2023-11-19

etc

• The Kings and Queens Theory of Fertility

  • Honing Fertility Fall Theories - by Robin Hanson

• How to Build Trust

• Multilingual Folk Tale Database: 10k folk stories from all over the world

Horseshit

• You shouldn't be driving over 100 MPH-and your car shouldn't let you

• Globalism vs. the Scientific Revolution

• (2020) Rational Ritual: Why everyone needs to know what everyone knows

  • HN comments

• The Macallan 1926 sold today for $2.71M a world record price paid for a spirit

Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering

• What is Free Speech For? - by Edward Feser

  Where moral and political discourse has effectively degenerated into a war of competing intuitions and sentiments, the remedy is to take things back to first principles. We need to ask exactly why it is that human beings can be said to have any rights at all in the first place. That will afford a way of determining whether there is such a thing as a right to free speech, specifically, and if so what its scope and limits are.

Musk

• Elon Musk to file 'thermonuclear lawsuit' as advertisers desert X

  • Musk: 'thermonuclear lawsuit' against media watchdog, advertisers 'oppressors'

• The New Tesla Cyberquad is Less Likely to Injure Your Kids.

Trump / War against the Right / Jan6

• "initial entrants were peaceably escorted into the building by Capitol Police"

• Mike Lee Isn’t Done With Liz Cheney Yet. He Had a Great Question for Her About Those FBI Agents and J6.

• Cheney, Kinzinger, And "Sham" J6 Committee Under Fire After Friday Footage Dump; GOP Senator Calls For Investigation | ZeroHedge

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• Denying the little god of free will: the next step for atheists?

• Bad Language

  Cambridge University Hospital Trust under scrutiny for using the word in maternity leave policies, losing points in NHS diversity assessment.

  One might think that the employees having babies and therefore on maternity leave are, in fact, by definition, mothers. One might even think that a hospital, and a maternity hospital in particular, is a place where physical realities of this kind would be difficult to avoid. And yet.

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• The Startling Evidence on Learning Loss Is In

  • NYT Piece Calls Learning Loss “Startling” — But It’s Not.

  The news organization needs to go so many steps further than this op-ed.They need to apologize for their untruthful, damaging reporting which gave cover to government leaders in refusing to open schools and teachers’ unions in refusing to return their members to the classroom.

  They need to apologize for smearing those of us who challenged. We didn’t just suffer reputational harm and hurt feelings. We lost friends, our communities, our jobs in some cases. And, our voices were not part of the necessary societal discussion that needed to happen but didn’t. Because The New York Times presented one viewpoint — kids are at terrible risk and schools need to stay closed — as the undisputed “science.” As inarguable fact. Anyone who dissented was clearly an insane, alt-right, flat-earther lunatic.

• New college grads are more likely to be unemployed in today's job market

• Study of psychedelics' influence on art, history and human existence

  On November 15, the University of California, Berkeley and Harvard University announced a new, collaborative initiative that will expand psychedelic research across the arts, humanities and social sciences. Called “Psychedelics in Society and Culture,” the joint effort between the nation’s foremost public and private universities will foster new ways of thinking and partnering to answer some of the most pressing and intriguing questions surrounding psychedelics and society.

Entertainment / ShowBiz / Advertising

• "Chicken Run" studio Aardman is apparently running out of clay

  Aardman apparently bought up as much of the Plasticine-esque material—formally known as Lewis Newplast—as it could get its hands on when the news broke. But they only apparently only procured enough of the stuff for one more film, the new Wallace & Gromit movie that’s currently slated for 2024.

• Cities: Skylines 2's troubled launch, and why simulation games are freaking hard

• Zero-k: A libre sci-fi RTS game, with an economy based on metal and energy | Hacker News

• 100 years after 'Nazi Olympics': Should Berlin host in 2036?

• Non-profit Matrix.org Foundation seems to be moving funds to for-profit Element

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• (Video) Offspring of Tape Robot and 3D printer

• Source code to infocom's text adventure engines released (zcode interpreters)

• Children’s tablet has malware and exposes kids’ data, researcher finds | TechCrunch

  The Dragon Touch KidzPad Y88X contains traces of a well-known malware, runs a version of Android that was released five years ago, comes pre-loaded with other software that’s considered malware and a “potentially unwanted program” because of “its history and extensive system level permissions to download whatever application it wants,” and includes an outdated version of an app store designed specifically for kids, according to Hancock’s report, which was released on Thursday and seen by TechCrunch ahead of its publication.

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• 'Earthquake' at OpenAI as senior staff quit after sacking of boss Sam Altman

• Why was Sam Altman fired from OpenAI?

• A Theory on Why Sam Was Fired

  Firing Sam makes a lot of sense if you sit on the OpenAI Board. Sure, the organization could lose its tax-exempt status, and that would be bad, but the California AG could also sue you for breach of fiduciary duty, or worse, if there's real financial fraud, start filing criminal charges. This is the kind of risk mitigation strategy intended to reduce a Full Clusterfuck to a Slap On The Wrist.

• Altman was raising billions from Middle East sovereign funds for AI chip startup | Hacker News

• OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

  • HN comments

• OpenAI Board Being Pressed by Some Investors to Reinstate Altman

• The Fear and Tension That Led to Sam Altman's Ouster at OpenAI

• OpenAI staff to the Board: "Bring Sam and Greg back, or we all resign"

• Update on the OpenAI drama: Altman and the board had till 5pm to reach a truce

• OpenAI board attempts to hit "Ctrl-Z" in talks with Altman to return as CEO

• Ask HN: Is anyone else concerned about OpenAI and safety?

