Steerzing in a New Direction...

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John D
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1321

Post by John D »

Matt Cavanaugh wrote:
John D wrote: "Game over man... game over!"
For those who didn't get the reference:

Paxton is one of my favorite actors. He was killed by the Alien, Predator and the Terminator!
https://screenrant.com/bill-paxton-acto ... ph-deaths/

"You may not be keeping up with current events but we just got our asses kicked pal!"



Aliens 2 has some flaws for sure.... but it is always in my top five.

Service Dog
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1322

Post by Service Dog »

fafnir wrote: Does anybody remember Bob Flanagan, the supermasochist? He was a comedian/performance artist/BDSM practitioner dying from cystic fibrosis who would do things like hammering a nail through the head of his penis for an art project (the kind of person Service Dog hangs out with between meeting interesting people). In the documentary about him there is a girl with cystic fibrosis, and she gets her nipples pierced. Something about showing your body, and everybody who thinks you are sick and weak, that you have control and power.
The only self-harm artist I like was Chris Burden. But yeah, you hit the nail on the penis regarding Bob Flanagan being a big deal with artsy hipsters a handful of years older than me.

I think there's a disassociative numbness -- ennui, autism, other ingredients-- which causes some people to lash-out... start antifa fires... trying to stimulate a response. Sometimes including a livestream camera. And some people poke, poison, fling-around & uglify their own bodies... in pursuit of same.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1323

Post by Bhurzum »

Service Dog wrote:
fafnir wrote: Does anybody remember Bob Flanagan, the supermasochist? He was a comedian/performance artist/BDSM practitioner dying from cystic fibrosis who would do things like hammering a nail through the head of his penis for an art project (the kind of person Service Dog hangs out with between meeting interesting people). In the documentary about him there is a girl with cystic fibrosis, and she gets her nipples pierced. Something about showing your body, and everybody who thinks you are sick and weak, that you have control and power.
The only self-harm artist I like was Chris Burden. But yeah, you hit the nail on the penis regarding Bob Flanagan being a big deal with artsy hipsters a handful of years older than me.

I think there's a disassociative numbness -- ennui, autism, other ingredients-- which causes some people to lash-out... start antifa fires... trying to stimulate a response. Sometimes including a livestream camera. And some people poke, poison, fling-around & uglify their own bodies... in pursuit of same.
Bob Flanagan, wasn't he the nutter in the "Happiness in slavery" video by Nine Inch Nails? The "victim" who willingly sat in the chair that systematically castrated, gutted then completely chewed him up and shat him out? I could google it but don't want to end up on a dodgy government database.

SFW (kinda) starting portion of the video. It cuts off before the genital torture and flying mince begins. You can see the dude I suspect might be Flanagan in the closing seconds of the clip.


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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1324

Post by fafnir »


Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1325

Post by Brive1987 »

The Australian bush, especially in summer, can be unforgiving.

Off track and out of river valleys, its totally uniform … nondescript. For city people used to grids and signs, it’s almost a given that you’ll be lost in 100 metres and one spin-around.

Had lots of experience with this while playing in the Army Reserves. Pretty much all you have is compass bearing and counted paces. Map to ground orientation was a luxury that assumes clearly discernible features.



RE experience. That can run both ways. Take the case of that British girl Esther Dingley who disappeared off the ridge on the French/Spanish border last November. She had 4 years non stop Alpine hiking with her boyfriend and good, well thought out kit (list available in link below).

Bang - disappeared in good weather in high but fairly open country … with no body. Her skull was found last June and her boyfriend, who had done hundreds of miles of searching, found her remains in August. On route. 🤷‍♂️

Seems that ice spikes are of little use in the pack, and worn boots are no substitute. Complacency.

https://42cc80b7-be3b-41e3-a85b-18b6640 ... 82f5a1.pdf

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1326

Post by Brive1987 »

The info pact put together by Esther’s boyfriend indicates that in addition to planning, sound kit and experience, she’d also completed a Mountain Leaders course.

He’s quite befuddled (the pack predates her discovery) as this was ‘just another jump’. It’s interesting following his logic given we now have a (semi) known outcome.

https://42cc80b7-be3b-41e3-a85b-18b6640 ... 82f5a1.pdf

I got the feeling with her though, that there was a drive and restlessness with her that wasn’t going to end well. At least she died happy.

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1327

Post by Brive1987 »

‘every frozen corpse on Everest was once a highly motivated person’

Matt Cavanaugh
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1328

Post by Matt Cavanaugh »

So Dingley was traveling with her partner, but then goes on a lengthy solo trek?

Sayers did a lot of solo trekking, too, leaving her BF at home.

I think there’s something off with these people.

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1329

Post by Brive1987 »

Matt Cavanaugh wrote: So Dingley was traveling with her partner, but then goes on a lengthy solo trek?

Sayers did a lot of solo trekking, too, leaving her BF at home.

I think there’s something off with these people.
Re Dingley, after 80 days joint trekking (and general living together in motorhome for 4x years), I’d say her solo moment was required rather than aberrant.

What’s more of a red flag is her compulsion to keep pushing to the last (November 22) minute with an almost frantic spasm.

That is definitely “off”.


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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1330

Post by ThreeFlangedJavis »

I share Serpent's frustration. China is engaged in an unprecedented military expansion and the Western democracies are more afraid of being xenophobic or warmongering than they are of being crushed by China. The China apologists in Australia are out cautioning against angering China. The Chinese aren't angered if you stand up to them, they're just using the old "hurting the feelings of the Chinese people" ploy because they know it works with Western simps. They also know that Australia isn't planning on getting nukes, they're just pretending to think they will so they can threaten nuclear attack in the hopes of forestalling an Aussie military build-up.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1331

Post by screwtape »

Royal Navy could expand into the Canadian Arctic to support allies

Thanks, lads, but only if we ask, OK? I know, that wasn't a point of order that worked for dozens of other places during the colonial era. Mind you, if I had to choose between La Trudeau and Boris as master of PolarBearLand, le petit pauvre Justin, il n'est pas en tête!

