Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

Break open your cage and VOOM: New policies for the Lib Dems – politicalbetting.com

2456

Comments

  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    They've already got a 6pm to 6am curfew.

    How much harder are they going to lockdown?
    Or they could --- i'm going left field here .........

    Get on and vaccinate......
  • DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    Just as Boris dithered too much, France and Germany have made exactly the same mistakes. Germany's Diet Lockdown was a disaster and now France are messing about again.
    And yet their daily death toll still remains significantly less than ours. What the hell happened in January? The numbers suggest to me that Kent was not slightly but significantly more lethal than the original variant.
    Other possibilities:

    Deaths being recorded as something else in other countries.
    UK obesity
    NHS being inferior to other countries health systems
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    Why is @Casino_Royale banned?

    He said something unpleasant about Radiohead in the musical discussions last night?
    Was he a fan of pineapple on pizza?

  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    ydoethur said:

    If weather like this continues, that won’t be a problem.

    If it’s like it was fortnight ago...
    When I was at boarding school I shared a bedroom with 11 other teenage boys. Let's just say that ventilation was essential. Often in winter the duvets on the 2 beds nearest the window were covered with snow or ice. If it had gone to the next 2 we knew it had been a bad one.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021
    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    Just as Boris dithered too much, France and Germany have made exactly the same mistakes. Germany's Diet Lockdown was a disaster and now France are messing about again.
    And yet their daily death toll still remains significantly less than ours. What the hell happened in January? The numbers suggest to me that Kent was not slightly but significantly more lethal than the original variant.
    Over the winter months, Germany's death toll is still lower, but so far is 60k people dead over just a few months. France rate was basically same as UK Sep -> end of the year, in fact larger in December, then it took off here in Jan at an incredible rate.
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207

    Floater said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    Just as Boris dithered too much, France and Germany have made exactly the same mistakes. Germany's Diet Lockdown was a disaster and now France are messing about again.
    Ursula will be very unhappy if Germany imposes more border restrictions...........
    That was another moment of insanity from VDL at the start of the pandemic lambasting countries for closing their borders.
    They said the same again just recently - the project trumps lives
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets
  • FloaterFloater Posts: 14,207
    Rumours from the hospitality industry that there might be some news tomorrow .... I hope they are right
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,154
    DavidL said:

    ydoethur said:

    If weather like this continues, that won’t be a problem.

    If it’s like it was fortnight ago...
    When I was at boarding school I shared a bedroom with 11 other teenage boys. Let's just say that ventilation was essential. Often in winter the duvets on the 2 beds nearest the window were covered with snow or ice. If it had gone to the next 2 we knew it had been a bad one.
    Beds? You were lucky to ‘ave beds.
  • I saw Prof Spector the other day say there should be other symptoms not just the classic three for Covid 19 but does anyone know what they are?

    I don't know if its paranoia from my wife being positive but I'm wondering if I have unusual symptoms or its a coincidence? Got a pounding headache and inside my chest feels 'scratchy' like I've been hanging around too much with smokers.

    No idea if its just nerves or if its symptoms. Booked a test.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    Just as Boris dithered too much, France and Germany have made exactly the same mistakes. Germany's Diet Lockdown was a disaster and now France are messing about again.
    And yet their daily death toll still remains significantly less than ours. What the hell happened in January? The numbers suggest to me that Kent was not slightly but significantly more lethal than the original variant.
    Other possibilities:

    Deaths being recorded as something else in other countries.
    UK obesity
    NHS being inferior to other countries health systems
    On obesity that didn't change over the last 2 months but our experience changed out of recognition to the EU average. Ditto recorded deaths. If anything I would say that the NHS has been at the forefront of developing more effective treatments for Covid.

    So far as I have been able to ascertain we really didn't do anything much different at Christmas. Something changed and 50k extra people died over 2 months. Incredible.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021
    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    It won't replace actors, it will just be a better and quicker form of the "digital human" approach they already use. A shocking amount of high end movies already deploy "digital human" versions of the actors in large numbers of scenes.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706

    I saw Prof Spector the other day say there should be other symptoms not just the classic three for Covid 19 but does anyone know what they are?

    I don't know if its paranoia from my wife being positive but I'm wondering if I have unusual symptoms or its a coincidence? Got a pounding headache and inside my chest feels 'scratchy' like I've been hanging around too much with smokers.

