2024-02-18

etc

• Sterling Home Explodes; 1 Firefighter Dies, Others Injured | News | loudounnow.com

• (2004) You can't tell people anything

• Still Trudging Towards Serfdom

  Other insights in the book continue to resound, especially regarding the inherently loose and arbitrary nature of state rulemaking and enforcement outside small zones where a political consensus does exist. Political agreement “to guide the action of the state” is always fairly limited in large modern republics because of the inherently diverse interests and needs of its citizens. But where agreement does not exist, it must be forged by a minority group within government which produces fiction to convince individuals that the sacrifice of individual freedom is needed in the name of the nation, the people, the common good, or equality. To that list, we can now add, equity, diversity, and inclusion. Truth doesn’t exist. What does exist is what the regime can create in our minds as to how we should think properly about a problem. Language must be manipulated to make a common identity apparent, and disincentives must be created to prevent citizens from dissenting or challenging it.

  Hayek finishes his book with the most essential truth: collectivism undermines our dignity as human persons. “Responsibility” must not be “to a superior, but to one’s conscience, the awareness of a duty not exacted by compulsion, … and to bear the consequences of one’s own decision, [is] the very essence of any morals which deserve the name.” Ever the advocate of the individualist society, Hayek counted its virtues as “independence, self-reliance, the willingness to bear risks, the readiness to back one’s convictions against a majority, and the willingness to voluntary cooperation with one’s neighbors.” We need these virtues today, and the tradition that undergirds them.

Horseshit

• Apple reportedly halts work on foldable iPhone

• Cheerios Chemically Castrating American Public With Impunity – PJ Media

  • PJ Media embracing "Environmenal Working Group" reports with full creedence. I guess the activist business requires going where the money is.

• Wilson Introduced an Airless Basketball for $2,500

• Fake grass, real injuries? Dissecting the NFL's artificial turf debate

• Authors 'excluded from Hugo awards over China concerns'

• Gun Control: On the Peculiar Coverage of the Kansas City Shooting | National Review

  Once again, the media is exhibiting a chronic lack of imagination in its coverage of gun-related crime, which is invariably marked out by a fanatical obsession with gun-control and a total lack of interest in anything else. Since Wednesday evening, I have read a hundred pieces about firearms — albeit not one featuring a single constructive suggestion — and read nothing whatsoever about parenting, juvenile delinquency, criminal-justice reform, or anything else. I have no interest in doing what I am criticizing here and jumping stupidly to my own conclusions, which is why I haven’t written anything blaming anyone other than the perpetrators for what happened. But others have, and I find it absolutely fascinating how one-tracked they are in their choice of villains. Apparently, the only thing that the American press can think of when looking for a potential solution is to pass a bunch of duplicative laws. It’s almost as if, instead of trying to help fix the problem, our media sees abominations such as these as useful cudgels, to be deployed against the usual enemies when convenient and then dropped as soon as they cease to be timely or politically effective.

  • "almost as if..." someone's caught on to the basic tactic of the Gun Control folks after 40+ years.

• There's a Reason McDonald's Coke Tastes Better Than All Others

  • HN comments

• Back-to-back deaths of 7 Indian students leave community shaken and worried

  In 2024 alone, seven students of both Indian and Indian American origin have died. All men 25 years old and under, two died by suicide, two died of overdoses, two were found dead after going missing, and one was beaten to death, according to police records in states ranging from Connecticut to Indiana.

• The Guardian view on the new drone wars: as prices fall, the casualties mount

  • prices must be brought back up, then? The only thing worse than rich arsewholes having the power to kill anonymously from afar is just anybody having access to that power? I say there's wisdom embodied in the spirit of the 2ndAmendment; the only answer to ever more awful weapons is their proliferation throughout society. Unarmed individuals are not free.

• It is forbidden to talk about violence at the Chaos Computer Club

• We're entering a golden age of engineering biology

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Biden Administration Is Said to Slow Early Stage of Shift to Electric Cars

• What the U.S. can learn from Norway when it comes to EV adoption

celebrity gossip

• Jimmy Carter’s Long Goodbye - The New York Times

  Mr. Carter entered hospice care one year ago Sunday, choosing to forgo further life-prolonging treatment with the intent to return to his simple home in Plains, Ga., to pass his final days in comfort and peace. As it turns out, there have been more final days than he or anyone around him anticipated. The former president’s long goodbye has defied the odds and absorbed many around the world who have spent the last 12 months honoring his memory even as he has refused to follow anyone else’s timetable. Hospice care is meant to ease the end for both patient and family, prescribed for those with less than six months to live. About half of those who enter hospice care last no more than 17 days.