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1332

Post by screwtape »

Oh, and since no one here has mentioned it, Biden has authorized a deferred prosecution for the Meng Wazhou person. And strangely enough, the completely unrelated arrests and imprisonments of two Canadians for nearly three years just happened to end up with them being placed on a plane headed for Canada at the same time as the Wazhou person got on her charter flight back to China. Choreographed just like Checkpoint Charlie.

Might we now be allowed to tell the Chinese to go and fuck themselves? I don't think we want their gain of function viruses any more than we want their cellphone networks that report everything back to Beijing.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1333

Post by fafnir »

ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: engaged in an unprecedented military expansion and the Western democracies are more afraid of being xenophobic or warmongering than they are of being crushed by China. The China
Same thing happened before the 2nd World War. It was all "let's disarm and not provoke a war, we are all reasonable people". The exact same vanguard of intellectuals are making the exact same arguments. It's theory over reality every single time. It takes a lot of education to be that dumb.

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1334

Post by Brive1987 »

I thought 4D chess was so 2018 😉


Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1335

Post by Brive1987 »

One in 10 Aussie military aged males (prime) were born in the CCP.

I’ve been wanting the Chinese to fuck off for some time.



https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/childre ... mographics

Service Dog
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1336

Post by Service Dog »

I feel vindicated by the Kamala Kovid Kerfuffle which occurred Live In Real Time on 'The View' tv-show last week.

It's funny to see the demands Kamala makes on all the less-important people around-her... collide with The View's self-importance.
--

I've been in similar situations-- where the Contingency Plan for what-we'll-do if someone tests positive... depends on whether an Important Person is inconvenienced, or a nobody:

On a bigname cosmetics company photo shoot-- the gladhandlers were super-concerned about getting their Celebrity Tranny a mobile onsite covid test... so s/h/it could board an international flight after the shoot. And they insisted us nobodies wear masks around s/h/it... to protect s/h/it. (But s/h/it wasn't required to mask.) But... when the Covid Testers showed-up Too Early... they were sent away. Because it simply-wouldn't-do if the Celebrity tested-positive BEFORE the fashion shoot, causing it to halt. In that case-- they deemed it perfectly-fine that we shoot in ignorant bliss with Typhoid Schrodinger, and only test s/h/it afterward.

In the two nursing homes I visit-- a _single_ positive test of any staffer or old-person-- triggered a shutdown of visitation for weeks & months. Only the old people were inconvenienced by that... so nobody cared about the rate of false-positives.

During the recent Fashion Week-- a husband & wife management team-- who I've often endured working-for-- spent weeks inside a massive concrete structure... planning a lavish fashion spectacle. Including staffers with electronic devices making a big show of scanning the attendees' Covid credentials/ to justify the lack of social-distancing & disregard for indoor mask requirements. The couple failed to realize the concrete bunker degraded wifi connectivity-- so, on show day, the check-in devices couldn't process the hundreds of guests. She's Argentinian & he's Polish... and the-bosses-who-keep-hiring-them think they're a cute Diversity couple. But the people who work under them-- know their accents are impossible to decipher over the walkie-talkie. Especially when they're screaming in panic. tee hee!
--

"Quoth The Raven" wrote about the The View & Kamala. After a long preamble-- came this devestating analysis:

With antigen tests, the FDA says that false positives can occur at a range of intervals, between 4% and 70% depending on disease prevalence:

Remember that positive predictive value (PPV) varies with disease prevalence when interpreting results from diagnostic tests. PPV is the percent of positive test results that are true positives. As disease prevalence decreases, the percent of test results that are false positives increase.

For example, a test with 98% specificity would have a PPV of just over 80% in a population with 10% prevalence, meaning 20 out of 100 positive results would be false positives.

The same test would only have a PPV of approximately 30% in a population with 1% prevalence, meaning 70 out of 100 positive results would be false positives. This means that, in a population with 1% prevalence, only 30% of individuals with positive test results actually have the disease.

At 0.1% prevalence, the PPV would only be 4%, meaning that 96 out of 100 positive results would be false positives.

Health care providers should take the local prevalence into consideration when interpreting diagnostic test results.

Another pre-print study shows false positives using PCR tests between 0% and 16.7%

https://media.patriots.win/post/h8k3my7T.png

"Our analysis of two regional data sets demonstrates the potential for a high frequency of false positives, especially when test positivity is low," the study says.

The same study lays out the obvious negatives of a high frequency of false positives:

In hospitals, there can be wasteful consumption of personal protective equipment in caring for false positive patients, while at the same time the unnecessary use of such equipment and other protective measures may impede the care of the patient. In respiratory patients, a false positive test result may impede a correct diagnosis, delaying or depriving such patients of appropriate treatment.

The presence of false-positive patients may hinder the development of improved medical care for COVID-19 patients based on clinical experience, because incorrectly diagnosed patients introduce noise into clinical observations. Over the longer term, if antibody or antiviral treatments become available for COVID-19 patients, or if prophylactic treatments are developed for asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic individuals that have tested positive, false-positive individuals may be subjected to medically inappropriate treatments.

15 Clinical trials of potential treatments could lose statistical power by unwittingly enrolling false-positive individuals, who would be exposed to potentially harmful side effects without any mitigating potential for benefit.

Another study from January 2021 predicts false positives of up to 5% and notes that “false positive results in [a setting of low prevalence] can have several adverse effects.” It lists some of these as:

unnecessary treatment and investigation

missing or delayed surgery

unnecessary isolation and contact tracing with subsequent negative impact on workforce and resources

a risk of subsequent increased exposure if the individual changes their behaviour as a result of believing that they have been infected

the individual being placed with other inpatients with COVID-19 and consequently exposed to the virus.