    No idea if its just nerves or if its symptoms. Booked a test.

    Best of luck. It would be weird if you were not a little paranoid in the circumstances. Entirely understandable and natural.
  • Floater said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    They've already got a 6pm to 6am curfew.

    How much harder are they going to lockdown?
    Or they could --- i'm going left field here .........

    Get on and vaccinate......
    Crazy talk!
  • Floater said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    They've already got a 6pm to 6am curfew.

    How much harder are they going to lockdown?
    Or they could --- i'm going left field here .........

    Get on and vaccinate......
    Pseudo-science....
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    ydoethur said:

    DavidL said:

    ydoethur said:

    If weather like this continues, that won’t be a problem.

    If it’s like it was fortnight ago...
    When I was at boarding school I shared a bedroom with 11 other teenage boys. Let's just say that ventilation was essential. Often in winter the duvets on the 2 beds nearest the window were covered with snow or ice. If it had gone to the next 2 we knew it had been a bad one.
    Beds? You were lucky to ‘ave beds.
    No doubt. The porridge on the other hand, that wasn't so lucky. Never tasted anything like it. Thank god.
  • Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    It won't replace actors, it will just be a better and quicker form of the "digital human" approach they already use. A shocking amount of high end movies already deploy "digital human" versions of the actors in large numbers of scenes.
    Indeed actors film a lot of the basis of CGI etc, even nowadays for computer games sometimes, which the has the CGI skinned onto the actors actions.

    It's not just Andy Serkis who makes a living doing that.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,418
    edited February 2021

    I saw Prof Spector the other day say there should be other symptoms not just the classic three for Covid 19 but does anyone know what they are?

    I don't know if its paranoia from my wife being positive but I'm wondering if I have unusual symptoms or its a coincidence? Got a pounding headache and inside my chest feels 'scratchy' like I've been hanging around too much with smokers.

    No idea if its just nerves or if its symptoms. Booked a test.

    Fingers crossed it’s nowt
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,344

    Mexico, where Reuters reports that president President Andres Manuel López Obrador is expected to ask Joe Biden to consider sharing part of the US coronavirus vaccine supply at a virtual summit on Monday.

    Tricky for Biden.

    Just use it to vaccinate all the wetbacks in the southern US?
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Germany has classed France’s Covid-battered Moselle region as a high-risk area for virus variants, triggering tougher entry requirements at the border between the two neighbours.

    France’s eastern Moselle region has been listed as an area “at particularly high risk of infection due to widespread occurrence of Sars-CoV-2 virus variants”, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for disease control announced.

    From Tuesday, cross-border travellers from Moselle will need to be able to show a recent negative coronavirus test.

    Germany has already introduced tough checks at its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria’s Tyrol region, ignoring calls from Brussels to keep borders within the bloc open. The checks at the Moselle crossing will be less strict, with random stops and requests for negative tests rather than every vehicle being stopped.

    Jesus, France, just lockdown already
    Just as Boris dithered too much, France and Germany have made exactly the same mistakes. Germany's Diet Lockdown was a disaster and now France are messing about again.
    And yet their daily death toll still remains significantly less than ours. What the hell happened in January? The numbers suggest to me that Kent was not slightly but significantly more lethal than the original variant.
    Over the winter months, Germany's death toll is still lower, but so far is 60k people dead over just a few months. France rate was basically same as UK Sep -> end of the year, in fact larger in December, then it took off here in Jan at an incredible rate.
    Something materially changed and many, probably most, of those who died were already infected before the Christmas relaxation. A much higher proportion of them died than had been the norm to that point despite a lot of the dry timber having already gone and the rules on care homes etc being much tightened up.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    It won't replace actors, it will just be a better and quicker form of the "digital human" approach they already use. A shocking amount of high end movies already deploy "digital human" versions of the actors in large numbers of scenes.
    I genuinely don’t know. Huge stars are very expensive (and have human flaws, paging Kevin Spacey)

    Why not just deepfake great actors from the past, and save the cash? Or make entirely new ones, that never age, perfected by algorithms to be 100% lovable and brilliant