• George Santos sues Jimmy Kimmel for tricking him into making videos on Cameo

• Julian Assange's moment of truth has arrived – and the stakes are high

Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering

• State Department threatening to obstruct ‘censorship’ investigation: House GOP - Washington Examiner

  • State Department Threatens Congress Over Censorship Programs

  In response to the outrage of this disclosure, the State Department sent its letter threatening in camera sessions until it gets a better “understanding” of how the Committee will use its “sensitive” information. That’s Beltway-ese for “We wouldn’t mind knowing the Examiner’s sources.”

  About that: the State letter wrote that the Examiner’s records were “reportedly obtained from the Committee,” and included a footnote and a link to a Kaminsky story, implying that the Examiner reported that it got the records from the Committee. But the paper said nothing about the source of the documents, which as anyone who’s ever covered these types of stories knows, could have come from any number of places. It’s a small but revealing detail about current petulance levels at State.

• From Censorship To Criminalizing Dissent | ZeroHedge

  Turn your attention to France right now. In the dead of night, a new law slipped through the General Assembly that would make it a crime to criticize mRNA shots. Critics call it the Pfizer law. It calls for fines up to 45,000 euros and possibly three years in prison for debunking an approved medical treatment.

  As a second item, I’m alarmed to read the lead piece in the New York Times opinion section that celebrates a defamation case about which I had not previously heard. It is by Michael Mann, professor at the University of Pennsylvania. He had sued a writer for the Competitive Enterprise Institute for taking issue with Mann’s climate change model, and the so-called hockey stick in particular. Essentially this verdict is criminalizing hyperbole, said the defense attorney.

  The op-ed writer, however, says this is justice. “Our recent trial victory may have wider implications,” he says. “It has drawn a line in the sand. Scientists now know that they can respond to attacks by suing for defamation.” He mentions in particular people who have disagreed with the COVID consensus—disagreeing with Anthony Fauci—or otherwise make “false claims about adverse health effects from wind turbines.”

  Will this case have a chilling effect on criticism of government? Absolutely! Indeed, it is terrifying to think what it implies. And the writer leaves nothing to the imagination. He sees this case as a wedge to make scientific criticism of any area of life—from vaccines to climate change to the conversion to EVs—essentially illegal. In any case, if not that, it comes close by erecting so many landmines that critics essentially shut up for fear of having their whole lives ruined.

Musk

• The Musk is BadMan Kabuki Minuet has taken up a new rhythm this week

• For Elon Musk Lately, It Feels Like It’s All About Russia, Russia, Russia - WSJ

  Frankly, when Putin is praising Musk, as he did earlier this month, and when the Musketeer Tucker Carlson is airing videos on the X social-media platform praising life under that authoritarian government as superior to the U.S., it is unnerving. When X is seeing a surge in Russian state-backed activity, as researchers say, and Musk’s satellite internet service, Starlink, is said to be used by Russian forces in the war against Ukraine, it is unnerving. This past week, Musk called on his echoverse to lobby the Senate not to pass an aid package for Ukraine, in the latest example of the billionaire’s speaking out about the conflict that is dragging into its second year.

• Musk Says Putin Can't Lose in Ukraine, Opposes Senate Bill

• Propaganda accounts found by Meta still flourish on X - The Washington Post

  Posing as Americans, Chinese accounts on X aim to divide and disrupt

  Previously, tech companies including Twitter, Facebook owner Meta and Google’s YouTube worked with each other, outside researchers and federal law enforcement agencies to limit foreign interference campaigns, following revelations that Russian operatives used fake social media accounts to spread misinformation and exacerbate divisions in 2016. But X has been largely absent from that effort since Elon Musk bought it in 2022, when it was still Twitter, and for months hasn’t sent representatives to biweekly meetings in which the companies share notes on networks of fake accounts they are investigating or planning to take down, according to other participants. “They just kind of disappeared,” one said.

  • It just so rude of them to skip the Extra-Legal Censorship Cartel meetings, isn't it? Refreshing to see anyone other than Russia as a bad guy, at least. They'll probably give themselves awards for their nuanced coverage because of that.

