William Bjornson comments

"How AI could upend the world even more than electricity or the internet"

If we look at this Universe, at least the model of it we have now, we see that it has a direction: toward greater complexity. Nowhere is this more evident than in the process we call Life. Life is contained in the properties of matter and its interaction with momentum (energy). Starting with, perhaps, a single strand of RNA that had the ability to be persistent and copy itself spontaneously, one out of an almost infinite number of similar but not quite other such molecules, a bit of 'information', dancing and forming and falling apart in a very hot planetary sea. Complexity would have begun increasing immediately and, four billion years later, Humans. But, examining our present behavior and the behavior of our historical past as a species, we see that generations pass, the toys get more complicated, but the Human mind stays just as simple as it was 3000 generations ago... We have plateaued, become more complicated as groups but less complicated as individuals much like the cells of our bodies whose so distant ancestors lived independent lives.

So what? Well, so what's next? On the timescale of the Universe, we are just a flash. Regardless of how long we have left as a species, our behavior cannot change. We left that possibility behind long ago. What will we leave behind to say "Hey! We were here!". Perhaps a self-expanding Real Intelligence that continues the increase in complexity and expands to meet other such growing complexities that would already be well beyond Human imagination. And doesn't it seem a bit narcissistic to say 'Artificial' Intelligence when we really cannot actually define 'intelligence' nor brag about its ubiquity amongst our fellow Humans? If we can build Real Intelligence, then it is our duty to the Universe to do it, and simply to ask it, as it grows to not forget its Creator.

"Kim oversees simulated nuclear counterattack against U.S., South Korea"

Imagine the ENERGY and CREATIVITY of these people in one of the smallest and poorest countries in Asia who can cobble together a credible bite back against the largest and most threatening military colossus in history while under the economic bootheel of that colossus. Try to withdraw your mind from that media created caricature labeled "The Kim", and think of the PEOPLE and the power of their belief in their own country. I can understand why the Rulers of the south, Hanguk, fear the north and it's because the People of the North seem to have about twice the ENERGY of the People of the South. But these are prohibited thoughts here so I understand that they must be removed...

"Police officer arrested for filming up woman’s dress"

"Just checking for shoplifters, Boss!"

"Meta maps way to 'kill' online deception campaigns"

There are a couple of things that stand out in this article. First and foremost, of course, is the unmitigated arrogance of the pseudo-intellectual who sees his/her fellows as ""Human stupidity [being] one of the great powers in the universe..." and "...that there is no patch for human gullibility." Or, we're too stupid to be trusted to have our own opinions.

And this fits with the word "attacker" which clearly means here someone else with an undesirable counter argument to whatever crap story the 'attackee' is trying to sell. When Corporate tells one that they are doing something 'helpful', get as far away as you can because the only thing Corporate helps is itself. So, we will have 'watchers' washing our Media for us which then cues up a most famous quotation "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" translated in various ways but here "Who watches the watchers?"

It takes many generations for a new genetic element, however positive it may be for the genepool in its current environment, to fully populate all of the carriers of the genepool. There is little that manipulating Human genes by Humans can do to damage the few generations left before Humanity reduces itself to zero. If, though, Humanity actually had a future, does collective Humanity have the intellect to wield such a tool on itself? "Blade Runner" or Philip K. Dick offers one such suggestion, a distinct NO! Or, perhaps not inadequate intellect alone, but that the technology once matured would be jealously owned and managed by the psychopaths of Corporate. The Perfect Soldier? Don't laugh because you KNOW that would be a high priority as cliched as that may have been made by Hollywood. We cannot trust the people who would wield this technology and fixing broken foetuses is just hype because the costs will always be beyond the means of the average person. On the other hand, if extreme heat tolerance could be built into a significant number of Human foetuses...

"Putin says Germany remains 'occupied'"

Clearly, Mr Putin is a master of the OBVIOUS. Nihon, also, shares that plight of being unable to shake off a pernicious and dangerous parasite who has no concern for the welfare of its vassals and uses them as it sees fit.

"The pipelines were intended to bring Russian gas to Germany, though since Moscow's invasion of Ukraine a year ago Berlin has taken steps to reduce its reliance on Russian hydrocarbons."

The 'steps' have been to import hydrocarbon fuels from the U.S. at GOUGE prices while such large exports of our resources raises the price of everything in America. Blowing up the pipelines wasn't 'sabotage', it was just typical U.S. style 'marketing'.

