Generational Dynamics World View - Printable Version +- Generational Theory Forum: The Fourth Turning Forum: A message board discussing generations and the Strauss Howe generational theory (http://generational-theory.com/forum) +-- Forum: Fourth Turning Forums (http://generational-theory.com/forum/forum-1.html) +--- Forum: Theories Of History (http://generational-theory.com/forum/forum-7.html) +--- Thread: Generational Dynamics World View (/thread-51.html) Pages:
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RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-25-2019 ** 25-Oct-2019 World View: New beetle named after Greta Thunberg
Greta Thunberg, the Swedish teenage girl who has been going around the world declaring that we should all be ashamed of ourselves because we're inflicting climate change on her, now has a brand new honor. Scientist Dr Michael Darby was studying a newly-discovered species of beetle, and decided to name it "Nelloptodes greta" after Thunberg because he was "immensely impressed" by her environmental campaigning. Thunberg shares this honor with others. A scientist named an amphibian "Dermophis donaldtrumpi" after Donald Trump because it buries its head in the sand. And a German admirer of Adolf Hitler in 1933 named a blind cave beetle the "Anophthalmus hitleri." https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50182815 RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-25-2019 ** 25-Oct-2019 World View: Charles Barkley: Pence needs to shut the hell up Yesterday I posted a message about Mike Pence's speech harshly criticizing China's property theft and human rights record, such as its arrest of priests and other religious clerics, and its imprisonment and enslavement of millions of Muslim Uighurs in East Turkistan (Xinjiang Province). Pence also criticized the NBA for kowtowing to China's demands not to speak, saying, "In siding with the Chinese Communist Party and silencing free speech, the NBA is acting like a wholly owned subsidiary of the authoritarian regime." Former NBA star Charles Barkley responded as follows: Quote: "Vice President Pence needs to shut the hell up, Several commentators have noted the hyprocrisy that Barkley feels free to criticize Pence (and Trump) in the most hostile terms with impunity, but is demanding that no one be permitted to criticize China. https://sports.yahoo.com/charles-barkley-mike-pence-needs-to-shut-the-hell-up-on-nba-china-005426523.html RE: Generational Dynamics World View - Marypoza - 10-25-2019 (10-22-2019, 12:11 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: LOL, Xenakis to replying to posts made two months ago when there were over half a dozen posts made just yesterday and today. I know the subject matter of the Yesterday's posts made you uncomfortable because it refutes the notion of 330 million Americans all loving liberal democracy and hating all totalitarianism, but that just isn't true. A lot of us have come to like totalitarianism and want the creation of a nationalist military state. Hillary is a globalist who is hated by the majority of the citizenry. You boomers can't even run political primaries according to the normal processes because doing so would return a result contrary to globalism. Gabbard, Williamson, Yang and Bullock are far more representative of what average Joe six-pack Americans believe in than Hillary or warren. On the Right it is TRUMP, NOT Jeb Bush, Graham or the late Mccain; who is far more representative of what the average Joe six-pack wants. -- l think they are gonna try to ram Groper Joe down our throats myself RE: Generational Dynamics World View - David Horn - 10-25-2019 (10-25-2019, 01:32 PM)Marypoza Wrote: -- l think they are gonna try to ram Groper Joe down our throats myself I think the PTB think it's the right choice, and I also think they've lost control of the process. My bet: EW. If not her, then it's open season. 26-Oct-19 World View -- Mike Pence harshly criticizes China as US bans Chinese survei - John J. Xenakis - 10-25-2019 *** 26-Oct-19 World View -- Mike Pence harshly criticizes China as US bans Chinese surveillance equipment This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Growing Western hostility and suspicion towards China **** Nike ad in 2018, part of its laughable 'Social Justice Leadership' program, showing Colin Kaepernick saying, 'Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything. Just do it.' US vice president Mike Pence on Thursday delivered a speech harshly criticizing the entire list of CCP activities that the West considers to be criminal -- jailing Uighurs, jailing priests, destroying churches, IP theft, forced technology transfer, cyber-theft, South China Sea crimes, and dozens more. Pence also criticized the hypocrisy of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and Nike. Pence's speech comes shortly after the US banned Chinese surveillance companies. The speech triggered harsh replies from the NBA and China. Once upon a time not so long ago, everybody loved China. America saved China in both world wars. Americans considered China to be a strange and wonderful place after World War II, despite the brutal violence of the Communist dictator Mao Zedong. The Tiananmen Square massacre was considered an aberration, and trade disputes were rarely understood by the public. So China was invited to join the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, based on commitments that it would open up its economy to outsiders, and would follow all the WTO rules and international law. Western leaders believed that membership in the WTO would change China for the better, encourage it to become a valued member of the international community, and abandoning the hostile policies of the past. None of that happened. Instead, China used the WTO as a tool to make suckers out of Western nations, ignoring WTO rules and playing victim, but angrily insisting that Western nations obey all WTO rules. China always made it clear that WTO rules and international law apply to everyone else but not to China, and signed agreements apply to the other parties but not to China. Things seriously began to change with the rise of Xi Jinping in 2011. In 2013, the CCP issued "Document Number 9" which listed evil "anti-China forces," including the following. Some of these "evil" forces named in the document include democracy, human rights, civil society, neoliberalism, and a free press. The reason the CCP gives why all of these