Yet despite the reality of false positive tests, no one talks about them publicly and the idea of them has been "debunked" by mainstream outlets like the CBC...


Matt Cavanaugh
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1338

Post by Matt Cavanaugh »

Service Dog wrote: It's funny to see the demands Kamala makes on all the less-important people around-her
Multiple reliable sources have reported that when she was CA AG, kamala required her staffers to line up every morning to greet her with a lusty "Good Morning, General!" Looking her in the eye was verboten and would get you fired.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1339

Post by Lsuoma »

I see they're going to have to bury Alan Lancaster Down, Down, Deeper and Down:

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-58698864

Matt Cavanaugh
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1340

Post by Matt Cavanaugh »

California school districts to set aside prayer rooms for Afghanis, in violation of McCollum v. Board of Education (1948)

https://www.kqed.org/news/11889134/cali ... e-students

John D
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1341

Post by John D »

Matt Cavanaugh wrote: California school districts to set aside prayer rooms for Afghanis, in violation of McCollum v. Board of Education (1948)

https://www.kqed.org/news/11889134/cali ... e-students
Christians are really pretty generous. Funny how that works.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1342

Post by John D »

Almost done listening to Bret and Heather's book. I enjoyed one chapter and learned some stuff about evolution. That was the only positive in my view. It is clear that they are Malthusian pompous geniuses. Ready to tell everyone that markets don't work and that the super-duper smart people have to make a bunch of rules. Really... total shit. A waist of my time.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1343

Post by John D »

waist?... waste?... waist? English sucks.

Steersman
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1344

Post by Steersman »

ThreeFlangedJavis wrote:

<snippety do dah>

The system is now so corrupt that a general can boast about colluding with Nancy Pelosi to undermine a President's control of the armed forces, using media distortions about the president as justification, and be lauded as a hero.
Kinda looks that way. ICYMI, interesting essay by Jeffrey Sachs which underlines the point:
Basically, American politics has become deeply corrupt over decades, and it became so corrupt that normal governance already collapsed many years ago. And people with resources and knowledge know it, but they haven’t cared, because things have more or less gone on O.K., ....
"I'm alright Jack" ... tends to be short-sighted at best.

But something for those beavering away on the vax:
The only way to have a viable economy and society is to control this epidemic. So it’s not really a trade-off. The question is how to be effective in controlling the epidemic and driving the transmission of the disease to very low levels. Simply letting the virus run through the society would be unacceptably costly, and that’s why essentially no country in the world is doing that. The real issue is to be effective in the response, and unfortunately the United States has not been effective so far.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/ ... oronavirus

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1345

Post by Steersman »

Service Dog wrote:
Steersman wrote: 7 days later, I posted a video debunking Eric Weinstein's theoretical physics claims-- as evidence that big-brother-Weinstein might be a kook, too.
Sounds plausible - you have a link?
These two posts link-to the video, & comprise my reactions at-the-time:

<snip>

https://slymepit.com/phpbb/viewtopic.ph ... 60#p501160
A belated thanks - fair amount of listening there which I'll have to put on the back burner. But a couple of threads to follow - that Timothy Nyguyen in the Blogging heads video in particular. Though would be nice to see some transcripts - Sam Harris is one of the better ones for providing those.

And interesting to see a comment there by Gumby in the Conspiracy thread.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1346

Post by Steersman »

John D wrote:
fafnir wrote:
Service Dog wrote: TMI about my personal life
Those are some of the posts that have kept a lurker like me coming back when the SJW stuff tailed off.
Hmmmm... my thoughts so please skip if you don't give a shit.

The pyt started out as a reaction to the wokesters taking over the atheist/skeptical movement. Most of us got together to attack PZ or Becki... etc. over their obvious BS....etc. We objected to the accusations that atheist groups were overrun by sexist men and the patriarchy. We objected to the victimhood narrative etc.

As the years went by, PZ and Becki lost their popularity... but they were really the tip of the spear. The entire zeitgeist right now is wokeism. My own kid got sucked into the cult of wokeism.

Also, even though I am a "hard" atheist, I have a much different view of religion and conservatism than I did in the past. I used to get pissed when my Christian friends assumed all atheists were communist. Haha... then... in front of my eyes, most atheists I knew (including my kid) became "communist/socialist" (or neo-Marxists). Shit. The lesson to me is that my fellow humans really need some kind of religion. ....
Like most drugs, too much can be fatal. Y'all may recollect Dawkins' "Gerin Oil":

https://richarddawkins.net/2006/05/gerin-oil/
John D wrote:
This didn't work well in my view. It think that my daughter also needed an intellectual background to her moral thinking. The neo-Marxists have easily sucked her in during her college years... years of taking "women's studies"... etc. Now her moral frame is sort of disgusting to me. My heart is broken.

<snip>
They should close the lot of those "Women Studies" programs. Interesting summary of Koertge's & Patai's "Professing Feminism":
The authors, however, demonstrate that these problems have existed since their ideology’s inception, and were particularly common within Women Studies programs. The authors wrote of the isolationist attitude that dominates many of the programs, along with a virulent anti-science, anti-intellectual sentiment driving many of the professors, staff and students.
https://www.feministcritics.org/blog/20 ... inism-noh/

That "Feminist Critics" website had been offline for ages but nice to see that it's back; wonder what the story is there.

One of the authors, Noretta Koertge, also had some choice criticisms of feminism in her "The Feminist Critique [Repudiation] of Logic":

https://philpapers.org/rec/KOETFC

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1347

Post by Steersman »

Lsuoma wrote:
Stankeye wrote:
<snip>

No dobut. I can see once someone is on your cunt list it is probably hard to get out. I was more lamenting not understanding from my perspective, but there is nothing anyone owes me in helping me to understand.

