a world without espionage that’s not this one. I don’t think you could do very good spying if everyone knew who your spies were.

Sometimes.

There’s also digressive victimhood. That’s where someone in a dominant group is accused of wrongdoing, and they claim victimhood on some other axis.

When dominant groups are accused of discrimination against non-dominant groups, they often seek to portray themselves as the victims of discrimination instead. Sometimes, however, members of dominant groups counter accusations of discrimination by invoking victimhood on a new dimension of harm, changing the topic being discussed. Across three studies (N = 3081), we examine two examples of this digressive victimhood – Christian Americans responding to accusations of homophobia by claiming threatened religious liberty, and White Americans responding to accusations of racism by claiming threatened free speech.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103121001360

Wait, what’s the difference between a Nazi and a conservative? That’s a change in degree not in kind.

I’d heard of him but didn’t think about him often.

I’ve known 3 philosophy majors that I know of.

One had a PhD and was absolutely insufferable. We were coworkers, and he’d often say falsehoods to try to be funny. Like, “Did you write that documentation I asked for?”, and he’d say like “I spent all morning writing it as a series of haikus”. I’m like, my guy, just answer the question. I’d ask him to stop being sarcastic so often in professional contexts and he’d be like “I’m not being sarcastic I’m being ironic.” You knew what I meant, Ryan!

He would also use language to say things that were tEcHnIcAlLy true. Like, “I finished that task (or 1 equals 1)”, except he had more subtle ones.

Was it because he was a philosophy PhD? Probably not. Some of his annoying habits he tied back to philosophy stuff, but he was probably just an asshole. But that’s who I think of (other than chidi)

The other one I knew was fine in a messy nihilist rich kid way. Fun at parties. Can’t be friends.

And the last one is one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Just thoughtful and patient and a really positive person.

Not in the sense people usually use the phrase “action points”.

In D&D, on your turn, you get one action. That might be hitting someone with a sword, casting a spell, or whatever. You can also move, but that’s not typically an “action”. Some classes also get what are confusingly called “bonus actions”, which are extra things you can do on your turn. Rogues, for example, can try to hide as a bonus action even after they did a normal action like shoot someone. A regular fighter who shot someone with a bow wouldn’t be allowed to try to hide on the same turn, but the rogue could.

Because you only get one action (and bonus actions), no one calls them action points. You might say “you already took your action” or something.

Compare with a game like the original Fallout. You get a number of action points based on your stats. For an average character, it’s 7. Shooting someone typically takes 2, a called shot takes 3. I think movement also takes action points. So on your turn you might shoot someone 3 times (six action points) and move a little (1 action point). Or take a called shot (3 AP) and move a lot (4 AP). Lots of options. Divinity Original Sin 1 and 2 also use action points in a similar way.

This is way more explanation than you probably needed. The key thing is on D&D you typically do one thing on your turn (eg: attack, cast a spell). Pretty much every action has the same “cost” in this sense. You can’t really mix and match, and there’s not as much tactical depth on your turn. (Pathfinder 2e gives you three actions per turn, but I don’t think anyone calls them points there, either.)

Heh, that would’ve been my guess. Nothing to be embarrassed about! Your joke worked. It was just weird to see all those concepts put together in a way they wouldn’t go in an actual game. (DND doesn’t have action points, for starters)

Moved to Linux (popos on desktop, mint on ancient laptop). Been fine. Don’t miss windows. Play games and browse the web without issue.

Emulators are pretty great. The touch screen isn’t an ideal interface, but for less action-y games like final fantasy it’s fine.

What a strange mix of RPG tropes. I get what you meant but that’s like when you see “hacking” on tv.