WesDym

@uriel238 The race to off-board labour leaves me, repeatedly, with the unanswered question: Once enough people are out of work, who’s going to BUY what these companies are selling? How do they expect to survive in an economy with permanent, historically high unemployment?

@Nurse_Robot I encourage you to read Sun-Tzu’s The Art of War, just as one source of the human nature of conflict.

It is dangerous folly to corner people as you seem to be suggesting. Like it or not, people you hate are also human beings, with all the same rights you wish to have. If you seek to deprive them of their own space, they WILL come for yours; indeed, they will have little choice.

You cannot petulantly demand or try to require that people or views you don’t like have no peace.

@TranscendentalEmpire The article itself said that beards don’t meaningfully interfere with masks, so it’s not even necessary to feed that troll; they already knew that, if they read it.

Military beard/mask doctrine goes back literally a century, based on tech of that time – not what we have now. (I’m not sure how proven it was then, either, but it hardly matters now.)

I share what I’m sure is widespread suspicion that this policy is, in our time, racist in intent, not just in effect.

@gedaliyah “The patriarchy makes me sad. I wish I knew how to overthrow it.”

@KoboldCoterie Looongtime queer activist here, and I agree with you completely. In fact, the action was an illegal infringement on someone’s lawful permit, no matter how sincere. Freedom means – indeed, REQUIRES – putting up with other people’s shit. Our laws necessarily defend that.

I’m saying all this as an activist and legal asst of more than 40 years. You are legally correct, and I also agree with you morally and philosophically.

Just leave other people alone.

@Postmortal_Pop Pretty sure that’s already part of it. In the original Pride flag, the colours had meanings, and none of them were either exclusionary or definitional; they all applied equally to straight people, or anyone. It was always meant to be inclusive; hell, that’s why we use a rainbow. All-colour is a visual metaphor for all people.

@MossyFeathers I encourage you to read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. Which, despite the title, is mostly about AVOIDING conflict. He discusses this subject, though not exactly. Cornering people is dangerous and foolish, and an invitation to violence. Unless you’re ready to DESTROY someone, just leave them alone.

@MossyFeathers Okay, so what is your alternative proposal? Send them to re-education camps to learn the right way to think (or at least fake it)? Round them and up fire them into the Sun? Maybe put them in concentration camps? What? Let’s hear some ideas.

Like it or not, a free world means putting up with other people’s shit, and that requires giving them space. Punishing people in what they consider their own space is only going to make things worse.

Don’t stoop to your opponents’ tactics.

@dhork People forget that ‘Pride’ is called that because it was a reaction to a culture that tried to shame us. It means, “We are NOT ashamed to be who we really are.” Early Pride events were called marches, not parades, and there was little or no fun involved, just unity. And you could be legally fired, evicted, or expelled for participating, and many of us were. We don’t forget that.

Some butthurt or very immature RWNJs came up with ‘Straight Pride’, which they think is hilariously clever.

@PattyMcB No, I’m not. But I am a fucking grown up. And apparently, you’re not.

There’s a saying: If you meet an asshole, then you’ve met an asshole. If everyone you meet is an asshole, then YOU’RE the asshole.

A lot of people are assholes. A lot of lawyers are assholes. But not ALL lawyers are assholes. But it might seem that way, if you are.

Anyway, I don’t imagine you’ll ever have anything to say worth reading, so see ya. Hope your life gets better.

@Davriellelouna I’ve seen this legal framework before. It’s called Originalism, and Originalism is voodoo bullshit. It’s basically, “Because Washington enslaved people, literally anything that doesn’t explicitly say otherwise must mean the same thing.” It’s pre-determined, self-fulfilling, completion-backwards legal forensics, and I say again, IT IS BULLSHIT.

How do I know? Not just on its own obvious terms, but because the very same people will say the opposite when it suits them. They lie.

@PattyMcB EVERY one? That seems statistically unlikely. Are you sure there isn’t some other relevant factor involved?

@YourMomsTrashman I’d call that a predictable result, heh. And some of that input has got to be garbage.

@YourMomsTrashman A purpose-designed system might have the same underlying POTENTIAL for garbage output, IF you train it inappropriately. But it would be trained on a discretely selected range of content both relevant to its purpose, and carefully vetted to ensure it’s accurate (or at least believed to be).

A cancer-recognizing system, for example, would be trained on known examples of cancer, and ONLY that.

@YourMomsTrashman I’m no expert, but my sense is that you’re probably correct. This seems to me a version of the long-understood GIGO principle in computing (Garbage In, Garbage Out), also a principle in nearly all forensics of any kind. Your output can only be as good as your input.

Most of our general-use ‘AI’ (scorn quotes intentional) has been trained on an essentially random corpus of any and all content available, including a lot of garbage.

A purpose-designed system would not be.

@GreenKnight23 I have to remind myself now and then that around ten thousand people are new to the Internet every day. That includes people as insufferably tiresome as you.

It’s not that you don’t have a point. You do. Or whether you’re ‘wrong’. That’s irrelevant. It’s that you’re being such an asshole about it.

Luckily, modern tools let us permanently block people who just want to pick fights for the sake of it.

Bye.

@athairmor Perhaps ironically, what we’re erroneously calling ‘AI’ really is a kind of black mirror. It’s a crude simulacrum of the shared human id, our worst failings and impulses – made manifest in virtual form, like a digital golem. It’s everything superficially awful about us, ginned up to seem self-aware and act autonomously.

That’s an inevitable and predictable result of how it was created.

@billwashere More specifically, I come from a realm of scientists and academics, and I’ve by now seen MANY highly intelligent, very well-educated people who have demonstrated astonishing stupidity.

At the same time, I’ve also personally known people with clinically diagnosed neurological deficiency who can nevertheless reason very well, even very wisely.

What you’re staying is true in broad statistics, but it’s not a rule.

@billwashere I used to believe that, but no longer do. I’ve seen too much evidence against it.

I’m now certain that any self-capable person can develop and have good thinking habits. They might need help in with information or education, and some guidance in basic logic. But I’m certain by now that rational thought is not dependent on superior or even average native (neurological) intelligence.

They’re uncommon, but folks like the Sllingblade guy really do exist. I’ve known them.

@billwashere I realized sometime back that actual intelligence isn’t very relevant to good reasoning. It comes down to good thinking HABITS, which nearly anyone can develop with enough effort and practice. But it doesn’t come naturally for most people, and instead must be taught and learned. And the later in life you learn those skills, the more you have to UNlearn to do it.