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btaf45 , in ‘Judeo-Christian’ roots will ensure U.S. military AI is used ethically, general says

So humans are going to program artificial intelligence with human superstitions? Hahahahahaha. How long before the AI starts assuming it is Yahweh?

kromem ,

Probably not too long, particularly given that one of the competing early sects of Christianity had Jesus claiming that we’re in a non-physical copy of an earlier now dead world from within the future, established by a creator brought into existence by an original spontaneously existing humanity in whose images it and us were made.

This also happened to be the sect that was endorsing the idea matter was made up of indivisible parts, and were interpreting the mustard seed and sower parables within the context of Lucretius’s “seeds of things.” They claimed the proof was in the study of motion and rest, and that the ability to observe one of these indivisible points would only be possible in the non-physical.

So in a modern age where a popular belief is that we’re in a simulation of an evolved world from some future point in its time, where we are in the process of bringing forth an intelligence likely capable of building non-physical copies (i.e. digital twins) of our world and us, and where at low fidelity the world which otherwise behaves like it is continuous suddenly behaves like it is discrete when interacted with - much like how virtual worlds we build today convert from continuous world seed functions to discrete voxels to track interactions and changes - it is quite possible that an AI reviewing such texts in that context might end up thinking itself to be an approximate copy of the (re)creator of our own world.

gAlienLifeform , in [Texas Tribune] Justice Department threatens Texas with legal action over floating barrier in Rio Grande
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

And, in a development that should come as zero surprise to anyone who hasn’t been in a coma for like a decade, Texas immediately threw this sternly worded letter back in DOJ’s face and kept on doing exactly as they have been doing.

Can we just skip to filing the lawsuits the next time Abbot or DeSantis or whichever fascist in this country feels like pulling a campaign stunt with taxpayer dollars?

MasterObee , in ‘Immensely Invisible:’ Women Fighting ICE’s Inaction on Sexual Abuses

Ice is under the DHS which is part of the ‘fourth branch’ of government. These bloated organizations actively fight against peoples civil rights and most of them should be dismantled and defunded. They’re essentially able to get funding and make their own rules thanks to the Chevron Deference, luckily the SC is reviewing that court case and will hopefully overturn it.

This would cause legislators to actually legislate, and ensure that their policies are what any part of the executive branch is able to enforce, nothing more. Overturning the Chevron Deference is necessary for proper checks and balances between our branches of government

MasterObee , in Texas charges prisoners 50% more for water as heat wave continues

They say that prisoners have access to tap water, but the prisoners say that tap water is crap.

This could all be solved by, ya know, having potable tap water by fixing some of our shit infrastructure.

Our treatment of prisoners is a disgrace.

EhList ,
@EhList@lemmy.world avatar

The infrastructure of Texas isn’t great.

CmdrShepard ,

Texans would be so mad at your right now if their power worked and they could get online to read this.

_cerpin_taxt_ ,

…and knew how to read.

ezchili , in Aussie Bus Driver Fed Up with 'Misbehavior' Dumps 18 Kids on Side of the Road

This is like if cops couldn’t handle misbehaved individuals, … - oh

BURN , in Aussie Bus Driver Fed Up with 'Misbehavior' Dumps 18 Kids on Side of the Road

I can’t imagine being a bus driver. 15 years ago when I was riding the bus regularly we were shits, but we knew where the limit was. Kids now don’t seem to know where to stop.

SeaJ ,

My dad is one currently. He actually likes it. Although he has had COVID three times because of it.

ChickenLadyLovesLife ,

It’s a pretty sweet job honestly. Pay is good and it includes health insurance and a small pension, and you get the middle of the day to yourself. All you have to do is drive a big yellow Tonka truck around and put up with the occasional obnoxious middle-schooler.

SeaJ ,

Sadly, yes he is doing it for the insurance. He is retired but not yet 65.

ChickenLadyLovesLife ,

I’m a school bus driver. I tried to enforce the mask-wearing rules towards the end of COVID and some of the kids literally threatened to kill me with a plastic bag over my head or with guns they said they would get from their dads. Nothing was done despite this all being video recorded. A few months later the same kids threw goldfish (the crackers, not the actual fish) at me and got banned from the bus for a week. Go figure.

My only real problem was with their choice of snack food. If they’d thrown white chocolate Kit-Kats at me I would have just picked them up and said nothing about it.

BURN ,

You illustrate my point perfectly.

