Jim: Attention isn’t all you need. There is something else waiting to be discovered. And there is probably something genuinely irreducible about organic existence that will require the superintelligent silicon layer to be grafted on top of a carbon-and-water foundation. Plus, organic beings have a temporal gravity that cannot be simulated. Large language models are created by a Darwinian process that is a pale shadow of billions of years of the real one.
Isegoria: Longevity definitely has a genetic component: Three decades ago a famous study of Danish twins found that our genes “only moderately” influence how long we’re likely to live. Longevity, the authors estimated, was about 25 percent heritable, meaning the remaining three quarters was determined by environmental factors and lifestyle choices, such as diet and exercise. Most subsequent studies found heritability to be somewhere in the 20 to 25 percent range, and 25 percent is now widely accepted....
Bob Sykes: Although the obesity epidemic (at least two-thirds of everyone) explains much the the differences in death rates among Americans (and between Europeans and Americans), the basic cause is genetics. About 80 to 90 % of life expectancy is genetics, 5 to 10% diet, and 5 to 10% excercise and fitness.
Jim: The fundamental question is not technical, it is moral: Do Americans have a right to step outside without being subjected to obscene sci-fi surveillance? Flock is not the only offender. There are also: * Traffic cameras * ALPRs (automated license plate readers) * Store surveillance cameras * Doorbell cameras * BWCs (police body cameras) * Innumerable data vendors that trade in your personal information * Etc. and so forth, virtually without end If Americans have no right to privacy, then there is no...
Isegoria: Flock highlights how many missing persons they help find (10,000 last year) and how many stolen vehicles, but news stories tend to mention the kinds of crimes most of us think of: vehicle theft (~389), shootings (~194), theft/larceny (~160), homicide (~149), robbery (~129), hit-and-run (~105), assault (~105), and burglary (~102).
Patrick Henry: “700K crimes each year” Which crimes? Where? Running red lights? Murder? Rape? Illegal border crossing? Fentanyl sales? How many accused by photo were found not guilty? What others uses of data captured by Flock cameras are there? What revenue was obtained? When the consent of Americans to be tracked by commercial entities while going about their lawful business given?
Jim: I take your corrections. Someone should solve food at some point. Who is working on this?
Isegoria: Apparently his Grimmer than Hell collection includes the Lacey stories.
Szopen: Reminds me of the story of Dr. Witaszek who during WW2 tried to use typhus on Nazis. He was captured, tortured and executed. Children were sent to German families in order to be Germanized (recovered by red cross fortunately) and wife was sent to Auschwitz.
Bruce: David Drake’s Lacey and His Friends assumes the output will go to oligarchs.
Felix: The Transparent Society by David Brin, if I recall, assumes there will always be Flockish cameras and the like. So, make their output public. Side note: Amazon’s “Customers also bought or read” for this book is quite the interesting reading list.
McChuck: Being seen in public is fine. But what Flock camera coverage does is effectively stalking.
Isegoria: I haven’t read In the Days of My Youth I Was Told What It Means to Be a Man: A Memoir. Does the father come back to die under the son’s care?
Michael Lynch: Actually Junod did have that father and wrote a book about it.
Phileas Frogg: He combined gentle and meek kindness with implacable strength. A consummate Christian gentleman, and a better man than I.
Szopen: I was too young to ever read them, and in fact I only learned about them after the fall of Communism. I was only 13 when the first semi-free elections were held. I mostly remember hearing old jokes with my parents laughing and explaining why it was funny — and then slowly they stopped laughing.
Bruce: Szopen, is that what happened to Krokodil and Szpilki? Or were they too establishment?
Szopen: In Poland, a similar phenomenon appeared with respect to comedy: the quality of comedy shows fell in the first few years, because previously a lot of comedy was based on innuendos and clever allusions, hinting on something which people supposed not to know or were not supposed to think or say. Once those things could be said in the open, comedians kept depending on old tricks and it was just not fun anymore.
Gaikokumaniakku: When East Asians ask me whence come my antiquated notions of the USA, I read selections from the first Little House book to them. The dear, sweet, sympathetic little girl hopes that her father will bring back a dead bear, because she loves to eat bear meat.