tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post8944570500736143729..comments2024-03-29T00:39:31.629-07:00Comments on CONTRARY BRIN: From geology to quantum science to a healthy planet...David Brinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comBlogger120125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-21775729390958852252022-05-21T14:23:39.938-07:002022-05-21T14:23:39.938-07:00onward
onward
onward<br /><br />onward<br /><br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-63572297887357516802022-05-21T11:38:31.840-07:002022-05-21T11:38:31.840-07:00Dr Brin:
It illustrates my point that pyramid-sha...Dr Brin:<br /><i><br />It illustrates my point that pyramid-shaped societies lack mechanisms to question disastrous delusional errors of leaders.<br /></i><br /><br />As Orwell told us, they eventually run into reality, usually on a battlefield.Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-13902040371392992862022-05-21T11:21:18.926-07:002022-05-21T11:21:18.926-07:00Luís Salgueiro the same syndrome happened many tim...Luís Salgueiro the same syndrome happened many times, e.g. Croesus of Lydia whose flashy army convinced him he could conquer the vast Persian Empire... and Alexander who succeeded. It illustrates my point that pyramid-shaped societies lack mechanisms to question disastrous delusional errors of leaders.<br /><br />Like Vlad P.<br />David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-9062413300896779012022-05-21T09:42:13.227-07:002022-05-21T09:42:13.227-07:00Alfred, you may want to rethink a statement here: ...Alfred, you may want to rethink a statement here: <br />"Maybe… so I'd appreciate it if the 'Left' quit pissing him off for no good reason other than signaling the correctness of their moral stand."<br /><br />Musk union-busting, business cheating, market manipulation, sexual abuse, and now open embrace of fascism is not the "left pissing him off." These are the actions of someone that abuses his power. These things make Musk *dangerous* in the same way that the Koch brothers are dangerous. <br /><br />Are the "left" supposed to ignore abuse like this in the name of getting electric cars a couple of years earlier than otherwise? Getting reusable launch ten years ahead of schedule? <br /><br />You are arguing that a Great Man is allowed to break rules that the rest of us must follow. matthewhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17757867868731829206noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-75934076732486712032022-05-21T08:27:47.714-07:002022-05-21T08:27:47.714-07:00"My mother dreamt of a better life for me, an..."My mother dreamt of a better life for me, and I hope my journey in life inspires Australians to reach for the stars"<br />- Anthony Albanese, PM elect<br />scidatahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07152319593457629592noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-58302265771346953832022-05-21T07:55:59.251-07:002022-05-21T07:55:59.251-07:00Now that democratic fires have lit,
and sacred ban...Now that democratic fires have lit,<br />and sacred bangers have been bit,<br />Australia has a new government. <br /><br />(... and not before time.!)Tony Fiskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14578160528746657971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-91290309692268419432022-05-21T05:50:58.001-07:002022-05-21T05:50:58.001-07:00gerold:
There seem to be other people arguing pub...gerold:<br /><i><br />There seem to be other people arguing publicly against falling population levels and I find it infuriating.<br /></i><br /><br />They mean the white population is falling.Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-75535080842262585182022-05-21T05:46:25.034-07:002022-05-21T05:46:25.034-07:00@gerold
Paraguayan War:
