fatbird

It's the same way that Sam Altman talks about the risks of AI deciding to kill humanity: because that's dramatic and attention grabbing, and also the most unlikely outcome. Talking about it keeps us from talking about the real, ground level problems like the massive, unplanned-for disruption in jobs and education.

They just need to keep the money tap flowing, and tomorrow can worry about itself. Who's going to hold them accountable for data-centres-in-space five years from now, when they don't exist? Has Musk suffered any blowback from his hyping the Hyperloop that never materialized?

Agree with the rest of your point.

[0] https://financialpost.com/news/economy/imf-sees-canadas-fina...

It's worth keeping in mind that in the U.S. the health marketplace is extremely complicated and cannot be analyzed with simple demand/supply graphs.

Expect it to go higher as negotiations cement Iran's highway robbery. Which, yes, it is highway robbery, but it's robbery no one is able to stop without invading and occupying Iran to execute proper regime change... which no one, least of all the US, is stepping up to do.

The U.S. has lost all negotiating leverage. It's been demonstrated that they're unable to militarily impose their will on Iran, and they're far more sensitive to economic disruption than Iranians are--who are, as I type this, forming human shield rings around vital bridges and facilities, ready to die if the U.S. bombs them. Negotiations are, at this point, about the U.S. coming away with some face-saving outcomes.

Before this started, it was impossible to imagine that Iran could achieve all this. It's hard to how this isn't a massive win for Iran.

Very down-to-earth guy who knew what he wanted and made his choices. Didn't at all seem like the sort to find edge-of-the-atmosphere flying a mystical experience.

1. define a requirement 2. implement the requirement 3. verify that the requirement was implemented

TDD was built around the idea that 1 and 3 could be unified in automated testing, and that's certainly true for a large part of it. But QA as a discrete role needs to exist because, beyond verifying that 2 was done correctly, they expose higher level bugs in 1, the requirements themselves.

It's virtually impossible to define requirements completely and without second order interactions that cause problems. QA is as effective at exposing assumptions and handwaving by the people who created the wireframes or the visual design as by the developers failing to test their own work.

And ideally, this leads to the cycle being virtuous: higher quality starts at the requirements phase, not the implentation phase. It's not just that QA should work closely with the engineers--the engineers need to work closely with UX and VD to ensure they fully understand the requirements. The incentives are aligned among all parties.

This is not obvious on its face, but also, paying taxes is not my only concern wrt the civil society in which I live.

No one is insisting on Ukraine in NATO. NATO has been continually refusing, officially and unofficially, membership for Ukraine because it's actively involved in a war. The NATO charter automatically rejects membership for any party actively engaged in hostilities, defensively or otherwise. Ukraine will never be in NATO unless it has an actual peace with Russia. Talk of Ukraine joining NATO is, again, Russian disinformation trying to blame NATO expansion for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Whether or not it's under constant bombardment, Ukraine is now supplying 50% of its consumable supplies; in 2022, it was under 5%. Ukraine actually exports some weapons and drone tech to finance other purchases.

Its manpower crisis has been continually overstated by Russian propaganda. At the moment, they have 800k+ in their army. They rejected a bill recently to lower the conscription age to 25 from 27. They have an untapped pool of manpower aged 18-27 that they're avoiding if possible (as has been possible so far).

Whether or not Europeans are arguing a lot, they're still providing massive material and financial aid to Ukraine, which still has a functioning economy and social welfare system. Their gov't pensions go out on time and in full. They're not experiencing hyperinflation. There's a reason that Ukrainians as a population aren't willing to accept the kind of crap settlements Trump is pushing.

> Man, how can you believe this nonsense?

You're the one spouting Russian disinformation, especially after looking at your other comments. If you're not getting paid for this, you should be.

For practical purposes, unemployment around 4% means full employment, because there's always a portion of the population not working for some reason: taking time off, too dumb, don't want to work, unable to for reasons of temperment or psychological health, etc. At 4% (as the US has often been in the last few decades) it's really difficult to fill menial roles or unskilled factory jobs with people who know their ass from a hole in the ground.

Russia at 2.2% means many needed positions are going unfulfilled, crippling productivity and planning. It's a sign that the manpower needs of the war are draining productive workers, slowing their own economy at a time when they need more productivity to overcome sanctions and other economic effects.

Every day that passes, Russia gets weaker: more oil sold in crude form only, since they don't have refining capacity to export gasoline; foreign currency reserves shrinking, since China is their main customer; another 35k casualties every month, with mounting costs for enlistment bonuses and death benefits; outer provinces stripped of men of fighting age, North Korea unwilling to send more soldiers, African recruits drying up; inflation raging, industries shutting down, and all economic indicators heading south.

It's terrible that Ukraine is trapped in this slugfest, but at this point, time favours Ukraine.

Copernicus was proposing circular orbits with the sun at the center instead of the earth. The Copernican model required more epicycles for accurate predictions than the considerably well-proven Ptolemaic model did, with the earth at the centre.

It wasn't until Kepler came along and proposed elliptical orbits that a heliocentric solar system was obviously a genuine advance on the model, both simpler and more accurate.

There was no taboo being preserved by rejecting Copernicus's model. The thinkers of the day rightfully saw a conceptual shift with no apparent advantage and several additional costs.

No one burned to death inside a Tesla while driving normally. It's always following a crash.

We don't know how many were pedo/rapists, but we know all of them liked to socialize with one and trade favours and spread his influence.

Norway, a founding member of NATO, has always shared a border with Russia. Before Finland and Sweden joined NATO, they'd already developed operational compatibility with NATO going back decades. NATO encroachment was an issue only insofar as it took away local targets for Russian expansion.

Bring Russia into NATO.

Putin desired NATO membership because then, any hostilities with another NATO member would become an intra-alliance conflict that NATO couldn't deal with. When Greece and Turkey fought over Cyprus, they were both in NATO, so neither side could invoke article 5 for help. Russia in NATO wouldn't prevent Russian wars, it would neutralize NATO.

Also, calling this a bad move presumes that the US isn't going to fall much, much further than it is now, which is seeming quite plausible. When your dance partner is heading for a cliff, you need to stop dancing with them.

All of these issues go back long before Trump, who has made things uniquely worse. But any two countries with as long (and tightly bound) a history as ours are going to have constant points of friction. Are you suggesting Canada is uniquely a "fake friend" in this equation?