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Mark in the Middle

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Re: Mark in the Middle

#581

Post by slg »

DenisM wrote: post #576
slg wrote: post #571

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intent matters in society. There is a difference between murder and manslaughter. We don't know the ultimate result of all this on the US since we are right in the middle of it. It is possible things turn out relatively fine, but the US democracy right now is on the edge of collapse. The most recent example of such is that we have generals worried about a coup. [1] Also the US isn't the only target of this type of be…

> the US democracy right now is on the edge of collapse How so? The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. What are the signs of the collapse? The sole link you provided has nothing to do with a coup - it talks about Trump potentially deploying military to quell riots. It is his constitutional right to do, however the generals are…

>The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. What are the signs of the collapse?

The signs? The words of the president and the people around him. The article I linked is one example in which people are having to seriously consider dangerous situations that were thought impossible during all recent presidential elections.

The edge of collapse also doesn't mean it has collapsed yet. I wouldn't even say it is a likelihood that it will collapse, but there is some non-trivial chance that the US democracy fails between now and the end of the year. It has been at least decades since anyone would have said something like that previous sentence. The cold war might have been the last time in which there was this high of a chance of catastrophe.

>The sole link you provided has nothing to do with a coup - it talks about Trump potentially deploying military to quell riots. It is his constitutional right to do, however the generals are of course free to resign from this. Is this a coup on your book?

It is talking about Trump potentially deploying military in either the lead up to the election, on election day, or in the wake of election day. This can be done for any number of reasons. It can be done to rile up his base like he did with his photo-op at St John's. It can be done to intimidate people away from voting. I can be done in the wake of the election to challenge it's legitimacy or to quell protests and civil unrest in response to him challenging the election's legitimacy. The first example is clearly not a coup. The second probably doesn't qualify either even though it would be illegal. The third one is using military violence or the threat of it to illegally seize power from rightful leaders. Isn't that a text book definition of a coup?

Re: Mark in the Middle

#582

Post by DenisM »

slg wrote: post #581
DenisM wrote: post #576

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the US democracy right now is on the edge of collapse How so? The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. What are the signs of the collapse? The sole link you provided has nothing to do with a coup - it talks about Trump potentially deploying military to quell riots. It is his constitutional right to do, however the generals are…

>The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. What are the signs of the collapse? The signs? The words of the president and the people around him. The article I linked is one example in which people are having to seriously consider dangerous situations that were thought impossible during all recent presidential elections. The edge of…

> Isn't that a text book definition of a coup?

Yes, also completely made up.

Trump talks a lot, often times incoherently and faster than he thinks. This is not the greatest quality in a president, but also not the worst.

Re: Mark in the Middle

#583

Post by DenisM »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #577
DenisM wrote: post #576

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the US democracy right now is on the edge of collapse How so? The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. What are the signs of the collapse? The sole link you provided has nothing to do with a coup - it talks about Trump potentially deploying military to quell riots. It is his constitutional right to do, however the generals are…

> The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. "Collapse of democracy" doesn't impute lawlessness. The attempt to cripple the USPS under DeJoy was legal, for example. If the US continues its slide into authoritarianism, you can bet it will happen with the pretense of legality. But that aside, Trump has indicated that he won't honor t…

> If the US continues its slide into authoritarianism, you can bet it will happen with the pretense of legality

And how is this going to happen? The Constitution puts firm limits on the President's power, the Supreme court will not approve of anything contrary to that (no matter who appointed the justices), and the Congress is not going to change the constitution by a vote of 2/3rd. What is the mechanism of usurping power that you see?

Re: Mark in the Middle

#584

Post by edmundsauto »

punkrex wrote: post #560
edmundsauto wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness, Facebook's culpability in the Myanmar incident is because they launched in a language when they didn't have any moderators or AI who could understand the language. Further, much of the info was spread via memes - while extracting text from images is pretty good now, it wasn't always this way.

They were repeatedly warned by local groups, international NGOs and the US State Department that the speech was inciting violence. They refused to do anything and it escalated into a pogrom.

Not defending FB here - it looks like they have acknowledged their faults in this issue specifically.

That said, this argument structure sounds a lot like "US leadership was warned about the attacks on Pearl Harbor". It looks like FB under reacted to these warnings, probably because they didn't realize how bad the outcome would be. How can info/escalations be presented so as to break out of the noise? (I'm assuming here that FB also has been warned of a lot of really bad things that never came to pass, which isn't something we can know - but it's an interesting thought experiment.)

What is the expectation in terms of separate the signal from the noise? How can the critical factors be identified ahead of time? Was it foreseeable that the targeted hate speech would turn into violence? What level of reaction is appropriate, given the uncertainty of hate speech -> violence?

Apologies for the brain dump - not expecting answers to all of them. And not defending FB here. I just think these types of questions are very interesting (plus I just read Superforecasters, which examines similar decision making w/r/t the decision to kill bin Laden).

Re: Mark in the Middle

#585

Post by codezero »

ThomPete wrote: post #551
codezero wrote: post #536

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm 40 and have worked with plenty of people in their early 20s, one engineer who joined my company at 19. They seem completely well adjusted, smart, eager to grow and learn, and the only distinct difference I notice which maybe could moonlight as seeing them as annoying is that they ask for raises, are demanding, and know what they deserve and won't deal with bullshit. Those are great features, and I've learned so m…

the article is literally about people in tech, on top of that spotify, youtube, twitter google all having their issues with handling dissenting opinions.

