2024-05-24

etc

• How Long Will Population Fall? - by Robin Hanson

• US firm to pay $310M over Ohio derailment and toxic fire

  • Norfolk Southern Agrees to Pay More Than $310 Million Over Ohio Train Derailment.

• Nikon Z 28-400mm f/4-8 VR: The Best All-Purpose Lens I've Ever Used

• Why paying women to have more babies won’t work

  What, then, can governments do? High-skilled immigration can plug fiscal gaps, but not indefinitely, given that fertility is falling globally. Most economies will therefore have to adapt to social change, and it falls to governments to smooth the way. Welfare states will need rethinking: older people will have to work later in life, for instance, to cut the burden on the public purse. The invention and adoption of new technologies will need to be encouraged. These could make the demographic transition easier by unleashing economy-wide productivity growth or helping care for the old. New household technologies may help parents, rather as dishwashers and washing machines did in the mid-20th century. Baby-boosting policies, by comparison, are a costly and socially retrograde mistake.

Horseshit

• Hershey sued for $5M over missing 'cute' face on Reese's Peanut Butter Pumpkins

  "This is a class action against Hershey for falsely representing several Reese's Peanut Butter products as containing explicit carved out artistic designs when there are no such carvings in the actual products," the lawsuit states.

• American Airlines backtracks on blaming 9-year-old for being filmed in bathroom

• Chickens in Trees

  As it turns out, my upbringing in New York was not representative of the rest of the world — free-roaming chickens roosting in trees is entirely common in many areas. It’s instinctual.

• 'Time Bandits' show exclusive first look features Lisa Kudrow, more

  • Hollywood’s War on Dwarves « Lawrence Person's BattleSwarm Blog

  You may have heard something about a remake of Time Bandits and thought “that sounds like a bade idea.” An even worse idea? Making it without dwarves.

• Horror stories of cryonics: The gruesome fates of frozen bodies

• Hundreds of Stars Have Vanished Without a Trace. A New Study Could Explain Why

  • they might have just turned into black holes. or perhaps they were consumed by giant interstellar squid.

Electric / Self Driving cars

• Millennials Drive EV Adoption in the U.S.

Rank Propaganda / Thought Policing / World Disordering

• Introducing the Censorship Files - by Matt Taibbi

  “Right now, there’s a lot of bad actors who are using freedom of information requests to harass academics working at public universities,” added Alice Marwick of the University of North Carolina. “And that wasn’t something we saw until a few years ago.” In the last year, newspapers, magazines, and even broadcast programs like 60 Minutes have been aggressively arguing that civic-minded “anti-disinformation researchers” are suffering under assault by outside investigators, who misuse tools like congressional subpoenas and the Freedom of Information Act to slow or halt their crucial work. The “bad actors” are almost always described as “right-wing activists,” “conservatives,” “Trump’s allies,” and so on, who attack beleaguered protectors of the informational realm out of “bias” and bad faith.

  Bullshit. These are publicly funded researchers who’ve spent years developing tools for suppressing or deamplifying the speech of the very people paying their salaries. Taxpayers shouldn’t have to use FOIA to find out what these programs do or how they’re funded, but a look under the hood makes clear why they want things that way.

• Twitter Files-CIA

  a new Twitter Files investigation reveals that a member of the Board of Trustees of the CIA’s mission-driven venture capital firm and ostensibly “former” IC and CIA analysts were involved in a 2021-2022 effort to take over Twitter’s content management system.

  These existing or former IC employees, contractors, or intermediaries weren’t satisfied with simply controlling Twitter. They also wanted to use PayPal, Amazon Web Services, and GoDaddy in a totalizing effort to de-platform, de-monetize, and excommunicate from the Internet entirely those individuals that the IC et al. deems to be a threat.

