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I can confirm this. I am not proud of it because, not only does it break Wikipedia policy but was unethical and done for an unethical person, but one of the first tasks I was given at my first salaried job was to make a wikipedia page for the boss (he said that his publicist told him to get one done). The safeguards at Wikipedia almost held, but he had me battle the editors for weeks until it finally got done. I left a couple months later because he kept doing (and asking me do) unethical things, and wish I had the wisdom and courage then to have said no and quit on day one.
The guilds regulated art in cities, and most of it was commissioned by the church or aristocracy. The Soviet Union might have been more severe but, like in the Soviet Union, you would have to do it privately unless you had support of the guilds, aristocracy or church. The comparison still holds.
By that standard, you would then need to conclude that all medieval artworks and renaissance artworks were not art but Catholic or royal propaganda.
> There was no art, only pro-government communist propaganda
You’re conflating the Stalinist period with the whole history of the USSR.
That is true to an extent, but Soviet films are not all the same. Great artists like Bondarchuk were able to still tell compelling stories despite the political constraints of his time. Even Seventeen Moments of Spring, which was commissioned to influence the Soviet public to have a more positive view of the KGB, managed to tell a meaningful and very human story. Tarkovsky’s Sci-Fi films are also great and can hardly be said to be state propaganda even if they were considered acceptable enough to be made public. Many Soviet films are heavy handed and wooden propaganda movies (like the ones by Ozerov), but not all.
The only thing I’ve been watching lately are Soviet films on youtube. Mosfilms and Gorky films have their full catalogs on there. Sergei Bondarchuk’s films are deeply moving. Seventeen Moments from Spring is incredible as well- the Soviet answer to James Bond. For some reason it feels deeply refreshing to watch these films instead of what the US has been producing.
Cash app and all of the organizations that stored but did not secure her social security number and other information should be liable, not her
Yeah, I've seen them going around. The last one I saw at Jackson Square looked like the safety driver was driving. This is probably the worse urban environment for Waymo to be. I'm not sure how they're going to handle the roads or the people dancing in the streets (as well as mules, pedicabs, wacky bikes, scooters, drunk people and all of the wonderful chaos). Not looking forward to them becoming operational here.
You seem to be forgetting that diseases can travel fast, and do not stop at the border, especially respiratory ones. You also seem to be forgetting that governments go into lockdowns during the onset of pandemics (or fears of one).
Another commenter pointed out that we had elections during covid, but that was several months after the initial onset, and after shelter-in-place orders were lifted. It is true that it took three weeks from the first reported case in China until we had the first reported case in the US, and then another eight weeks until the first lockdowns. It would have to be an accelerated timeline for the US to use it as a pretext to stop elections, but we are also much more sensitive to the threat of respiratory pandemics, having just gone through the first one in living history. If a US case is reported within the next three weeks, it is possible that it could be used as a pretext; especially because it would benefit the group who last time were the biggest opponents of the lockdowns.
But once again, I am not arguing for this. I am only explaining my hypothetical: if this is used as a pretext to disrupt the elections, I will assume it was intentional (until proven otherwise).
Well, I'm laughing at you then, because the planned or actual use of plague as an overt or covert weapon has an extremely long history from the siege of Caffa (1346) to the proposed Japanese operation to spread plague in the US during WWII. Other diseases have equally extensive overt and covert planned or actual use. Overturning governments and preventing elections also has an equally long and storied past. The fact that you think it is more absurd that a pathogen might be used to prevent an election, than any of the plots to kill Castro, or the proposed Operation Northwoods where the US Joint Chiefs of Staff approved bombing its own population as a pretext to invade Cuba shocks me.
So, I’ll ignore the insults because you seem to still not understand. If this is used as a pretext, then I will make my assumption. We have not completed the election yet even if early voting may have started in some districts. We are a month from election day. The majority of votes have not been cast, counted, verified, and the new congress seated. I would rebut that your beliefs are not based on reality because you state it as if it’s already completed and don’t seem to understand hypotheticals (and use insults to try to make your point:)
That’s only if you care about nation states.
My original comment is flagged, so I will assume you didn’t read it and don’t understand my hypothetical. Here it is: if this is used as a pretext to prevent the US mid-term elections, then I will assume that it was intentional (accepting that it might have merely just been taken advantage of), because this is an unknowable situation for me (and you), and this administration does not deserve the benefit of the doubt in anything it does anymore
Once again, this is hypothetical- only if this is not contained, i.e., what ever safety precautions to prevent this were broken.
Your lack of belief in how covert operations work shows a lack of history. I obviously have no secret knowledge about his, but even reading one or two historical accounts about intelligence services (and others) would prove you wrong
There are as many possibilities as one could imagine. This is still hypothetical (as I said in my comment above, I know what I will assume only if it disrupts the elections, and hope it does not, which will restore some trust), but means, motives and who benefits are important to remember when evaluating unknowable situations. Granting the benefit of the doubt is not something I do for this US administration and their fellow travelers.
One silver-lining of all of these debates is that we are collectively engaging in philosophy. That is awesome and I hope this shifts our culture to start rewarding deep reflection that is not immediately marketable.
Once again, you are demonstrating a naive and simplistic understanding of political economy that is irrelevant to the discussion.
> your comments tell me you live in a fantasy world of books and theories instead of the real world, where reality is much simpler and crueler. Keep on living in Disney.
No. We create our reality. I don't accept the beliefs that you advocate. I don't accept that our government shouldn't care for all of its people, regardless of what they contribute in tax revenue. I don't accept that our government regulates the economy to create poverty while redistributing wealth to the already wealthy. That is abhorrent and an unacceptable state of affairs. It directly contradicts the American Revolution and what inspired it.
