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#31
Off the Record / Re: The Off Topic Topic
Last post by Tonitrus - December 31, 2025, 02:17:17 PMQuote from: Sheilbh on December 31, 2025, 10:29:38 AMTo me the issue isn't that the police can access this via a warrant but that Google (or other search engines) are storing and monetising it in the first place.
The twist in this case is the police DID get a warrant (though it took Google a year to deliver)...and then when it was challenged, the court here is saying that the police don't even need one in the first place.
Though I suppose a police agency would still need one if the corporation in question resisted a request?
#32
Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread
Last post by DGuller - December 31, 2025, 01:55:01 PMQuote from: Admiral Yi on December 31, 2025, 12:00:07 PMI agree. Maybe technology changed what we need to remember, but looking things up has just too much latency for some tasks. For example, pilots have thick books with them on how to deal with emergencies, but some procedures are burned into memory because they need to be done immediately when the situation arises. Also, if you're interested in research, you kind of have to keep many things in memory to connect the dots, knowing that you can look them up is not enough, although AI has changed that somewhat as well.Quote from: Josquius on December 31, 2025, 11:00:27 AMOnce upon a time it made sense. Books were scarce. Remembering had value. Even without AI this hasn't been so for a while.
It would be nice to see a change in how things are done to encourage more application even at undergrad.
Life would be impossible without remembering. We use basic math every day. We use language every day.
#33
Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread
Last post by DGuller - December 31, 2025, 01:43:26 PMAll this talk about how AI stacks up against the best of humans IMO misses a much more subtle advantage: accessibility. This morning, while taking clean dishes out of my dishwasher, I noticed a part lying at the bottom. I took a picture of it and asked ChatGPT what it was, without even revealing where I got it from. It correctly identified the part, and the dishwasher it came out of, and explained to me what it was and how critical it was.
Did it do something that a human couldn't do? No, of course not. I could've gotten my answer in a few different ways, but none of them would've taken a minute and a single cell phone picture. Just making intelligence more accessible, and not even better than a human intelligence, is already a huge win when multiplied over many such events.
Did it do something that a human couldn't do? No, of course not. I could've gotten my answer in a few different ways, but none of them would've taken a minute and a single cell phone picture. Just making intelligence more accessible, and not even better than a human intelligence, is already a huge win when multiplied over many such events.
#34
Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread
Last post by Sheilbh - December 31, 2025, 01:03:11 PMQuote from: Admiral Yi on December 31, 2025, 12:00:07 PMLife would be impossible without remembering. We use basic math every day. We use language every day.You also can't apply without knowledge. I'm not a big nutrition or fitness person so only kind of get this but I'm reminded of a barrister's comment that facts are protein, arguments are carbs. His job is literally advocacy but it needs the detail and the facts to do anything.
I'm not so sure on academia being we're taught what we collectively know, but the contemporary take or interpretation of it. We are taught not the past but the present - which is built on those foundations.
FWIW found another use for AI - it is good at generating lists that I can upload into Anki flshcards.
#35
Off the Record / Re: Are we in the opening scen...
Last post by Sheilbh - December 31, 2025, 12:56:46 PMYes, no and maybe 
I don't know and I think it probably depends where you're looking at it from.
I think the framing is interesting becuse there was an extraordinary article by Peter Thiel in the FT for Trump's inauguration. The reason it was so extraordinary - and right to publish - was how unhinged it was. But the whole framing of it was around apocalypse. As you'd expect from a fan of Girard, Thiel was using its original meaning as an unveiling, a moment of revelation when what is true but obscure is clear. It was, needless to say, something Thiel looked forward to with glee. As mad as his article was I think there is something interesting in that additional meaning of the apocalyptic.
My immediate thought though is the Gramsci line is right. It's not apocalypse it's that we're between regimes, in the interregnum - "the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum morbid phenomena of the most varied kind come to pass." It's become a cliche and I think there are problems with using that to interpret the current moment. But I do think we are in a period of interregnum where an order is dying but a new one has not yet been created. More diagramatically Arrighi has his list of regimes and interregnums - so the regime based on British power ends with the First World War, but is not replaced by the post-war order until 1945. That period lasts until the crises of the 70s and is replaced by the neo-liberal order which, on his measure, ended with the collapse (and rise/return of Asia). I think we are still in that middle phase - and the key point as I think on every single issue is China particularly and Asia more generally. Whether it's climate, the economy, politics, culture whatever - if that's not at least half the story we're telling, or picture we're interpreting then we are missing what's happening for parochial navel-gazing.