I guess it is one of many of the pit's Shiri Scissor moments.
Actually, he went off my ignore list for a couple of months recently, but went back on when he started re-cunting on a regular basis. Cuntiness is clearly a personal assessment, and I've never dream of telling people who they need to ignore. Steerzo has also gotten off, and stayed off. I can't be bothered to deal with cunt-holes, so fuck doggo in the eye, until I might feel like taking the time to read his output again. As I said earlier, I diskard him.
Thanks Boss. Any particular reason I was put on the Group W bench to begin with? Any particular reason for then finding (some) acceptance there? ;)

Though as something in the way of pouring oil on troubled waters, I'm reminded of a classic quip, of many, from Dr. Strangelove:

"Gentlemen. You can't fight in here. This is the War Room!"

Steersman
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1348

Post by Steersman »

Bhurzum wrote: On the subject of 'pit "ignore" lists - I'm amazed you buggers haven't all ignored me by now. I bring fuck all to the table except ignorant rantings, disgusting observations and ilittarete skriblins.
It's all good - mostly in any case ... ;)

<snip>
Bhurzum wrote: Anyway, I just wish you fuckers would ease off on the ignoring (it's very SJW behaviour) and start talking things out. If anything, I might learn a bit more when you lot show your workings.

Cunt cheese.
A lovely and quite apt phrase. Reminds me of a classic cartoon:
And_then_a_miracle_happens_cartoon.jpg
(44.2 KiB) Downloaded 145 times
Rather amazing, and quite "problematic", how so many of us - present company excepted, of course ... ;) - work on "unexamined assumptions". Which often aren't evident until we're presented with a "conclusion", with a fait accompli, that looks rather like the classic "precious bodily fluids". Easy to connect a bunch of dots, much harder to ask which connections make sense.

Somewhat apropos of which and maybe to throw the fox in amongst the chickens, there's been some chatter here about some supposed "gain-of-function" research. But little discussion, that I've seen, about why that might have been done, assuming - on the hypothetical - that it had been. Was it designed to "cull the herd"? Biological warfare? (Why would an American organization ask a Chinese lab to do that?) Or simply to understand the process? As misguided as the latter might be.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1349

Post by Lsuoma »

Steersman wrote:
Lsuoma wrote:
Stankeye wrote:
<snip>

No dobut. I can see once someone is on your cunt list it is probably hard to get out. I was more lamenting not understanding from my perspective, but there is nothing anyone owes me in helping me to understand.

I guess it is one of many of the pit's Shiri Scissor moments.
Actually, he went off my ignore list for a couple of months recently, but went back on when he started re-cunting on a regular basis. Cuntiness is clearly a personal assessment, and I've never dream of telling people who they need to ignore. Steerzo has also gotten off, and stayed off. I can't be bothered to deal with cunt-holes, so fuck doggo in the eye, until I might feel like taking the time to read his output again. As I said earlier, I diskard him.
Thanks Boss. Any particular reason I was put on the Group W bench to begin with? Any particular reason for then finding (some) acceptance there? ;)

Though as something in the way of pouring oil on troubled waters, I'm reminded of a classic quip, of many, from Dr. Strangelove:

"Gentlemen. You can't fight in here. This is the War Room!"
You did tend to get very verbose, and loved your "quotation" "marks" plus a few other things. Can't really remember everything now.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1350

Post by Lsuoma »

And props for your Alice's Restaurant reference, you father raper.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1351

Post by fafnir »

John D wrote: Almost done listening to Bret and Heather's book. I enjoyed one chapter and learned some stuff about evolution. That was the only positive in my view. It is clear that they are Malthusian pompous geniuses. Ready to tell everyone that markets don't work and that the super-duper smart people have to make a bunch of rules. Really... total shit. A waist of my time.
Wasn't it the super duper smart people who saved us from Trump by lying to him and conspiring with the Chinese and came back into power in at the election? The white house is swimming with people from Yale, and Harvard and Biden has to be on every brain enhancing drug going. They need to work out what they want.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1352

Post by Steersman »

Lsuoma wrote: And props for your Alice's Restaurant reference, you father raper.
:D

Hard to believe that song is over 50 years old.

Remember when I first heard it - I had been in residence at university (never did finish a degree) when the song came on the radio just about lunch time. It was so engaging - and long - that I just had to listen to all of it before heading off to lunch. But what was amusing, and memorable, was that as I headed out of the residence I saw that there were a whole bunch of other students streaming out of the residences who had similarly delayed their lunches for the same reason.


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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1353

Post by John D »

Steersman wrote:
Lsuoma wrote: And props for your Alice's Restaurant reference, you father raper.
:D

Hard to believe that song is over 50 years old.

Remember when I first heard it - I had been in residence at university (never did finish a degree) when the song came on the radio just about lunch time. It was so engaging - and long - that I just had to listen to all of it before heading off to lunch. But what was amusing, and memorable, was that as I headed out of the residence I saw that there were a whole bunch of other students streaming out of the residences who had similarly delayed their lunches for the same reason.

It was a typical case of American blind justice!

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1354

Post by AndrewV69 »

Speaking of which :



OTOH this is Pakistan we are talking about

So, no need to ban gender studies. The unwashed will take care of them at some point. One way or the other, it is not going to flourish.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1355

Post by Steersman »

John D wrote:
Steersman wrote:
Lsuoma wrote: And props for your Alice's Restaurant reference, you father raper.
:D

Hard to believe that song is over 50 years old.

<snip>
It was a typical case of American blind justice!
:) All those "circles and arrows" going to waste ...

