This is a pivotal moment in human history. Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), a system that exhibits all the cognitive capabilities the brain has, is probably only a few short years away. When we look back on this time in the decades to come, I think we will realise we were standing in the foothills of the singularity - nothing less than the dawning of a new age for humanity. [Link to the Article at X]
"We [The Babylon Bee] have a refusal to treat silliness seriously"-- Seth Dillon
“My views are pretty much those of a Democrat circa 2010. But I have been demonised relentlessly”. [*]
“The left calls people on the right “nazis” or “fascists” when they have not even physically harmed another human being, let alone advocated genocide or war.
My actual views are pretty much those of a Democrat circa 2010, but I’ve been demonised relentlessly with the above slurs.”
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| The Overton Window shifts Left. Thanks, Colin Wright |
Below the fold. What the most neutral (but still obsequious) AI says about this:
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| China’s “net system” captures return rocket |
Classic China Cope!
SpaceX was founded in 2002, China's space industry 46 years earlier.
SpaceX landed reusable rocket in 2015, eleven years earlier than China.
SpaceX launches more per year into space than all other space nations combined.
SpaceX, a public company, launches double what the country of China launches.
SpaceX cost per kg to space one-third of Chinas Long March rockets.
SpaceX created Starlink, revolutionary worldwide internet access....
But... China relanding a booster eleven years LATER than SpaceX shows "superiority of the State Owned Model". Right…
Remember? Chinese experts — experts all over the world — said landing rockets back on earth was “impossible”. Then when SpaceX did it, the cope continued: “Oh well, Elon didn’t do it as soon as he said he would”. (!)
Elon Musk being the guy who turns “impossible” into the merely “late”. (It’s happened with Tesla, too).
SpaceX will study what China has done, but won’t copy it. “Copying is not our style”. It sure is China’s style though. Baidu, WeChat, Alibaba, Taobao, even its EVs. All copied. Mind you, they do a damn fine job of it. They often improve the original. But it’s hard to come up with a single invention from China in the 21C that’s world-changing and a household name.
All recognising China’s bright history and world-changing innovations (the compass, gunpowder, paper) in its long and remarkable history. See: Joseph Needham “Science and Civilisation in China”.
Earlier: SpaceX launches more than Rest of World.
At a major Islamic event attended by thousands in Britain, preacher Abdur Raheem Green openly declared that non-Muslims are the enemies of Allah.
He urged his followers to “hate” those living among them who don’t share their faith.
This isn’t spiritual guidance.
This is dangerous indoctrination, and it’s spreading openly in the West. [Link]
Openly, repeatedly, forcefully, unashamedly stated, by Imams in every mosque of the United Kingdom.
Channel 4 of the BBC did a doco on this “Undercover Mosque” decades ago. It showed how violent anti-west Islamist speech was rife through mosques in the U.K.. It was ignored.
They would not dare to make the same documentary today. Because Hate Speech laws, especially under Keir Starmer, means you get arrested for saying true things about The Religion of Peace. For whom “peace” means that everyone, everywhere, submits to the will of Allah.
SpaceX only exists because of Elon Musk.
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| Short answer to The New Yorker. No, he can’t. He’s a Nepo Nazi. Funded by mummy to Maine’s most expensive private schools. A Vet-hating Vet. Then a wastrel and a fraudulent “Oyster Farmer”. And now… a failed Senatorial candidate |
He’s got a Nazi tattoo. Smack bang right there on his chest. Not just any old Nazi tattoo, but the Totenkopf. The “Death’s Head” tattoo of the S.S., Hitler’s most enthusiastic Jew-extinguishers. Then pretended (ie, lied) that he didn’t know what it was…
Dems: He’s a Nazi? No worries. He’s a lying Nazi? Even better!
Platner is a bogus “oyster farmer”. In reality shucks a few oysters for his Mum’s restaurant.
Dems: He’s a fraud? No worries. “We’re not hiring a priest”. “Give him grace”. I mean, who cares!
Platner is a member of the Marxist-Leninist DSA.
Dems: He’s a Communist? No worries. We love communism!
Platner: “All Cops are Bastards”.
Dems: No worries. We hate cops too!
Platner: “Rural Americans are racist and stupid”.
Dems: Right on, brother! As saint Hillary said, they’re all Deplorables!
Platner: Says Purple Heart veteran Terry Daniels “doesn’t deserve to live”.
Dems: No worries, bro. We hate vets too!
Platner: Calls for theft of private property.