• Meta disbanded its Responsible AI team

• Sam Altman Is Said to Be Discussing Return to OpenAI with Company's Board

• OpenAI: Sam Altman is reportedly mulling a return to the company

• In Stunning Reversal, OpenAI Board In Talks With Sam Altman To Return As CEO After Satya Nadella "Furious" At Ouster | ZeroHedge

• Candlelight Vigil in Dolores Park Calling for the Return of Sam Altman as CEO

• OpenAI investors push for return of ousted CEO Sam Altman

• The Fear and Tension That Led to Sam Altman's Ouster at OpenAI

• Fear that AI could one day destroy humanity may have led to Sam Altman's ouster

• Sam Altman in talks to return to OpenAI amid rift over dangers of AI

• Altman Sought Billions for AI Chip Venture Before OpenAI Ouster

  • HN comments

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• Where did Starship fragments end up after its in-flight destruction?

  I modelled results for a number of masses, ranging from 0.1 kg to 50 kg, and with a fixed drag surface of 1 m2 for each fragment irrespective of mass. This is not very realistic by the way, but sufficient for a general idea nevertheless. Another deviation from reality is that there was no further mass loss (e.g. because of ablation upon reentry) of the debris pieces in the model. So, this is a bit a case of a proverbial "spherical cow reentering" (but not in a vacuum: the MSISE90 model atmosphere was used to model atmospheric drag).

• Which Presidents Have Seen UFOs? Yep, It's More Than One

Crypto con games

• If you created a Bitcoin wallet before 2016, your money may be at risk

Economicon / Business / Finance

• The IMF is slowly pushing for digital currencies to replace cash

• What do we know about non-profit boards?

• Walmart CEO says high inflation has ended and that shoppers may soon encounter the polar opposite in stores: deflation | Fortune

  Walmart shoppers could start to see deflation — or a decrease in prices — in dry groceries and consumables in the coming months, he said. General merchandise prices “came down a little more aggressively in the last few weeks or months,” he added. Even if overall prices don’t fall on an annual basis, McMillon’s comments underscore the slowdown in US inflation after the Federal Reserve ramped up interest rates. That’s a big change from the decades-high inflation that hammered shoppers in the wake of the pandemic.

  • HN comment

• A 30-Year Trap: The Problem with America's Weird Mortgages Archive

  Only the United States has such an extreme system of winners and losers, in which new buyers face borrowing costs of 7.5 percent or more while two-thirds of existing mortgage holders pay less than 4 percent. On a $400,000 home, that’s a difference of $1,000 in monthly housing costs.

• Amazon gains on FedEx and UPS in package delivery volume

• Gas prices have dropped below $3 per gallon in these 11 states.

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• Who can beat The Donald? The Rock

• Trump vows to kill Asia trade deal being pursued by Biden if elected

• Biden's Soft Landing, and He Deserves Some Credit

• Vivek toasts CNN on "vermin"

• From airlines to ticket sellers, companies fight U.S. to keep junk fees

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Biden admin renews sanctions waiver giving Iran access to $10 billion from Iraq

• How Panicked Is the Army? Check Out Letter Eating Crow, Asking People Booted Over Vaccine to Come Back – RedState

  • US Army asking soldiers dismissed for refusing Covid-19 vaccine to come back

World

• China's Rise Is Reversing

Israel

• A space engineer confronts Earth's brutal realities in Gaza

• Waymark founder has 37 family members killed by Israel in airstrike

• Israeli police say extreme sexual violence, rape by Hamas terrorists was systematic: The Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas Against Women is working to compile a database of gender-based atrocities.

• ‘Glorified the massacres:’ An NBC journalist in Israel was arrested on suspicion of inciting terror

• Surveillance footage shows Hamas bringing hostages into Shifa Hospital on Oct. 7

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• “Ukraine Sure Doesn’t Look Like a Democracy Anymore,”

  Then in May of 2022, the Ukrainian parliament passed a law formally banning all these parties. President Volodymyr Zelensky signed the law. The list included the Opposition Platform for Life, which had held fully 10 percent of the seats in parliament. Among the 11 banned parties are the Socialist Party of Ukraine, the Progressive Socialist Party of the Ukraine, the Union of Left Forces, and the Communist Party of Ukraine.

  Democracies do not ban elections, but Ukraine has put the democratic process itself on hold since declaring martial law in 2022. This hiatus was supposed to be temporary, but it has been repeatedly extended, most recently in July 2023. As a result of that vote in the Ukrainian parliament, where all opposition parties have been removed, the parliamentary elections scheduled for last month were canceled. Presidential elections were scheduled for March 2024, but under current rules they too will not be held,

• Ukraine war: The Russians snitching on colleagues and strangers

• The Invisible War in Ukraine Being Fought over Radio Waves

Health / Medicine

• 59% of 18-25 year olds in the United States are overweight or obese

• First chikungunya vaccine approved in US

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• 280M e-bikes are slashing oil demand far more than electric vehicles

• On a former palm oil plantation, a community rebuilds

• Iceland: Signs of magma being closer to the surface

• EU allows use of controversial weedkiller glyphosate for 10 more years

• The Arctic is warming 4x faster than the rest of the world

• Where did they all go? How Homo sapiens became the last human species left

• Suck carbon from the air? US facility launches novel climate solution

• Extreme weather and falling demand are pushing wineries into the red

• US industry disposed of at least 60M pounds of PFAS waste in last five years