Having said all that I do think about the Keynes passage about pre-WW1 Europe because I do suspect - especially for Europeans - we'll be explaining to future generations what the 90s and 00s was like in a similar way:
Again I think the key forces here are globalisation and the rise of Asia. But I think part of the consequences of that, especially with Trump, is that there is going to be a decoupling of Europe and America. Which will be transformative and I think is already relevant in how Europe orients itself towards Russia and China as I think we're moving back to Eurasia after a few hundred years of a Euro-Atlantic with the Americas as European hinterland, then s shaed Atlantic, to Europe as an American frontier. Again I think it maybe feels like apocalypse if you're in - and a believer in - that Euro-Atlantic, but possibly not if you're from, say, China or India within living memory of profound absolute rural immiseration and seeing vistas and possibilities opening that were impossible to imagine a generation ago. Again I think for a lot of the world the "rules based liberal order" is not something to mourn because it never looked rules based, liberal, or orderly for them.
On nukes I've always had a base layer of anxiety about this - I'm always surprised that people don't share because it seems to me almost incredible that we've had the capacity to destroy ourselves for 80 years and so far haven't. I think the risk is far lower than it was during the Cold War but I still find it strange that people don't worry more about them.
I don't know and I think it probably depends where you're looking at it from.I think the framing is interesting becuse there was an extraordinary article by Peter Thiel in the FT for Trump's inauguration. The reason it was so extraordinary - and right to publish - was how unhinged it was. But the whole framing of it was around apocalypse. As you'd expect from a fan of Girard, Thiel was using its original meaning as an unveiling, a moment of revelation when what is true but obscure is clear. It was, needless to say, something Thiel looked forward to with glee. As mad as his article was I think there is something interesting in that additional meaning of the apocalyptic.
My immediate thought though is the Gramsci line is right. It's not apocalypse it's that we're between regimes, in the interregnum - "the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum morbid phenomena of the most varied kind come to pass." It's become a cliche and I think there are problems with using that to interpret the current moment. But I do think we are in a period of interregnum where an order is dying but a new one has not yet been created. More diagramatically Arrighi has his list of regimes and interregnums - so the regime based on British power ends with the First World War, but is not replaced by the post-war order until 1945. That period lasts until the crises of the 70s and is replaced by the neo-liberal order which, on his measure, ended with the collapse (and rise/return of Asia). I think we are still in that middle phase - and the key point as I think on every single issue is China particularly and Asia more generally. Whether it's climate, the economy, politics, culture whatever - if that's not at least half the story we're telling, or picture we're interpreting then we are missing what's happening for parochial navel-gazing.
Having said all that I do think about the Keynes passage about pre-WW1 Europe because I do suspect - especially for Europeans - we'll be explaining to future generations what the 90s and 00s was like in a similar way:
QuoteWhat an extraordinary episode in the economic progress of man that age was which came to an end in August, 1914! The greater part of the population, it is true, worked hard and lived at a low standard of comfort, yet were, to all appearances, reasonably contented with this lot. But escape was possible, for any man of capacity or character at all exceeding the average, into the middle and upper classes, for whom life offered, at a low cost and with the least trouble, conveniences, comforts, and amenities beyond the compass of the richest and most powerful monarchs of other ages. The inhabitant of London could order by telephone, sipping his morning tea in bed, the various products of the whole earth, in such quantity as he might see fit, and reasonably expect their early delivery upon his doorstep; he could at the same moment and by the same means adventure his wealth in the natural resources and new enterprises of any quarter of the world, and share, without exertion or even trouble, in their prospective fruits and advantages; or he could decide to couple the security of his fortunes with the good faith of the townspeople of any substantial municipality in any continent that fancy or information might recommend. He could secure forthwith, if he wished it, cheap and comfortable means of transit to any country or climate without passport or other formality, could despatch his servant to the neighboring office of a bank for such supply of the precious metals as might seem convenient, and could then proceed abroad to foreign quarters, without knowledge of their religion, language, or customs, bearing coined wealth upon his person, and would consider himself greatly aggrieved and much surprised at the least interference. But, most important of all, he regarded this state of affairs as normal, certain, and permanent, except in the direction of further improvement, and any deviation from it as aberrant, scandalous, and avoidable. The projects and politics of militarism and imperialism, of racial and cultural rivalries, of monopolies, restrictions, and exclusion, which were to play the serpent to this paradise, were little more than the amusements of his daily newspaper, and appeared to exercise almost no influence at all on the ordinary course of social and economic life, the internationalization of which was nearly complete in practice.
