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  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,098
    Nigelb said:
    Top notch deadpan delivery, nice covid touch at the end.
  • On August 24th you said there was no border down the Irish Sea. https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/2991068#Comment_2991068

    I’m sure I can find other examples. That took 5 minutes.
    That was tongue in cheek in reply to CHB quoting "Consequence of Northern Ireland being legally within UK’s customs territory as per NI protocol."
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 20,005

    That was tongue in cheek in reply to CHB quoting "Consequence of Northern Ireland being legally within UK’s customs territory as per NI protocol."
    The following comment is “we signed up to a border” and your response is “no we didn’t”.

    Face it you’ve been caught talking b*llocks.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 50,837

    Much of that is probably because nobody can understand a word you are saying when you are masked. I had to repeat myself three times in Sainsbury’s the other day because the girl at the till couldn’t understand me.
    Its best to pay for the bottle of whisky before drinking it in my experience.

    :smiley:
  • The following comment is “we signed up to a border” and your response is “no we didn’t”.

    Face it you’ve been caught talking b*llocks.
    There's no legal border.

    There are special arrangements, but I don't care about them.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,987

    Mask wearing is not a requirement in Sweden. It is in France, Spain, the UK etc where cases are increasing quickly. What has happened is exactly as I predicted 6 weeks ago. People wearing masks do not socially distance. Even the latest amazon advert has people wearing masks standing next to each other chatting.
    Neither do people not wearing masks. We do not wear masks in Wales.

    Caerphilly says hi! Newport will say hi next week.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Alistair said:

    I do not see how he possibly justifies the Arizona figure given the shifts he applies to other states.

    Also we don't have final voter registration figures. Both parties register voters right up until the deadline. In fact late surges in voter registration is the norm.
    True on both and obviously there is an element of what independents do. My view on AZ has always been that the Democrat share of the vote there has been remarkably stable since 2000 in a range of 44-45pc but the margin was close last time because the Republicans share came down with 3rd parties picking up share.

    One thing with voter registration is that the usual drives to get people out would have been hampered by CV
  • There will certainly be a market for Theresa May's views on Brexit. She got it all right, given the initial mistake of the referendum result. Pity that an unholy alliance of cynical opposition MPs, ultra-loony Brexiteers, a Brexiteer opposition leader, and a self-serving Boris, blew up her well-plotted route out of the mess.
    Top notch deadpan comedy there.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 76,030
    How Trump’s Billion-Dollar Campaign Lost Its Cash Advantage
    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/07/us/politics/trump-election-campaign-fundraising.html

    Is he really cash constrained at this point ?
    Seems at least questionable - though it’s pretty certain that the spending has been extraordinarily inefficient (& no doubt there’s also a large helping of plain old grift in there).
  • Varoufakis on Newsnight
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 76,030

    Top notch deadpan comedy there.
    Beats slapstick.
  • Richard_NabaviRichard_Nabavi Posts: 30,822
    edited September 2020

    Varoufakis on Newsnight

    He's speaking as an expert in how to achieve your goals when negotiating with the EU against a brick-wall deadline from a position of weakness, I guess?
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,987
    Cyclefree said:

    Well people pay to hear Mrs May speak. Apparently she’s made a million quid since leaving. And she’s not exactly Mrs Charisma is she. Nor does she have any successes to her name.

    So there seems to be a market for useless ex-British PMs.
    I'd pay good money to see Johnson speak, particularly if it meant an early resignation.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,098
    Cyclefree said:

    Well people pay to hear Mrs May speak. Apparently she’s made a million quid since leaving. And she’s not exactly Mrs Charisma is she. Nor does she have any successes to her name.

    So there seems to be a market for useless ex-British PMs.
    This is the sort of company that hires her. https://www.themuse.com/profiles/world50
  • .. and APL.
    I avoided that one.
  • Nigelb said:

    How Trump’s Billion-Dollar Campaign Lost Its Cash Advantage
    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/07/us/politics/trump-election-campaign-fundraising.html

    Is he really cash constrained at this point ?
    Seems at least questionable - though it’s pretty certain that the spending has been extraordinarily inefficient (& no doubt there’s also a large helping of plain old grift in there).

    Given the fiscally incontinent way he has been running the country, there is a bit of karmic justice if the same thing has happened to his campaign.

    Anyone who cares about sound finances should want Trump gone. What he was doing to the countries deficit BEFORE COVID19 hit should be bordering on criminal.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,987
    Indeed.