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1356

Post by Steersman »

AndrewV69 wrote: Speaking of which :

https://twitter.com/AndrewV691/status/1 ... 1061407747

OTOH this is Pakistan we are talking about
Maybe one place where Women Studies might reasonably be seen as the lesser of two weevils.
AndrewV69 wrote: So, no need to ban gender studies. The unwashed will take care of them at some point. One way or the other, it is not going to flourish.
Ran across an essay from something of a feminist philosopher, one Amia Srinivasan - a smart cookie by the look of it, a talk she had given at King's College London:
“The objection I have in mind is that feminist philosophy rests on a mistake: namely, a conflation of epistemology and politics. Philosophy, at least on the conventional understanding, is an epistemic project, a project oriented toward truth or knowledge, and thus committed to the kind of unfettered inquiry that is conducive to the acquisition of truth and knowledge. Feminism meanwhile is a political project, a project oriented toward the emancipation of women and the dissolution of patriarchy.”
https://users.ox.ac.uk/~corp1468/Resear ... 20talk.pdf

Maybe a worthy objective in itself - maybe more so in some places than in others. But as a political project it tends to degenerate into something that's little short of Lysenkoism.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1357

Post by Lsuoma »

The time interval between now and the release of Alice's restaurant is greater that the interval between it's release and the start of The Great War...

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1358

Post by Lsuoma »

Latest kerfuffle - Search for "bodies with vaginas lancet".

:popcorn:

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1359

Post by Lsuoma »

Also, complete fucking loser and political weather vane Keir Starmer says that it's not right to say that only women have a cervix:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-58698406


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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1360

Post by Steersman »

Lsuoma wrote: The time interval between now and the release of Alice's restaurant is greater that the interval between it's release and the start of The Great War...
Now I feel really old ... ;)

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1361

Post by Steersman »

Lsuoma wrote: Latest kerfuffle - Search for "bodies with vaginas lancet".

:popcorn:
I see the RT article has a tweet of Helen Joyce, she of the recent:



https://www.rt.com/news/535784-lancet-c ... s-vaginas/



ICYMI, she had quite a good article at Quillette on the topic about a year ago:

https://quillette.com/2020/06/20/she-wh ... -be-named/

A particularly cogent and telling passage:
An adult human who identifies as female

— Anonymous Twitter account

Marks for cunning, I suppose. Using “female” instead of “woman” is clearly an attempt to avoid circularity. The problem is that “female” is not something you can identify as. It’s a word with an objective definition that holds right across all of biology, and hardly any of the things it refers to are capable of identifying as anything. It means: “of or denoting the sex class that produces large gametes,” and so it refers to peahens (not peacocks), fish eggs (not fish sperm), kangaroo pouches (only the females carry joeys), the pistil of a flower (not its stamens), and so on.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1362

Post by Steersman »

Lsuoma wrote: Also, complete fucking loser and political weather vane Keir Starmer says that it's not right to say that only women have a cervix:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-58698406

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIWHMb3JxmE
Well, technically speaking he's correct: girls from birth to the onset of puberty have cervixes while technically not qualifying as women - i.e., "adult human females (produce ova)". It IS the standard definition:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woman

And people with CAIS look like human females - many of them possessing cervixes - while having an XY karyotype and internal but non-functional testicles:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complete_ ... y_syndrome

And menopausees likewise have cervixes but don't meet the "necessary & sufficient condition" to qualify as "female" - that is, as Joyce herself emphasized, "produces ova". Not that Joyce herself is particularly happy with the logical consequences of that premise, one that she insisted "holds across all of biology". She blocked me on Twitter for pointing that out. Bit surprising given that she's got a PhD in mathematics:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extension ... efinitions

But a curious and somewhat amusing phenomenon - part Lilliputian civil war, and part Rape of the Lock, Part Deux.

Much of it caused by many people insisting that "woman" in particular is an identity based on some "immutable essence" instead of accepting that it's just a label for a transitory biological capability: "Sally" isn't less Sally because she no longer qualifies as woman once she hits menopause. As with all of us when we had our 20th birthdays and could no longer call ourselves "teenagers".

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1363

Post by Brive1987 »

My sewer pipe is broken just before the main and under the street.

$29k to fix. I’m unimpressed.

Keating
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1364

Post by Keating »

Guess there was a downside to your new diet after all

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1365

Post by Gumby »

Keating wrote: Guess there was a downside to your new diet after all
:clap:

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1366

Post by Brive1987 »

Keating wrote: Guess there was a downside to your new diet after all
I see the invasion of drain shattering roots as evidence that all plants are evil.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1367

Post by Matt Cavanaugh »

Lsuoma wrote: The time interval between now and the release of Alice's restaurant is greater that the interval between it's release and the start of The Great War...
Stop with that shit it's depressing.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1368

Post by Lsuoma »

Gumby wrote:
Keating wrote: Guess there was a downside to your new diet after all
:clap:
Hey Gumbers!!

Perhaps you could do a funny pic about Brivo's humorous situation?

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1369

Post by Matt Cavanaugh »

Lsuoma wrote: Also, complete fucking loser and political weather vane Keir Starmer says that it's not right to say that only women have a cervix:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-58698406
Keir Starmer wrote:“We need to have a mature, respectful debate about trans rights…”
Keir Starmer wrote:[C]laiming only women have cervixes “is something that shouldn't be said. It is not right."
Whenever they say 'debate', they really mean 'lecture.'

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1370

Post by Matt Cavanaugh »


ThreeFlangedJavis
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1371

Post by ThreeFlangedJavis »

screwtape wrote:
Sat Sep 25, 2021 12:03 pm
Oh, and since no one here has mentioned it, Biden has authorized a deferred prosecution for the Meng Wazhou person. And strangely enough, the completely unrelated arrests and imprisonments of two Canadians for nearly three years just happened to end up with them being placed on a plane headed for Canada at the same time as the Wazhou person got on her charter flight back to China. Choreographed just like Checkpoint Charlie.

