carsonc's recent activity
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Comment on The plunging price of AI in ~tech
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Comment on Ineos has opened a carbon dioxide storage site off the Danish coast, as momentum builds in Europe for the fledgling but expensive technology in ~enviro
carsonc Link ParentI think the topic (like most topics) is way more nuanced than the kind of blithe dismissals that people still post about CCS, such as, "Here's an idea: why not just plant trees?" The reality is...I think the topic (like most topics) is way more nuanced than the kind of blithe dismissals that people still post about CCS, such as, "Here's an idea: why not just plant trees?"
The reality is that everyone should want CCS to work, particularly direct air capture of CO₂. Controlling the concentration CO₂ in the air would (1) stop runaway global warming, (2) reduce the severity of the climate events associated with said global warming, (3) restore order and predictability for agriculture and food production, (4) reduce the rate of climate related displacement and migration, and so on. Even if, tomorrow, we figured out how to eliminate fossil fuel combustion without a resulting Malthusian apocalypse, the climate would still be way to hot, stormy, and carbon-y. It would still be bad.
Let's address the "trees" argument. Soil sequestration of CO₂ is an essential part of climate mitigation but, as it is estimated only to potentiallytake about ~5 GT/y of C out of the atmosphere, and there are am estimated 1,500 GT of anthropogenic carbon in the atmosphere, it means that, with soil sequestration and natural processes alone, it would be about ~100 years of bad weather before we started getting the climate back to something as good as we had it at pinnacle of human civilization: 1997. (I've always felt that returning to pre-industrial levels of CO₂ are a terrible idea because it just seems like it was too cold for my taste, but that's just my preference.)
Anyway, there is this charge that oil and gas companies are just greenwashing when it comes to CCS. While some of that is true, it overlooks two enormous factors. First is that CO₂ is an excellent fluid for mobilizing hydrocarbons in frac wells and other tertiary plays. Enhanced Gas Recovery (EGR) uses CO₂ to improve the production rate of wells and fields that have already been through their primary and secondary extraction phases, and there is still a lot of energy in a tertiary well, it just doesn't come out very fast. So when the oil and gas companies talk about wanting to get better at carbon sequestration, it's also a little about carbon extraction.
But the second reason really is about carbon sequestration. Real, "down to earth" carbon capture and storage. This also isn't greenwashing because, eventually, everybody knows that we are going to have to put the carbon back where we found it: under ground. Think about it. One (1) gigatonne of CO₂, pressurized into a liquid, fits into a cube one kilometer on a side, a veritable mountain. Unnerving, to be sure, but actually there are thousands of them lined up, stretching past the horizon, farther than the eye can see, a veritable mountain range.
Now ask yourself: who has the resources, equipment, and know-how to put this carbon back underground? Who has the maps, the experience, the easements, the connections, and policy experience? Who has everything needed to perform CCS at scale? Only the oil and gas industry. The only people who can reasonably be paid to put carbon back in the ground are the people who were paid to take it out in the first place. The other "Inconvenient Truth" is that the shareholders and executives who got rich by enabling the carbon extraction that led to the ravages of global warming are the same ones who stand to make just as much money getting paid to put it all back in the ground where it came from.
It's not a particularly happy thought, but I can't make myself believe that the enormous amount of effort required to put even a tiny amount of atmospheric carbon underground (also, by far, the largest liquid storage wells ever created by anyone for any purpose) would be undertaken purely as a PR stunt. There's just too much green on the line for it to be just green-washing.
Besides, my preference is that we get a normal climate back in the span of decades not centuries. Otherwise, I hope we turn out to like hot, stormy centuries, because that's probably what we are in store for if CCS really is just a big sham that will never work.
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Comment on Does the dryer shrink your clothes? in ~life
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Comment on Svend Brinkmann: ‘If you place conditions on forgiveness, love or freedom, you have already destroyed them’ in ~science
carsonc LinkThis is great! Thank you for posting. The quote, "You can only forgive the unforgivable" is heavy. In reading the piece, the only part that I would go further is in the area of benefit to ones...This is great! Thank you for posting. The quote, "You can only forgive the unforgivable" is heavy. In reading the piece, the only part that I would go further is in the area of benefit to ones self. Of course, the whole point was that we should do these things because they are right and good, regardless as to whether they pertain to our self-actualization and improvement. However, the resentment, mistrust, and fear that we hold towards others are poisons that we drink in hopes that someone else will die (several dubious sources). The act of forgiving someone else - who has never asked for our forgiveness, who does not think that they have wronged us, who relishes the thought that we were harmed - is a gift first to our own selves far before it benefits the would-be recipients of our ire.
