nstents

It's a great question. Adherents to the Old Testament point to Original Sin.

But even without religion we can use today's standards of morality to be sure that at some point in human development there was a first time for a person to commit an abjectly "sinful" crime of inhumanity against another. Not having been there to witness the event, I can't tell you the what or why of it. Fratricide, parricide, abuse, and more, I think we can be sure there is a first time for all of these.

Speculation leads to many answers. One, absent religion, is that because we seem to be derived from pond scum "inhumanity" developed somewhat before morals and ethics did, and has found its niche in us.

It's hard to know enough details about the three people most closely involved. To make matters more difficult, a person being "good" or "bad" is a very subjective viewpoint. No, he was probably not good to his wife, and no he admits he wasn't a good father.

At the same time, he was a pro, and his abilities to inspire belief in the goal of being a better person helped countless people believe in something bigger than themselves.

Not to create a strawman out of thin air, but I'd argue that he did more good for far more people than he did to hurt and estrange his family. If there is an equation for such a comparison.

There is no way to condone the damages he caused. I just think it's better overall that we had him as he was, than not at all.

I meant to be saying that the Kogui were not the ones pushing the music production retreat, but it was a third party, the creators of the site, doing so.

My apologies for having allowed a different interpretation in my previous comment.

I think that's an easy conclusion to come to, but the top level page of the site seems to push a different conclusion: "...On this path, we recognize and honor the indigenous peoples of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta — the Kogui, Arhuaco, Wiwa and Kankuamo — as ancestral guardians of the territory and living source of the wisdom that inspires and underpins our work."

It can help in getting a perspective on this message to investigate the Kogui tribe, its philosophies, and its structure, including how they raise their future leaders. There's a strong similarity, with important differences, between Plato's Allegory of the Cave (from the Republic) and how some children are brought up. These children later become important figures in the community.

Edit: an early BBC documentary on the Kogui https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJNpMxhO4Ic

Even twins may use the term "you" between each other.

That's quite the box they're put into; they're either completely ignorant of the outside world, or they're completely infected by it. Perhaps there's a middle ground.

Reading Damn Interesting every day, I had no idea. Someone used your insults on AOL, or something like that, repeatedly. Thank you for the laughs.

I can't continue the thread to answer your last, more definite, question.

I used an indefinite article on purpose in order to not go to a particular person. The topic I posed was on the relationship, not on persons. So any democratic socialist mayor for that matter.

If that's an important issue for you, could you use your collective resources more thoroughly in addressing it?

Is not a Democratic Scoialist also a Socialist these days?

What's that got to do with anything?

I love that question. It's a great question because it's designed to elicit avenues of attack.

I'd say that Democratic Socialism, today among the general population of the United States the term Socialism has no set definition, no real understanding of its roots, and no real concept of how it would be enacted politically in a Democratic society.

So I'm really not sure what you mean by Democratic Socialist. I think you mean as defined by Wikipedia.

If so, in short I see Marx as being a root among many to Socialism, and so on to Democratic Socialism. The dogma from Marx follows through to an application for people to obtain their "needs": "More of whatever, less expensive, and better evrything! And AI is actually Socialist, so let's do it and vote for me!!!" That kind of cynical approach.

It's definitely being redistributed through the market. Also, I believe there are efforts underway to create open source AI.

I'm not advocating a Marxist dogma, so I can't affirm "we should take and redistribute AI capacity in some way".

I'd "need" to know what you see my interpretation of needs as being before I could answer better. But I'll give it a try without a dictionary.

In its most fundamental sense, a need is a requirement for life to continue and reproduce. These requirements typically involve the abilities to compete, to obtain food, to have shelter, to mate and protect the young, etc.

Isn't AI to serve needs? For example, the need to find bugs in software so somebody can compete economically and employees can meet their needs as described above? To buy food, shelter, raise children?

Quite seriously, I think this is an important underpinning of why AI is advancing, and where it's taking us. The fact that it overlaps with Marx, at least to me, is a fascinating and incredible irony, because its success is an application of the very seductive message behind Marxism.

I appreciate everyone's time in challenging this.

I'm suggesting that AI fundamentally meets a tenet of Marxist dogma, and I'm surprised a Socialist mayor hasn't taken advantage of that fact.

