"Paul Dirac's remarks on God and religion (1927)

If we are honest — and scientists have to be — we must admit that religion is a jumble of false assertions, with no basis in reality. The very idea of God is a product of the human imagination. It is quite understandable why primitive people, who were so much more exposed to the overpowering forces of nature than we are today, should have personified these forces in fear and trembling. But nowadays, when we . . . "

x.com/PhysInHistory/status/180

The risks around artificial intelligence might be better understood by following the money not the technology....

This suggests we need to be regulating (better) the economic & market uses of AI, rather than focussing on its technical capabilities.

Indeed, states have a long history of regulating markets, and whatever some economists seem to think, regulation is what has most often saved capitalism from eating itself!

#artificialintelligence #technology #regulation

theconversation.com/to-underst

The sad and hilarious thing is that computer nerds already control the means of production they're just not doing anything with it other than what they're told.

Passing through Flint yesterday, and this caught my eye.

And naturally the billionaires' response is, "Don't take money from me! Make poor people wait another 5 years before they can collect social security!"

The idea that such people create jobs is contrary to the evidence. They aren't the people who innovate - they are the people who restrict innovation by protecting their incumbent position.

thedailybeast.com/billionaires

@nadiaalbelushi@mastodon.social
I love Space Engine. I have just been exploring nearby stars whose names I could remember, and discovered that Castor (in Gemini) is a sextuple. Even better, they all orbit fast enough to see rapid movement with time speeded up to max.

Everyone will enjoy this on pointe #British takedown of #Trump by a satirist called Tarquin via birdshite #DarkHumor #Humor #politics

It's long so it's been threaded

Please #share!

threadreaderapp.com/thread/175

The price of Huggies diapers went up 6% between April- June 2023.

Inflation, right? Wrong.

Kimberly-Clark, the maker of Huggies, reported that the cost to make its products fell by $75 million.They took the money and ran, banking $168 million in operating profits in Q3 2023.

Now, new research shows that corporate profits drove 53% of inflation during the 2nd and 3rd quarters of 2023. During the 40 years prior to the pandemic, profits drove just 11% of price growth.

I just learned about this. It won't rival European rail, but it's a start. I think a big part of building a real rail network in the US will be changing public perception about it. It's a public service, not a for-profit enterprise. whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/s

I am glad to see big media starting to pay attention to the wacko faux philosophies guiding the nutter ideas of the AI boys. Here is Prof. @henryfarrell
in The Economist:
programmablemutter.com/p/the-s

@Unixbigot
I love it.

To be fair, though, most tech bros are power users and managers. I've not met one that can code worth a damn.
@aral @onepict @cstross

@skweetis
This is an excellent reason for defederating threads. I really do not want big tech social media algorithms having anything whatsoever to do with what I see on Mastodon.
@timbray

Scientific American op-ed:

Tech Billionaires Need to Stop Trying to Make the Science Fiction They Grew Up on Real

Today’s Silicon Valley billionaires grew up reading classic American science fiction. Now they’re trying to make it come true, embodying a dangerous political outlook

(by me):

scientificamerican.com/article

Friends, today is a good day to stop using chrome :)

Download Firefox, reimport your bookmarks, set as default browser, replace chrome in all the places you launch it from muscle memory... I guarantee you wont miss anything from chrome, and in one step you take one step away from Google owning the web.

20 minutes, tops.

mastodon.social/@Tutanota/1115

Show older
Qoto Mastodon

QOTO: Question Others to Teach Ourselves
An inclusive, Academic Freedom, instance
All cultures welcome.
Hate speech and harassment strictly forbidden.