ignorabimus's recent activity

  1. Comment on [Columbia University president] Minouche Shafik: Universities must engage in serious soul searching on protests in ~life

    ignorabimus
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    Sorry, I know a lot of things should go in the politics megathread, but I thought this was interesting enough to warrant a seperate piece as a university leader posting a piece on the protests in...

    Sorry, I know a lot of things should go in the politics megathread, but I thought this was interesting enough to warrant a seperate piece as a university leader posting a piece on the protests in a mainstream newspaper it seems to be quite a significant step. Of course if it's not appropriate I would appreciate it if the moderators could close/lock/delete it and sorry for the hassle. I also know this is a controversial topic – I don't want to create unproductive hate, please engage charitably if at all :)

    This piece has a very PR-y feel (of course, given the pressure the university is under from legislators). I think the intereting parts are

    For me, the lesson is clear. If colleges and universities cannot better define the boundaries between free speech and discrimination, government will move to fill that gap, and in ways that do not necessarily protect academic freedom. Just as our predecessors fought for desegregation and the admission of women, we need to create an educational environment where we fight all forms of prejudice, including against Arabs, Jews and Muslims.

    Which seems to be a rebuke of US politicians for trying to intervene in higher education?

    And a part which seems to be pointing out that the protests follow in a long and legitimate history

    Second, what is the university’s role in the context of a major political crisis like the war in Gaza? There is a long history of political activism on campuses, which has contributed to many important examples of progress, such as opposition to the Vietnam war, the anti-apartheid struggle and the civil rights movement.

    5 votes

  5. Comment on Ireland can’t blame its anti-immigrant problem on Rishi Sunak – The sudden arrival of European-style populism in Irish politics is the result of thirteen years of government complacency in ~misc

    ignorabimus
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    I agree totally here, but also because of the impact on UK politics. I think there are two harms Boosts the conservative party and I don't really know much about Irish foreign policy positions but...

    I think tying the immigration increase here to the UK's small boats nonsense is also foolish.

    I agree totally here, but also because of the impact on UK politics. I think there are two harms

    1. Boosts the conservative party and I don't really know much about Irish foreign policy positions but my guess would be that a Labour government would be better for Ireland (not least because they don't have the emotional maturity of a 2 year old and probably wouldn't let David Frost loose on foreign policy decisions)
    2. A lot of people in the UK see exporting immigration problems to another country as "mission accomplished" more than a harm.

    So if I were an Irish government minister the one thing I would not do is make statements to the press which support the Tories and boost the white elephant Rwanda deal. Especially given that as you point out it's very unlikely to be the source of a lot of refugees.

    2 votes

  6. Comment on Ireland can’t blame its anti-immigrant problem on Rishi Sunak – The sudden arrival of European-style populism in Irish politics is the result of thirteen years of government complacency in ~misc

    ignorabimus
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    TL;DR

    TL;DR

    These incidents speak to a deeper existential anxiety in the Republic. The story of modern Irish history might be one of the underdog that managed, somehow, to emerge as a diplomatic superpower, as the Economist declared in 2020. But events of the past year have reversed Ireland’s exceptionalism. It may be rich and in possession of serious soft power. But it is also a country where citizens loot the inner city; chant that Ireland is full; and where the biggest party – Sinn Féin – was born of an ethno-nationalist project. Ireland has been forced into a realisation: in spite of its diplomatic successes, and its decade of rapid liberalisation, it has all the problems of a normal European country.

    The central mistake of Fine Gael’s 13-year tenure is simple. It spent so long carefully stage-managing Ireland’s international reputation that it was blind to the problems fomenting all around it. Now the party has stepped back from all the clever reputational manoeuvres – the border, the triumphant gay marriage and abortion referendums, the love affair with Joe Biden’s White House – only to realise that it has built its own death trap.

    3 votes

  10. Comment on Climate policy is working – double down on what’s succeeding instead of despairing over what’s not in ~enviro

    ignorabimus
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    China provides one of the best illustrations of how lower-cost technology can enable the rapid deployment of clean energy. According to the nonprofit Global Energy Monitor, China is on track to almost double its current wind and solar capacity by 2025 and thus meet its target of generating 1,200 gigawatts from clean energy five years ahead of schedule. Conversely, although the United States has had great success in directing new investment to domestic clean energy manufacturing since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, it has been slower to deploy renewable energy and encourage the production and purchase of electric vehicles, thanks to bureaucratic delays and weak supply chains as well as local opposition to new clean energy infrastructure.

    Crucially, governments must do more to raise climate financing for developing countries that have done little to create the crisis but already suffer some of its worst effects. The main objective at this year’s UN climate change conference in Baku, the Azerbaijani capital, will be setting a new goal for climate financing now that the $100 billion yearly target dating from 2015 has been achieved. Given that 18 times that figure will be required by 2030, governments will need to muster the creativity and determination to figure out how to unlock public and private sources of financing in practical ways.

    13 votes

  13. Comment on Ireland plans to send asylum seekers back to UK under emergency law in ~news

    ignorabimus
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    Will be interesting to see what happens here. The Irish government (whether intentionally or not) has given a massive boon to Rishi Sunak in making these public statements, given that one of the...

    Will be interesting to see what happens here. The Irish government (whether intentionally or not) has given a massive boon to Rishi Sunak in making these public statements, given that one of the primary criticisms of the Rwanda policy was that it would be an ineffective (and extremely expensive) deterrent. Plus I think a lot of people in the UK will actually see "exporting" the problem to Ireland as a good thing (and a useful threat to clobber the EU with).

    5 votes

  16. Comment on Germany’s robotic stores must rest on Sundays, too in ~news

    ignorabimus
    Link Parent
    I don't really see what the issue for worker's rights is when it comes to working on Sunday? There are lots of real issues I can think of (e.g. shift work, excessive working hours, overtime not...

    I don't really see what the issue for worker's rights is when it comes to working on Sunday? There are lots of real issues I can think of (e.g. shift work, excessive working hours, overtime not being properly compensated, etc) but "the bible says Sunday is a day of rest" doesn't really seem like a valid basis for the state to make policy.

    13 votes

  18. Comment on Complex systems science allows us to see new paths forward in ~science

    ignorabimus
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    I think this a great overview of a field and has a lot of useful principles. For example about failure events, it's essential to be aware that failure is not linearly independent – if one thing...

    I think this a great overview of a field and has a lot of useful principles.

    For example about failure events, it's essential to be aware that failure is not linearly independent – if one thing goes wrong (e.g. earthquake) it's very likely that this will cause knock-on failures (e.g. aftershocks).

    What’s more, once a rare but hugely significant ‘tail’ event takes place, this raises the probability of further tail events. We might call them second-order tail events; they include stock market gyrations after a big fall, and earthquake aftershocks. The initial probability of second-order tail events is so tiny it’s almost impossible to calculate – but once a first-order tail event occurs, the rules change, and the probability of a second-order tail event increases.

    One thing I've noticed is that people have a tendency to "overfit" from the previous thing which went wrong. For example lots of people thought Ukraine would fall to Russia immediately because Afghanistan fell immediately to the Taliban. The article proposes that we should instead focus on building general resilience to all kinds of failure, rather than the ones which seem most proximate.

    There are better ways to make consequential, society-wide decisions. As the mathematician John Allen Paulos remarked about complex systems: ‘Uncertainty is the only certainty there is. And knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security.’ Instead of prioritising outcomes based on the last bad thing that happened – applying laser focus to terrorism or inequality, or putting vast resources into healthcare – we might take inspiration from complex systems in nature and design processes that foster adaptability and robustness for a range of scenarios that could come to pass.

    3 votes