Now that's interesting. One reason I fear AI is exactly because of the relationship you call a word game.

I would think that AI is a great fit for Marx's goal of "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs", and as such a Socialist mayor would promote its use it to advance towards Socialist goals. Note: would, not should.

Is AI not in an important way from humanity's abilities, and is it not being used to help meet our needs?

The actual quote seems to be “We've begun to raise daughters more like sons... but few have the courage to raise our sons more like our daughters.” https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/72290-we-ve-begun-to-raise-... among many other sources.

I'm not sure I see the rationale behind your response. Could you please let me know where I victim blamed, rather than endorsed personal responsibility for one's own wellbeing? Is there no case to be made against the well dressed, well adorned man, leaking money from his pockets going into a violent slum? Has he zero responsibility for not metaphorically fastening his seat belt against the bad drivers?

The context for my reasoned perspective is certainly there in my post. It's beyond the pale to suggest from it that I'm endorsing or otherwise promoting or supporting a rationale for police inaction and a low conviction rate for SA.

Look, there are reasons companies go through stringent interview processes and background checks for their new hires. There are reasons parents follow up on references for a baby sitter. There are reasons everywhere for people to make responsible efforts to limit potential hurts and damages from other people's purposeful bad actions.

The guy should do the same by not traipsing into a slum. It's a matter of personal responsibility because he personally suffers from the reasonable eventuality of doing so.

I have to take issue with your excising the context of my post, especially where the need for seatbelts is concerned: they're needed everywhere you drive. And even though steps are taken to assure we can drive the streets and roads without fear, yet I am personally to blame for not being cautious in protecting myself. Not because of the law, not because of a lack of societal effort to protect me, but because I ignored the need for personally limiting the consequences of bad actors acting badly. Please don't take this to a reductio ad absurdum argument.

Please also don't straw man me again by taking my point to a "massively different" scenario.

And lastly, thank you for silently accepting my point that there are cases, such as the man irresponsibly going into a violent slum, where a person should take special precautions. Perhaps if you can see the need for men to take special precautions then you can take sexism out of the equation and see the need for women doing the same.

From your perspective it may reflexively seem that women carry zero responsibility for other people's actions in the example you give. Yet at the same time a woman most certainly has a responsibility to herself, her future self who would have to live with the trauma...the many types of trauma...for knowingly going to an environment expected to harbor severe threats from other people.

As a counter to your position, imagine a well-dressed man with diamond and gold jewelry, a very expensive watch, and money spilling from his pockets, casually strolling into a slum known for its violence, and all the while thinking quite airily "It's not my fault if anything bad happens to me. No, not my fault at all."

I drive with my seatbelt on not because it's the law, and not because I'm afraid of my causing an accident. I drive with a seatbelt on because I have a duty to myself to take precautionary action against the inevitable irresponsible and potentially life threatening actions of others. Regardless of who's at fault, ignoring consequences does not diminish personal blame for suffering the outcome.

It will be interesting to see how much carbon dioxide is also created through this process.

Yes. Exactly.

No. As an educator (HS Maths) in order to effectively both educe and induce understanding it's never about feeling superior. That feeling is so very obstructive to a student's willingness to listen and perhaps more importantly to the deeper intrinsic satisfaction I get when a student says "OH! I get it!"

That's a really interesting question. I guess I can't judge myself without bias, and I've most often been told I'm too hard on myself. So again the answer would be no.

A sense of superiority due to status (including race, wealth, etc), and ability, is a stepping stone on the way to lessening the worth, and so humanity, of others.

Yes. https://finbold.com/norways-sovereign-wealth-fund-discloses-...

Some may not be aware that SpaceX is also an AI company.

In the 1980s, being not entirely adept at mathematics I recall scouring every library and bookstore I could find for any snippet that would explain a proof, or even a concept, so that I could understand it. Videotaped lectures by other professors were sometimes available on campus too.

On a daytime episode of David Letterman, Isaac Asimov predicted fiber optics would one day bring about television studios in people's homes: https://youtu.be/cIB1b_8hqB0?si=212sGzZ71VIZORML&t=696

All sources of understanding are so very much appreciated.

Other anecdotal accounts of very similar travels would offer a wider range of experiences, observations, and conclusions.