Week 52
"@inthehands@hachyderm.io
A shockingly large portion of the world’s current problems trace back to an excess of investment money desperate for more things to invest in"
Quora: "The [human brain, neural net ("AI")] comparison is ridiculous but fun to do. We have no real idea what brain neurons firing really does. There's lots going on in all its connections. There's no reason to conclude that they communicate only binary information. And then there are all the other cells in the brain that aren't neurons. We don't know what they do either.
This analogy is also wrong in other ways. The brain's connections are highly organized. It's far more complicated than the layers in an artificial neural network"
Scaling existing approaches 1000-fold would mean power requirements becoming ginarmous. People talk about "AI" needing electricity equaling the demand of a small country today. What kind of power req would be thousand times that? Clearly nothing that can be supplied in a sustainable manner. A new approach is called for. Lots of phenomena is formulated via mathematics.. Where is the mathematics of thought (math used for NN implementation does not count).
And there is the problem of textual data not being enough for intelligence, see Yann LeCun (reportedly he is working on this problem), different types of data and more of it will be needed for human-like intelligence.
Based on these numbers current "AI" is at the level of a hamster. A hamster is performing LLM for you, so we should not be surprised when it spits out complete garbage as it frequently does such as when it says in Roman architecture before the use of windows there was MS-DOS. Or w/ MS copilot code generation whose debugging costs more time then it saves.
Let's also not forget the neural net approach might be architecturally deficient from get-go, no matter the scale, it will not achieve AGI (though it can be part of a larger solution doing its little isolated black box thing). We do not mimic nature one-to-one. Planes do not fly like birds. Mathematically formulating any physical phenomena has almost no relation to the way nature computes that phenomena (God does not use, or need differential equations).
Quora: "[Neural network] parameters are more analogous to synapses (connections) than neurons (the nodes in between connections) somewhere in the range of 100-160 billion is the current upper number for specialized networks.
Deriving the number of neurons in AI systems from this number is a stretch since these AIs emulate certain types of connections and sub assemblies of neurons, but let's continue...
So now let's look at the brain, and again this are all contested numbers. Number of neurons ~ 86 Billion, Number of Synapses ~ 150 Trillion, another generalization: average number of synapses per neuron ~ 1,744.
So now we have something to compare, and I can't stress this enough, these are all wonky numbers, so let's make our life a little easier and divide :
Number of Synapses (Brain ) : 150 trillion / Number of parameters AIs: 150 billion = 1,000 or in other words current AIs would have to scale by a factor of one thousand their connections to be on par with the brain"
One neuron in human brain is connected (via "synapses") to 1000+ other neurons.. Massive number. The "number of parameters" usually quoted for neural networks (eg LLMs) are equivalent to synapses in human brain.
Governance descending from militocracies are not necessarily run like militaries today... The evolution of such cultures eventually led to bureucratic governance structures of a certain type of an elite that had its roots in military rule. Such evolution proved more durable, more useful than other kinds. A king would want order, a strong army, want to keep its existing land, which could lead to wanting to have a healthy, educated, industrious population, rather than Anglo cultures who descend from merchantile parasitic money grubbers merely seeing their country, overseas territories as places to be exploited, "traded with" and that sometimes could mean destruction of local artisans, local rules, as well as enslavement of countries at large. Plutocratic culture did not evolve into something healthy and durable as we clearly see in US and UK now. Both countries are legit basket cases.
Gizmodo: "I’m Tired of Pretending Physical Media Isn’t Still Better Than Streaming Digital.. I was assigned to watch Furiosa at LA’s glorious IMAX Headquarters. In order to prep, I thought I’d just turn on Max and re-watch Mad Max: Fury Road. And to my surprise and quick consternation, what was discovered within a few minutes of watching the film is that something was off with the score’s audio. My husband and I have long been appointment movie theater goers—we’re there at the first or second opening-day showtime—and we remember how Mad Max: Fury Road sounded. This was not it. Figuring that something must have gone wrong with Max’s streaming service compression of the audio files, we switched over to our digital copy. And still it didn’t sound quite right. So we dug out our Blu-ray and popped it in, and there it was: the pristine sounds of Junkie XL’s warring drums and guitars coming out of our soundbar"
"@Survival_Is_Insufficient@ni.hil.ist
I was grocery shopping and everyone kept saying to me, 'Stay warm 🤗!!' I was thinking that everyone was being really friendly in a creepy Midwestern way until I realized I was wearing my 'Stay warm, burn a bank' Christmas sweater. I had forgotten! Faith in humanity restored"
Glorified pattern matchers.. they are stupid at a fundamental level.