Western values are considered "evil" is because they are interpreted to be weapons undermining the authority of the CCP. These "evils" permeated every aspect of CCP policy under Xi. Specific hostile acts were all performed under this doctrine, including illegal activities in the South China Sea, violent crackdowns on Christians, Buddhists and Muslims, the arrest and enslavement of millions of Uighurs and Kazakhs, and crackdowns on free press and democracy movements in Hong Kong. This doctrine and these acts have steadily eroded the goodwill that people in the West have had for China. Increasing, Westerners view China with hostility and suspicion. One of the most dramatic signs of the growing hostility to China is that George Soros, who for decades has been an enormous admirer and supporter of the CCP, has now turned against it, because the Social Credit Score system is turning China into the worst police state in world history. **** **** Mike Pence harshly criticizes China as US bans Chinese surveillance equipment **** Pence's speech on Thursday focused on several of China's illegal practices: <QUOTE>"The Communist Party in China has arrested Christian pastors, banned the sale of Bibles, demolished churches, and imprisoned more than one million Muslim Uighurs. ... Last July, the director of the FBI told Congress that of his agency’s 1,000 active investigations into intellectual property theft, the majority involve China. American enterprises continue to lose hundreds of billions of dollars each year in intellectual property theft. ... And today, China’s Communist Party is building a surveillance state unlike anything the world has ever seen. Hundreds of millions of surveillance cameras stare down from every vantage point. Ethnic minorities must navigate arbitrary checkpoints where police demand blood samples, fingerprints, voice recordings, and multiple angle head shots, and even iris scans. And China is now exporting to countries in Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East the very same technological tools that it uses in its authoritarian regime: tools that it’s deployed in places like Xinjiang; tools that it’s deployed often with the help of American companies. And Beijing has also smashed the barriers between civilian and military technological domains — a doctrine that China calls “military-civilian fusion.” By law and presidential fiat, companies in China — whether private, state-owned, or foreign — must share their technologies with the Chinese military."<END QUOTE> China's massive buildout of surveillance equipment is reaching into every country of the world, as China collects information on billions of people, inside and outside China, which it puts into its huge big data database. There's a backlash growing against Chinese-made surveillance products on multiple levels. Surveillance cameras have been around for years, and few people were concerned, as long as the cameras were used in places like banks and busy intersections, and as long as nobody ever reviewed the video except a human being. Public alarm over the general surveillance issue has been increasing as the public has become aware that not humans but computers are increasing reviewing the video, using artificial artificial (AI) technology that provides facial recognition capabilities, matching faces up to records in databases, allowing the software to track any individual in real time. **** **** Backlash grows against Chinese surveillance and AI equipment **** This comes amid increasing global awareness that the China's military is using these same devices for surveillance in cities and countries around the world. This awareness was boosted by a shocking demonstration in August when a researcher was able to prove that millions of surveillance devices marketed by Dahua Technology, and installed around the world, contain a secret backdoor that can easily be hacked, and used for eavesdropping. That means that if you have one of these devices in your war room, board room, or bedroom, even when the audio is disabled, someone knowing the IP address of the device can access the device remotely and secretly listen in to conversations and sounds in that room. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZTza1BiahQ A Duhua spokesman was quoted as saying that the company "conducted an emergency investigation, and the preliminary results are that this vulnerability does not exist after refactoring—some end-of-life products may have security risks. We have a plan to repair the related products." Wow! That's nice! **** **** US bans doing business with Chinese surveillance and AI firms **** The Dept. of Commerce announcement blocked eight Chinese companies, and they can be divided roughly into two groups -- surveillance cameras that capture video and audio and transmit it to the central server over the internet, and artificial intelligence (AI) products that interpret the video and audio being captured, particularly with facial recognition and identification. The eight Chinese companies are as follows:
It's believed that the America and the West have been most successful in developing advanced AI algorithms for surveillance and recognition, but Chinese companies have a big advantage because of their huge data base to use for training and testing purposes. Ironically, China desperately needs surveillance data from around the world for a completely different reason: testing its facial recognition software. All the Han Chinese ("yellow race, black hair, brown eyes, yellow skin") have similar facial characteristics, and the Chinese need millions of faces of people from all countries and races to test its facial recognition software. **** **** China's growing global surveillance tentacles **** It's frightening how successful China has been at using these surveillance and AI technologies not only to imprison and enslave millions of Muslim Uighters and Kazakhs, but also to continually identify and track all activities of every Chinese citizen, as well as millions of people outside of China. Furthermore, a number of incidents have been reported that are increasingly alarming people about the use of surveillance equipment, including equipment made by other manufacturers. During the last four years in Ecuador, China has installed a vast surveillance system, known as the ECU-911 system, that can be used to spy on all Ecuadorian citizens. The China-made surveillance equipment contains as many as 4,200 cameras, monitored