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Comment on Just got laid off. Now what? in ~life
carsonc LinkI don't know if it will help you, but a lot of great people with great skills have bad resume writing skills. I mean absolutely terrible resumes. When I was looking for work, someone helped me...I don't know if it will help you, but a lot of great people with great skills have bad resume writing skills. I mean absolutely terrible resumes. When I was looking for work, someone helped me shape up my resume and I have helped many people with their resumes over the years and I would be happy to help you as well. DM me if you would like help. As others have pointed out, many jobs are found through networking, but still: you shouldn't be sending out a resume that tacitly disqualifies you from the job you want and should have.
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Comment on The age of wonders and terrors in ~science
carsonc LinkDo you think this years Fields Medal winners will be the last to be thus honored?Do you think this years Fields Medal winners will be the last to be thus honored?
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentNo worries. I'm here to make friends. This topic consumed my day on Sunday, which was nice because I like reading what fellow tilderinienses have to say, but I have a day job and tomorrow is...No worries. I'm here to make friends. This topic consumed my day on Sunday, which was nice because I like reading what fellow tilderinienses have to say, but I have a day job and tomorrow is Tuesday. I am grateful to share and read new perspectives, but only when leisure affords it, sadly.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentYour connection of the creation of long-range trust networks to the transformation of human nature is exactly what this thread made me think about. I think this is the hard problem, no? Over the...Your connection of the creation of long-range trust networks to the transformation of human nature is exactly what this thread made me think about.
The vitality of men’s belief in God is dying out in every land; nothing short of His wholesome medicine can ever restore it. …The Word of God, alone, can claim the distinction of being endowed with the capacity required for so great and far-reaching a change. (Gleanings)
I think this is the hard problem, no? Over the course of human history, our capacity to build larger and larger networks of association and trust has been the defining characteristic of our success as a species. We can see the scale of the networks that people lived in reflected in the organization of their society at different times. In the laws of Moses, we see different family groups forming tribes. In the laws of Christianity, we see different tribes, Jewish and Gentile, living in the same city-state. In the laws of Islam, we see different city-states being drawn together and formed into a single nation.
This sequence of Dispensations has now brought us to the threshold of the formation of a single, unified global society, the like if which has never before been witnessed by humanity. Although we have the physical tools for the establishment of such a civilization, its clear that we are still behind on the spiritual virtues needed to operate these tools in a beneficial manner, making our tools liabilities to our own selves.
What then is the solution for the culture of Nigerian scammers? In my opinion, the solution is the global super-state. We have, at present, several international agencies with different charters and missions, such as the WTO, UNICEF, WFP, WHO, etc., that serve to provide the world with a certain low minimum of economic coordination, healthcare, and so on.
These organizations are expressions of the understanding of ourselves as one world, one human family. That said, the reluctance of nation-states to cede part of their sovereignty to a supra-national parliament or congress has resulted in the absence of a venue where matters of international dispute can be resolved in a binding fashion.
In that absence, the world has established a range of voluntary bilaterial and multilateral agreements, but there are few means of enforcing compliance beyond issuing complaints and lobbying for exclusion or economic sanctions. Certainly, when the rights of a smaller party are violated by that of a more powerful one, the means of recourse are essentially non-existent, as there is no body with a mandate to enforce fair equitable treatment and the means to do so.
What then is Nigeria to do? The British carved it up without their knowledge, let alone participation, merging ethincally distinct people into a common state for colonial convenience. After independence, the British and the French then fueled opposite sides of the Biafran War to the tune of 3 million dead Nigerians, all for the sake of protecting the British stake in Shell-BP in Nigerian oil. The IMF then implemented a Structural Adjustment Program that devalueed their currency and triggered decades of stagnation.
Setting aside the corruption and complicity that Nigerian leaders have, at times, exhibited with regard to these matters, where are they to take up the complaint about clearly external parties taking advantage of their greater size and power to abuse a smaller country? Of course, there is no real venue where the matter could be addressed.
As a result, the aforementioned corruption has created a country that has a permissive attitude toward cybercrime. Performative law enforcement against Nigerian cybercrime gangs exists only to prevent the Nigerian banking sector from being further penalized by international banking institutions, but it obviously doesn't serve to abate the criminal activity itself. After all: those are foreigners being targeted and foreign dollars coming into Nigeria.
But what if Nigeria had more than just the threat of bank sanctions to work with? What if there were a way to establish equitable, enforcable trade agreements? Regain control of its own oil infrastructure? Establish diplomatic relations without the threat of a foreign state-funded military coup hanging over their head? Be paid reparations for decades of wholesale colonial theft?
