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Saturday, September 21, 2024

Those Tempted To Conclude That Our Nation

Those tempted to conclude that our nation is experiencing "unprecedented" levels of political lunacy may want to revisit the several decades that ended our twentieth century.

...what is likely to be significantly different, however, is that those deploying such political lunacy will discover they've lost control of both the lunatics and lunacy (see the first presidential debate of 2024)...it reminds one of a paraphrase often attributed to Nixon: those following the rule that the "ends justify the means" often discover that their "means is the end."

...stated differently, the Republican Party (corrupt and dishonest) must immediately dissolve and replace itself if it's going to function as a credible counterbalance to the Democratic Party (old and confused- post Biden withdrawal- youthful, enthusiastic and promising) and thereby strengthen our democracy.


Web:

UPI, Does America need a shrink? The irrationality of the 2024 election

"Does America need a shrink? Has American behavior, certainly regarding the November presidential election, become so irrational and inexplicable that clinical help, if it were available, is urgently needed?"--UPI--

SciAm, Vote for Kamala Harris to Support Science, Health and the Environment

"In the November election, the U.S. faces two futures. In one, the new president offers the country better prospects, relying on science, solid evidence and the willingness to learn from experience. She pushes policies that boost good jobs nationwide by embracing technology and clean energy. She supports education, public health and reproductive rights. She treats the climate crisis as the emergency it is and seeks to mitigate its catastrophic storms, fires and droughts.

In the other future, the new president endangers public health and safety and rejects evidence, preferring instead nonsensical conspiracy fantasies. He ignores the climate crisis in favor of more pollution. He requires that federal officials show personal loyalty to him rather than upholding U.S. laws. He fills positions in federal science and other agencies with unqualified ideologues. He goads people into hate and division, and he inspires extremists at state and local levels to pass laws that disrupt education and make it harder to earn a living.

Only one of these futures will improve the fate of this country and the world. That is why, for only the second time in our magazine’s 179-year history, the editors of Scientific American are endorsing a candidate for president. That person is Kamala Harris"--Scientific American--

The Pulitzer Prizes, Four Pulitzer-winning takes on the rise of Adolf Hitler  and Takeover: Hitler's Final Rise to Power by Timothy W. Ryback (Audible audio) or (check your local library's boundless collection)

"The biggest running international story of the 1930s was the rise to power of Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party. Today we share the work of four reporters who won Pulitzer Prizes for covering this story."--Pulitzer Prizes--

AP, GOP Targets a Biden Executive Order [EO 14019on Voter Registration Ahead of the Fall Election

EO 14019 should have been published decades ago and promulgated annually thereafter, funded by the Defense and SNAP budgets in alternating years. 

UPI, Sen. Bob Menendez says he won't resign after federal indictment [Whether the accused senator steps down is irrelevant because he confuses his right to be considered innocent with a nonexistent right to continue serving in the Senate. The senior United States senator from New Jersey must be immediately expelled from office, and the Democratic party must take all appropriate actions required to ensure that happens.]

APNews, Republican Texas AG Ken Paxton is acquitted of corruption charges at historic impeachment trial [This ominous warning has already been broadcast twice at the federal level; now the same warning has been broadcast at the state level!

There is nothing political about these warnings; when your existing political system is conducting repeated oscillating impeachment-aquit[t]al proceedings, your nation has no functioning political system.

Dissolution and replacement of the non-existing political system is the necessary and sufficient electoral response; fault, blame, origin of the problem, negotiating strategy, who's responsible for the dysfunction, who's strongest, which party is dissolved and replaced first or second, etc. is all irrelevant.]

APNews, GOP threat to impeach a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice is driven by fear of losing legislative edge [i.e. The recently elected justice may provide a majority that requires the GOP to draw and use fair electoral district maps.]






Last Updated September 21, 2024 added link for a local library example link for Takeover: Hitler's rise to power.

Sunday, September 15, 2024

Are AIs Doing Something Like Human Reasoning

 You Judge



You may find this special issue of New Scientist: The AI Revolution (requires subscription) helpful as "you judge"...

"...First, these systems are not yet reliable. Nor are they conscious. They’re not deciding to do anything that might be harmful to us. The real potential for harm is in humans using them, and therefore we do need to regulate them.


Second, just because we don’t understand precisely how they work yet doesn’t mean they’re magic. It’s just that they’re very complex. We will be able to understand them. We just need to do the science, and to do the science we need these systems not to be entirely in the hands of for-profit corporations...

Third, ..."

--Melanie Mitchell, New Scientist 22 April 2023 p49--
RES:


The Right Way to Regulate AI by Alondra Nelson (download pdf)

Web:




I wonder if advanced aging senior "deep neural networks" will conduct a reflective retirement review of their lifetime work...probably not without a memory.




Other AI-Related Discussions and Information:

SF Pres Club, AI + Journalism (Vimeo)  [Moderator - Rachel Metz]

Current Biology, Primer on Neural network models and deep learning, Apr 2019 (article includes a downloadable link to pdf [406Kb], which includes a further reading section)


“...The problem is that the task of prediction is not equivalent to the task of understanding,” said Allyson Ettinger, a computational linguist at the University of Chicago..."









AI-Related Applications:















Last Updated September 15, 2024; added link to paper on KANs.