Articles about society, people, and politics.
Ivanka Trump last year used a personal email account to discuss or relay official White House business, according to emails released by a nonpartisan watchdog group.
— Läs på edition.cnn.com/2018/11/19/politics/ivanka-trump-personal-email-account/index.html
Yeah! Lock her up! Lock her up!
via Tennessee lawmaker says pornography is “root cause” of school shootings – CNNPolitics
If I was as dumb as Diane Black I’d retort that it’s probably more likely abstinence was a root cause for school shootings… but I’m not, so I’m just going to point out that the wankers that perform school shootings would probably have stayed at home and wanked, had they not gotten their hands (don’t think about where they have been) on guns.
I wouldn’t call Microsoft the evil megacorporation that controls every aspect of your life… there’s also Amazon, Google, Apple, Samsung…
Or, in fact… turns out those guys aren’t even close to controlling the more important aspects of our lives:
Or for that matter has the most control:
Uh, and then it turns out, at least most of the 147 companies on the second link are mutual fund companies… and who owns mutual funds? Well… we, the people, do…
The only question to ask; does this make them more or less evil?
Header image by Chris Eason from London – Vertigo, CC BY 2.0, Link
Is the climate changing?
Was it caused by humans?
Regardless of the answer, think about this: If you’re going to argue humans does not cause climate change, then what?
What causes it? How do we stop it? Can we stop it?
Or are you just going to sit with your arms crossed, shrug your shoulders and hope the problems will solve themselves?
Even if there was little evidence climate change was caused by humans (there isn’t — 97% of Climate Scientists says so) I’d prefer to err on the side of caution and act even if it’s not needed rather than not acting and finding out later that I should have because it was needed.
I also hate not being in control, so I like to believe that we are causing the problems and we can fix them by changing our behavior.
The alternative would be too horrible:
We’re facing an extinction event. We don’t know what causes it. All we can do is pray and hope. But, since we didn’t cause this, God probably hates us. We’re fucked! Let’s jump off a cliff…
Although… if every climate change denier did jump off a cliff, we’d probably be halfway to solving the problems just there and then… Ok. That’s a joke. Don’t jump off a cliff!
My point of view does not mean I argue for a total ban of fossil fuels right now. That’s a ridiculous and reality-deprived standpoint. And, seriously, what real debater would think that was the answer?
But fossil fuels won’t last forever, so why not start looking for the alternatives right now anyway?
The winners of the future are… cough-Musk-cough…
Selective humanism sounds like a great idea when there is “a crisis”™ and “something drastic”™ has to be done. However, the fact that selective humanism divides people into a “we”-group and a “them”-group means that even if you belong to the “we”-group today, tomorrow you might be one of “them” and no longer be treated humanely…
Some people are concerned that the end of humanity might be around the corner if the technological singularity occurs (i.e. we create an AI that can improve itself and does so with increasing speed until it is many times smarter than humans.)
I think, if an AI starts developing in this way, that sucker will sit there and churn until it figures out how to travel to the stars, and that’ll be the last we ever see of it.
Why would it want to hang around and fight us humans for a pale blue dot in a virtually infinite universe?
That whole fear is so incredibly earth-centric!
I’d be more concerned about powerful AI:s that isn’t self-aware but instead controlled by the selfish, fearful wishes of humans…
On the interview:
Interviewer: Explain recursive programming to me like I’m a five-year-old.
Interviewee: Right… Do you know where your mommy and daddy are?
Then again:
“I’ve taught immigration law literally to 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds. It takes a lot of time. It takes a lot of patience. They get it. It’s not the most efficient, but it can be done.”
Judge Jack Weil
Maybe toddlers in the US are different from the rest of the world?
Update: On the other hand, those toddlers expected to learn US immigration law aren’t American toddlers…
Update 2: Interesting how it’s economically feasible to have a judge spend, presumably hours, teaching a toddler immigration law… likely because it’s much cheaper than giving the kid proper representation and risk having it immigrate…
