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Path of HUH???

Can confirm: that path to ruin often leads to my email inbox.

Luckily, there is now a trillion dollar industry making machines that will always tell you you're right. I foresee no problems.

The fact that I can name multiple people on Path B who pushed their genuine and truthful peers off YouTube :/

Don't worry, you'll always have Grok to do Vibe Physics with you.

Especially when your insight could cost a planet raping corporations any amount of money.

Bath of ruin: "Imagine how much smarter Einstein could have been if he'd had ChatGPT"

Shhhhh... Don't give them any ideas. She's got enough on her plate and shouldn't have to waste time sending them to her cranks video.

first thought, you beat me by 10 seconds

This is part of the danger of toxic positivity, and specifically AI chatbots and other yes-men—if you always affirm everything, you act as an enabler for people with this kind of destructive mindset, and can turn everyday issues into dangerous delusions.

You forgot the optional extra box on the right side for mad science/supervillainy.

well for sure we know which path many people are taking😲😂

But what if the establishment *is* suppressing my insight

When I was in graduate school I had an insight that I hoped would overturn physics, and as a result, well, I wouldn’t say I’ve completely overturned the prevailing wisdom on the internal reconstruction of the 90-degree partial dislocation in silicon, but I put it up for serious debate

You could have let both be true, but ya just had to look didn’t ya?

I keep getting unsolicited emails from guys (they're always men) who took The Path Of Ruin, and desperately want to push their half-baked ideas and crackpot theories.

you could claim this was specifically about blood on the clocktower and get a lot of mileage from it without changing anything

Don't listen to him! Your ground breaking thoughts on physics are valid and we are willing to publish it. Just look at this one

Pretty good description of the path leading down the road to "dark academia"

Yeah I get suppressed a lot

I work in a Physics department, and despite not being a physicist myself, I regularly get emails from people who've chosen the path of ruin, trying to convince me to stop suppressing their insight. It's a real thing.

Hmm this and the last xkcd are sort of establishing a theme.

“oh no i failed to accomplish this thing i hoped to accomplish” “did you do a good job?” “well yes, but…” “enough said”

just because my self worth test is flawed doesn’t mean the establishment isn’t suppressing my insights!

*stares at electric universe cranks*

Unfortunately not always a path of financial ruin

That's exactly what they WANT you to do.

Skipped a giant step before the "BUT..."

Maybe you had a subconscious bias about society and presented a flawed argument with the illusion of choice masking your inability to compensate for things beyond your control. We crunched the numbers, counting beans makes coffee. It doesn't solve a debt crisis.

Your insight in the tunnel was okay, the monster lurking at the end of the tunnel was at fault.

Title text: "If nothing else, that reasoning definitely overturns syllogisms." Alt text: https://explainxkcd.com/3155#Transcript