by 16 centers and around 3,000 employees. The system lets the government track phones, and may soon be upgraded with facial-recognition capabilities. The equipment was manufactured by two Chinese firms, Huawei Technologies and China National Import & Export Corp (CEIEC). As with all Chinese-made network products, we have to assume that the Chinese military is able to access the surveillance and data, and correlate it with the data in their own databases. In London, the developer of the prestigious King's Cross 67-acre 50-building Estate was forced to abandon plans to deploy facial recognition technology throughout the site. It had already been used at a busy intersection for two years, but attempts to extend it to the entire site met with sharp opposition and a debate about the ethics of facial recognition. Surveillance technology in London goes much deeper than King's Cross. Hikvision is generating millions of dollars in annual revenue by supplying its surveillance cameras for use on the British parliamentary estate, as well as to police, hospitals, schools, and universities throughout the country. According to Adm. Lord Alan West, "It’s rather like being able to get a Mata Hari into each office." The same kind of thing is true in Australia, which may be more exposed to continual surveillance and spying by China's military than any other country in the world. Australia has hundreds of thousands of surveillance cameras, mostly made by Hikvision and Dahua, have been installed in local council offices, at schools and universities, on buses, in shopping centers and thousands of other public spaces across Australia. The surveillence equipment is at use at every level of government, from some of the most sensitive federal government agencies, all the way down to suburban councils. Australian officials have already been raising alarms about the infiltration of Chinese people in the organs of Australia's government, at a time when tensions are growing sharply because of China's illegal activities in the South China Sea. According to Fergus Hanson of Australia's Strategic Policy Institute: <QUOTE>"It's a real dereliction of duty to have them in military bases. But even on the street you've got the potential to inadvertently contribute towards Chinese espionage activity by providing real time information about the situation on the ground, all over the world, and in collective terms, quite an important data feed to China."<END QUOTE> There was even a backlash in Beijing, of all places. Parents and students at Tsinghua High School were furious when it was discovered that the school had installed surveillance cameras in all the male toilets. Officials were forced to remove the cameras. **** **** The National Basketball Association (NBA) controversy **** In the last month, public hostility in America to China took another huge leap forward, because of an event that's almost impossible to believe. The event involved the National Basketball Association (NBA), which is hugely popular in China, with millions of Chinese following the games and purchasing related products, including Nike sneakers. Houston Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey posted a tweet supporting the pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. The CCP has blocked Twitter in China, so the tweet would never be seen by Chinese, and would be quickly forgotten. But the CCP lashed out at the tweet, considering it an insult to the Chinese people, and canceled several NBA games and public events in China. These events have substantially heightened the public's hostility to the CCP, and awareness of the CCP's dictatorial policies. Many commentators pointed out that the CCP uses violence to control public opinion in China, and is now trying to use economic weapons to extend its control of public opinion to everyone in the world. The hostility to China has increased even further when basketball star LeBron James made comments supporting the CCP, and condemning Daryl Morey as being "uninformed." This has caused an enormous reaction in the American public. People who previously didn't know how to spell Hong Kong or who thought it was a kind of chop suey suddenly became "informed" about what's going on in Hong Kong. LeBron's support for the CCP is particularly ironic because of his extremely vocal and vitriolic criticisms of Donald Trump in the past, including this January 18, 2018, tweet, quoting Martin Luther King: "-Injustice Anywhere Is A Threat To Justice Everywhere- Our Lives Begin To End The Day We Become Silent About Things That Matter- #ThankYouMLK50" These events are important for three reasons. First, these quickly moving events show how quickly simple events can escalate. This is literally how world wars have begun. Second, these events particularly affect public attitudes towards Hikvision and other companies that are being banned. The trend has been a growing public anxiety towards surveillance equipment in general. But the massive use by China's military of AI-enhanced surveillance equipment to violate human rights in all of China, particularly in Xinjiang and Hong Kong, has focused public hostile attitudes toward surveillance equipment to hostility to surveillance equipment from China in ways we haven't seen before. Third, these events show how easy it is for Americans to turn against each other when money is involved. Generational Dynamics predicts that once a "regeneracy event" occurs, such as a missile attack on American soil, then political differences will be dropped, and the country will unite behind the president. **** **** Mike Pence's criticism of the NBA and Nike **** Mike Pence's speech on Thursday heightened the controversy over the NBA and Nike. Pence called out the NBA and Nike for kowtowing to China: <QUOTE>"And far too many American multinational corporations have kowtowed to the lure of China’s money and markets by muzzling not only criticism of the Chinese Communist Party, but even affirmative expressions of American values. Nike promotes itself as a so called “social justice champion,” but when it comes to Hong Kong, it prefers checking its social conscience at the door. Nike stores in China actually removed their Houston Rockets merchandise from their shelves to join the Chinese government in protest against the Rockets general manager’s seven-word tweet, which read: “Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong.” And some of the NBA’s biggest players and owners, who routinely exercise their freedom to criticize this country, lose their voices when it comes to the freedom and rights of the people of China. In siding with the Chinese Communist Party and silencing free speech, the NBA is acting like a wholly owned subsidiary of the authoritarian regime."