Started by the spanish a...@gerold<br /><br />Paraguayan War:<br /><br />Started by the spanish ascendency dictator Solano Lopez of Paraguay, a devoted fan of Napoleon Bonaparte.<br />Solano ordered his troops to invade much bigger Brasil in a bid to get access to the sea (vide Questão do Prata: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platine_Wars).<br />Paraguay mobilized an army of 300 000 troops. It took the combined efforts of Argentina Brasil e Uruguay to stop Paraguay.<br /><br />The Paraguayan elite before the war disdained the Guarani: "Prior to the war, indigenous people occupied very little space in the minds of the Paraguayan elite. Paraguayan president Carlos Antonio Lopez even modified the country's constitution in 1844 to remove any mention of Paraguay's Hispano-Guarani character" <br /><br />ALso: "When the thirty-seven-year-old Solano López succeeded to the presidency in 1862, he inherited his father’s ambitions for the country but little of his patience. The younger López had spent the previous decade as war minister, the man charged with modernizing the military. Thanks to his obsessive efforts, the Paraguayan armed forces could boast some strikingly modern features: a flotilla of steamers, several new artillery pieces, Congreve rockets, an ample supply and medical corps, and a world-class fortress at Humaitá, along the Paraguay River, that European observers likened to Sebastopol. Solano López also hired British engineers and specialists to train his troops, which now numbered in the tens of thousands.13<br />This militarization helped solidify the nationalism of the average Paraguay- ans, who now saw their earlier xenophobia receive official sanction.14 Patri- otic festivals, celebrations of the president’s birthday, and anti-Argentine and anti-Brazilian diatribes in the state newspapers (some of which were written in Guaraní) helped reinforce national pride even as they conveyed the dan- gerous idea that Paraguay had to defend itself or be overwhelmed: ¡Viva la república del Paraguay! ¡Independencia o muerte!" Kraay, Hendrik (2004). I Die with My Country: Perspectives on the Paraguayan War, 1864–1870. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.<br /><br />Sounds familiar?<br /><br />It's almoast like the same alien mind as infected these men thru the ages. The same discourse, the same rhetoric... million of dead in their wake.<br /><br />Luís Salgueirohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09639187787702431357noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-91953091885275208902022-05-21T00:37:02.405-07:002022-05-21T00:37:02.405-07:00Jon S
You are just so far off the truth - I have ...Jon S<br /><br />You are just so far off the truth - I have not noticed that before - I will keep that in mind when reading any future posts from youduncan cairncrosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14153725128216947145noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-86759828274660265952022-05-20T23:26:36.495-07:002022-05-20T23:26:36.495-07:00I can appreciate what Musk has accomplished, but h...I can appreciate what Musk has accomplished, but his recent turn to the dark side is just bizarre. It's as weird as his petulant "pedo guy" comment but the stakes now are much higher. <br /><br />Vote Republican? Why not just encourage people to drink bleach - it's almost like a cleansing.<br /><br />His other idiotic comment recently is that the human population is too low. WTF? Stand on Zanzibar anyone? There seem to be other people arguing publicly against falling population levels and I find it infuriating. We're drowning in the waste products of industrial civilization and pushing every other lifeform to the brink of extinction and we don't even have 8 billion yet. This moron is saying the earth could support twice that number and there just isn't room for that sort of dimwit myopia. geroldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05140093281920523064noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-42056646971670499222022-05-20T20:11:25.763-07:002022-05-20T20:11:25.763-07:00Even Bill Maher said tonight of Elon Musk,
"...Even Bill Maher said tonight of Elon Musk,<br /><i><br />"One side doesn't believe in the emergency of climate change or democracy. You're not going to get me onto that side.<br /><br />I mean Elon Musk, this week...I'm a fan in many ways, but when he said, 'Now, I'm going to vote Republican'? I've got to part company there.<br /><br />[shows Musk's tweet]<br /><br />I can't go there with him. Because of what I just said. Because of where the big issues are."<br /></i>Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-1770302896442920072022-05-20T19:42:30.042-07:002022-05-20T19:42:30.042-07:00Wow, this has got to gall old Vlad...