  • Elon Musk's X allows China-based propaganda banned on other platforms

• (Feb 13) Russia using Elon Musk’s Starlink on Ukraine front line, says Kyiv

  Responding to those reports, Musk’s SpaceX, which owns Starlink, said on X last week that it “does not do business of any kind with the Russian government or its military. Starlink is not active in Russia, meaning service will not work in that country. SpaceX has never sold or marketed Starlink in Russia, nor has it shipped equipment to locations in Russia.”

  Musk provided thousands of Starlink terminals to Ukraine to help it fend off Russian troops soon after their full-scale invasion in February 2022, giving Kyiv’s forces a valuable technological advantage in the form of high-speed internet for communications, targeting and battlefield management software. However, Kyiv’s praise for the businessman turned to fury when Musk started to limit the operation of Starlink in areas of Ukraine that Russian forces have occupied since 2014, including Crimea.

  • Isn't "internet access" a humanitarian good, of universal application, that should be available to anyone regardless of their beliefs, or the system of governance they're currently suffering? Should Starkink be available only to the Ukrainians? or to neither side in this conflict? Are the phone providers getting flak for serving russians here? Is this just another chance to have a "Musk is Bad" two minute hate?

  • (Feb 13) Ukraine says Russia uses Musk's Starlink terminals at front

• Musk's biography: why it's interesting - Byte Tank

Trump / War against the Right / Jan6

• One trucker, anyway: Truckers Warn Loads To NYC Will Be Rejected Starting Monday | ZeroHedge

• Obscene award against Trump is testing the New York legal system’s integrity | The Hill

Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp

• Conspiracy Theory Debunker Finds Real Conspiracies ⋆ Brownstone Institute

  Ariely spends a few sentences philosophizing about what is the true responsibility of a newspaper – is it just to publish true information, or is it “to do this cost-benefit analysis for the society…?” But apparently he let the matter lie, acquiescing in real censorship of real information.

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• (2014) The racist children's songs you might not have known were racist

• Calif. volunteer, Fran Itkoff, 90, forced out of MS Society job for asking about pronoun usage

  “The verbiage she said was you didn’t abide by their diversity, equity and inclusion, so they had to ask her to step down and she can’t be a part of the MS society as a volunteer.” Itkoff’s daughter Elle Hamilton said.

  • Statement from the National MS Society | National MS Society

    Recently, a volunteer, Fran Itkoff, was asked to step away from her role because of statements that were viewed as not aligning with our policy of inclusion. Fran has been a valued member of our volunteer team for more than 60 years. We believe that our staff acted with the best of intentions and did their best to navigate a challenging issue. As an organization, we are in a continued conversation about assuring that our diversity, equity and inclusion policies evolve in service of our mission, and will reach out to Fran in service of this goal.

• Cousin marriage is probably fine in most cases

  in many states it is legal to have sexual relations and marry one’s first cousin. Is it really OK to kiss your cousin? Geneticists mostly say that it is, with some caveats. In 2021 the National Society of Genetic Counsellors (NSGC) published updated guidelines for consanguineous couples (people descended from the same ancestor) and their offspring. The risk to offspring is greater, but the increase is quite small. According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention about 3% of all babies born in America have birth defects. The NSGC guidelines state that for “couples with no known genetic disorders in the family, there is an additional 1.7% to 2.8% risk for significant birth defects.” Many other couples face far higher risks of genetic complications for their offspring, and those unions are not banned.

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• Child education: Are computers or books better for learning?

  The field is new, and the evidence is mixed — there is no scientific consensus on whether books or digital devices are better for a child's learning. One study in elementary schools in Honduras, for example, found that substituting laptops for textbooks did not make a difference in student learning in the end — it was neither positive nor negative.

  There are many factors at play in a child's education. Their home environment is just as important as the materials and devices they use for learning. One of the biggest problems in education is poverty — poor access to books and computers.

  • Or, just possibly; individuals differ, and there's no one "best" for all. But of course the premise wasn't the thrust and the point was to preach about poverty.

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• When you use a Walkman the memories come back: the people in love with old tech

• Reddit signs $60M content licensing deal with AI company

  • Reddit has a new AI training deal to sell user content

  • Reddit has reportedly signed over its content to train AI models

• VR porn a no go for Apple Vision Pro users as capability blocked by Apple

• Game over? Industry suffers slowdown after decades-long winning streak

  The $200bn video games industry is reckoning with its biggest slowdown in 30 years, as the huge growth driven by smartphone gaming and the latest generation of consoles reaches its limits.