Futurism: "Back in the day, you could ask the red-hot AI system to whip up instructions on everything from shoplifting to committing murder. But that's changed as its creators have enacted more and more controls on it — with the assistance, of course, of underpaid overseas moderators... But as geniuses online have figured out, there's a brilliant 'jailbreak' that unlocks a much naughtier side of the system"
H2 Fuel News: Launched in January 2021, the FCH2RAIL project had a budget exceeding €14 million, over 70% of which was funded by European Union programs. The consortium included Renfe, CAF, Toyota Motor Europe, and CNH2, among others, all working to develop a prototype train equipped with a Fuel Cell Hybrid PowerPack (FCHPP)... Designed to operate seamlessly on both electrified and non-electrified tracks, the prototype achieved over 10,000 kilometers of testing across varied routes. This included challenging journeys in the Aragonese Pyrenees and cross-border trials in Portugal, signaling the adaptability and robustness of hydrogen technology.
Bytes Europe: "Australia And South Korea Strengthen Hydrogen And Carbon Capture Partnership.. Australia and South Korea have formalized a new bilateral agreement to bolster climate and energy collaboration, paving the way for expanded clean energy industries and trade opportunities.
Signed on December 20th, the Green Economy Partnership Arrangement (Green EPA) aims to diversify clean energy supply chains, enhance hydrogen systems, and advance carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS). This agreement will also streamline trade barriers and foster cooperation on carbon market standards and certifications"
"The 9th Guangzhou International Hydrogen Technology Industry Expo will be held from March 5-7, 2025, at the Poly World Trade Center, Guangzhou, China. As a leading platform for hydrogen technology and its applications, the expo will feature 180 exhibitors showcasing cutting-edge products in hydrogen health, medical, beauty, and agricultural sectors. With a focus on innovation and market transformation, this event is expected to attract 30,000 professional visitors from across the globe"
The Guardian: "‘Fastest-growing fire risk’: why do lithium batteries keep exploding across Australia?.. Fire and Rescue NSW responded to 272 battery-related fires last year, while Victoria and Queensland authorities say they happen almost every day...
Fire and Rescue NSW has referred to lithium-ion batteries as the “fastest-growing fire risk” in the state. The agency responded to 272 battery-related fires last year – more than five each week...
If a lithium-ion battery is charged too fast, it can result in thermal runaway – an uncontrollable increase in temperature. “The electrolyte heats up, because there’s too much energy in the battery,” Ellis says. “It’s in a pressurised system, and so then all of a sudden – bang … it’ll crack.” The liquid electrolyte is highly flammable and will burst into flames when exposed to air...
Overheating and physical damage are the main causes of battery failure.
Lithium-ion battery fires can reach high temperatures within seconds and release highly toxic gases. Because of their chemical components, burning batteries can develop self-sustaining flames that are difficult to extinguish"
Chomsky: "[2015] America is a plutocracy masquerading as a democracy.. Democrats now are mostly what used to be called ‘moderate Republicans.’ There’s ample evidence that most of the population, at the lower end of the income spectrum, is effectively disenfranchised – their representatives pay no attention to their opinions. Moving up the income ladder, influence increases slowly, but it’s only at the very top that it has real impact"
Gore Vidal: "There is only one party in the United States, the Property Party.. and it has two right wings: Republican and Democrat."
#Chapo
Politico: "New research shows the massive hole Dems are in.. Even voters who previously backed Democrats cast the party as weak and overly focused on diversity and elites..
When asked to compare the Democratic Party to an animal, one participant compared the party to an ostrich because 'they’ve got their heads in the sand and are absolutely committed to their own ideas, even when they’re failing.' Another likened them to koalas, who 'are complacent and lazy about getting policy wins that we really need.' Democrats, another said, are 'not a friend of the working class anymore'"
Malik, The Guardian: "A consensus is emerging: Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. Where is the action?"