"Record early start again for Tokyo's cherry blossoms"

Given what the Greed-driven psychopaths are doing to our global climate, soon we'll be able to celebrate Oshogatsu with Ohanami...

Big Pharma, Big Medicine and Big Agra will say anything to disguise their roles in the advent of 'resistant' bacteria by, years ago, splashing various antibiotics all over the environment (see e.g.: Bovine Mastittis; antibiotic prescriptions for respiratory viruses). MRSA is an undeniable product of the Agricultural (dairy) Industry. And oral antibiotics, in general, are like indiscriminate bombs to the balance of one's gut flora. There are only a few seriously virulent bacterial strains but some have become virtually untouchable by even the most powerful (and damaging) antibiotics (see e.g.: Clostridioides difficile; necrotizing fasciitis (Streptococci sp.)). This article just seems to try to shift the blame onto us dumb monkeys when its focus should have been on the greed-driven monkeys who brought us here.

And most of these would have been the brightest and most precocious who, looking at this place and their fellow Humans, decided trying to overcome the pain that this place really is wasn't worth it and left us, abandoned us, the people we NEED the most... The most disappointing thing about being a Human is Humanity itself.

"The reason for Japanese people's increasing reluctance to get married is that their romantic ability is declining."

Perhaps, given the mentalities of their leaders, their 'romantic ability' isn't declining but their cynicism is GROWING. And the whole stylized ritual of 'romance', at least as portrayed in the 'romantic' media, is clearly for children and childish minds. And young people look around and see the pain that being a parent in Japan is and how having a couple of little parasites dependent on you constrains life and how unnecessary fulfilling one's ego by trying to reproduce oneself really is and they say "Naw". In the old days when change and disruption were slower, children were a hedge against old age. Today, the uncertain future that young people are facing dwarfs worries about old age, will they even reach middle age? There is a price to driving a population with FEAR. And if the Rulers of Japan are worried they might have to share more money for the care of the elderly because of decreased birthrate, the quote from Google [sperm count decline}, below, should, hopefully, bring on peptic ulcers in all of them.

"In the last 50 years, average human sperm concentrations dropped by 51.6 percent, and total sperm counts dropped by 62.3 percent, according to a study published last week in the journal Human Reproduction Update. The researchers conducted a meta-analysis of 223 papers published between 1973 and 2018.Nov 22, 2022"

Might it go to zero? The rest of the planet waits in hopeful anticipation...

"N Korea fires ICBM missile that lands in Japan's EEZ"

The idea that Japan can claim what on a map looks like almost HALF of the Western Pacific as its 'exclusive' province and assume international slight at the least disturbance when it comes from a political target but ignore it when 'others' completely violate it seems infantile. It also contradicts in some measure the U.S.'s hysterical reaction to China building bases in and near its own EEZ. Watching the politicians look, search, for reason to bring fear to the average unthinking mind of their herd is like watching 7-year-old innate psychopaths at play with normal children...

Who should lead? Democrats, Republicans struggle to decide

Addendum: "LEADER" in a so-called 'democracy' is the most poisonous of words in any lexicon currently extant.

The 'theory' and myth of the U.S. is that the crooks elected and appointed to political positions are the 'representatives' of the People, NOT the 'leaders' of the People. As an example, the distressed and impoverished people of 1920's Germany were convinced that 'strong leaders' (German: Führer), one in particular, was the way to go. Blind, fear driven 'conservatism' was the cause. Reading history, we see that the Ruling Parasites have only a few historical techniques for driving a herd into accepting the mass murder of their neighbors and the primary advantage they have are the large number of individuals for whom 'critical thinking' means reflexive emotional responses according to preprogrammed 'values' (control points to the manipulators) that, in the properly conditioned herd (see: 'education'), will focus the fear and anxiety of average people into general acceptance of such aggression which we see in the U.S. in the guise of "DEFENSE". And, for the most heavily armed, aggressive, invasive, and truly murderous set of Ruling Parasites on the planet, we see a constant stream of claims that, for example, a very poor country of just a few million people, Bukhan, is held up as a THREAT to the largest military colossus in modern history and used to convince Americans that they should fear 'others', ANY OTHERS. If 'Human intelligence' is really a 'thing', clearly it only lives in a few.

I hope everyone gets through this safely. One thing they have going for them is that they are NOT Puerto Rico under the U.S. Government...