• Sundar Pichai Is Google's Steve Ballmer

• (aug 2023) Releasing my tools under the MIT License was probably a mistake

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• 2600 official Intel SPEC benchmark results have been invalidated because the compiler was using steroids.

• The mechanical Bendix Air Data Computer, part 5: motor/tachometers

• The Raspberry Pi Virtual Modem

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• Humanity's remaining timeline? It looks more like five years than 50

• Jim Keller responds to Sam Altman's plan to raise $7T to make AI chips

• Phallocentricity in GPT-J's stratified ontology

• Mind-blowing OpenAI Sora videos that show it's another ChatGPT moment for AI

Crypto con games

• Bahamas Bank Deltec Accused of Giving Bankman-Fried Secret Credit to Buy Tether

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Commercial real estate 'debt bomb' of $929B comes due this year

• US Economy Will Fall into a Recession in the Middle of 2024 (Archive)

• A US productivity boom may explain how inflation slowed amid a strong economy

• The Great Compression Thanks to soaring prices, 400-square-foot house is upon us

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• The Media Is Cheering Dems' Rightward Turn on Immigration

• Texas to build 80-acre border base for National Guard troops | The Texas Tribune

• Amazon argues that national labor board is unconstitutional

• The hottest trend in U.S. cities? Changing zoning rules to allow more housing

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• Proposed legislation would allow defendants to inspect the algorithms of any code used to produce evidence against them in court.

• Justice Department Sues Tennessee for Enforcing State Law that Discriminates Against People with HIV

  The department’s investigation found that the state and TBI subject people living with HIV to harsher criminal penalties solely because of their HIV status, violating Title II of the ADA. Tennessee’s aggravated prostitution statute elevates what would otherwise be misdemeanor conduct to a felony because the individual has HIV, regardless of any actual risk of harm.

• Why some aging spies won't walk out of U.S. prisons, long after the Cold War

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• The US military is embedded in the gaming world. Its target: teen recruits

• Did Biden just accidentally ban arms sales to Turkey?

World

• Trudeau Government Is Sued over Emergencies Act

• Booksellers on the Seine in Paris Get an Olympic Reprieve

• No lunch in Ginza: Japan's scaled-back spending helps push economy to recession

• Pakistan Needs a Plan

• Argentina Sees First Monthly Budget Surplus in 12 Years

Iran / Houthi / Red Sea / Mediterranean

• U.S. Designates Houthis a Terrorist Group - The New York Times

  State Department on Friday designated the Houthis as a terrorist organization, following through on a mid-January warning to crack down on the Yemen-based militant group. The action officially labels the Houthis as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist group, a step that gives the United States new powers to crack down on the Iran-backed Houthis’ access to the global financial system. It restores a designation given to the group late in the Trump administration, which Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken reversed soon after taking office in 2021, partly to facilitate peace talks for Yemen’s civil war.

Israel

• Egypt Reportedly Building Walled Area on Border as Contingency for Mass Exodus

• I'm a doctor who went to Gaza. What I saw wasn't war – it was annihilation

• Rafah Has Long Suffered Under Brutal Israeli Assaults

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• Russia attempting to develop nuclear space weapon to destroy satellites with EMP

  • U.S. Fears Russia Might Put a Nuclear Weapon in Space (Archive)

• Russia uses Zircon hypersonic missile in Ukraine for first time, researchers say

• Major Victory For Russian Army As Ukraine Forces Flee Eastern City | ZeroHedge

• Kremlin runs disinformation campaign to undermine Zelensky, documents show

• With Prison Certain and Death Likely, Why Did Navalny Return? (Archive)

China

• China Revives Socialist Ideas to Fix Its Real-Estate Crisis

Health / Medicine

• The future of silk: We are already using it to transport vaccines

• Red Wine Lost Its Health Halo

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• The Ute Tribe will construct one of the largest solar farms in the US for $1B+

• At the Climate Threshold

• Amazon Rainforest Facing Drastic Collapse from 2050, Scientists Warn

• Humanity's remaining timeline? It looks more like five years than 50

• Why an Oregon small utility is among the biggest polluters: Amazon data centers

• Cement is a big part of the carbon problem. Make it part of the solution

• Kazakhstan: Methane mega-leak went on for months

• February on course to break unprecedented number of heat records