I get that - I was arguing that dealing with dissenting opinions has nothing to do with the age/generation of the people.

I think it has more to do with corporate structures set up to look like democracies when they absolutely are not. That's not the IC's fault, it's the company's so they should have to figure it out.

Re: Mark in the Middle

#586

Post by jakelazaroff »

DenisM wrote: post #583
jakelazaroff wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. "Collapse of democracy" doesn't impute lawlessness. The attempt to cripple the USPS under DeJoy was legal, for example. If the US continues its slide into authoritarianism, you can bet it will happen with the pretense of legality. But that aside, Trump has indicated that he won't honor t…

> If the US continues its slide into authoritarianism, you can bet it will happen with the pretense of legality And how is this going to happen? The Constitution puts firm limits on the President's power, the Supreme court will not approve of anything contrary to that (no matter who appointed the justices), and the Congress is not going to change the constitution by a vote of 2/3rd. What is the mechanism of usurping…

Trump gets re-elected, by hook or by crook, and spends the next four years continuing to dismantle political infrastructure? Republican congresspeople continue to rubber stamp his agenda and Democrats offer only token resistance? The courts that Trump and McConnell have spent the past four years packing only rule against the most flagrant of Constitutional violations?

Trump has spent the last four years flagrantly breaking the law and suffered no real consequences. It strains credulity that he wouldn’t accelerate this with another four years and a solid Supreme Court majority.

Re: Mark in the Middle

#587

Post by slg »

DenisM wrote: post #582
slg wrote: post #581

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The elections are happening, legislature legislates, judicial system is adjudicating, the military is following the constitution. What are the signs of the collapse? The signs? The words of the president and the people around him. The article I linked is one example in which people are having to seriously consider dangerous situations that were thought impossible during all recent presidential elections. The edge of…

> Isn't that a text book definition of a coup? Yes, also completely made up. Trump talks a lot, often times incoherently and faster than he thinks. This is not the greatest quality in a president, but also not the worst.

The New York Times is stating "senior leaders at the Pentagon, speaking on the condition of anonymity, acknowledged that they were talking among themselves about what to do if Mr. Trump, who will still be president from Election Day to Inauguration Day, invokes the Insurrection Act and tries to send troops into the streets".

This is only "completely made up" in the sense that every hypothetical the military prepares for is a made up scenario.

Re: Mark in the Middle

#588

Post by ficklepickle »

claudeganon wrote: post #450
alquemist wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going further back, the Protestant Reformation was enabled by the spread of the printing press. In its wake, the 30 Years War. Upon utter exhaustion of the parties involved, the Peace of Westphalia set the stage for the modern nation states.

And an often passed over part of the Protestant Reformation is that it was fueled by rabid anti-Semitism and scapegoating. Martin Luther wrote a 65,000 word treatise called “On the Jews and their Lies” that’s widely considered to have been the basis for Nazi ideology: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemiti...

I don't know why this is down voted, the link describes his later antisemitism in detail. Rabid is an apt descriptor.

Re: Mark in the Middle

#589

Post by DenisM »

slg wrote: post #587
DenisM wrote: post #582

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Isn't that a text book definition of a coup? Yes, also completely made up. Trump talks a lot, often times incoherently and faster than he thinks. This is not the greatest quality in a president, but also not the worst.

The New York Times is stating "senior leaders at the Pentagon, speaking on the condition of anonymity, acknowledged that they were talking among themselves about what to do if Mr. Trump, who will still be president from Election Day to Inauguration Day, invokes the Insurrection Act and tries to send troops into the streets". This is only "completely made up" in the sense that every hypothetical the military prepares…

> every hypothetical the military prepares for is a made up scenario

Trump is within his authority to send the troops into the streets to quell an insurrection against constitutional order. This being an unusual situation naturally the generals should be getting prepared. Where's the coup?

Re: Mark in the Middle

#590

Post by DenisM »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #586
DenisM wrote: post #583

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the US continues its slide into authoritarianism, you can bet it will happen with the pretense of legality And how is this going to happen? The Constitution puts firm limits on the President's power, the Supreme court will not approve of anything contrary to that (no matter who appointed the justices), and the Congress is not going to change the constitution by a vote of 2/3rd. What is the mechanism of usurping…

Trump gets re-elected, by hook or by crook, and spends the next four years continuing to dismantle political infrastructure? Republican congresspeople continue to rubber stamp his agenda and Democrats offer only token resistance? The courts that Trump and McConnell have spent the past four years packing only rule against the most flagrant of Constitutional violations? Trump has spent the last four years flagrantly br…

> Trump gets re-elected, by hook or by crook, and spends the next four years continuing to dismantle political infrastructure?

He already had four years. What exactly did he dismantle? The courts, the congress, the senate, the elections, the state rights? Did anything change at all in the "political infrastructure"?

> courts that Trump and McConnell have spent the past four years packing only rule against the most flagrant of Constitutional violations

This trope is getting old. Justices are not puppets of their presidents. Sometime a conservative appointee turns out liberal and serves out their term long after the president is gone and forgotten. The terms "conservative" and "liberal" apply to justices only very loosely. I invite you to read opinions of, say, Justice Scalia [1] - he's not the freedom-crusher you imagine them to be.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_v._Texas#Scalia's_dis...

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