    I didn't want a Corbyn led government. I voted for a candidate representing Labour because I knew Corbyn could not possibly win, but that Johnson would more than likely win a majority. I voted Labour (Vale of Glamorgan- who else could I reasonably vote for to unseat Cairns?) because the prospect of a Corbyn minority government, although undoubtedly disastrous, was less dangerous than a Johnson majority government.

    Even a moron like Corbyn would have taken the trouble to read a treaty he was signing.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 34,162
    Latest figures:

    Biden 1.84 / 1.85
    Trump 2.32 / 2.34

    https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/politics/market/1.128151441
  • I avoided that one.
    Very wise.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 34,162
    I might try writing code for a tracking app using BASIC on my Spectrum ZX+2 if nothing else seems to be working.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 83,160
    edited September 2020
    Some interesting info from Carl Heneghan, starting around 7 mins e.g. There have still been outbreaks in care homes over the summer, but much lower hospitaliation / deaths, even among this vulnerable group. Also, found people still shedding 72 days after they were initially infected, and would still register a positive on the PCR test.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WdzMVekUBU
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,987
    Nigelb said:

    How Trump’s Billion-Dollar Campaign Lost Its Cash Advantage
    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/07/us/politics/trump-election-campaign-fundraising.html

    Is he really cash constrained at this point ?
    Seems at least questionable - though it’s pretty certain that the spending has been extraordinarily inefficient (& no doubt there’s also a large helping of plain old grift in there).

    Perhaps he could try Deutche Bank. I hear they have lines of credit available for borrowers guarenteed by Russia.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 76,030

    Perhaps he could try Deutche Bank. I hear they have lines of credit available for borrowers guarenteed by Russia.
    What’s the German for “fool me once...” ?
  • No, not necessarily the case at all - though absolutely I do think that we "protect" too many areas, but that is a separate debate.

    Japanese style zonal planning consent is much, much better: essentially local areas give zoning indications of green areas where consent is virtually automatic, amber where its more complicated and red where it is prevented. Then rather than a developer spending years getting planning for an estate . . . or even worse a speculator doing so then looking to flip it on to a developer . . . people can simply get the land they want and build the home they want and that's it.

    If consent in a "green zone" is virtually automatic (subject to planning regulations) then owning land with consent becomes worthless. The land already had consent so getting it or sitting on it is achieving nothing so someone who actually intends to build should get the land rather than a speculator hoping to get consent then flip in for a windfall profit but zero added value.
    And if the land within that zone contains ancient woodland or an archaeological site of national importance?

    Planning permission is not just about giving permission. It is also about setting constraints on the developer to make sure they do the whole mitigation process properly including proper archaeological and environmental investigations. Automatic approval makes that whole system worthless.
  • I'd pay good money to see Johnson speak, particularly if it meant an early resignation.
    Why let him off the hook?
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 34,162
    edited September 2020
    Heneghan: for people under 50, the risk is virtually zero.
  • And if the land within that zone contains ancient woodland or an archaeological site of national importance?

    Planning permission is not just about giving permission. It is also about setting constraints on the developer to make sure they do the whole mitigation process properly including proper archaeological and environmental investigations. Automatic approval makes that whole system worthless.
    You can separate mitigation from the planning process - and if there's known ancient woodland etc to protect then why wouldn't that be a red zone already?
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,987

    Why let him off the hook?
    Because Johnson will do for us all if he doesn't go soon. I never anticipated I would miss Mrs May sooo much.
  • edmundintokyoedmundintokyo Posts: 17,716
    edited September 2020



    And if the land within that zone contains ancient woodland or an archaeological site of national importance?

    Planning permission is not just about giving permission. It is also about setting constraints on the developer to make sure they do the whole mitigation process properly including proper archaeological and environmental investigations. Automatic approval makes that whole system worthless.

    We have an extra restriction on areas of archaeological significance, the town maintains a map of those areas and if you're building in one then there's a process to check if there's anything that would justify doing a dig before you tear the ground up. My local tyre fitter, who also sells real estate (the town also has some dedicated real estate agents but they appear to sell neither real estate nor tyres) was bitching about it, people run into it more than usual here as this town has the remains of three separate castles, which is like one per 6,000 people.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    edited September 2020

    We have an extra restriction on areas of archaeological significance, the town maintains a map of those areas and if you're in one then there's a process to check if there's anything that would justify doing a dig before you tear the ground up. My local tyre fitter, who also sells real estate (the town also has some dedicated real estate agents but they appear to sell neither real estate nor tyres) was bitching about it, people run into it more than usual here as this town has the remains of three separate castles, which is like one per 6,000 people.
    Very sensible system again. The whole system there is well organised and impressive, we could learn a lot from it.