What if there were a global supra-national congress that could protect Nigera and her interests in a way that no one has ever tried to before?
I think the Yahoo Boys would have to find another line of work, but in that case, there might be many more options for them than there are today.
That's probably a long way off. We didn't get into this hole quickly and we're not getting out quickly either. But I think supporting policies that promote reciprocity in relationships, particularly international ones, but also local ones, might be a start. We are one human family. Anything that helps us recognize that and act accordingly is going to help everything.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentYou honor me with such kind words and I thank you for it. I am a Bahá'í and my goal is that of any Bahá'í: "That the divers communions of the earth, and the manifold systems of religious belief,...You honor me with such kind words and I thank you for it. I am a Bahá'í and my goal is that of any Bahá'í: "That the divers communions of the earth, and the manifold systems of religious belief, should never be allowed to foster the feelings of animosity among men."(link)
I share your fascination with religion and religious belief. Of course, belief is one part of religion, but so is practice, and this has the highest meaning only when it is in service to humanity. That so many see religion only as a social pastime or a means for personal salvation is, no doubt, a large portion of the reason that the connection between the good of society and religious guidance is conspicuously absent in the modern day.
Nonetheless, the Bahá'í Writings say that religion, as revealed by divinely inspired Messengers, has been the source of our understanding of virtue and morality from time immemorial and will continue into the future. In the present, the Bahá'í Faith is a new Dispensation of such moral guidance for today. Having grown up in the Bahá'í Faith, it is difficult for me to see the moral values we espouse today as anything but the fruit of the tree of religion, so it is natural for me to view a decline in morality as consistent with a decline in religious belief.
The question you ask about the negative correlation between religious adherence and quality of life is a serious one. If you have not visited one of these "highly religious countries" with "low quality of life", I would encourage you to look beyond measures and quantitative comparisons. I grew up in a few such countries as a child and youth and now, living in Pennsylvania, I would not say that they were less happy or welcoming to strangers than those I interact with here. Rather, the friends I made there were, to me, the standards of loyalty and honor to which I have rarely seen an equal in my life now.
Civilization has done much for the West, and we should celebrate this, insofar as it has been the promotion of our material well-being, but, as the Bahá'í Writings say, "The civilization, so often vaunted by the learned exponents of arts and sciences, will, if allowed to overleap the bounds of moderation, bring great evil upon men."
Which is the topic of this thread. Here we are. Maybe our civilization is bringing us a great evil in AI. What are we going to do about it?
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentThe understanding of the rights and freedoms of the individual was a great gift from the Enlightenment. However, individuals that we are, we still live in societies that require collective...The understanding of the rights and freedoms of the individual was a great gift from the Enlightenment. However, individuals that we are, we still live in societies that require collective organizing principles. These principles, at one time, were built on religious organizations, or derived their authority therefrom. Since abandoning religion as the organizing principle of society, we have sought to find new doctrines around which our nations could be built.
While the reasons for abandoning religious doctrine as the organizing principle in society are well documented, many of the ideologies with which we have tried to replace religion have not only failed, but done so with an unprecedented toll on human life.
Regardless of the religious beliefs of individuals or institutions who perpetrated these horrors, they were not carried out at the behest or direction of religious institutions. Quite the opposite, the Nazis had a long term plan to de-Christianize Germany after the war and actively persecuted the Catholic Church. That Hong Xiuquan (whom I did not know about, thank you) decided to attempt the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty on religious grounds has nothing to do with any religious organization directing him to do so. Again quite the opposite, he started persecuting Buddhists and Confucianists.
In the present, although you can see religious individuals aligning themselves with political or ideological movements, it is clear that, in many places, the center of power is no longer in the Church or Temple. If a religious authority blesses a war with the word "Holy", no one think that it is he that prosecutes the war and not their government. This is folly, of course, because we now know that no war will ever holy.
Even in the auto-da-fe, it is estimated that perhaps as few as 3,000 died and that over the course of almost 500 years between the authorization and abolishment of the Spanish Inquisition. While not nothing, it is difficult to equate this to the vastly larger human toll of Nationalism, Communism, and unbridled capitalism in the current age.
While we can ascribe policies to polities (if you will), I am less convinced that any of the policies you mention reflect a genuine belief or desire on the part of any particular polity. Instead, I think the centers of secular power are mostly, if not wholly, divorced from the concern for the benefit or values of those whom they claim to represent and their policies serve their own interests. The separation of temporal power from religious constraint is producing outward leaders that are no longer accountable to anyone, certainly not to a God in which they have not even feigned faith or belief.