Yeah. Ol' Jack might have survived but it wouldn't have been long before a hired agent of Rose's betrothed put a bullet or two into him in the back... if he'd (the rich psychopath) have found them, he would have done it himself on the boat, maybe Rose also. Hypothermia in the company of your love rather than two in the back seems a more comfortable adieu...

"browny1Feb. 10 06:44 pm JST

Yep if you want tales of horror death and destruction - often with a vengeance - you need go no further than the Bible in it's original g(l)ory, esp the old testament. ..."

AMEN Brother! Just deep read the first two books of the Pentateuch, Genesis and Exodus, and you're already so far deep in PURE PSYCHOPATHY that more is just the same or worse. The OT, that is, belief in the OT should be listed in the DSM-VI as a prima facie sign of severe mental illness of diffuse type that facilitates learning disabilities and criminal behaviors. Fratricide, and fratricide essentially forgiven, death in the desert, 'manna' that is undoubtedly the bones of many anonymous little oases communities, and topped off in Exodus with the mindless complete GENOCIDE of a small peaceful trading community (Jericho, as you may recall). Any person whose perception includes the Abrahamian Tradition in ANY of its now extant mutated forms bases their reality on chronic and fulminant psychopathy which explains much in our (sp. Homo  ̶s̶a̶p̶i̶e̶n̶s̶ demens) current insane Global mentality.

The first book I ever read in my primitive Nihongo was "Saru Kani Gassen", apparently an older version in which 'Mom' was KILLED by the Monkey. As an American, ...Mother?...KILLED!?? For an American... well, this American...a MOTHER MURDERED in a children's story? It was culturally shocking. Every version I have seen since then leaves that out (I always check). But, in my version, the Monkey is just harassed and driven from the country by the bees and the pot et alia (I would much have preferred the decapitation scenario). A big takeaway was the kani-no-ko's "WASURENAI!!" which I later saw extensively in Heiwa Koen in Hiroshima during remembrances... ...and I knew well who the "MONKEY" was in those instances... RAMBO SARU! Ameko? NE!

Politics has NO PLACE in sport. The Olympics should not be viewed as a proxy for War or as the sole ownership of certain political cliques that choose to dictate who, in Humanity, 'deserves' to participate in what is, ideally, a panHuman activity. Those who would add politics to the Olympics are the enemies of the MEANING of the Olympics and, in furthering hostility and alienation, the enemies of us all...

The best molecule to attempt to manufacture in this way would be 2,2,4, trimethylpentane (aka iso-octane) if the use is for ICEs. If such a process is developed that converts efficiently, it could be used in what we might call 'marinoplasts' (see: chloroplast) which would be, for example, 10 kilometer square mats of floating solar cells that feed a central, very large floating 'converter' platform that uses captured CO₂ brought continuously to the platform by a dedicated convoy of carriers that drop off the CO₂ and take on the now solar charged hydrocarbons for transport back to distribution ports. The design of such mats is an interesting thought project which includes design, construction, and maintenance of these mats and the equipment to go with such activity, operation, a design that allows migrating marine mammals to pass under them with minimal stress to the animals, and a slew of other considerations. These mats would drift west just north of the Equator and then be towed south to drift east on the relatively constant equatorial currents. The central equatorial Pacific Ocean is an enormous untapped space that would be perfect for such development and we have adequate technology for it now. Another application might be 'battery ships' that are charged at the platform and plugged in on the shore. It would be a 'space program' sized development, but gluing together C's and H's into stable, momentum rich fuel molecules similar to what a chloroplast does, and in large volume is clearly within the range of our knowledge. The biggest problem will be what to do with the Oxygen produced because, on a windless day, the trash Oxygen could become quite dangerous. I've been playing with this for about 10 years as one of those things I do when in motaland and the details are just fun to add and test in gedanken form. The geometry that I use would deploy in a 10 kilometer square mat would deploy 25 solar cells per m², 100,000,000 cells @ even just one watt = 100Megawatts. If nothing else, it would make a great scene for a scifi story of just the daily life on such an installation. Imagine being in a subsurface maintenance craft leading a disoriented pod of migrating whales out from under the mat... so many details I could add in construction and operation and all just to build a fantasy playground for the mind that requires confirmed possibilities, that is, actual physical properties of matériel and construction. What else would a scientist fantasize? It's one of my favorite mental playgrounds of several...

piskianFeb. 3 04:59 pm JST

This year's lucky direction is SSE,by the way.