Dems: He wants to impoverish America? No worries. He wants to steal stuff from Republicans? Fine, as long as it’s for us, no problem.
Platner: Calls for Open Borders.
Dems: You want to illegally import Democrat voters and steal working-class job? Great!
Platner. Accused of sexual misconduct.
Dems: No! That’s beyond the pale. Resign buddy!
So he has. He’s now resigned. He steps down from the race in the crucial state of Maine. Crucial to the Dems obsession with taking back the Senate this coming mid-term.
The link here is to a compilation of Dems in complete lock-step about just a wonderful candidate Platner was. Until he wasn’t.
Sure, anyone can make a mistake supporting a candidate who turns out to be flawed. But the Dems seem to have a particular genius for picking weird heroes. Think of Lenin, Stalin, Mao. More prosaically: think how they drooled over Michael Avenatti… as a presidential candidate! Whoopi and the ladies of The View loved him! He’s now in jail. Couldn’t they see that at the time? The View? Jimmy Kimmel? All the late-nighters? I mean, even I could see it, sitting here in Hong Kong.
Then there’s James Talarico in Texas. The lads of the Ruthless pod take that apart. Here.
Trump: "I know sports very well."Also Trump: "What's a Red Card?"
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| The Short is here. |
By Benedict Beckeld.
Shorter Beckeld: Islam is both a proselytising religion, AND a political religion. In that, it’s unique amongst the Abrahamic religions.
Christianity is proselytising, but not political. (Give unto Caesar what his Caesar's and unto God what is God's)
Judaism is political, but not proselytising. It's super-hard to convert to Judaism.
Islam is both proselytising AND political. It's a totalitarian system of life. It's super-easy to convert to Islam. Once you're a Muslim you have a whole swathe of stuff you have to do, because you're Muslim. One of those is to try to convert those around you. If necessary, by war, by Jihad.
THAT's why Islam is incompatible with western societies. Which make a clear and clean distinction between the Church and the State. Between what’s private between you and whatever god you believe in; and your public duties, rights and obligations.
[The 3:40 version of the above clip, here]
Notes from my recent back operation at Hong Kong's Canossa Caritas hospital, 1 Stubbs Road. Where happens our son was born in August 1997, just after HK's handover to China.
Mise en scene: me, on one of those mobile trolley bed things they have in hospitals, to move the patient around. Dressed in operating gowns. Slightly dosed with relaxing drugs, I'm feeling pretty chill as we head to the Operation Theatre.
I'm feeling chill because I trust them. All the staff, the nurses, the doctors, the support staff, I trust them all. They are all super friendly, super supportive, super kind, super "give confidence" type people. I know that they have all been trained to the top international levels. I know all the equipment is the latest, world class stuff.
So, here goes. [It's kind of AI-assisted slop, but if I don't post it now, I never will. It's been sitting in my pending tray since the op last December]
The fluorescent lights of the operating theatre in Hong Kong’s Canossa hospital hummed like a lazy orchestra as the pre-op sedation wrapped my nerves in warm cotton wool. I lay on the narrow table, leads stuck to my chest, watching the monitors blink and beep. One small machine kept up a steady, almost cheeky *ping* every few seconds.
“Ah,” I slurred “I see you have… the machine that goes ping.”
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| “Night sky from a lonely beach in New Zealand”. Milky Way with the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds |
It’s taken from Birdlings Flat, near Lake Forsythe (!) located right at the base of the Banks Peninsula just south of Christchurch.
Places my ancestors came to in the mid 19th century.
The Magellanic “Clouds” — actually galaxies — are two of our closest galactic neighbours in our Local Group of galaxies. In about a billion years they’ll merge into our own Milky Way, to become part of our spiral arms and add to the 400 billion or so Stars we already have.
I’ve looked at this very same night sky, the Milky Way, the Magellanic Clouds, from offshore East Coast Australia, in a racing yacht, Sydney-Hobart. The southern night skies are glorious.
Are we alone? Are we, mammals on Earth, alone in this vast universe? I used to think “certainly not”. We are not alone. It’s not possible. Star numbers: at least 8 x 10 with 23 zeros. And more Planets than even this vast number of Stars. What are the odds? Surely there must be life, intelligent life, elsewhere! Surely….
But maybe not. The very-very-very odd combination of random events that led to Homo Sapiens on Planet Earth may well be too random for even such a vast number of Stars and Planets to guarantee another civilisation. We may well be alone. Even if not alone, we’ll never be able to communicate with an intelligent alien species. The distances are simply too vast. The physics too brutal.