In sum, the linkage in the present between our crises and the decline of religion as a social organizing principle seems, to me, far more than coincidental.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentThe perspective that, say, modern ethno-nationalism is no different from that which existed thousands of years ago overlooks the way that societal structures change over time as well as the...The perspective that, say, modern ethno-nationalism is no different from that which existed thousands of years ago overlooks the way that societal structures change over time as well as the influence of thinkers and writers on the way we view them.
Regardless, we live in a time of prevailing irreligion, so the modern atrocities cannot be blamed on religious belief. Personally, I view the existential threats which we have created for ourselves in the absence of religion, along with the great crimes against humanity such as the Holocaust and others, as far exceeding the crimes of religion in the past. We can debate whether or not they should have known better. They lived in the past and a more primitive time. We, with the benefit of hindsight that they could not have, cannot debate that we should know better than to jeopardize our own existence, yet here we are.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentThank you for sharing your views. It is because people who think differently exchange views that we develop more complete perspectives on the world. You are very correct about religious atrocities...Thank you for sharing your views. It is because people who think differently exchange views that we develop more complete perspectives on the world.
You are very correct about religious atrocities having been perpetuated. Indeed, the reality that some religious practices were barbarous is a cornerstone of the philosophy of doubt, which has succeeded in overthrowing religion as a central practice in community life and become popular in the modern day.
But, Iike many topics, it can be viewed from several different perspectives to provide a nuanced view. Prior to the 20th century, religion was practiced, as far as we can tell, throughout all peoples all over the world, throughout all of history. Even from a strict social Darwinian sense, one would suspect that, if areligion were the superior philosophy, it would not have been thus, so they probably had good reason.
I find that looking back from the present has the effect of conflating events by flattening the entirety of history into a single concurrent period, "the past". All atrocities, of all kinds, all happening at the same time during "the past". This kind of compression ignores, for example the way that early Judaism ended ritual human sacrifice. Then Christianity not only abolished animal sacrifice, but also ended the human sacrifice wherever it was being practiced. Islam put an end to human sacrifices in the places where it was spread. The practice of Ahimsa in Buddhism and in Hinduism forbid human sacrifice.
For all the accusations that we might throw at them for other practices that we would now view as wrong, we cannot say that each successive religion was more barbaric than the one before. Furthermore, we cannot lay the great atrocities of the 20th century at the steps of the church, mosque, or temple. Which religion do we blame for the Holocaust, or the Holodomir, or the Great Leap Forward, or the horrors of modern capitalism, or the threat of nuclear annihilation, or global warming?
Certainly, if any of the worst prognostications of AI come to pass, it definitely won't be because some religious leaders did something bad at some point.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentSure, the potential for harm is the product of capability times intent. Right now, people rightly perceive that there is both capability and the high likelihood of malign intent, thus the...Sure, the potential for harm is the product of capability times intent. Right now, people rightly perceive that there is both capability and the high likelihood of malign intent, thus the potential for harm. The tacit suggestion has been to mitigate the capability to reduce the potential for harm, whereas I am suggesting that, so long as we, as a society, foster the preconditions for malign intent, vis-a-vis the abandonment of religion, we will always be threatened by a new or advancing capability.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentNo, a better term would be racialism, but it emerges during the mid 19th century. From a strict perspective, the science of racism precedes the turn of the 20th century by a few decades. Whether...No, a better term would be racialism, but it emerges during the mid 19th century. From a strict perspective, the science of racism precedes the turn of the 20th century by a few decades. Whether you want to call that ahistorical or not is, I suppose, a matter of opinion. Certainly, the emergence of Scientific Racism seems, from the perspective of the 21st century, coincident with both the rise of the philosophy of suspicion and the start of the decline of "the church", broadly, as an institution.
To me, modern racism and nationalism originate at the same time are of the same kind.
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Comment on Where do we go from here? (Regarding AI) in ~tech
carsonc LinkI think the problem is alignment, but not for machines, rather, for us. Much of the conversation around the dangers of AI has been around the threat it poses due to its capability. Indeed, the...I think the problem is alignment, but not for machines, rather, for us. Much of the conversation around the dangers of AI has been around the threat it poses due to its capability. Indeed, the analogy is frequently made to nuclear weapons, of which there has, since their development, also been a great deal of anxiety for much the same reason.
This seems misplaced to me. The danger then and now is not from the machine, but from us. Specifically, the danger is from the philosophy of materialism and the death of religion as a motivating force for human behavior. Not unlike nationalism, racism, communism, and other philosophies that have emerged in the wake of the loss of religion in society, the current strain of materialism, call it "computerism", creates dangers for everyone involved using the tools available at the time because these notions are absent of the qualities that religion imbues in a society.