    Even if you have automatic consent then building regulations presumably still need to be abided by.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 83,160
    edited September 2020
    https://www.nationalreview.com/news/usc-professor-placed-on-leave-after-black-students-complained-his-pronunciation-of-a-chinese-word-affected-their-mental-health/

    It appears Google translate is also massively racist, as I just put into there and it definitely sounds like the N word.

    These students in Southern California must be permanently outraged / suffering emotional exhaustion given all the Spanish spoken there and the Spanish word for black.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 34,162

    https://www.nationalreview.com/news/usc-professor-placed-on-leave-after-black-students-complained-his-pronunciation-of-a-chinese-word-affected-their-mental-health/

    It appears Google translate is also massively racist, as I just put into there and it definitely sounds like the N word.

    These students in Southern California must be permanently outraged / suffering emotional exhaustion given all the Spanish spoken there and the Spanish word for black.

    This madness has to stop.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 83,160
    edited September 2020
    Andy_JS said:

    This madness has to stop.
    This particular case it even by some of the bonkers stories, is right on the extreme bonkers scale. Man teaches a communication class about doing business with Chinese people and tell them they will use this particular word as a filler. There is clearly no racist intention and it is factually correct. Is he supposed to totally ignore that it exists, and thus in doing so fail his students to prepare to deal with the world they have signed up to be educated about.

    Good luck if they do go to China and have a meltdown about the perceived racism of their hosts language. They might first want to watch out being called a Gweilo or Baizuo, and 100% they will be called the first by somebody and totally openly.
  • Black is white
    Up is down
    Left is right....

    Brexit: UK chief negotiator calls for 'realism' from EU

    :D:D:D

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54062413
  • edmundintokyoedmundintokyo Posts: 17,716
    edited September 2020

    Very sensible system again. The whole system there is well organised and impressive, we could learn a lot from it.

    Even if you have automatic consent then building regulations presumably still need to be abided by.
    Yes, regulations on new buildings are strict and quite detailed, but mainly to ensure earthquake and fire safety. It's all very *objective*, for example if you're near a slope greater than x degrees than your building has to be at least y meters away. The size your building can be in a particular zone is calculated mathematically, based on the ratio of the amount of floor space to land. This is probably a little bit sub-optimal, but it means that it's fairly quick and easy to tell what's allowed and what isn't, and there isn't too much left to somebody's discretion.

    Rules on renovations seem incredibly relaxed - I hardly had any official involvement at all except when I applied for "pay for my septic tank" and "pay me for moving to your town" subsidies - but I guess this would work less well in Britain as renovating existing buildings is a much more common thing to do and people would take the piss.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,794
    rcs1000 said:

    There is no debate.

    Python is simply better.
    Yup, I worked with C and C++ in a previous life and now I'm basically all Python, Tensorflow and SQL. Python is leaps ahead of C++, it's not even a serious competition.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,794

    Now what about Tensorflow vs PyTorch?
    I still don't understand why anyone bothers with anything other than Tensorflow.
  • We have an extra restriction on areas of archaeological significance, the town maintains a map of those areas and if you're building in one then there's a process to check if there's anything that would justify doing a dig before you tear the ground up. My local tyre fitter, who also sells real estate (the town also has some dedicated real estate agents but they appear to sell neither real estate nor tyres) was bitching about it, people run into it more than usual here as this town has the remains of three separate castles, which is like one per 6,000 people.
    Prior to the mid 80s there was a similar system in the UK. The trouble is that outside of those areas there was no requirement for any pre development investigation. Dozens of nationally important sites were only found when they bulldozers ploughed through them. The PPG system introduced by the Thatcher government put a stop to that by insisting on developer paid investigations prior to the commencement of any works and watching briefs whilst works were underway. Many of the best sites in Britain were discovered and preserved because of this system.

