| Time |
Event |
| 2:51a |
Search engine changes this month, huge
Google is
enbullshitifying
Google Search
to the max, converting it into presenting the ramblings of bullshit generators (described by Google as
"artificial intelligence").
I reproach the article for swallowing that conceptual error, and also for referring to
services as "products" (thus blurring an important distinction).
I have had no access to Google Search for many years, aside from a
period of time when I could access it via a LibreX proxy. That is because
it depends on
nonfree JavaScript
code, which I won't trust.
I recommend people ditch Google Search and switch to other engines
such as duckduckgo.com.
|
| 8:51a |
Fossil fuel project sued, AK
*Young Alaskans sue state over fossil fuel project they claim violates their
rights.*
It would *roughly triple the state’s greenhouse gas emissions for decades*,
the lawsuit claims.
|
| 8:51a |
|
| 8:51a |
Pro-Palestinian speech surveillance
*The pretext of counter-terrorism as a reason to investigate Americans started with "red squads",
HUAC and J Edgar Hoover.*
|
| 8:51a |
Surveillance of fitbits
Google has moved the surveillance of fitbits to Google servers. It
used to be done using
fitbit-specific servers.
Both kinds of surveillance are morally intolerable, and I don't see
why one is more or less bad than the other. The crucial point is that
this sort of surveillance is gratuitous, because it can easily be
avoided. The morally legitimate way to design such products is to let
users communicate directly with them from their own computers, running
free software. That way, no company would get to surveil users
through the devices they supposedly own.
|
| 8:51a |
|
| 8:51a |
U. of Mass. chancellor rebuked
Professor Appy of the University of Massachusetts rebukes the chancellor for calling in
state thugs to arrest and torture students who had made an encampment, and reports the false
claim that these
arrests contributed to "safety" on campus.
He mainly focuses on what inspired him to decide to be arrested.
|
| 8:51a |
The thought-terminating cliche
One of disinformationists' tools: the "thought-terminating cliche" that offers
an excuse to give up really
thinking about what the truth is.
|
| 8:51a |
|
| 8:51a |
Drugged-driving laws
Australia plans to develop a test for being actually
impaired as a
driver by marijuana.
This is to avoid punishing drivers that are impaired, from those
that have lawfully used marijuana but too little to be impaired as
drivers by it.
|
| 8:51a |
Top oil firms' pledges
Oil Change International says, *Top oil firms' climate pledges failing
on
almost every metric.*
The pledges of BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Eni, Equinor,
ExxonMobil, Shell and TotalEnergies are basically greenwashing.
Those companies uses these pledges to stave off laws that would try to
make them really reduce greenhouse emissions. At the same time, they
lobby to weaken the application of the existing laws that could limit
the
destruction of civilization.
I expect that they help stir up farmers' protests against increases
in the
price of fossil fuels.
|
| 8:51a |
Coastal towns losing land, SCT
In northern Scotland, towns are being gradually
washed
away by storms exacerbated by global heating and sea level rise. Some towns are
clearly going to be gone in a few years.
Similar things are happening elsewhere. Land in North America at the
edge of the Arctic Ocean has been
eroding even faster.
|
| 8:51a |
Manslaughter case against Big Oil, FRA
*A criminal case has been filed against the CEO and directors of the French oil company
TotalEnergies, alleging its fossil fuel exploitation has contributed to the deaths of
victims of climate-fuelled
extreme
weather disasters.*
|
| 8:51a |
|
| 8:51a |
Both wings: DEI
This book review is a resume of a book about the ideological intolerance of the American
left in recent years, by a reporter who formerly participated in that but
eventually stopped complying.
I have not read the book itself — only the review.
|
| 8:51a |
|
| 8:51a |
|
| 8:51a |
USPS protected by senators
DeJoy told senators
he will not make drastic changes
to mail delivery this year.
If that means what it sounds like, it could mean he will not undermine the effectiveness
of vote by mail. I would not trust his word, though.
|
| 8:51a |
Israeli-Palestinian peace process
Salman Rushdie: *Although he has “argued for a Palestinian state for most of my life
— since the 1980s, probably &mdash right now, if there was a Palestinian state, it
would be run by HAMAS, and that would make it a
Taliban-like
state, and it would be a client state of Iran."* He finds it strange that some
progressive students support such a thing.
To me, it is disappointing but understandable — they are yielding to the tendency to
oversimplify situations into "side A vs side B". If you think about the Gaza war in terms
of "pro-Israel" vs "pro-Palestine", then your condemnation of Israel's bombardment and
tends to lead you into supporting Israel's enemy, HAMAS.
Therefore I am firmly pro-Israel and firmly pro-Palestine.
*Can the Israeli-Palestinian
peace
movement rebuild after 7 October?*
Let's not lose sight of
where we want to end up.
|
| 2:50p |
|