<END QUOTE> Pence's criticism of the NBA for hypocrisy and kowtowing to China infuriated former NBA star Charles Barkley, who has substantial money at stake. He responded as follows: <QUOTE>"Vice President Pence needs to shut the hell up, number one. All American companies are doing business in China. I thought the criticism of commissioner Silver and LeBron James was unfair. Daryl Morey — who I like — he can say whatever he wants to. But there are consequences. I don’t understand why these holier-than-thou politicians — if they’re so worried about China, why don’t they stop all transactions with China? President Trump has been talking about and arguing with tariffs for China for the last two years. I think it’s unfair for them to do all their business in China and just because this thing happens try to make the NBA and our players look bad. All American companies do business in China. Period."<END QUOTE> Several commentators have noted the hyprocrisy that Barkley feels free to criticize Pence (and Trump) in the most hostile terms with impunity, but is demanding that no one be permitted to criticize China. China's Foreign Ministry responded to Pence's speech as follows: <QUOTE>"The most important criteria on China's human rights situation is whether the Chinese people are satisfied. As the country advances in leaps and bounds, the Chinese people have an increasingly stronger sense of happiness and fulfillment. Our government attaches high importance to protecting and advancing human rights. During the past over four decades of reform and opening-up, China's human rights cause has seen tremendous progress that has been recognized by the world. The Chinese people now enjoy unprecedented rights and freedoms. This is a fact that no one can deny except for those obsessed with prejudice. Nearly 200 million Chinese practice various religions, of which more than 20 million are Muslim. Chinese people of all ethnic groups enjoy full religious freedom in accordance with law. ... China's foreign policy is aboveboard as always. China pursues an independent foreign policy of peace, a path of peaceful development, a new type of international relations and a community with a shared future for mankind. China never advances its own interests at the expense of others, and its development will never pose a threat to any country. China never seeks hegemony or expansion. That's exactly why we have so many friends all over the world. Some people's attempts to wantonly label China or drive a wedge between China and other countries will never succeed. Such attempts will bring nothing but shame on those people themselves. While arbitrarily accusing and lecturing other countries, Mr. Pence and his like have turned a blind eye to serious domestic problems in the US and tried to cover their own political malpractice by smearing other countries to divert public attention in the US. From the PRISM program to frequent, severe shootings, from extensive racial discrimination to obvious wealth gap, from arbitrary sanctions and use of force on other countries to wanton withdrawals from international agreements and treaties, there are so many cases in point proving that the US has become notorious for lack of moral principles and credibility. We advise some people in the US to carefully examine themselves in the mirror, get fully aware of their own problems and mind their own business. They should cease talking utter nonsense and stop playing mutually detrimental tricks as soon as possible."<END QUOTE> It's always exasperating to read the CCP's comments on anything, which rarely have anything to do with the truth. She says, "China never seeks hegemony or expansion." But China in recent decades has annexed Tibet and East Turkistan, and slaughtered, tortured, beat, raped and imprisoned millions of Buddhists and Muslims. Today, China has illegally annexed the South China Sea, in violation of internation law, and repeatedly lied about. The CCP consider the Chinese to be the Master Race, immune from international law. And she says that racial discrimination in America is as bad as China's human rights record, even though we are not beating, torturing, locking up and jailing millions of Mexicans and blacks. In heard one analyst at MSNBC wonder why China would ever sign a trade deal with the US after that speech by Trump. The answer is that China is desperate to end the sanctions, which have disrupted China's relentless path to war. John Xenakis is author of: "World View: War Between China and Japan: Why America Must Be Prepared" (Generational Theory Book Series, Book 2), June 2019, Paperback: 331 pages, with over 200 source references, $13.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732738637/ Sources:
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KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Hong Kong, National Basketball Association, NBA, Nike, Mike Pence, Mao Zedong, World Trade Organization, WTO, Document Number 9, Chinese Communist Party, CCP, East Turkistan, Xinjiang, Uighurs, Kazakhs, Dahua Technology, Hikvision Digital Technology Co Ltd, iFlytek, SenseTime, Ecuador, ECU-911, Huawei Technologies, China National Import & Export Corp, CEIEC, King's Cross, London, Australia, Fergus Hanson, Strategic Policy Institute, Tsinghua High School, Beijing, Daryl Morey, Charles Barkley Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal John J. Xenakis 100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A Cambridge, MA 02142 Phone: 617-864-0010 E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-25-2019 ** 25-Oct-2019 World View: Dow Jones Industrial Average in 2070 Quote:> Billionaire Ron Baron Forecasts Dow 650,000 Within 50 Years Higgenbotham Wrote:> Anybody who is a "buy-and-hold" billionaire at a record high in By 2070, there will have been a world war, and the world will be well into the Singularity, and there may no longer be a stock market at all. But if we ignore all that, then the trend value of the DJIA is given by the following formula: trend value = 38.46486589 * exp(0.0457096666 * (date - 1900)) And in 2070, that equals: "38.46486589 * exp(0.0457096666 * (2070 - 1900))" = 91161.5578464588 