Y’all are saints for putting up with those little shitheads. It really sucks that the schools won’t do anything about threats of violence either, and that’s something I’ve heard from teachers too.

Covid really fucked this generation up. I was lucky enough to be well into college by the time it hit. With these kids their formative years were entirely online

Royal_Bitch_Pudding ,

Covid simply accelerated what was already happening

SeaJ , in Alabama woman ‘fired’ from spa after alleged kidnapping

Behind the Bastards just did a couple really good episodes on the increase in kidnapping hysteria.

Mereo , in Texas charges prisoners 50% more for water as heat wave continues

The price of bottled water went up 50% in prison commissaries across Texas last month. The controversial move has two state agencies pointing the finger at each other as inmates struggle to endure an entrenched and deadly heatwave in facilities without air conditioning. The state raised the price from $4.80 per case (24 bottles) to $7.20 per case on June 27. Commissary vendor Royal Pacific Tea Company requested to raise the prices in March even though it contract was incomplete. The prices were negotiated by the state comptroller’s office and appear to be approved by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

“I actually begged him not to [drink the tap water],” said Amy Aguilar, whose loved one is at TDCJ’s Ferguson Unit. Her significant other — whose name she asked TPR to not use — has described the water as “rancid” smelling. And she said she was concerned about the quality. “Do you smell the sewer?” Aguilar said she asked him, “And he goes, ‘you kind of just smell it all. It’s just this big ole rich mix of rancid smell.’ ” Water quality in prisons nationwide have been characterized as very low, due to the age of the facilities and the often remote locations.

Of course, for them, prisoners are subhumans, sigh.

DrPop , (edited )

Royal Pacific tea company sounds like slave traders. No Surprise they are taking advantage of the situation.

gAlienLifeform OP ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

Yeah, it’s been a while since I’ve read any British history but let’s just say this is far from the first time an organization with the words “Royal” and “Tea Company” in their name made a pile of money from the suffering of captive people

XbSuper , in Texas charges prisoners 50% more for water as heat wave continues

They have to pay for water?

gAlienLifeform OP , (edited )
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

This is about bottled water at the commissary, but

Because of the ongoing heatwave TDCJ guards pass out glasses of cold water each day, and TDCJ has pointed out the men have access to tap water. But many current and former inmates have expressed concern about the water quality of the aging prisons — many older then 50 years.

“I would never drink the water at the tap,” said Don Aldaco, a recently paroled man who spent 24 years in various TDCJ facilities. “I would always get a piece of a sheet and I would tie it on the actual spigot, like a filter. I would have to change it like every other day because of all the rust and all the crud coming out.

Other current inmates commented on the smell of tap water in specific facilities resembling sewage. A TDCJ spokeswoman called the claim false.

“I actually begged him not to [drink the tap water],” said Amy Aguilar, whose loved one is at TDCJ’s Ferguson Unit. Her significant other — whose name she asked TPR to not use — has described the water as “rancid” smelling. And she said she was concerned about the quality.

“Do you smell the sewer?” Aguilar said she asked him, “And he goes, ‘you kind of just smell it all. It’s just this big ole rich mix of rancid smell.’ ”

Water quality in prisons nationwide have been characterized as very low, due to the age of the facilities and the often remote locations.

e; this is over a decade old now, but this bit from a documentary where they check out a convention for prison vendors gives you an idea of how much money’s going on behind this whole evil system

Chainweasel , in Tennessee toughens voting rules for people with felony convictions

At least the residents that participated in the January 6th insurrection won’t be able to vote in 2024 then.

VanillaGorilla , in Texas charges prisoners 50% more for water as heat wave continues

Charges for water?

Do they disclose the cleaning fee after checkout or right in the beginning? What about the convenience fee?

Are Texas prisons run by Ticketmaster?

DoctorTYVM ,

Americans have a punishment boner when it comes to the legal system. They don’t want to prevent crime or improve society. They want the bad people to suffer.

md5crypto ,

Ted Bundy wished he was being ‘punished’ by this system instead of fried.

Misconduct ,

Ah yes. It’s better than being dead. What a low bar…

gAlienLifeform OP ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

I mean, with how our system works I’d bet this company (Commissary vendor Royal Pacific Tea Company) and TM share some investors at least, but this sort of thing is not unique to Texas prisons or limited to commissary fees.

BigMcLargeHuge ,
@BigMcLargeHuge@mstdn.social avatar

@VanillaGorilla @gAlienLifeform

Texas prisons are run by someone even worse than Ticketmaster.