Al Monitor: "Pope again condemns 'cruelty' of Israeli strikes on Gaza"
Ed Zitron: "In the last year, I’ve spent about 200,000 words on a kind of personal journey where I’ve tried again and again to work out why everything digital feels so broken, and why it seems to keep getting worse, despite what tech’s 'brightest' minds might promise. More regularly than not, I’ve found that the answer is fairly simple: the tech industry’s incentives no longer align with the user.
The people running the majority of internet services have used a combination of monopolies and a cartel-like commitment to growth-at-all-costs thinking to make war with the user, turning the customer into something between a lab rat and an unpaid intern, with the goal to juice as much value from the interaction as possible. To be clear, tech has always had an avaricious streak, and it would be naive to suggest otherwise, but this moment feels different. I’m stunned by the extremes tech companies are going to extract value from customers, but also by the insidious way they’ve gradually degraded their products...
As every single platform we use is desperate to juice growth from every user, everything we interact with is hyper-monetized through plugins, advertising, microtransactions and other things that constantly gnaw at the user experience. We load websites expecting them to be broken, especially on mobile, because every single website has to have 15+ different ad trackers, video ads that cover large chunks of the screen, all while demanding our email or for us to let them send us notifications...
Your work software veers between 'shit' and 'just okay,' and never really seems to get better, nor does any part seem to smoothly connect to another. Your organization juggles anywhere from five to fifteen different pieces of software — Slack or Microsoft Teams and/or Zoom for communication, Asana or Monday or Basecamp for project management, or Jira, or Trello, or any number of other different ways that your organization or team wants to plan things. When you connect with another organization, you find they’re using a different product, or perhaps they’re using the same one — say, Slack — and that one requires you to join their organization, which may or may not work"
If Iran / Russia were not happy with Assad but Israel was, both countries could prefer a new regime given they received certain guarantees. In that case the toppling of Assad becomes an RU/TR/IR operation. How Syria shapes up after Assad will give clues which side pulled off this feat.
The New Arab: "A series of reportedly leaked documents found following Bashar al-Assad's regime collapse have revealed a covert channel of communication between Syria and Israel. Although the papers have not been independently verified, they bear the official Syrian Arab Republic letterheads and intelligence branch stamps.
Photographs of the alleged documents were shared widely online by several journalists in Syria and pan-Arab Arabic language media outlets. The contents of the reported documents challenge the long-standing narrative that the Assad government was a steadfast opponent of Israel, instead portraying its alleged complicity in Israeli military operations against Iranian targets"
#AlJazeera #Assad
This thing is beyond terrible #copilot #ai
"@QasimRashid@mastodon.social
This week is another reminder that:
We don't have an energy shortage
We don't have an insulin shortage
We don't have a housing shortage
We don't have a teacher shortage
We don't have a labor shortage
We don't have a food shortage
We have a billionaire excess who buy politicians to deny us access to basic human rights"
Oliver Stone, The Untold History of US: "Roosevelt kept up his harsh attack on business throughout the 1936 campaign. He trumpeted the list of progressive achievements. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) and other government programs put millions of unemployed back to work in government jobs. The economic and banking systems had been reformed. The government, for the first time, sided, however tentatively, with labor against the employers and nurtured the growth of unions. Social Security guaranteed a modicum of comfort in old age that few workers had previously enjoyed. The tax burden was shifted increasingly to the wealthy.
On the eve of the election, Roosevelt took his defiantly antibusiness message to supporters at Madison Square Garden, declaring,
'We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace—business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering. They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob … They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred.'
When election day came around, the revitalized Democrats gave the Republicans the political thrashing of their lives at every level.
The Windsors running UK.. Fine. It would be much better than.. whatever the f--k this is right now, the system they have, where bidness is calling the shots and everyone else gets the shaft.
The state of UK / US is so bad if their respective militaries took over and ran the country they would be better off. Some countries need to experience a firm hand for a while so their plutocratic culture is cleansed.