So ignoring the Singularity, the DJIA will be 91,000 in 2070. ** DJIA Historical Page ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ww2010.i.djia.htm RE: Generational Dynamics World View - David Horn - 10-26-2019 (10-25-2019, 10:41 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: By 2070, there will have been a world war, and the world will be well into the Singularity, and there may no longer be a stock market at all. You seem fascinated by the Singularity which, by definition, cannot be contemplated in any reasonable fashion. Will it happen at some point? Sure. We're already plodding along with quantum computing, and conventional AI. Marrying the two virtually guarantees a quantum change (pun intended). The real problems are two: when and what. When requires a crystal ball, since all projections of fundamental change are wrong, right to the minute they're right. A breakthrough (hopefully one that doesn't threaten the future existence of humans) will trigger the fallover point, and it's off to the races form there … probably, at least. We can't really know. The 'what' is even harder to fathom. Humans may cease to exist, become trans-human, become something akin to pets or be partners with the emerging new paradigm … or something else entirely. So let's make a few assumptions. First: we won't live to see any of this. Second: our children may not either. Third: the generations in place at the time will be the product of what we do in the interim. Fourth: no single path is identifiably better than any other, when the goal is totally undefined -- with one exception. We humans should prefer some substantial degree of freedom at the entry point. That guarantees nothing, but makes much more possible. This is no different than the goals we're trying to reach in the current paradigm, so we should get on with it, and let the futurists look for the coming magic in the entrails they study. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-26-2019 ** 26-Oct-2019 World View: The Singularity (10-26-2019, 08:41 AM)David Horn Wrote: > You seem fascinated by the Singularity which, by definition, I don't know what word you're referring to that includes "cannot be contemplated in any reasonable fashion" in its definition, but Singularity is certainly not that word, since many people have contemplated the Singularity in reasonable fashion. Many quantities related to finance and technology grow at fixed exponential rates. The DJIA does, which is why I can say that the 2070 trend value is 91,000. The power of computers is also growing exponentially. Google "Moore's Law" for more information, but even when transistors reach their limits, things like quantum computing will continue the same exponential growth. I wrote an article in 2005 estimating that the Singularity will occur around 2030. I re-posted the article a couple of years ago, since I consider still to be valid. ** Artificial Intelligence and the Singularity by 2030 ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ww2010.i.singularity151228.htm Other people who are knowledgeable about computers estimate 2040 or 2050, and in one case 2060. I don't recall anyone who is very knowledgeable about computers estimating any later than that. So by 2070, the world will be well into the Singularity. Here are a couple more articles I've written about the subject: ** 13-Mar-16 World View -- Google's AlphaGo computer defeats world champion at game of Go ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/xct.gd.e160313.htm#e160313 ** 29-Dec-15 World View -- Artificial Intelligence breakthroughs in 2015, the Singularity by 2030 ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/xct.gd.e151229.htm#e151229 ** 19-Feb-11 News -- IBM's Watson supercomputer bests human champions on Jeopardy! ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/xct.gd.e110219.htm#e110219 Also, Tom Mazanec wrote a science fiction short story about time travelers who survive World War III and the Singularity, but go back in time and try to prevent them from happening at all. ** 'Maybe we'll get it right this time' by Tom Mazanec ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ww2010.i.mazanec090309.htm RE: Generational Dynamics World View - pbrower2a - 10-26-2019 People enjoy thinking and creating, and the people who do those reasonably well are not going to delegate those functions to machines. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-27-2019 (10-26-2019, 08:40 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: People enjoy thinking and creating, and the people who do those reasonably well are not going to delegate those functions to machines. The machines will do their own thinking and creating. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-27-2019 ** 27-Oct-2019 World View: Trump announces that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi died like a dog
Donald Trump announced the killing of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in a televised announced on Sunday morning. Since usually all I post is "doom news," it's nice to post some good news that's significant. Trump's description of the military details of how the mission was carried out, and the bravery and effectiveness of our forces, was really quite dramatic. If you didn't see the press conference live, then you might try to find a youtube video. No American soldiers were injured or killed. However, a dog working with the special forces was wounded when he chased al-Baghdadi into a cave, and al-Baghdadi blew himself up. Al-Baghdadi was whimpering and screaming, and died like a dog. What I found very interesting is that the mission was cleared in advance by Russia, Turkey, Syria and the Kurds. They weren't told what the mission was, but they were asked not to shoot down our helicopters, which would be flying low. The hideout, incidentally, was in Idlib, which was a surprise to me. I listened to the analysis on Fox News this morning, but switched over to CNN a couple of times. As usual, CNN has become a total sewer. The first time I switched over, around 10:50 am ET, they were talking about how Trump should be ashamed of himself for using the word "scum." At 11 am, the news at the top of the hour was (paraphrasing): "Al-Baghdadi has been killed, but the really important news is that the impeachment hearings are showing what an incredibly, unbelievably horrible and evil person Trump is." Also, it was mentioned on Fox News that not a single