    Sadly successive governments have sought to water down these protections and the information we are being given now is that the latest scheme will remove them almost entirely from areas deemed suitable for development.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 83,160
    edited September 2020
    MaxPB said:

    I still don't understand why anyone bothers with anything other than Tensorflow.
    Well TF 1.x shall we say "unique" approach put a lot of people off. TF 2.x fixes a lot of this, with eager execution and better Keras integration, but in the meantime PyTorch has been pushed heavily and a lot of the state of the art research is increasingly being first released using in PyTorch.
  • Yes, regulations on new buildings are strict and quite detailed, but mainly to ensure earthquake and fire safety. It's all very *objective*, for example if you're near a slope greater than x degrees than your building has to be at least y meters away. The size your building can be in a particular zone is calculated mathematically, based on the ratio of the amount of floor space to land. This is probably a little bit sub-optimal, but it means that it's fairly quick and easy to tell what's allowed and what isn't, and there isn't too much left to somebody's discretion.

    Rules on renovations seem incredibly relaxed - I hardly had any official involvement at all except when I applied for "pay for my septic tank" and "pay me for moving to your town" subsidies - but I guess this would work less well in Britain as renovating existing buildings is a much more common thing to do and people would take the piss.
    A very smart system designed to have people own homes and build functional homes.

    As opposed to our system designed it seems to protect property values.
  • You can separate mitigation from the planning process - and if there's known ancient woodland etc to protect then why wouldn't that be a red zone already?
    The information we are being given is that the protections will not be there.
  • The information we are being given is that the protections will not be there.
    I doubt it.

    What needs to be dealt with is NIMBYism.

    Environmental issues should be a part of the planning regulations but once the regulation is dealt with that should be it.

    Nobody should be able to object because it would harm property values. We should have a free market.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,794

    Well TF 1.x shall we say "unique" approach put a lot of people off. TF 2.x fixes a lot of this, with eager execution and better Keras integration, but in the meantime PyTorch has been pushed heavily and a lot of the state of the art research is increasingly being first released using in PyTorch.
    TF2 also made everything very slow for us so we switched back to TF1, I haven't really kept up on whether it's been fixed but if it has we will probably migrate everything over at some point. I think because our whole tech stack is GCP based it makes more sense for us to stick with it as well. PyTorch is Facebook, personally I'm pretty untrustworthy of Facebook in general and I think I'm just sceptical about everything they're involved with outside of their core social media function.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 83,160
    edited September 2020
    MaxPB said:

    TF2 also made everything very slow for us so we switched back to TF1, I haven't really kept up on whether it's been fixed but if it has we will probably migrate everything over at some point. I think because our whole tech stack is GCP based it makes more sense for us to stick with it as well. PyTorch is Facebook, personally I'm pretty untrustworthy of Facebook in general and I think I'm just sceptical about everything they're involved with outside of their core social media function.
    Which version of TF2? I got significant speed-up going from early 2.x release, with 2.2.

    With TF 2.3, I have suffered a bit of a slow down with one project, all the rest are the same.

    TF 2.4 comes out soon with Cuda 11 support, so hopeful that will see uptick in performance, especially if I get myself a nice 3090 :-)

    I understand your suspicion of Facebook led PyTorch, but it does seem like latest academic research is now majority PyTorch. Where as 2 years ago it was all overwhelmingly TF.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,987

    Black is white
    Up is down
    Left is right....

    Brexit: UK chief negotiator calls for 'realism' from EU

    :D:D:D

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54062413

    The UK government is gaslighting the EU!
  • The UK government is gaslighting the EU!
    No. The UK government is being entirely reasonable. The EU is unreasonable if they think this Brexiteer government would agree their preposterous proposals.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,886
    edited September 2020

    https://www.nationalreview.com/news/usc-professor-placed-on-leave-after-black-students-complained-his-pronunciation-of-a-chinese-word-affected-their-mental-health/

    It appears Google translate is also massively racist, as I just put into there and it definitely sounds like the N word.

    These students in Southern California must be permanently outraged / suffering emotional exhaustion given all the Spanish spoken there and the Spanish word for black.

    It's interesting. After 7 years of speaking little but Mandarin, it did become a verbal tic that I was hyper aware could be misconstrued when I returned to UK. I found myself repeating it when struggling to remember vocabulary and in places I would previously have said "um or err".
    Fortunately, my heavy South Taipei "gangster" accent renders it closer to "nay ge".
    My Mandarin makes me sound like Ray Winstone to native speakers apparently.
    Which greatly amuses people.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,794
    edited September 2020

    Which version of TF2? I got significant speed-up going from early 2.x release, with 2.2.