Musk

• X plans to make likes private for all users

  • X Confirms Plan to Make 'Likes' Private, Remove Likes Tab from Profiles

• Tesla using Autopilot technology experienced one accident per 7.63M miles

• Tesla could use more of Elon Musk's focus, former board member says

• Elon Musk's XAI Secures New Backing from Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia and Tribe

• Elon Musk says AI will take all our jobs

• SpaceX Weighs Plan to Sell Shares Valuing Firm at $200B

• Pentagon pursuing Russian use of Musk's Starlink terminals

• Media Matters Lays Off a Dozen Staffers Following Federal Probe, Lawsuit by Elon

Trump / War against the Right / Jan6

• 'Unified Reich' Hoax One Of The Most Blatantly Dishonest Attacks On Trump Yet | ZeroHedge

• Donald Trump 'Unified Reich' Video Leaves People Stunned

• Trump's online account promotes ‘unified Reich’ video, adding to alarming pattern

• White House slams ‘sickening’ video shared by Trump referencing ‘unified Reich’

• Trump posts Truth Social video with headline about a 'unified reich' : NPR

• Trump campaign deletes video mentioning 'unified Reich' - BBC

• Trump campaign video includes references to a 'unified Reich'

• 'This is Hitler's language': Biden slams Trump campaign post

• Trump campaign deletes ‘unified Reich’ post after widespread backlash - POLITICO

• After backlash, Trump pulls social media post with reference to 'unified Reich' | Reuters

  At two points in the video, text below a larger headline reads: "INDUSTRIAL STRENGTH SIGNIFICANTLY INCREASED... DRIVEN BY THE CREATION OF A UNIFIED REICH." The text is somewhat blurred, making it difficult to make out at first glance.

• Trump posts video referencing ‘unified Reich’ if reelected | CNN Politics

  Former President Donald Trump on Monday posted a video showing images of a fake newspaper article that references a “unified Reich” if he’s reelected in 2024. The video details “what happens after Donald Trump wins” with a narrator reading hypothetical headlines such as “Economy Booms!” and “Border is closed,” styled as World War I-era newspaper clippings. Under one headline that reads “What’s next for America?” is a reference to the “creation of a unified Reich.” Another headline in the video states “15 Million Illegal Aliens Deported” next to the start and end days of World War I.

• Trump Posts, Then Takes Down, Video Online With Headlines About a ‘Unified Reich’ - The New York Times

  The 30-second video, which Mr. Trump posted on his social media site, Truth Social, features several articles styled like newspapers from the early 1900s — and apparently recycling text from reports on World War I, including references to “German industrial strength” and “peace through strength.” One article in the video asserts that Mr. Trump would deport 15 million migrants in a second term, while text onscreen lists the start and end days of World War I. Another headline in the video suggests that Mr. Trump in a second term would reject “globalists,” using a term that has been widely adopted on the far right and that scholars say can be used as a signal of antisemitism.

  “This was not a campaign video, it was created by a random account online and reposted by a staffer who clearly did not see the word, while the President was in court,” Karoline Leavitt, a campaign spokeswoman, said in a statement. “The real extremist is Joe Biden.”

• Trump deletes social media video about election victory referencing 'Unified Reich' after facing backlash - ABC News

  The phrase "Unified Reich" appears as a part of hypothetical news articles in the video that announce Trump's hypothetical victory in the 2024 election, with the narrator asking, "What happens after Donald Trump wins?" Under a big headline that says, "WHAT'S NEXT FOR AMERICA?" there is a smaller headline that appears to read: "INDUSTRIAL STRENGTH SIGNIFICANTLY INCREASED DRIVEN BY THE CREATION OF A UNIFIED REICH." The video then predicts an economic boom, tax cuts, border security and deportation of undocumented immigrants if Trump wins the 2024 election.

• Trump’s social media account shares video referencing ‘unified Reich,’ then deletes it | PBS NewsHour

  The headline appears among messages flashing across the screen such as “Trump wins!!” and “Economy booms!” Other headlines appear to be references to World War I. The word “Reich” is often largely associated with Nazi Germany’s Third Reich, though the references in the video Trump shared appear to be a reference to the formation of the modern pan-German nation, unifying smaller states into a single Reich, or empire, in 1871.