https://www...Wow, this has got to gall old Vlad...<br /><br />https://www.npr.org/2022/05/20/1099876370/ukraine-russia-poland-border-returnDavid Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-78281917533312458962022-05-20T19:41:44.303-07:002022-05-20T19:41:44.303-07:00Alfred Differ:
We can ask, ya know. He actually d...Alfred Differ:<br /><i><br />We can ask, ya know. He actually does respond to people on Twitter.<br /></i><br /><br />I'm not on Twitter.<br /><br /><i><br />As for the rest of how he helps*, remember that some of his employees are Democrats. Some of them go on to create other companies and related jobs.<br /></i>><br /><br />How is that affected by anything any of us say here? Or even on Twitter?<br /><br /><i><br />"Isn't that what Musk himself is doing?"<br /><br />Maybe… so I'd appreciate it if the 'Left' quit pissing him off for no good reason other than signaling the correctness of their moral stand. His people are opening the next frontier for us. Please let them.<br /></i><br /><br />I'm confused about what you lambasted us about earlier. Again, nothing we say here affects what his company is doing. You may be talking about something I'm unaware of, but from what I've seen, "the left" responds to his support for authoritarians and bullies. You're saying just let it go because he's doing good work? What good will that do anyone if he helps Republicans undermine democracy and our rights? <br /><br /><i><br />"his stated reason for supporting Republicans is diametrically opposite to the reality of what Republicans are"<br /><br />You DO see the flaw in that thinking… don't you?<br />People can reasonably disagree about what Republicans are.<br /></i><br /><br />Individual Republicans maybe, but the party has told us what it is. They're the party of white grievance and white Christian nationalism. They're the party of cheating, threats, and violence as a means to holding onto power.<br /><br /><i><br />My PERSONAL opinion is your opinion about them is reasonably good, but I don't agree with the position that there are no good Republicans.<br /></i><br /><br />"There Are No Good Republicans" is hyperbole, but the germ of truth is that any Republican in the House or Senate is a vote for Kevin McCarthy or Mitch McConnell respectively controlling the agenda. In that sense, even good Republicans are bad (in the same way that "Even bad sex is good"). Susan Collins, for example, may not be a white Christian nationalist, but she helped give us a supreme court majority to the right of Roberts.<br /><br /><i><br />For now, I'd rather they didn't govern and were given time for this fever to burn out. Lots of time. That means Progressives who do NOT have a sufficiently large voter bloc to govern MUST make use of willing allies no matter the stench.<br /></i><br /><br />So again, how is a wealthy and influential individual who directly opposes that goal an ally?<br /><br />When I first began corresponding with Dave Sim, he was making some seemingly-irrational arguments. Like a 20-page essay in the form of anecdotes and stories whose thesis was that women were irrational because they only think in anecdotes and stories. My unease went beyond disagreement with the gist of his arguments. It felt like he was insulting the intelligence of his fans, making fools of anyone who actually took his side. I often wondered if it was a test--if he was trying to separate the reflexive fanboys from any claims to critical thinking. For a time, I actually believed that calling him out on his inconsistencies was the answer he would respect.<br /><br />In hindsight, no, that's not what he was up to. He was convinced that he was right and that anyone who argued differently was possessed by a demon trying to undermine his faith in God. I'm not kidding.<br /><br />But when Elon Musk says something so irrational as that an aversion to divisiveness and hate is a reason to support the party who <b>runs on</b> divisiveness and hate--I smell the same rat. Maybe it's a test. And even if it's not, my sense of integrity still means something.<br />Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-33900076739315583632022-05-20T19:37:27.236-07:002022-05-20T19:37:27.236-07:00Duncan, one last point, then I'll leave you al...Duncan, one last point, then I'll leave you alone on this.<br /><br />Musk started as the scion of a wealthy family. He no more depended on a loan for starting collateral than did, say, Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates.<br /><br />I have no idea what games company you're talking about, which, given that I'm a pretty avid gamer, may tell you something about his "success" there.<br /><br />PayPal, as I said, was a losing proposition when he sold it. That's why he sold it. It took people who knew what quality control was to make it profitable.<br /><br />Tesla was doing well enough, they just needed venture capital. He contributed nothing to the company but money and bluster - and, eventually, a corporate culture that was toxic in both the metaphorical and literal senses (there's a reason Tesla Corp is rated as worse for then environment than freaking ExxonMobil by an MIT group, and why the NLRB is after them for various violations of labor law including union-busting).<br /><br />And are you under the impression he does <i>any</i> of the design work for SpaceX? All he does is make grandiose promises that can't be fulfilled, much as he does with Tesla.<br /><br />And that's as far as I'm going with this. I spend too much time arguing with Elon's fanbase as it is. All I can say is, he's not taking you to prom no matter how hard you stan.Jon S.https://www.blogger.com/profile/13585842845661267920noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-57652346194603860422022-05-20T18:55:17.730-07:002022-05-20T18:55:17.730-07:00Larry,
An ally in what way?