We, Homo Sapiens, are the consciousness of the universe. We are the only one we know, so far. We may very possibly the only one. Better care for it. Better nurture “the light of consciousness”.
Well, not of AI. As in “Artificial Intelligence”. I’m not saying we should be scared of that.
But Artificial Super Intelligence? Perhaps we need not be literally “scared”. But concerned? Yes. We ought be concerned. We ought to consider, very seriously indeed, its potential dangers.
I’m not talking Luddite stuff. Tolpuddle Martyrs stuff. I’m not talking “AI will take away my job” stuff.
I’m talking existential. As in: life threatening. As in: a threat to the survival of humanity itself.
This is not being a “retard”. Plenty of super smart people worry about it. Chief amongst them Elon Musk, himself a major owner of AI. His concern about the existential threat led to his funding OpenAI, to be public, open to public scrutiny, of understanding its dangers. But which was hijacked by Sam Altman, litigated… but that’s another story.
I’m reposting the above video I posted in February. I rewatched it last night. It’s a good summary of the issues, in short film format.
There’s a follow up to “Writing Doom”, by Suzy Shepherd: Seat at the Table
And for a deeper dive, there’s Roman Yampolskiy talking to Steven Bartlett about AI Safety: Only 5 Jobs left in 2030
There’s a non-zero chance ASI could wipe out Homo Sapiens. Perhaps a non-trivial chance.
Surely we should look at it? Discuss it? Without worrying that we’re becoming EU-apparatchik worrywarts?
Everywhere in the world that things go better, where the poor get richer, where the rich also get richer, in every single case it’s down to capitalism. ,
“But isn’t China socialist?”. “Didn’t China have huge growth since 1980?”. Yes to both. But but…. The growth wasn’t down to socialism. It was and is, very simply, because the Communist Party allowed the market to expand. It was market expansion, aka capitalism, that grew the growth.
China has been economically successful to the exact extent that it has allowed market forces to operate.
I saw that with my own eyes on the ground in China, from the 1970s to now.
Whenever China shifts back to more Party control, growth stops or slows. We’ve seen it. I’ve seen it, lived it, experienced it.
That’s the reality of the world in the last century. Capitalism works.. Socialism doesn’t.
It’s Capitalism all the time, all the way.
For the Year to June 2026:
SpaceX launches: 76. Successful: 100%
Rest of World (ROW) launches: 49. Successful: 88%.
Elon Musk has done what was unthinkable, even “impossible” a decade ago. A private individual launching rockets… then a private individual launching and retrieving rockets… then a privately individual launching more rockets than the ROW combined. At 100% success. And retrieving, reusing them.
But… you know, “Elon bad”. Because he thinks, as I do, that the Democratic Party in America has gone lala-loopy crazy left, full-on Socialist. Anti-democratic hard-authoritarian Left. Not me saying this: they, the Dems, say it themselves, loud and proud.
Meanwhile. You have something you need to put in space? How do you like your odds if you don’t use SpaceX? Because you don’t like Elon. How do you like the 12% chance of losing your precious cargo…?
Happy "Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Establishment Day". A Hong Kong holiday.
28 29 years ago that Hong Kong was handed over to the Chinese government, by the UK government.
In Chinese it's 回归, Hui Gui, which is much simpler and much more descriptive. It means "the return of Hong Kong to our beloved motherland".
28 29 years ago, last night, Jing and I sat in a Wanchai Bar, watching the proceedings. All the Chinese army waiting on the Shenzhen side, to cross over into Hong Kong on the stroke of midnight.
It was a very wet, rainy night. Prince Charles was here for the handover, and famously described the Chinese bureaucrats at the ceremony as "appalling old wax works". It would be good if he was as honest today about Islam in Britain as he was then about those appallling Chinese apparatchiks.
Jing was pregnant with John, who was born two weeks later.
The Chinese largely kept out of Hong Kong politics, until forced to do so by the riots of 2019. But even then, I think it's fair to say, they handled that with a light hand, given what they could have done and many people, including people here in Hong Kong, were calling for them to do.
One simple thing to note: unlike most post-colonial places, Beijing has not demanded the change of a single name of a single street or building in Hong Kong. It's still Victoria Harbour, Victoria Park, Queen Elizabeth street, Pottinger St, Des Voeux road, and so on. I'd guess there's been more renaming in Australia than here in Hong Kong.