• Trump social media account shares video mentioning "unified reich;" Biden blasts "Hitler's language" - CBS News

• The Real Meaning of Trump's 'Unified Reich' Post - The Atlantic

  Trump’s problem here is that even though his excuse makes sense, he is also an authoritarian who has used anti-Semitic language. Believing that he might have posted subtle Nazi messaging doesn’t require much of a leap. Not only did he attempt to steal the last election and promise to be a dictator, but he has also consistently disregarded checks and balances and suggested “termination” of the Constitution. He called neo-Nazi marchers in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 “very fine people,” hobnobbed with white nationalists, and delivered menacing remarks about American Jews who do not support him—on Rosh Hashanah, no less. His former chief of staff says Trump once told him that “Hitler did some good things.” It’s no coincidence that so many of those past sloppy reposts came from supporters of his who hold hateful views. (It also doesn’t help that a staffer on the campaign of Ron DeSantis, a rival and would-be successor in the GOP presidential primary, was caught surreptitiously inserting Nazi imagery into social-media posts.) The Biden campaign quickly pounced on the situation.

• Biden-Harris HQ on X: "Trump posts a new ad foreshadowing a second Trump term that says he will create a “UNIFIED REICH,” echoing Nazi Germany

• Trump set for historic Bronx rally: Thousands descend on New York City as residents reveal what they really think of Biden | Daily Mail Online

Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp

• Covid Subcommittee Details Allegations of Illegal Activity by Fauci Aide

• Second US worker infected with cow-linked bird flu

Religion / Tribal / Culture War and Re-Segregation

• Apple Taps Bank of America Veteran as Latest Diversity Chief

• Pope clears way for 'God's influencer' to become a saint

  A London-born teenager - whose proficiency at spreading the teachings of the Catholic church online led to him being called "God's influencer" - is set to become a saint. Carlo Acutis died in 2006, at the age of 15, meaning he would be the first millennial - a person born in the early 1980s to late 1990s - to be canonised. It follows Pope Francis attributing a second miracle to him.

Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts

• Did Robert Maxwell start the censorship of science? - The Conservative Woman

• A Theoretical Case Against Education

• Don’t bother learning about this one, unless you already know what I am talking about

• Redefining the scientific method: as the use of sophisticated scientific methods that extend our mind | PNAS Nexus | Oxford Academic

  Using data on all major discoveries across science including all Nobel Prize and major non-Nobel Prize discoveries, we can address the question of the extent to which “the scientific method” is actually applied in making science's groundbreaking research and whether we need to expand this central concept of science. This study reveals that 25% of all discoveries since 1900 did not apply the common scientific method (all three features)—with 6% of discoveries using no observation, 23% using no experimentation, and 17% not testing a hypothesis.

• More Schooling Is Linked to Slowed Aging and Increased Longevity

• University of N. Carolina System Board of Governors votes to repeal DEI policy

• In major change, college athletes set to be paid directly by schools

• Harvard Students Walk Out of Commencement Protesting Suspensions

Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising

• Bing API is down, bringing Microsoft Copilot, DuckDuckGo and ChatGPT web search

• OpenAI does a deal with News Corp for content

• Atari acquires Intellivision brand uniting competitors from gaming's early years

• Microsoft Reportedly Readies $16B Bid to Acquire Valve / Steam

  • HN comments

• Big Telecom's Fake Consumer Groups Attack Community Owned Broadband Networks

• Spotify abandoning and bricking Car Thing

  • Spotify is going to break every Car Thing gadget it ever sold

  • Superbird-bulkcmd: Spotify Car Thing resources to access U-Boot shell over USB

  • "Unacceptable": Spotify bricking Car Thing devices in Dec. without refunds

• Google has more than doubled Play Store's app price limit to $1k

TechSuck / Geek Bait

• Right to Repair: Nikon opens up Self Service Repair section on website

• The Oral History of Selling World of Warcraft Server Blades

  The HP server blades were so old that instead of recycling teams offering a few dollars per server to get the blades or decommissioning them just to be able to take and resell the old hardware, Blizzard was faced with another scenario. They were going to have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars, possibly up to a million dollars to have the servers removed from the racks. That figure is not being inflation adjusted. The old servers were just not worth it on the secondary market and old blade servers can be harder to move. As a result, the upgrade project was in limbo, until the company had an idea. The idea sounded crazy at first, as an almost funny suggestion around autographing and selling off the servers.

AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World

• Nvidia will now make new AI chips every year

• Sam Altman's Scarlett Johansson Blunder Just Made AI a Harder Sell in DC

• Meta's Zuckerberg Creates Council to Advise on AI Products

• The Low-Paid Humans Behind AI Ask Biden to Free Them from 'Modern Day Slavery'

• Another OpenAI employee announced she quit over safety concerns

• NASA, IBM Research to Release New AI Model for Weather, Climate

• Google Is Paying Reddit $60M for Fucksmith to Tell Its Users to Eat Glue

  • Google promised better search – now it's telling us to put glue on pizza

Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO

• First crew launch of Boeing Starliner capsule on hold until June 1 earliest

• "Unexpected" by whom? The unexpected connection between the northern lights and Hubble's death

  Unfortunately, Hubble’s final servicing mission occurred way back in 2009, and its altitude from that point (at solar minimum), which was at about 570 km, has been decaying ever since. The decay of Hubble’s orbit hasn’t been steady, however, but has lost altitude irregularly: with the greatest weekly altitude losses corresponding to the greatest levels of solar activity. During solar minimum, Hubble’s altitude changes by barely 0.01 kilometers per week, as Earth’s atmosphere is most compact and interacts with orbiting satellites the least. During solar maximum, however, it can lose up to between 0.3 and 0.6 kilometers in just a single week: corresponding to cumulative changes in altitude that add up to more than 10 kilometers per year at the peak of the solar cycle.

Crypto con games

• Crypto's 'huge moment' scrambling US politics

• (PDF) FTX bankruptcy examiner's report

  As has been widely reported in the press, the FTX Group; affiliated individuals including Bankman-Fried, Nishad Singh, and Ryan Salame; and affiliated non-profit organizations and political action committees made extensive political contributions. Donations were directed to politicians of both major American political parties, as well as to political action committees, national, state, and local political parties, and party-aligned groups. As explained below, multiple investigations have determined that many of these donations were made in violation of law.

  challenges relating to Bankman-Fried’s extradition from the Bahamas, the USAO-SDNY ultimately chose to not try Bankman-Fried on these campaign finance charges.

  investigations identified over 1,000 political contributions totaling over $200 million. They also determined that many of these donations were made using purported “loans” from Debtor entities that were, in fact, transfers from customer or corporate funds to Debtor insiders. many of the recipients “have either returned the funds to the Debtors or turned them to [sic] over to the U.S. Department of Justice.” S&C and the USAO-SDNY continue to investigate.

• SEC Approves Ethereum ETF

  • SEC approves rule change to allow creation of ether ETFs

  • SEC Opens the Door for Spot Ether ETFs in Big Crypto Victory

Economicon / Business / Finance

• Nvidia's Business Is Booming. Here's What Could Slow It Down

• Walmart, Target Unleash Price-Cut Tsunami As Working-Poor Hit Brick-Wall | ZeroHedge

• Corporations are forcing Americans to pay more for less – in their own words

• Red Lobster was killed by private equity, not Endless Shrimp

• Pixar to Cut 14% of Workforce

• Banks Want in on Private Credit

• Sudden container crunch sends ocean freight rates soaring, causing global alarm

Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making

• Lawmakers say Section 230 repeal will protect children–opponents predict chaos

• Biden Keeps Passing Smart Climate Policies

• House GOP claims Hunter Biden lied under oath during congressional deposition | Fox News

• White House issues a whopping nine corrections to Biden's NAACP speech transcript | Fox News

• Justice Department to Sue Live Nation, Seek Breakup of Concert / Ticketing Giant

  • U.S. suing Ticketmaster owner Live Nation

• CIA Blocked Probe Into Hunter's Hollywood Tax 'Sugar Brother': Whistleblower

• "Whistleblowers’ emails reveal John Kerry blocked the FBI and DOJ from arresting Iranian terrorists