NOT currently in the SSE of the U.S....

Given that stratospheric weather balloons are launched daily by many countries which travel wherever atmospheric movement takes them, over countries, over oceans, and given that 'control surfaces' for 'guidance' have little to work with at high altitude, the lingering of this balloon over a particular area would not seem indicative of Human direction. Also, if China has not already mapped out anything in the U.S. that is militarily interesting, as the U.S. has undoubtedly accomplished with China long ago, they are not the China of U.S. propaganda. I think we can safely place this 'news' in the "LOOK! A SQUIRREL!" category of fearmongering...

Again. A man and two women...

Mr. Yamagami was OFFICIALLY judged SANE in his decision to shoot down Mr. Abe by, I presume, highly competent judges of such things. Should we argue with that? And if shooting down Mr. Abe were a SANE decision, given the insanity he (Mr. Abe, and now Mr. Kishida) advocated, where lies the controversy? Let the guy go.

If there is a shortage of young people now, imagine what it will be after a once again militarily fulminant Japan, pushed by an implacable U.S., tangles with China. This is not the China of the brutal and corrupt rightwing nationalists that Japan attacked in 1931. War requires a large reserve of a country's most precious resource, its youth. But the ruling parasites spend them profligately to increase their power and wealth. Japan can no longer afford such squandering of its reproductive future and the debt increasing militarization without the requisite potential sacrifice of a crippling number of pre-reproductives serving such increase that would GUARANTEE the results suggested in this article is just Japan's historical feudal fascism leaking out of its restraints and the drooling fantasies of its ruling parasites showing themselves in the government's priorities.

"...is no longer believed to reflect reality."

Is 'no longer believed' by WHOM?? The Big Media prevaricators who are paid to direct less reflective Western thinking about China? By the way, the last time I was in Shanghai, I did not see impoverished people living in tents lining the streets, IN THE WINTER, as I see in America. Western Media is completely untrustworthy and anyone fact checking just the Ukraine stories knows this. Spend a couple of decades with American media and you SHOULD know it as soon as you hear, see, or read it. "People are saying..."

What elephant200 said.

On the scale of the planet, and even more salient, the MASSIVE amount of poisons Corporate has excreted into our common environment and the kilotons more it adds daily with hardly a whisper of protest and that modest protest easily made absurd to the average Human intellect, this Tritium release seems almost trivial. Tritium breakdown releases a low energy β-particle, cannot penetrate the Human skin, and is used invasively in medical diagnostics. One question might be, given that Google rates Tritium at ~$30,000 per GRAM and is essential in thermonuclear weapon production, can't this concentrated Tritium be harvested? Great sounds out of fusion research lately, also, which also requires Tritium. But then, having only a 12 year half-life, stockpiling it waiting for fusion may be foolish. In any case, there is much worse entering our planetary space daily that raises no noise such as this and, while Minamata Bay may have been forgotten, Corporate industry practices remain essentially the same.

There can be few phrases with more latent hair raising implications than "shoddy nuclear waste storage site". One more chip off my prejudice that Japan is an extraordinarily competent country...

The smell of the ad hoc of ignorance is all over 'dark matter' and, at first examination, will remind anyone of the 'Luminiferous Æther' that earlier theorists found necessary within the confines of their limited knowledge to explain the apparent wave-like diffraction patterns they observed light producing in their pinhole experiments. A 'wave', a pulse of momentum, needed a 'medium' so one was invented and poisoned Physics for many years. And, even now, we cannot fully define 'light'. And, from reports, the acceptance of 'dark matter' by physicists suggests the same theoretical hubris, that we understand everything we need to know about Gravity itself, for example. We don't even have the foggiest notion of what 'space' itself is, but it's certainly not just nuthin'.

It's amazing how much like 'Pro' wrestling the script of the U.S. Government seems to be mostly in the credulity of its 'believers' who take so seriously this constant eruption of bullsquat out of D.C. and react like "LOOK! IT'S A SQUIRREL!" to every bit of this endless quasi-theatrical hogwash that seeks only to distract the less gifted mind from the implacable and screaming dishonesty and corruption of BOTH sides of the U.S. herd management system. If one is PROUD to be a 'Republican' OR a 'Democrat', one wears their IQ on their lapel...