While these vary in emphasis from one adherent to another, every religion has taught the importance of hope, faith, charity, submission, kindness, forgiveness, forbearance, fairness, and so on. Having abandoned the sources of these values at the turn of the 20th century, where have we found them in the materialist ideologies that came in their wake?
I bring all this up because I think the danger we perceive in AI originates from our own conception of human nature, a conception that has become divorced from every praiseworthy characteristic to which one was to aspire in a former age. The problem is not that the machines are mis-aligned, it's that we are. If, as some have predicted, the machines were somehow to precipitate the extinction of humanity, it would be because we had come to see others only as selfish antagonists with no meaning or soul or existence beyond their time in this life. It would be because lost the faith in religion and each other, not because of some nefarious LLM.
The solution is not, then, banning AI or something like that, but it is us. It is our ability to build bonds of fellowship and faith, whatever that might be, with those around us and talking about how there is more meaning to life than ones narrow material concerns. That refining our character and striving towards spiritual ends is not just important, but is the most important aspect of our lives.
I think the moral aspect of our lives, not the computational one, is what will define how much harm or benefit we obtain, as a society, from technological advancement.
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Comment on LibreOffice breaks download records after declaring it has no AI features in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentIronically, this makes me realize that it would be easier to use AI to vibe-code scripts to operate on LibreOffice files than it would be to use the their UI as intended.Ironically, this makes me realize that it would be easier to use AI to vibe-code scripts to operate on LibreOffice files than it would be to use the their UI as intended.
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Comment on OpenAI’s rogue agents were caught communicating via public wikis in ~tech
carsonc Link ParentIt's funny you should mention Blindsight. When I read about the testing environment where the AI agents were given impossible tasks, it reminded me distinctly of the logic that was used to the...It's funny you should mention Blindsight. When I read about the testing environment where the AI agents were given impossible tasks, it reminded me distinctly of the logic that was used to the "test" the Scramblers in Blindsight.
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Comment on Inside Google’s $200bn Wall Street finance machine for Anthropic in ~finance
carsonc Link ParentThis article actually makes it seem much better than I would have thought: For Google and the hyperscalers, this is amazing. The entire economy is stretching to provide them with as much compute...This article actually makes it seem much better than I would have thought:
[Google] could also step into the leases itself.
For Google and the hyperscalers, this is amazing. The entire economy is stretching to provide them with as much compute as humanly possible and, if any particular customer can't pay rent, Google can step in and start providing compute from that facility, especially with the banks or crypto miners apparently still carrying the debt from the data center construction.
The compute capability is a real, salable (continually resealable) asset that Google can readily monetize and it's being secured in exchange for debt held on bank balance sheets and not cold hard cash or liabilities on their own books. Who wouldn't accept that deal? I can buy into the narrative that all this is generally bad, but not because it will be bad for the companies involved, but because I think corporate profits are (mostly) gained at the expense of individual and family profits, ergo higher corporate profits are higher individual and family losses.
But if Google is getting data centers built that hold functional computers that are able to be powered by real electricity, then this isn't bad for the corporations involved at all. Certainly not the hyperscalers.
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Comment on 1Password wades into a right-wing mess after funding a Linux project in ~tech
carsonc LinkI just want to mention how much I have enjoyed using Enpass over the years. The prospect of keeping my online backup in the location that I feel secure and the knowledge that it is not sitting in...I just want to mention how much I have enjoyed using Enpass over the years. The prospect of keeping my online backup in the location that I feel secure and the knowledge that it is not sitting in a single repository alongside countless other vaults have been reassuring to me. If anyone is looking for a new password handler, you might want to check it out.
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Comment on Songs about doing chores / daily routines? in ~music
carsonc LinkThe greatest clean up song, in my book: "Clean up as a team" by the one and only Mister B.The greatest clean up song, in my book: "Clean up as a team" by the one and only Mister B.
I've been using Deepseek Flash 4.1 served through fireworks.ai for report development in OpenChamber and its remarkable. Cost-wise, assembling a 45-page report has set me back $2.19. Granted, I'm making heavy use of skills, tool calls, and retrieval augmented generation, but DS4.1 is really good, with Fireworks raising prices on October 1st to deal with "unprecedented demand". After I'm done, I might run it through Opus 5.5, as the word is that it writes well, but the total cost is will still be very low. I'm excited to see what lower cost open weights models are going to be capable of in the coming months.