Might we now be allowed to tell the Chinese to go and fuck themselves? I don't think we want their gain of function viruses any more than we want their cellphone networks that report everything back to Beijing.
Markets work to do deliver bread and baubles in a semi-efficient way to where the demand is. Demand, not need. You don't have much hope of matching supply to demand without the feedback mechanism of the free market. Markets are completely blind to civilization threatening consequences of their operation though. How on earth is anyone other than an "expert" going to have the tools to recognise deferred costs, especially costs that neiher producers nor consumers have any interest in knowing about. The market will only respond once the threat is no longer ignorable and the demand is created, which is probably decades late. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver. There is a big difference between being governed by experts and governed by sensible people who accept advice from experts. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1372

Post by ThreeFlangedJavis »

ThreeFlangedJavis wrote:
screwtape wrote:
Sat Sep 25, 2021 12:03 pm
Oh, and since no one here has mentioned it, Biden has authorized a deferred prosecution for the Meng Wazhou person. And strangely enough, the completely unrelated arrests and imprisonments of two Canadians for nearly three years just happened to end up with them being placed on a plane headed for Canada at the same time as the Wazhou person got on her charter flight back to China. Choreographed just like Checkpoint Charlie.

Might we now be allowed to tell the Chinese to go and fuck themselves? I don't think we want their gain of function viruses any more than we want their cellphone networks that report everything back to Beijing.
Markets work to do deliver bread and baubles in a semi-efficient way to where the demand is. Demand, not need. You don't have much hope of matching supply to demand without the feedback mechanism of the free market. Markets are completely blind to civilization threatening consequences of their operation though. How on earth is anyone other than an "expert" going to have the tools to recognise deferred costs, especially costs that neiher producers nor consumers have any interest in knowing about. The market will only respond once the threat is no longer ignorable and the demand is created, which is probably decades late. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver. There is a big difference between being governed by experts and governed by sensible people who accept advice from experts. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver.
Sorry, Tape, that was a reply to John's comment about the Weinsteins. And a duplicate line too!

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1373

Post by ThreeFlangedJavis »

The man could be right about this. They're scared of the Western working and middle classes with their enlightenment principles and expectations of a decent life in return for hard work and taxes. That's why they're being demonised and replaced. It might be less about racial change than about swapping out the old-style citizen for a supposedly less entitled one.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1374

Post by fafnir »

ThreeFlangedJavis wrote:
screwtape wrote:
Sat Sep 25, 2021 12:03 pm
Oh, and since no one here has mentioned it, Biden has authorized a deferred prosecution for the Meng Wazhou person. And strangely enough, the completely unrelated arrests and imprisonments of two Canadians for nearly three years just happened to end up with them being placed on a plane headed for Canada at the same time as the Wazhou person got on her charter flight back to China. Choreographed just like Checkpoint Charlie.

Might we now be allowed to tell the Chinese to go and fuck themselves? I don't think we want their gain of function viruses any more than we want their cellphone networks that report everything back to Beijing.
Markets work to do deliver bread and baubles in a semi-efficient way to where the demand is. Demand, not need. You don't have much hope of matching supply to demand without the feedback mechanism of the free market. Markets are completely blind to civilization threatening consequences of their operation though. How on earth is anyone other than an "expert" going to have the tools to recognise deferred costs, especially costs that neiher producers nor consumers have any interest in knowing about. The market will only respond once the threat is no longer ignorable and the demand is created, which is probably decades late. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver. There is a big difference between being governed by experts and governed by sensible people who accept advice from experts. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver.
Experts are ignorant about 99% of things. Even then, being an expert means different things in different areas. Being an expert in particle physics means that there is a lot you don't know, but what you do know, you know with a high degree of certainty and replicability. Is it possible to be an expert in economics in the same way as you can be an expert in particle physics? I'm pretty sure in particle physics you are mainly going to get schools of thought at the bleeding edge fringes. In economics you have schools of thought concerning the most basic practical questions about how to run an economy. Lots of areas impacting policy are more like economics than particle physics. I think one needs to show that experts are actually capable of pricing deferred costs and steering markets in a way that leads to good results. Can they? This is starting to feel like it is drifting to the information problem with central planning.

Beyond any concern about expert, you are proposing giving a huge amount of power away. To impose deferred costs you are going to have to have a global authority capable of calculating and imposing those costs. Is that possible? It's going to be run by the same type of people with the same type of interests and the same incentives as the WHO. Is it not going to become the plaything for political intriguing, corruption and globalism? I think this solution will make everything worse.

AndrewV69
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1375

Post by AndrewV69 »

Steersman wrote:
Sun Sep 26, 2021 2:36 pm
Somewhat apropos of which and maybe to throw the fox in amongst the chickens, there's been some chatter here about some supposed "gain-of-function" research. But little discussion, that I've seen, about why that might have been done, assuming - on the hypothetical - that it had been. Was it designed to "cull the herd"? Biological warfare? (Why would an American organization ask a Chinese lab to do that?) Or simply to understand the process? As misguided as the latter might be.
What I have been given to understand is GOF (gain of function)research is to determine the likely evolution of a virus and prepare for the day said same virus naturally emerges BUT, we are prepared, so all is good.

I suppose I could speculate further about the why of outsourcing GOF to a different country, but the most obvious one is that it is risky. One accidental release could have severe consequences, as said improved virus then rampages through a population for which we are unprepared to contain it.

So, GOF research is proposed as an overall good despite the risks (and last I heard the CCP is now considering outsourcing said research to another country).

At any rate apparently it was banned, then a cut out was established allowing funding to proceed to proposals which were then outsourced to yet another party.

Unfortunately, awkward documents keep appearing that suggest there was GOF research and a lab leak or something similar.

Meanwhile, a couple of people involved in the scheme (Fauchi, Daszak) have been vehemently insisting that the virus was NOT a lab leak and there was no GOF research in the first place. There are any number of proposals that seek to throw squid ink into the waters :

Gain-of-Function Research: All in the Eye of the Beholder

Not unexpected, who would want to go down in history for all the deaths, extensive societal disruption and economic carnage we are currently experiencing?

Anyway,

Despite proposals that it was deliberately released, I tend to not seriously entertain them. There are any number of conspiracy theories one can mix and match and choose from.