Democrat leader has congratulated the armed forces for killing al-Baghdadi. Pathetic. So if there are any Democrats who happen to read this, let me provide you with some news, since you obviously have absolutely no idea what's going on in the world, couldn't find Syria on a map, and probably don't even know how to read a map: Do you remember that nasty ISIS organization that was beheading Americans during the Obama administration? Well, the leader of ISIS was killed this morning. If you're a Democrat, then I realize that Nancy Pelosi and AOC have turned you into someone who is too stupid to understand anything more than that, but you should try to remember that nugget of news. OK, now you can go back to the latest Pelosi and AOC news. ---- Source: -- Trump says Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi blew himself up as U.S. troops closed in https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-forces-launch-operation-in-syria-targeting-isis-leader-baghdadi-officials-say/2019/10/27/081bc257-adf1-4db6-9a6a-9b820dd9e32d_story.html (Washington Post, 27-Oct-2019) RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-28-2019 ** 28-Oct-2019 World View: A teaching moment for forum members Trump's announcement of the killing of al-Baghdadi provides me with a teaching opportunity for those who read the Generational Dynamics web site and forum, and have been making snarky comments directed at me with the implication that the only reason I wrote about it is because you imagine I love Trump. shoshin Wrote:> There's always a Tweet.... zzazz Wrote:> I saw the nes. Trump was boasting " I killed al-Baghdadi ", " I So, in response to these snarky comments, here's what I wrote on May 2, 2011, when Osama bin Laden was killed: John Xenakis Wrote:> Osama bin Laden is dead So as you can see, Dear Snarky Reader, what I wrote about the bin Laden killing has the same tone as what I wrote about the al-Bagdadi killing. This is a good example of how I treated Obama and Trump in exactly the same way. The real evil today is the total demented obsession that Democrats have with Trump. The result is that Democrats are becoming stupider every day. The reason is that there's a lot going on in the world, but Democrats know almost nothing about it, since they know little to start with, and then the Democrats spend 24 hours a day obsessing over their impeachment carnival instead of paying attention to the world. So they know less and less about the world every day (except for the ones who read my web site). So I'm not joking when I say that Democrats are getting stupider every day. And Hillary Clinton, particularly, seems to have become psychotic. Finally, I'll address zzazz's idiotic comment about the significance of the death of al-Bagdadi. I'll start with an example. World War I was triggered when Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated by a Serb high school student. It's not that Ferdinand was some fantastic leader who was controlling history. It's because the killing was an event that triggered other events. So the killing of al-Baghdadi will almost certainly provoke revenge attacks, as the killing of bin Laden did. During his press conference, Trump repeatedly said that al-Baghdadi died like a coward, died like a dog, whimpering and crying. He said that repeatedly so that it would be clear that al-Baghdadi was no hero, but a pathetic figure who should be forgotten, not avenged. Another interesting thing about the killing, which I mentioned in the article, is that the US received the cooperation of Russia, Turkey, and others in the operation. Generational Dynamics is a non-ideological methodology for interpreting and analyzing history and current events. The Core Principle of Generational Dynamics, which I've stated many times, is as follows: Quote: Core Principle of Generational Dynamics: The Core Principle applies to Trump, to Obama, to al-Baghdadi, to Ferdinand, and to all politicians. I've written 6,000 articles in the last 15 years, containing thousands of Generational Dynamics analyses and predictions about hundreds of countries, all of which have come true or are trending true. There is no journalist, politician, analyst or web site anywhere in the world with a better record of accurate analysis and forecasting. Generational Dynamics is a major development. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - pbrower2a - 10-28-2019 Dogs may be among the nastiest predators in the animal world, rivaling bears and cats in causing other animals to flee for their lives -- but they do not make and detonate suicide vests, let alone induce others to use them in mass murder. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - pbrower2a - 10-28-2019 (10-28-2019, 09:36 AM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: ** 28-Oct-2019 World View: A teaching moment for forum members Obama recognized the slightness of his role (signing off on the decision), gave credit to the intelligence services and the Armed Services for a job done well, and asserted that anyone who kills Americans in terrorist attacks can expect much the same. He did not gloat. Quote:The real evil today is the total demented obsession that Democrats Donald Trump is a horrible person wholly unsuited to the Presidency. It is he who has the sick obsession with the repudiation of his predecessor. The next effective conservative President will act much more like Obama than like Trump. Ronald Reagan had his limitations, but he at least recognized those limitations, could recognize sage advice from people more expert than he, and could back off from something going awry. Quote:The result is that Democrats are becoming stupider every day. The No, just more certain and resolute as Trump piles on more objectionable behavior while solving nothing. Besides, Democrats seem to be winning more of the well-educated part of the electorate from the Republican Party while losing the under-educated part of the white population as part of the electorate. Meanwhile, Asians and Hispanics have not been assimilating into the Republican Party as they used to when they assimilate into the middle class. As late as 1964, a majority of Americans with college degrees voted for Barry Goldwater. Eisenhower won overwhelming majorities among college graduates and did badly among high-school dropouts. Obama won a majority of college graduates and lost badly to under-educated white voters (people with no college education are now considered