    Like I said. It’s a rabbit hole. And I’ve fallen in it
  • guybrushguybrush Posts: 257
    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    It won't replace actors, it will just be a better and quicker form of the "digital human" approach they already use. A shocking amount of high end movies already deploy "digital human" versions of the actors in large numbers of scenes.
    I genuinely don’t know. Huge stars are very expensive (and have human flaws, paging Kevin Spacey)

    Why not just deepfake great actors from the past, and save the cash? Or make entirely new ones, that never age, perfected by algorithms to be 100% lovable and brilliant

    Like I said. It’s a rabbit hole. And I’ve fallen in it
    That's nothing. I've heard that flint dildos are going to be mass produced by 3D printers any time now.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 41,947

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    I've noticed in a couple of places the term BAME being phased out in favour of something vague and inoffensive, so maybe it is on the way to being cancelled.

    Have to agree with @Gardenwalker, without minimising the reality of racism, which is of course present in our society we do appear so wrapped up in the whole thing as to miss the bigger picture... class, wealth.

    I would suggest the experience of a Chinese person working in the City, black kid on a council estate, Asian factory worker in the midlands, Orthodox Jewish dude in North London, Indian doctor/Chancellor of the Exchequer (I could go on) are so diverse and varied as to make the term meaningless...

    Yes, there have already been articles in the Guardian complaining about ‘BAME’ being patronising. Which it is

    It’s not long for this world. If Kinabalu is not get careful he will still be using it next year and he’ll get cancelled. However, I predict he will execute a perfect 180 and eagerly use the new word, whatever it is, while simultaneously claiming he always regarded ‘BAME’ as bigoted and ugly
    I doubt it. What I can predict with 100% confidence is that you and your ilk will continue to be angered loudly and beyond measure by the sensitivities and the lexicon of the anti-racism movement and yet oddly low wattage about racism itself.
    Every single ‘approved term’ for BAMEs (Christ, it really is ugly, it makes me wince just writing it) has been superseded by a ‘more sensitive’ term, in time. I’m old enough to remember ‘Afro-caribbean’. And let’s not forget ‘coloured person’ was itself a politically correct replacement for earlier words.

    There is no reason BAME will be immune to this iron law. Especially as it is hideous and patronising.

    I’m actually willing to bet on this, if we can frame the wager coherently.
    So Bame goes in favour of something else. Then that goes and there's something else again. Language evolves. Sensitivities change. So what? This is not in my top 50 of things to be angry, concerned or irritated about on planet earth 2021. Racism, OTOH, is.

    I genuinely do not get why people have those things in the reverse order and I think those who do ought to carry out a self-audit - a proper one - before they write too much on it.

    Have you done that?

    Serious question. I'm not trying to be an insinuating smarmball. Not this time.
    Racism is.

    Unless its racism against Jews.

    Got it.

    When will you stand up and say Jews count?
    Says the nasty little troll for whom the Holocaust was just a statistic.
    Where are you getting that from, I have never said that. I've hated anti-Semitism all my life, my best friend growing up lost his great grandmother at Auschwitz, his grandmother survived thankfully.

    That you'd rather throw accusations at others instead of saying Jews count and anti-racism must include fighting anti-Semitism is sickening.

    Is saying Jews do count really so difficult for you?
    Unlike deceitful little trolls, I have a basis for the things I write.

    I refer to the recent debate as to whether race should be considered an aggravating factor for a crime. Was the Lawrence murder, for example, more heinous than if the victim was just a 'wrong place wrong time' random selection?

    I argued yes. You said no. For you it was just about the crime itself. The act.

    I tried - but failed - to make you see differently by considering genocide. Could the evil of the Holocaust, the mass murder of millions, be captured purely by the number of victims? Did the fact it was Jews selected for termination not add to the horror? Did this not show how racial targeting for a crime did indeed add to its gravity? Or was it just about the stats? So there we go. Food for thought at the very least.

    Also unlike deceitful little trolls, I'm not forever making up stuff about my private life to try and make myself look authentic and enlightened.

    Others may be fooled, Philip, but I'm not. I'm happy enough to tumble around with you, it can be fun, but you can sometimes veer into genuine unpleasantness and today was a particularly bad example.

    Suggest we go back to where antisemitism was crassly introduced (by you) into this discussion and pretend it never happened.