Some theories are more interesting/entertaining than others. However, It is a target rich environment. Pick one that suits your fancy. Do not expect me to debate any of them at this point in time.

Meanwhile,

This article from the Intercept is pretty comprehensive, with links to sources with links to documents to substantiate their conclusions.
Leaked Grant Proposal Details High-Risk Coronavirus Research The proposal, rejected by U.S. military research agency DARPA, describes the insertion of human-specific cleavage sites into SARS-related bat coronaviruses.

There is a wealth of material available for those inclined to peruse further into the workings of Fauchi, Daszak et al and what they have wrought if one is so inclined.

My conclusion :

Winter is coming, and YOU are not prepared.

Keating
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1376

Post by Keating »

fafnir wrote: Experts are ignorant about 99% of things. Even then, being an expert means different things in different areas. Being an expert in particle physics means that there is a lot you don't know, but what you do know, you know with a high degree of certainty and replicability. Is it possible to be an expert in economics in the same way as you can be an expert in particle physics? I'm pretty sure in particle physics you are mainly going to get schools of thought at the bleeding edge fringes. In economics you have schools of thought concerning the most basic practical questions about how to run an economy. Lots of areas impacting policy are more like economics than particle physics. I think one needs to show that experts are actually capable of pricing deferred costs and steering markets in a way that leads to good results. Can they? This is starting to feel like it is drifting to the information problem with central planning.
This is supposed to be exactly the point of politicians: facts + values = policy. I think the start of the problem we're seeing is the idea that you can derive values from facts: i.e. The Science™. Add to that several generations of spineless politicians devoid of values themselves, who have started deferring to the "experts" preferred policy positions rather than applying the value positions they were elected on to the set of facts that are actually true.

Until that changes, then yes, any centralised planning will just make things worse.

ThreeFlangedJavis
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1377

Post by ThreeFlangedJavis »

fafnir wrote:
Mon Sep 27, 2021 12:49 pm
ThreeFlangedJavis wrote:
screwtape wrote:
Sat Sep 25, 2021 12:03 pm
Oh, and since no one here has mentioned it, Biden has authorized a deferred prosecution for the Meng Wazhou person. And strangely enough, the completely unrelated arrests and imprisonments of two Canadians for nearly three years just happened to end up with them being placed on a plane headed for Canada at the same time as the Wazhou person got on her charter flight back to China. Choreographed just like Checkpoint Charlie.

Might we now be allowed to tell the Chinese to go and fuck themselves? I don't think we want their gain of function viruses any more than we want their cellphone networks that report everything back to Beijing.
Markets work to do deliver bread and baubles in a semi-efficient way to where the demand is. Demand, not need. You don't have much hope of matching supply to demand without the feedback mechanism of the free market. Markets are completely blind to civilization threatening consequences of their operation though. How on earth is anyone other than an "expert" going to have the tools to recognise deferred costs, especially costs that neiher producers nor consumers have any interest in knowing about. The market will only respond once the threat is no longer ignorable and the demand is created, which is probably decades late. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver. There is a big difference between being governed by experts and governed by sensible people who accept advice from experts. 99% of us rubes know absolutely nothing about almost everything so I don't see how providing us with what we want is any kind of universal problem solver.
Experts are ignorant about 99% of things. Even then, being an expert means different things in different areas. Being an expert in particle physics means that there is a lot you don't know, but what you do know, you know with a high degree of certainty and replicability. Is it possible to be an expert in economics in the same way as you can be an expert in particle physics? I'm pretty sure in particle physics you are mainly going to get schools of thought at the bleeding edge fringes. In economics you have schools of thought concerning the most basic practical questions about how to run an economy. Lots of areas impacting policy are more like economics than particle physics. I think one needs to show that experts are actually capable of pricing deferred costs and steering markets in a way that leads to good results. Can they? This is starting to feel like it is drifting to the information problem with central planning.

Beyond any concern about expert, you are proposing giving a huge amount of power away. To impose deferred costs you are going to have to have a global authority capable of calculating and imposing those costs. Is that possible? It's going to be run by the same type of people with the same type of interests and the same incentives as the WHO. Is it not going to become the plaything for political intriguing, corruption and globalism? I think this solution will make everything worse.
I'm not actually proposing anything. I am saying that free markets are blind. They are just the best known means of supplying demand relatively efficiently. They are completely oblivious to the consequences of the manufacture, transport and consumption of products. Experts, by which I mean people who study systems and phenomena of any type and have a good model of their behaviour are the ONLY people who can possibly foresee certain types of developing crises. I agree with Weinstein that the chances are good that somewhere along the line blindly following market forces is going to lead down a path with catastrophic results. I am certainly not saying that there are not a whole swathe of disciplines where the "expert" consensus is either wrong or ideologically based or that experts do not approach solutions from a very narrow perspective. I am concerned that the current, growing populist revolt against rule by the elite is becoming dangerously anti-science. To be clear I agree with the main thrust of the populist argument, I'm just not impressed with some of the attached extreme libertarian Dunning-Krugerites.