I'm honestly cur...Larry,<br /><br /><i>An ally in what way?</i><br /><br />I'm honestly curious if he's found a Republican he finds palatable. We can ask, ya know. He actually does respond to people on Twitter.<br /><br />As for the rest of how he helps*, remember that some of his employees are Democrats. Some of them go on to create other companies and related jobs. You'd have to watch the people in his orbit to see all that, though. There is a lot more going on around him that what people see in his tweets.<br /><br /><i>Isn't that what Musk himself is doing?</i><br /><br />Maybe… so I'd appreciate it if the 'Left' quit pissing him off for no good reason other than signaling the correctness of their moral stand. His people are opening the next frontier for us. Please let them.<br /><br /><i>his stated reason for supporting Republicans is diametrically opposite to the reality of what Republicans are</i><br /><br />You DO see the flaw in that thinking… don't you?<br />People can reasonably disagree about what Republicans are.<br /><br />My PERSONAL opinion is your opinion about them is reasonably good, but I don't agree with the position that there are no good Republicans. <br /><br />For now, I'd rather they didn't govern and were given time for this fever to burn out. Lots of time. That means Progressives who do NOT have a sufficiently large voter bloc to govern MUST make use of willing allies no matter the stench.<br /><br />*Don't worry folks. Let's just not ask him to run for office, hmm?Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-5380316804348008412022-05-20T18:42:12.033-07:002022-05-20T18:42:12.033-07:00China sure did sell us a lot of stuff, but I think...China sure did sell us a lot of stuff, but I think that distracts from what really happened over there. <br /><br />Most importantly, they stopped doing some of the really stupid things Mao had them doing and began the process of reverting to form.<br /><br />China is traditional empire and a geopolitical island. They are their own worst enemy with respect to their living standards.<br /><br />What the US really did was help make the process of recovery quick by buying all that crap. It's the same trick we did for all the willing nations on that end of the world. <br /><br />Play in our markets… you'll wind up lifting yourself.<br /><br />Want to do it all by yourself? Perhaps you should read about some of the few things on which all economists agree. Let us know when you change your mind.Alfred Differhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01170159981105973192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-15035712046067877952022-05-20T17:14:46.011-07:002022-05-20T17:14:46.011-07:00Jon S - said
Musk is rich because he was born ric...Jon S - said<br /><br />Musk is rich because he was born rich. It's the classic case of being born on third base and thinking you hit a triple.<br /><br />He didn't "create" companies - he bought them<br /><br />Which is the biggest bollocks I have heard since the last GOP announcement<br /><br />Musk started with a LOAN - living in his office<br />His first company was a games company and made a few Million<br />Then Paypal - until he fell out with the money people <br />Then Tesla - the founders were there but they had nothing before Musk bankrolled the company and led to success<br />Then SpaceX <br />Those are the BIG onesduncan cairncrosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14153725128216947145noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-62662300022070481992022-05-20T16:42:16.084-07:002022-05-20T16:42:16.084-07:00I'm always trying to promote true computationa...I'm always trying to promote true computational thinking (a fancy term for WJCC), more in gov't than in schools, but it's becoming quite the thing these days, everywhere from the Baltics to Mongolia.<br />https://time.com/6174935/bolor-erdene-battsengel/scidatahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07152319593457629592noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-7629784300940685972022-05-20T15:18:56.948-07:002022-05-20T15:18:56.948-07:00In response to Elon Musk's tweet, Jon Favreau,...In response to Elon Musk's tweet, Jon Favreau, a former Obama speech writer, said: <br /><br />"Hey man, if you want to support a bunch of electric vehicle-hating climate deniers, that’s on you. <br /><br />Not sure it helps the cause that you and your team have dedicated much of your lives to, but I guess you’ll get some attention on Twitter, so there’s that!"<br /><br />https://twitter.com/jonfavs/status/1527002709743763457?s=20&t=KO74B7v1hIsJifQvCmSLzQA.F. Reyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08102355714883828348noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-25369771464446583892022-05-20T11:08:35.426-07:002022-05-20T11:08:35.426-07:00On trade balance, we can quibble over the specific...On trade balance, we can quibble over the specifics of various situations. But the facts of Russia's present situation are as Krugman states them: <br /><br />* Russia has been exporting to us (and Europe), not nick-nacks, but something we really do need (energy). <br /><br />* Currently, they are having a hard time importing, which increases their trade surplus. <br /><br />* This situation is not serving them well.