Again I think the key forces here are globalisation and the rise of Asia. But I think part of the consequences of that, especially with Trump, is that there is going to be a decoupling of Europe and America. Which will be transformative and I think is already relevant in how Europe orients itself towards Russia and China as I think we're moving back to Eurasia after a few hundred years of a Euro-Atlantic with the Americas as European hinterland, then s shaed Atlantic, to Europe as an American frontier. Again I think it maybe feels like apocalypse if you're in - and a believer in - that Euro-Atlantic, but possibly not if you're from, say, China or India within living memory of profound absolute rural immiseration and seeing vistas and possibilities opening that were impossible to imagine a generation ago. Again I think for a lot of the world the "rules based liberal order" is not something to mourn because it never looked rules based, liberal, or orderly for them.
On nukes I've always had a base layer of anxiety about this - I'm always surprised that people don't share because it seems to me almost incredible that we've had the capacity to destroy ourselves for 80 years and so far haven't. I think the risk is far lower than it was during the Cold War but I still find it strange that people don't worry more about them.
#36
Gaming HQ / Re: What are you playing? (Red...
Last post by HisMajestyBOB - December 31, 2025, 12:34:01 PM21 games played, with three games taking up most of the time:
Mega Man X Legacy Collection (31%)
Final Fantasy VII (original, not remake. 30%)
SimCity 4 (19%)
Most of the playtime for MMX and SC4 were my son, not me.
Non-Steam games were mostly Strategic Command WWI and ACW.
Right now I'm playing EU2: For the Glory.
Mega Man X Legacy Collection (31%)
Final Fantasy VII (original, not remake. 30%)
SimCity 4 (19%)
Most of the playtime for MMX and SC4 were my son, not me.
Non-Steam games were mostly Strategic Command WWI and ACW.
Right now I'm playing EU2: For the Glory.
#37
Computer Affairs / Re: Alternative search engines
Last post by HisMajestyBOB - December 31, 2025, 12:27:04 PMI use DuckDuckGo exclusively.
#38
Off the Record / Re: Are we in the opening scen...
Last post by crazy canuck - December 31, 2025, 12:06:09 PMQuote from: Josquius on December 31, 2025, 11:01:13 AMQuote from: crazy canuck on December 31, 2025, 10:46:22 AMYes, we are now at or over 1.5C of warming.
We are definitely in the mitigation phase of global warming.
We should be.
The way things are looking at the moment seems far more we are in the "there's nothing we can do anyway. Who cares. We've more important things to do" stage.
Depends who is we. The Americans are definitely in don't look up mode.
#39
Off the Record / Re: The AI dooooooom thread
Last post by Admiral Yi - December 31, 2025, 12:00:07 PMQuote from: Josquius on December 31, 2025, 11:00:27 AMOnce upon a time it made sense. Books were scarce. Remembering had value. Even without AI this hasn't been so for a while.
It would be nice to see a change in how things are done to encourage more application even at undergrad.
Life would be impossible without remembering. We use basic math every day. We use language every day.
#40
Off the Record / Re: What does a TRUMP presiden...
Last post by Syt - December 31, 2025, 11:35:19 AMQuote from: Zoupa on December 31, 2025, 04:02:30 AMI'm not sure why the Department of Labor has someone tweeting out these things in the first place. Is NASA going to start tweeting about manifest destiny next? The Parks Service about the Monroe doctrine?
Arbeit macht frei?