under-educated). To be sure, under-educated blacks and Hispanics still vote heavily Democratic, probably because the well-off in their ethnic groups have influence upon them as well-off white people have little influence upon poor whites. There are far more people with college degrees than there used to be, and the ill-educated white people could never get along with the Eisenhower-Rockefeller Republicans once necessary for Republican wins of the Presidency. Scratch the surface of Obama supporters in the suburbs, and you often find an Eisenhower-Rockefeller Republican in ideology -- someone aghast at any form of demagoguery, including anti-intellectualism. Quote:I'll start with an example. World War I was triggered when Austrian Europe was a powder-keg. Its most powerful leaders still had the attitude characteristic that any offense to the Ruler was a cause for striking back hard. Meanwhile the political leadership had failed to adjust to the economic and cultural realities making near-absolute monarchy obsolete. Leaders often were still of the mindset that had established the reactionary era following the defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte. Golden Ages, as the historian Barbara Tuchman wrote in The Proud Tower, do not immolate themselves in mutually-suicidal warfare, let alone make the likes of Lenin and Hitler possible in the aftermath. Something other than the assassination of the Archduke would have precipitated something like WWI. Quote:So the killing of al-Baghdadi will almost certainly provoke revenge As I like to put it, history is all too often an obscene tale whose ink is the blood of innocent people, including those who get dragooned into war as soldiers. Yes, the German soldier of WWII was usually as innocent as Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel was guilty. ...If Osama bin Laden died pleading for his life, then Obama had the decency to not say so. al-Baghdadi may have spared himself of a court trial in which his crimes against humanity would be exposed, and of course it is regrettable that he took three children with him. We have a good reason for studying history -- not so much for any pornography of human suffering, but instead so that we can avoid making the same or similar mistakes when the opportunity arises. It is best to stop the tempting retribution when judging the culpable. We must remember Genghis Khan and Adolf Hitler. Yes, I see Donald Trump as the American equivalent of Nero or Caligula. To be sure, neither Nero nor Caligula was elected, but both became demagogues in practices. Donald Trump got elected as a demagogue. If we Americans are to learn anything from the Trump mess, it is that we must reject demagoguery in any form and not believe that we simply need to elect the demagoguery that fits our values and desires. Some day we may find, as in 1980, that the solution to mass economic distress in which many complain about being overworked and underpaid is to be worked harder for less and compensate for such by taking on second jobs that we find even more degrading so that we can all share in the creation of wealth that ultimately creates more opportunity and puts an end to stagflation. Quote:Another interesting thing about the killing, which I mentioned in Trump said it, so it must be true. Sure. Such as that global warming is a myth? Then why did I see a small snake slithering around last Sunday even if snakes usually have hibernated by now where I live? It's almost Halloween, and I have yet to have seen any frost. Yes, I live to the north of Interstate 90, so I have not moved south. Quote:Generational Dynamics is a non-ideological methodology for So what blinds you to the hollowness, cruelty, recklessness, ignorance, and dishonesty of Donald Trump? As Heraclitus puts it in one of the shortest but most complete statements of wisdom ever made, Character is destiny. I can say this: if I had a child to raise I would put character above all intellectual ability, cultural sophistication, class privilege, and technical wizardry. Poor character makes all those advantages makes one even more damaging if one gets the opportunity to use such talent. I have gotten to meet people often derided as "trailer trash". For whatever limitations they have, many are far better people than Donald Trump even if they have humble roles as cleaners, servants, or laborers. I no longer deride people as "trailer trash". It is not the trailer that makes trash out of people: it is people who trash their state in life, whether they be people so disabled that they cannot hold jobs or heirs of great fortunes. The world would be far better off had Josef Goebbels been a farmhand. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - David Horn - 10-28-2019 (10-26-2019, 07:19 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: ** 26-Oct-2019 World View: The Singularity Give this a moment's thought. Why should something so drastically different be imaginable in any real degree? The best thought exercise I ever heard, (note: it's not mine to claim) made the point perfectly. Get in a Wayback Machine, and travel to Runnymede at the time of the signing of the Magna Carta -- surely an example of advanced thinking for its time. Once there, find someone to harangue about the future, and expound to him or her (most likely, him) about the Internet. For that matter, just get them to understand life in the 21st century. No one in that time would have had a usable benchmark for anything we take for granted. Air conditioning and automobiles would be magic, but the internet -- simply beyond comprehension. For us, the Singularity is our future "Internet". RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 10-28-2019 ** 28-Oct-2019 World View: Algorithms for the Singularity (10-28-2019, 01:25 PM)David Horn Wrote: > Give this a moment's thought. Why should something so drastically The thing is that the Singularity is not drastically different at all. Here's an example. The first major chess-playing program was written in the 1960s, using the "minimax algorithm." The way that algorithm works is "if I play A then you'll play B and I'll play C or if I play A and you play X then I'll play Y." So the algorithm creates a tree of possible moves and responses, and uses that to select the best move. It was a pretty weak chess player. So when IBM's Deep Blue beat Garry Kasparov to become world chess champion in 1996, it was using the EXACT SAME minimax