Like I suggested before, please go read a book
You've brushed off the failure of your arguments. That indicates that your position is not being driven by reasonable considerations.
> If the government hadn't imposed such strict lockdowns in some states, there would have been no need for the "essential" workers
That is a non sequitur. We do have essential workers whether or not they are the only workers working during a time of crisis or not.
> the American revolution was based on the premise of no taxation without representation
That is a bumper sticker level of understanding of our history. Please educate yourself on what inspired it. Read the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, John Locke, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson.
> get off your high horse
No. An enlightened government takes care of the people (and an unenlightened government is not worth having). Our economy creates poverty. We are in a crisis that has been growing since the 1980's and is reaching a flashpoint. You may not have been here for the 2008 financial crisis and Occupy Wall Street, so you may not have heard of Thomas Picketty's book Capital in the Twenty-First Century, but this webpage will give you a brief overview and a graph: https://www.epi.org/publication/top-1-percents-share-income-...
> DSA and communism in the USA are screwing up a country which is great
They are bringing a long overdue correction that is necessary to preserve our country. They have not even begun, so your claim that they are screwing up this country is absurd. This country is being run into the ground by the current administration and his fellow travelers.
Even on your own terms, your argument fails. You claim that rich people pay for almost all the income, sales and property tax, but then only back up your claim with the federal individual income tax.
The federal individual income tax only accounts for about half of the federal government's revenue, let alone the revenue for states and localities from taxes and other fees. The payroll tax, property and sales taxes, as well as fees, are paid predominantly by the non-rich (you claim a Pareto distribution but that only holds for the individual income taxes- sales taxes are highly regressive). The top 10% receive roughly half the total income and pay roughly half the total revenue. That is not even close to "almost all" of the tax revenue for the governments in the United States.
Not only does your argument fail on its own terms, your terms are wrongheaded. I presume that you were here during covid, and must have realized that the "essential" workers were predominantly the lowest paid people in the US. That should clue you into the fact that people contribute a lot more to society than taxes!
> as I’m guessing you are a native born bleeding heart American liberal, otherwise you would have a more realistic view of the world
I am a native born American and my forefathers and foremothers fought for the prosperity and rights that you enjoy but do not appreciate. You say you are from a third world country, and that might partially explain why you are ignorant on this matter. I suggest you read the works that inspired the American Revolution and try to understand why people fought for it.
> You are taking a reactive point of view that over-applies hidden meanings to words
You don't seem to have read the comments. There is no hidden meaning that I have over applied.
> They are also, literally speaking from a logistics point of view, a problem.
You are assuming the problem and then redirecting from its origins. The economy creates poverty. The economy is regulated by the government. Enlightened government should take care of the people and the common wealth, not be a tool for the wealthy to capture more wealth.
Besides demonstrating a naive and simplistic understanding of political economy, your statements are irrelevant to what we have been talking about.
Please explain to me how "[poor people] eat through resources without replenishing them" and how "rich people" do not? Please explain how it is good or just for a government to act as a system to secure private wealth for the wealthy and not to care for all of the people and the common wealth?
> Poor people are a problem, they eat through resources without replenishing them, how you deal with them is another thing
Wow, you really doubled-down. That's a deeply anti-social way of thinking. Poor people are not a problem. An economy that creates poor people is the problem. That is a failure of government when it is captured by the wealthy and turned into a system to create private wealth rather than common wealth.
And by the way, poor people eat through resources without replenishing them? Ha, what do you think 'rich' people do?
Earlier I mentioned that the legal age was 16 in the Virgin Islands. I was emphasizing that the legality of age was not the primary issue; the issue was the morality of taking advantage of a vulnerable person. I think we may be on the same side of this.
> They said it's hard to accept the poor of other nations when you are busy supporting your own poor
The original comment did not say what you claim.
The original comment framed it as “dealing with” the poor population. That is bad framing. The role of government is to take care of the people, not to “deal with” them. That framing is important because the people are not a problem to be dealt with. They are to be protected and cared for. The framing is important because it dictates what is accepted and what gets done.
> everyone already has their own poor population to deal with
Yikes, that is quite the dehumanizing framing
Edit: A person commented "why?" before deleting their comment, which I had started responding to. I still want to give my response:
Because an enlightened government is for the people (and an unenlightened government is not worth having). The purpose of a government is to care for the welfare of the people, not to be the securer of private wealth for the wealthy. The above comment frames it as "dealing with" an undesirable population. That population is the people, and it is a perversion to think otherwise.
The World Health Organization includes not just actual but also threatened physical force or power that results in injury, death or psychological harm
I’ll jump in- why care? Because it sucks to have people taking pot shots at you. If it is just one, then sure, that isn’t so bad, but when you have a group doing it, it can become existential. You may not have seen this type of violence before but it is unsettling. A group of people can do low effort violence that feels fun and harmless to them (each taking a lazy swing at someone), but the cumulative effect can be beating up or killing someone. Getting yelled at, or having someone write threatening things to you, is not as bad as being punched or having a stone thrown, but it is still damaging to humans.
I thought that was how most people understood LLM’s capabilities? We have spent millenia creating language to map onto our world. Therefore, implicit in that language is a simulacrum of our world.
Yikes, please stop. It doesn't matter if Minsky did or did not accept her offer. Please re-read my comments (and your own).
We've gone over this several times. You have not discussed this in good faith. I won't respond to you again about this.