• Massachusetts collected $1.8B from surtax on the state's highest earners

• Biden Moves to Secure CHIPS Act Funding for Kenya

• Supreme Court Sides with Republicans over South Carolina Voting Map

• Consultant behind fake Biden robocalls faces $6M fine and criminal charges

  • $6M fine for robocaller who used AI to clone Biden's voice

• US to Resume Trump-Era Tariffs on Graphics Cards Assembled in China

Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security

• Felony Pleas Of US Officers Bribed By ‘Fat Leonard’ Defense Contractor Thrown Out Over Prosecutorial Screw-Ups: REPORT | The Daily Caller

• Uvalde Families Sue State Police, School District for Response to School Shooting.

• "Incognito Market" Owner Arrested

• A Leak of Biometric Police Data Is a Sign of Things to Come

• Why progressive DAs are losing their grip on the West Coast.

External Security / Militaria / Diplomania

• Pentagon Tacitly Admits Biden's Gaza Pier Stunt Is A Total Failure

• Russia likely launched counter space weapon into low Earth orbit last week

• First Aerial View Of B-21 Raider Offers New Insights | The War Zone

World

• Canada's military is in crisis: the good ideas fairy is definitely not helping

• Mandela's vision of Black unity fades as South Africa closes door to migrants

• Google to build first subsea fibre optic cable connecting Africa with Australia

• Muslim majority Kosovo considers same-sex unions amid fierce opposition

Israel

• Israel tells U.S. it will punish Palestinian Authority if ICC issues warrants

Russia Bad / Ukraine War

• Ron Paul: The Vietnamization of Ukraine

• US thinking about letting Ukraine use its weapons to strike Russia

• Russia says it will strike British targets if UK weapons are used in Russia

• Estonia Says Russia Removed Border Markers as Tensions Rise

China

• China Launches Military Drills Around Taiwan as 'Punishment'

  • China starts 'punishment' drills around Taiwan after island swears in new leader

• Taiwan Says Chip Machines Can Be Shut Off If China Invades

Health / Medicine

• ‘Deny, denounce, delay’: the battle over the risk of ultra-processed foods

  But health authorities and food companies resisted the link, Monteiro tells the FT. “[These are] people who spent their whole life thinking that the only link between diet and health is the nutrient content of foods . . . Food is more than nutrients.” Monteiro’s food classification system, “Nova”, assessed not only the nutritional content of foods but also the processes they undergo before reaching our plates. The system laid the groundwork for two decades of scientific research linking the consumption of UPFs to obesity, cancer and diabetes.

• With weight-loss drugs booming, companies target dieters with new foods

• Fluoride, Water, and Kids' Brains: It's Complicated

• Daily cannabis use overtakes drinking in US first

  • Cannabis Tops Alcohol as Americans' Daily Drug of Choice

• Risk for psychosis skyrockets among teens who use cannabis.

• STIs, including syphilis, gonorrhea, increasing globally: WHO.

Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda

• The Collapse Is Coming. Will Humanity Adapt?

• ‘Magical thinking’: hopes for sustainable jet fuel not realistic, report finds | Greenhouse gas emissions | The Guardian

• A Giant Crater in Siberia Is Belching Up Russia's Past

• Sites with radioactive material vulnerable to climate change risks

• Earth's magnetic field is overdue a flip. Should we be worried?

• A new age of sail begins

• Germany has too many solar panels, and it's pushed energy prices into negative

• Mom Fined $88K after kids collect 72 clams from beach thinking they were seashells

• Atlantic to get 'extraordinary' hurricane season

  • Atlantic hurricane season will be 'extraordinary,' forecasters warn

• Cities Stare Down 'Day Zero' as Reservoirs Go Dry

• Fossil fuels could have been left in the dust 25 years ago

• The hornet has landed: Scientists combat new honeybee killer in US

• (2011) Car Paint Colors Could Improve Fuel Economy, Reduce Emissions

• New research on Thwaites Glacier could reshape sea-level rise predictions

• A Test of Cloud-Brightening Machines Poses No Health Risk, Officials Say