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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1378

Post by fafnir »

ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: I'm not actually proposing anything. I am saying that free markets are blind.
The free market doesn't exist. There is only people. If people care than the aggregate behaviour of people we call a market cares.
ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: They are just the best known means of supplying demand relatively efficiently. They are completely oblivious to the consequences of the manufacture, transport and consumption of products.
Only to the extent people are oblivious/don't care.
ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: Experts, by which I mean people who study systems and phenomena of any type and have a good model of their behaviour are the ONLY people who can possibly foresee certain types of developing crises.
Like the 2008 financial crisis? Is the crisis you are talking about the kind of crisis that experts can forsee?
ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: I agree with Weinstein that the chances are good that somewhere along the line blindly following market forces is going to lead down a path with catastrophic results.
Market forces is just people. If we don't like that then the question becomes, is the alertantive better. The proposition seems to be to go with something like the WHO, but to control the global economy. How has the WHO been doing lately?
ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: I am certainly not saying that there are not a whole swathe of disciplines where the "expert" consensus is either wrong or ideologically based or that experts do not approach solutions from a very narrow perspective. I am concerned that the current, growing populist revolt against rule by the elite is becoming dangerously anti-science.
Is it though? It seems more anti-authoritarian to me. Most policy questions are not straight science questions. Whether to lock down isn't a scientific question. Whether to mandate face masks isn't a scientific question. Whether to have vaccine passports isn't a scientific question.
ThreeFlangedJavis wrote: To be clear I agree with the main thrust of the populist argument, I'm just not impressed with some of the attached extreme libertarian Dunning-Krugerites.
I'm not sure that taking the model of the WHO and turning that into the government of the world is an improvement on what ever the flaws are in the Dunning-Kruger folks. It's not even obvious that we have the power to do that. Why would China go along with it and not just compromise the one world government like they did the WHO? The plan as I see it is we give the power to shut down western economies over to an international elite controlled by China because someday too much freedom may lead our countries into trouble? When this plan has a way of forcing compliance from China, or any other country that the international elite choose to secure their wealth in so as not to pay the price of all this, then maybe it is worth considering.

Brive1987
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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1379

Post by Brive1987 »

Lsuoma wrote:
Gumby wrote:
Keating wrote: Guess there was a downside to your new diet after all
:clap:
Hey Gumbers!!

Perhaps you could do a funny pic about Brivo's humorous situation?
Let’s not drag him away from his true love.


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Re: Steerzing in a New Direction...

#1380

Post by Steersman »

AndrewV69 wrote:
Steersman wrote:
Sun Sep 26, 2021 2:36 pm
Somewhat apropos of which and maybe to throw the fox in amongst the chickens, there's been some chatter here about some supposed "gain-of-function" research. But little discussion, that I've seen, about why that might have been done, assuming - on the hypothetical - that it had been. Was it designed to "cull the herd"? Biological warfare? (Why would an American organization ask a Chinese lab to do that?) Or simply to understand the process? As misguided as the latter might be.
What I have been given to understand is GOF (gain of function)research is to determine the likely evolution of a virus and prepare for the day said same virus naturally emerges BUT, we are prepared, so all is good.

<snip.

So, GOF research is proposed as an overall good despite the risks (and last I heard the CCP is now considering outsourcing said research to another country).
Interesting quote from the Intercept article you linked later:
While Racaniello acknowledged that the research in the DARPA proposal entailed some danger, he said “the benefits far, far outweigh the risk.” He also said the fact that the viruses described in the proposal were not known pathogens mitigated the concern.
Given that type of perspective, it's not inconceivable that many researchers might turn a blind eye to the rules. "Medical ethics" often seems something of an oxymoron - Mengele and Tuskegee syphilis study and all that.
AndrewV69 wrote:
<snip>

Meanwhile, a couple of people involved in the scheme (Fauchi, Daszak) have been vehemently insisting that the virus was NOT a lab leak and there was no GOF research in the first place. There are any number of proposals that seek to throw squid ink into the waters :

Gain-of-Function Research: All in the Eye of the Beholder
Seems kind of amusing in a way, particularly if one has something of an affinity for gallows-humour, how a bunch of "scientists" and "politicians" are apparently trying to cover their butts. Though Hanlon's razor - never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity - may be applicable.

But that "Undark" site seems quite a place - hadn't run across it before - but the source of the name is rather horrific:

https://undark.org/2017/07/20/radium-girls-book-review/

Some justification for their "mission":
We appropriate the name as a signal to readers that our magazine will explore science not just as a “gee-whiz” phenomenon, but as a frequently wondrous, sometimes contentious, and occasionally troubling byproduct of human culture.
I had been thinking of Carson's "Silent Spring" as a nice illustration of a too-quick use of technology without thought to possible consequences, but that "Radium Girls" kinda takes the cake.
AndrewV69 wrote: Not unexpected, who would want to go down in history for all the deaths, extensive societal disruption and economic carnage we are currently experiencing?
Five million dead - so far - is of course nothing to sneeze at. But it's only a small fraction of the yearly death rate - about 0.8% or some 60 million. Not that we shouldn't try to minimize that, not least for the various side-effects, but it seems important to consider the context - we're a dying breed. So to speak.

As for "social disruption" and "economic carnage", I'm not entirely sure there isn't something of a silver lining in that cloud - even if the costs and benefits aren't shared equally. Biologist E.O. Wilson had something of a cogent observation thereon:
The real problem of humanity is the following: we have paleolithic emotions; medieval institutions; and god-like technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall.
Covid seems to have highlighted some serious problems in all 3 areas - moot whether we will have enough sense to learn from the experience.
AndrewV69 wrote: Anyway,

Despite proposals that it was deliberately released, I tend to not seriously entertain them. There are any number of conspiracy theories one can mix and match and choose from.
Something of a "perfect storm" in many ways. But less malice than stupidity seems to cover much of it.
AndrewV69 wrote: <snip>
Meanwhile,

This article from the Intercept is pretty comprehensive, with links to sources with links to documents to substantiate their conclusions.
Leaked Grant Proposal Details High-Risk Coronavirus Research The proposal, rejected by U.S. military research agency DARPA, describes the insertion of human-specific cleavage sites into SARS-related bat coronaviruses.

There is a wealth of material available for those inclined to peruse further into the workings of Fauchi, Daszak et al and what they have wrought if one is so inclined.

My conclusion :

Winter is coming, and YOU are not prepared.
The winter of our discount tent as Red-Green used to put it. Though I wonder - me in particular or us in general? We seem to have created a remarkably complex society that is in general fairly resilient to various shocks and upsets. But it may well have more than a few fatal flaws, glass jaws, and tipping points which may well turn out to be hell on wheels - some reason to be apprehensive.

But quite an article.

Locked