Blah blah AI no creativity, whatever, blah.
It’s still fun.
Stderr
All the unbuffered error messages
Blah blah AI no creativity, whatever, blah.
It’s still fun.
I’m on both sides of the fence about things like the world cup. For one thing, it’s a joy to see that humans can perform at such a level, but on the other, it seems to me like a complete kill off of any joy in the sport. Joy, which is often replaced by the ugliest form of nationalism. [I just accidentally put my finger on why I found the Norwegian team to be so charming] I also found the World Cup to be a bit disgusting, given that some of the nations involved are cheerfully performing crimes against humanity, while the others appear to be setting that aside, because, yes, the players practiced a lot. I think none of that really holds much water, because the players aren’t amateurs who are giving their lives to sport – they are professionals, who are gambling that they will make millions of dollars if they perform well.
A lot of this is what I consider being from the Department of Obviousness Department, which I normally try to avoid, but sometimes, the timing is such that I appear to have powers above and beyond those of an ordinary ex-nerd thinking about the future. There was a time, once, when I was arrogant enough to reply – when someone asked me to predict the future – “I make the future, I don’t predict it.” Which was literally true but also JD Vance-level stupid.
This topic is, unfortunately, inextricably inter-twined with AI, so I could as easily be talking about one axis of the problem, as the other. But let’s start with the data centers.
I first wrote about facial recognition back in 2017, shortly after starting this blogue. (stderr) Then, (stderr) I discovered to my complete lack of surprise, that there is a lack of proper paranoia about the topic, and – I suppose that’s justified because climate change is likely to wipe us out, while having no more personal privacy, won’t. I guess we’re arguing about “insult to injury” which is a great way of spicing up your injuries. Add it to heirarchical storage and, whups, things look bad. (stderr) It seems like just the other day I was laughing at people who were implementing poorly-planned “data lakes” but it seems that, miracle, AI actually has stepped in to help with the problem.
The great machine of scientific enquiry continues to grind relentlessly along, in spite of the smoking wreckage made, then thrown in its path, by the likes of RFK, Jr. Eventually, I suppose, the republicans will realize that ice-picking the tendons of American Science just means that some other detestable part of the world will “get ahead of us” in their endless imaginary fight for dominance.
I hear that they took him to the Naval Observatory for emergency medical care. Could this be The Day? It would be funny if it coincided with what I posted last night.
I feel as if all the point of progressivism has just served to use it as a target. Every place where there has been an attempt to move forward, it turns out that the forces of moving back are more motivated, more powerful, and they play dirty.
It’s a scary moment, when you realize that nationalism is a pack of lies, like religion and being a sports fan. For me, it was slow-dawning but got a strong boost when I was in the army (1983-9, basic and reserve) the wastage and stupidity began to sink in on me and I was reading a lot of the history of other countries. It’s hard not to read stuff like The Best and The Brightest [worldcat] and start to realize that the author is not just pointing out that the emperor’s new clothes show a lot of skin, but so do all of his wise senior advisors. So, how did such a bunch of idiots accomplish this? Then, you realize that behind every Bonaparte is a Talleyrand. Behind every Trump is a Miller. And they create the sweet-smelling bullshit we are all fed as we grow up. What really did it for me was reading Howard Zinn’s A People’s History, [worldcat] which – my offer still stands – I will give anyone a copy of if they ask for it politely.
Reading Zinn caused me to shift my interest in history a few points to the side of where it had been focused straight on military history, and I began re-reading my favorite military histories and thinking about the political context. And/or wondering how it was pitched at the time.
Its official name is “Perimetr” but many Soviet-era nuclear control officers called it “The Dead Hand.” David Hoffman’s book with that title won him a Pulitzer prize. Now you can imagine President Trump tweeting away over how Harper Lee should give him hers. And, now, you should stop – it’s horrifying. [openlibrary] [Read more…]