<br /><br />Therefore, it is not a universal truism that a trade surplus is a good thing. The opposite is not a universal truth either, but that was neither Krugman's point nor my own.<br /><br />A trade surplus is analogous to a paying job. You do well when you earn more than you spend on the cost of living. But eventually, you should have some practical use for the surplus that you accumulate. Dying with a big bank account is not a "win".Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-85336779418913070582022-05-20T10:57:52.357-07:002022-05-20T10:57:52.357-07:00"It had always been the conventional point of..."<b>It had always been the conventional point of view, especially in the economic beliefs of the Conservative Party, that a prosperous nation required a favorable trade balance or gold balance as it was formerly called. In simple language that means that a country is best off when it exports more than it imports. Phrased in that way it sounds silly, for it is surely evident that a country that ships out more than it takes in gets poorer every year in terms of real wealth.</b> Nevertheless there was an element of truth in it, a very practical truth at that time. The economic life was organized in such a comical fashion that each year the country produced goods of greater value than the people of the country were able to buy back and use up. This was known as over-production and many were the esoteric nonsensical things said about it. But the situation was that simple. The system of necessity produced more than it consumed. Of necessity. You can go into the mathematics of it later. Being an engineer you are bound to see the truth of it, and will probably be vastly amused by it."<br /><br />-Heinlein, in For Us, The LivingAndyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10918881673638295065noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-78380084459403139762022-05-20T09:24:56.635-07:002022-05-20T09:24:56.635-07:00Dr Brin:
Look at China today.
I think Krugman&...Dr Brin:<br /><i><br />Look at China today. <br /></i><br /><br />I think Krugman's point is that you have to <b>do</b> something with the money. Simply collecting piles of money from exports isn't enough on its own.Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-89460691738955612332022-05-20T09:14:59.636-07:002022-05-20T09:14:59.636-07:00LH that NYT paragraph is utter bull. Look at China...LH that NYT paragraph is utter bull. Look at China today. They built all tht by selling us crap no one really needed.David Brinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14465315130418506525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-2977654704512125382022-05-20T08:47:44.383-07:002022-05-20T08:47:44.383-07:00Today's a day for "It's not just me.&...Today's a day for "It's not just me."<br /><br />https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/19/opinion/putin-russia-sanctions-ukraine.html<br /><i><br />One final point: The effect of sanctions on Russia offers a graphic, if grisly, demonstration of a point economists often try to make, but rarely manage to get across: Imports, not exports, are the point of international trade.<br /><br />That is, the benefits of trade shouldn’t be measured by the jobs and incomes created in export industries; those workers could, after all, be doing something else. The gains from trade come, instead, from the useful goods and services other countries provide to your citizens. And running a trade surplus isn’t a “win”; if anything, it means that you’re giving the world more than you get, receiving nothing but i.o.u.s in return.<br /></i><br />Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8587336.post-9791697193229060382022-05-20T07:52:36.126-07:002022-05-20T07:52:36.126-07:00It's not just me.
https://www.nytimes.com/202...It's not just me.<br /><br />https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/opinion/republicans-trump-elections.html<br /><i><br />That’s because Republican election denialism is simply the strongest form of a belief that has defined the Republican Party since at least the Gingrich-era in the 1990s. For many Republicans, theirs is the only legitimate political party and their voters, irrespective of their actual numbers, are the only legitimate voters — and the only legitimate majority. Democrats, from this vantage point, are presumptively illegitimate, their victories suspect, their policies un-American, even when they have the support of most people in the country.<br /></i><br />Larry Harthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01058877428309776731noreply@blogger.com