They are run by Texas.

baronvonj ,
@baronvonj@lemmy.world avatar

Well, Texas loves private prisons, so many aren’t run by the state. This is another disgusting example of how libertarians get it wrong.

BigMcLargeHuge , (edited )
@BigMcLargeHuge@mstdn.social avatar

@baronvonj

Edit:
You know.. never mind. I don't care what a well-informed, saint of a person, like you thinks.

gAlienLifeform OP ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

Y’know, you had a bit of a point with your first comment, and I can definitely sympathize with getting frustrated when you’re trying to talk about serious issues and it feels like people aren’t listening to you (and I don’t know the history you’ve had in this community with that), but I don’t think you’re doing your ideas any favors with this

BigMcLargeHuge ,
@BigMcLargeHuge@mstdn.social avatar

@gAlienLifeform

This was me recognizing that I was arguing with someone that had already decided what the answer was.

FFS, he already KNOWS I'm a libertarian, regardless of what I actually am.

Further talk would be a waste of my time. While I'm no one important, my time is important to me.

Source: I've been on the "internet" since the compu-serve cb chat days. The people don't change, just the access method.

Thekingoflorda ,
@Thekingoflorda@lemmy.world avatar

Very cool, but please refrain from personally attacking people in this community. Thank you (:

BigMcLargeHuge ,
@BigMcLargeHuge@mstdn.social avatar

@Thekingoflorda

I edited it, so everyone thinks I believe him to be a swell guy.

Thekingoflorda ,
@Thekingoflorda@lemmy.world avatar

I already deleted the message I was referring to (;

Oh, and you don’t have to @ people for them to get a notification (:

gAlienLifeform OP ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

Not on Lemmy anyway, but I think this commenter is coming from Mastodon and idk how that works

baronvonj , (edited )
@baronvonj@lemmy.world avatar

FFS, he already KNOWS I’m a libertarian, regardless of what I actually am.

Not sure how you got that I was calling you a libertarian. I was agreeing with you that Texas sucks at prisons. And adding context that we suck at it by being somewhat libertarian about it by replacing what should be a public service with for-profit privatization.

@BigMcLargeHuge

gAlienLifeform OP , (edited )
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

I’m definitely no libertarian, but I do have one quibble with this - entirely private prisons are actually very little of the prison space in the United States. However, government run prisons do hundreds of millions of dollars in business with private vendors for things like the commissary and healthcare and phones &c., and all those businesses gouge taxpayers and inmates for substandard goods and services, because they’re able to negotiate sweetheart contracts with government bureaucrats who don’t give a shit and get lobbied like crazy (vendor salesperson: “Oh, your annual salary is only what? Ha, I’ve gotten commission checks higher than that! Let me get the tab for our lunch today.”).

So it’s a bit complicated but at the end of the day underfunding government services and throwing all of our responsibilities for things like taking care of our prisoners to for-profit companies is what’s caused all of this, so the solutions to these problems aren’t going to be coming out of a libertarian playbook imo.

baronvonj ,
@baronvonj@lemmy.world avatar

I will admit that Texas has a lower percentage of private prisons than I thought, but I think any for-profit privatization of prisons is bad.

underfunding government services and throwing all of our responsibilities for things like taking care of our prisoners to for-profit companies is what’s caused all of this

💯

so the solutions to these problems aren’t going to be coming out of a libertarian playbook imo.

Exactly.

MrBakedBeansOnToast ,

FYI: the „et“ in etc. is Latin for „and“ so it’s redundant to say “and etc.”.

gAlienLifeform OP ,
@gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world avatar

Oh yeah, I think I knew that at one point and then forgot it, thank you for reminding me

Shardikprime ,

Worst, Air bnb

chronicledmonocle , in ‘There’s nothing American about promoting violence’: country star Jason Aldean criticised for anti-protest song

Yeah because the Revolutionary War was so peaceful.

chronicledmonocle , in ‘There’s nothing American about promoting violence’: country star Jason Aldean criticised for anti-protest song

Yeah because the Revolutionary War was so peaceful.

erre , in Twitter changes logo to X in corporate rebranding
@erre@lemmy.world avatar

Can’t read because of paywall. Alternative: www.npr.org/2023/…/elon-musk-twitter-logo-bird-x

CriticalMiss , in Blinken says Ukraine has taken back 50% of territory that Russia seized

2022 line or 2014 line?

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