    With TF 2.3, I have suffered a bit of a slow down with one project, all the rest are the same.

    TF 2.4 comes out soon with Cuda 11 support, so hopeful that will see uptick in performance, especially if I get myself a nice 3090 :-)
    2.0 was when we tried initially, it made things take ages with our test models. From what you're saying it might be worth trying again soon. The 3090 plus the new storage interface looks incredible. Being able to use NVMe and PCIe 4 to get 5.5GB/s read speeds will make for some interesting gains.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,886
    Crumbs. Just watched PMQs. Couldn't watch to the end.
  • I love how we're now throwing the under 30s under the bus now for socialising when 1 week ago it was such a patriotic duty that it was subsidised at £10 a head.

    Plenty of people being very irresponsible at the moment and I'm just wondering how many daily cases we need before we have an intervention to curb social contact UK wide. I imagine it'll be 3 weeks too late, and the usual suspects will say just how impossible to predict the second wave was when here we are, predicting it.
  • MangoMango Posts: 1,031


    He got million more votes than any alternative. Therefore Britain has backed him.

    Cretinous.
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 29,868
    edited September 2020
    USA President betting -- the Biden risk premium remains

    Biden 1.84
    Dem 1.77

    Trump 2.3
    Rep 2.28
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 34,162
    edited September 2020
    Average number of UK Covid-19 deaths reported each day over the last seven days = 7.6.

    https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,252

    Black is white
    Up is down
    Left is right....

    Brexit: UK chief negotiator calls for 'realism' from EU

    :D:D:D

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54062413

    The EU were unrealistic in thinking the concessions offered to Cameron would be enough to keep us in the EU.

    ...or those offered to May would be enough to deliver the WA.

    So yep, that is a fair call from our side. Unless the EU wants no deal. And the resulting Singapore-on-the-Atlantic....
  • The EU were unrealistic in thinking the concessions offered to Cameron would be enough to keep us in the EU.

    ...or those offered to May would be enough to deliver the WA.

    So yep, that is a fair call from our side. Unless the EU wants no deal. And the resulting Singapore-on-the-Atlantic....
    It all sounds like a well -thumbed Boris J and Dominic C trick...when the chips are down and things look a bit iffy domestically, pick a fight with Brussels.. quite how this makes us Singapore I am at a loss....
  • The EU were unrealistic in thinking the concessions offered to Cameron would be enough to keep us in the EU.

    ...or those offered to May would be enough to deliver the WA.

    So yep, that is a fair call from our side. Unless the EU wants no deal. And the resulting Singapore-on-the-Atlantic....
    If you think we'll do better without a deal, what's the problem?
  • NerysHughesNerysHughes Posts: 3,375
    edited September 2020

    Some interesting info from Carl Heneghan, starting around 7 mins e.g. There have still been outbreaks in care homes over the summer, but much lower hospitaliation / deaths, even among this vulnerable group. Also, found people still shedding 72 days after they were initially infected, and would still register a positive on the PCR test.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WdzMVekUBU

    He seems to be indicating at around 7 mins 10 that lockdown had a very negative effect on care homes.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 34,162
    edited September 2020

    He seems to be indicating at around 7 mins 10 that lockdown had a very negative effect on care homes.
    True, he's said the same thing several times before.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 59,098
    edited September 2020

    The EU were unrealistic in thinking the concessions offered to Cameron would be enough to keep us in the EU.

    ...or those offered to May would be enough to deliver the WA.

    So yep, that is a fair call from our side. Unless the EU wants no deal. And the resulting Singapore-on-the-Atlantic....
    I have a subsidiary in Singapore. The idea that it is low regulation is clearly based on people who have never had a company there. The only reason to start a business there is that it good English is spoken (certainly compared to HK), it is incredibly conveniently located geographically, with excellent air links, and there is easy availability of domestic labour which makes expats very happy.

    (Historically, Singapore used to have low tax rates relative to near neighbours. But that advantage has largely been removed in the last couple of years.)
  • MangoMango Posts: 1,031


    Nope you still end up with an 'elected dictatorship'. Basically whoever commands a majority in Parliament is still in a position to do what they want as long as they can take enough MPs with them.

    Yes, but each party is accountable to its voters, rather than just the fucking 1922 committee or corporate paymasters being the sole arbiters of what's right.

    The UK has so much to learn from other countries. And never does.
This discussion has been closed.