algorithm. The only difference is that computers were much faster in 1996. In the 1960s, the move tree was only about 3 levels deep, but in 1996, on an IBM supercomputer, it was more like 15 levels deep. So there's nothing mystical about a computer chess champion. In fact, this was already recognized in the 1960s that one day the 1960s computer program would be world champion on a sufficiently fast computers. The Singularity is exactly the same. A computer making decisions to win a war or invent a new widget can do so with the same minimax algorithm, except that the tree will have to be much wider. This is well understood, and the only question is how long it will be before computers are fast enough. I estimate 2030. This is the article that I wrote in 2005 on the Singularity, and reposted in 2015: ** Artificial Intelligence and the Singularity by 2030 ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/ww2010.i.singularity151228.htm In that article, I described in detail the algorithm that will be used to make computers smarter than humans. That algorithm could never have been implement in 2005 because computers were too slow. But by 2030, computers should be fast enough to implement it. In recent years, the minimax algorithm has been buttressed by additional algorithms. Pattern matching algorithms will provide a kind of "intuition," where an AI robot can made decisions by comparing the current situation to a large database of similar situations in the past. Deep Learning algorithms are used to create the large database to be used in pattern matching. You mentioned quantum computing in a previous post. Quantum computing is perfect for this application because a quantum computer should be able to perform millions of pattern matching tests in a few microseconds. Once again, there's nothing mysterious, magical, or spiritual about this. There's no need for God to breathe on an AI computer to give it a soul. The algorithms are well understood today, and all that's needed is a fast enough computer. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - Warren Dew - 10-28-2019 While I agree with the "fast enough computer" theory, I don't necessarily agree with the idea that we'll get computers fast enough and efficient enough. Here's the issue: for decades, Moore's law was driven by reduction in processor size. Unfortunately, within the past decade, that reduction reached a physical limit as circuits on the chips shrank to the point that inductance effects between adjacent "wires" became limiting. At this point, Moore's law is being driven by parallelism instead of more powerful processors: having larger numbers of the same old processors running in parallel. That can still result in ever more powerful computers - but they will also be ever larger and consume ever more energy. That limits their usefulness in certain applications, in particular mobile applications. In 2050, the best artists may well be computers which fill buildings. We may still be traveling around town in Uber and Lyft vehicles driven by human beings, however. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - pbrower2a - 10-29-2019 (10-28-2019, 10:16 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: While I agree with the "fast enough computer" theory, I don't necessarily agree with the idea that we'll get computers fast enough and efficient enough. We have another constraint: human capacity to deal with the capacity of our machines. Just consider automobiles: the Model-T Ford was an easy machine to maintain and fix. Sure, it was an awful car by contemporary standards; it could never cope with the freeways of Dallas and it would be grossly unsafe. Henry Ford wanted it easy to repair because many people still farmers and ranchers were far away from a repair shop. Today's cars have collapsible steering columns which are less likely to kill a driver than the rigid ones that impaled him and have front sections designed to give way and absorb the shock of a collision. Cars have catalytic converters to reduce emissions of carbon monoxide (and as a side effect preclude the use of dangerous tetraethyl lead). That is before we even discuss the air conditioner which allows us to drive in 40C heat without getting heatstroke and allows us to drive I-80 from Nebraska to Ohio without going mad. But that is nothing in contrast to computing. Data can simply overwhelm us. I am going to say this about creative people: many people in mindless, repetitive jobs dream of being creative people even if the mindless, repetitive job pays well enough to offer a middle-income way of life. Creative people rarely dream of becoming assembly-line workers or checker-cashiers. Writers, editors, composers, musicians, actors, and artists will protect their privileged roles of doing work that they love from computers taking over. OK, there will be CGI that we will not escape, but all in all even the CGI requires artists to do the storyboards and edit the results. It might be technically possible to get simulations of John Wayne and Clint Eastwood into the same Western movie (they never appeared in the same movie!) -- but it will not be credible. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - David Horn - 10-29-2019 (10-28-2019, 04:58 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: ** 28-Oct-2019 World View: Algorithms for the Singularity You just proved my point. You've assumed a continuum that evolves directly from the Von Neumann machine of today. The emerging technology that we'll call the Singularity will most likely differ as dramatically from a Von Neumann machine as our brains do. More to the point, what that means in practice is totally beyond our meager ability to define in any meaningful way. If you look at my .sig, you'll see that intelligence, knowledge and wisdom are discrete characteristics. AI requires the first, and will be driven by the second, but the third is optional. The HAL9000 in "2001: a Space Odyssey" was intended as a warning. A computer of that capability operating on a quantum platform would reside easily inside a cellphone. The warning was too optimistic. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - Hintergrund - 10-29-2019 (10-25-2019, 11:35 AM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: And a German admirer of Adolf Hitler in 1933 named a blind cave beetle Either this admirer was pretty stupid, or he wasn't really an admirer. Do your research. And Greta's right about Climate Change. |