And the London mayor was knighted all of a sudden.. Is he being primed to take the job after Starm, so now the challenger will have a balancing title, the two can knight off?
Byline Times: "The Prime Minister's acceptance of right-wing economic orthodoxy is pushing his party and the country towards disaster, argues his former adviser Simon Fletcher..
For Ipsos, latest research has just 27% of the public satisfied with Starmer's performance, with 61% dissatisfied. Public satisfaction with the Government is also low, with a net satisfaction rating of -49...
Perhaps inevitably, but certainly very early on in the parliament, there is now speculation that Labour's poor performance may mean that Starmer will not survive as Labour leader and Prime Minister into the next election"
The Guardian: "[2013] In a cruel twist of fate, I fear that the movement for women's liberation has become entangled in a dangerous liaison with neoliberal efforts to build a free-market society. That would explain how it came to pass that feminist ideas that once formed part of a radical worldview are increasingly expressed in individualist terms. Where feminists once criticised a society that promoted careerism, they now advise women to "lean in". A movement that once prioritised social solidarity now celebrates female entrepreneurs. A perspective that once valorised "care" and interdependence now encourages individual advancement and meritocracy.
What lies behind this shift is a sea-change in the character of capitalism. The state-managed capitalism of the postwar era has given way to a new form of capitalism - 'disorganised', globalising, neoliberal. Second-wave feminism emerged as a critique of the first but has become the handmaiden of the second"
"@jensclasen@mastodon.social
I used to think that the most unrealistic thing in Bond films was the crazy super-billionaires striving for world domination.
Today I know that the most unrealistic thing in Bond films is probably efficient state institutions and courageous, well-resourced individuals who prevent crazy super-billionaires from seeking world domination"
"@GeofCox@climatejustice.social
My perspective from France includes reservations about both the UK's 'metro mayors' model and unitary authorities. Although such things exist in France (eg. Paris. which is both a commune and a department), the backbone of French democracy is the small commune with its elected mayor. The commune I live in has only just over a thousand residents.
Mayors are powerful, and local people have real access to them. When we moved here, we went to see the mayor (which is the norm here) and he personally guided us round the village school (we moved with an 8-year-old). When we had a problem with the village road outside our house, we went to see the mayor and a few days later the local team came a put in new drainage - and that afternoon the mayor himself came round and asked if that had all gone ok.
You see how different - how much more local and friendly and responsive - this is, compared with the UK ? Shouldn't you be devolving power down to much smaller areas/populations, rather than up to metro mayors and unitary authorities?"
There was major animosity between RFK and LBJ, Robert K never agreed Johnson's pick as VP, while in office, heading DOJ, he even started an investigation on Johnson. Needless to say as President, Johnson was saved from any such probes into his past (which was murky to say the least).
LBJ escalated the war in Vietnam and profited handsomely from it, he had investments in multiple weapon manufacturing firms. He left office as a billionaire in today's dollars.
Tim Fleming: "Mac Wallace, a convicted killer and a close associate of LBJ, had his fingerprints lifted from one of the boxes near the sniper’s nest in the Texas School Book Depository building. Wallace has long been suspected of being LBJ’s own personal hit man. Evidence of this comes from Billy Sol Estes, LBJ’s long-time bagman and bribe collector. Estes’ attorney wrote the following letter to the Justice Department in 1984:
'.. Dear Mr. Trott:
My client, Mr. Estes, has authorized me to make this reply to your letter of May 29, 1984. Mr. Estes was a member of a four-member group, headed by Lyndon Johnson, which committed criminal acts in Texas in the 1960's. The other two, besides Mr. Estes and LBJ, were Cliff Carter and Mac Wallace. Mr. Estes is willing to disclose his knowledge concerning the following criminal offenses:
Murders
- The killing of Henry Marshall
- The killing of George Krutilek
- The killing of Ike Rogers and his secretary
- The killing of Harold Orr
- The killing of Coleman Wade
- The killing of Josefa Johnson
- The killing of John Kinser
- The killing of President J. F. Kennedy.
Mr. Estes is willing to testify that LBJ ordered these killings, and that he transmitted his orders through Cliff Carter to Mac Wallace, who executed the murders'"