    If you don't take that (imo generous) offer you'll be talking to yourself for a while.
  • Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
  • Have these Wales polling figures been posted? If accurate a significant divergence from UK polling.
    https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1366016064178581506?s=19
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,340
    Interesting header @Gardenwalker.
    Not sure those policies add up to an election winning coalition.
    But since I am struggling to think of a single LD policy right now, then they are at least a start.
  • guybrushguybrush Posts: 257
    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    Yup, cat well and truly out the bag...
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706
    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    'm reminded of a brilliant early Asimov story where our hero historians (seriously) spend most of the story trying to break down the wall of secrecy that the government has built around a new technology which allows you to view the past. They succeed and the government officer asks them when do you think the past starts, what was your wife or neighbour doing 10 seconds ago? Welcome to the end of privacy. A really excellent twist.
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,851
    A very good piece Gardenwalker. A couple of tweeks to squeeze out the last few vestiges of Torydom (like getting rid of the TV license) and it would get my vote.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677

    Why is @Casino_Royale banned?

    The usual. Went from zero to Chris Brown on the anger scale in under 10 seconds.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 41,947

    I saw Prof Spector the other day say there should be other symptoms not just the classic three for Covid 19 but does anyone know what they are?

    I don't know if its paranoia from my wife being positive but I'm wondering if I have unusual symptoms or its a coincidence? Got a pounding headache and inside my chest feels 'scratchy' like I've been hanging around too much with smokers.

    No idea if its just nerves or if its symptoms. Booked a test.

    I've heard that writing made-up shit on the internet is a definite symptom.

    So I would get that test asap if I were you.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    It won't replace actors, it will just be a better and quicker form of the "digital human" approach they already use. A shocking amount of high end movies already deploy "digital human" versions of the actors in large numbers of scenes.
    I genuinely don’t know. Huge stars are very expensive (and have human flaws, paging Kevin Spacey)

    Why not just deepfake great actors from the past, and save the cash? Or make entirely new ones, that never age, perfected by algorithms to be 100% lovable and brilliant

    Like I said. It’s a rabbit hole. And I’ve fallen in it
    Well, it would have the upside of solving half of our 'representation' and 'identity' issues in a heartbeat. Want a female James Bond? Voilà - pussy galore. Think there are too few Venezuelan vuvuzelaists on Eastenders? Now all the characters are. Want the Foreign Secretary to look and sound like Jeremy Corbyn? The revolution is now...
  • TimTTimT Posts: 6,456

    I saw Prof Spector the other day say there should be other symptoms not just the classic three for Covid 19 but does anyone know what they are?

    I don't know if its paranoia from my wife being positive but I'm wondering if I have unusual symptoms or its a coincidence? Got a pounding headache and inside my chest feels 'scratchy' like I've been hanging around too much with smokers.

    No idea if its just nerves or if its symptoms. Booked a test.

    Fingers crossed it’s nowt
    @ Gallowgate. There is a very long list of symptoms, I suspect because just about every tissue in the human body can be infected because they all have the ACE2 receptor and the serase enzymes and polysaccharides that enable infection.

    However, 95% of symptomatic patients exhibit one of the principal 3 symptoms - dry cough, fever, shortness of breath. But don't discount COVID if you don't have all three - only 15% exhibit all three. Recently, anosmia - loss of the sense of smell - has emerged as highly predictive of COVID too.


    https://medical.mit.edu/covid-19-updates/2020/08/ever-expanding-list-covid-19-symptoms
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,340
    valleyboy said:

    Have these Wales polling figures been posted? If accurate a significant divergence from UK polling.
    https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1366016064178581506?s=19

    Yes they have. They mysteriously passed by uncommented on by some of our most fervent poll watchers.
    My view. This, Scotland and Westminster polls are all part of a worldwide incumbency bonus. As bored, frustrated and traumatised populations desperately hope that their governments are competent.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 22,700
    Excellent piece, @Gardenwalker . Thanks.

    On Deep Fakes, if they become too particular-person-like, it would run into Rights problems.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
    edited February 2021

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 12,360
    edited February 2021
    Thanks for a great article.
    Comments

    1) Free tuition counterintuitively helps the richest most, so it has problems and is less liberal than it seems.

    2) Yes

    3) This would have been good after Brexit as step one, but is retrograde now. FoM is deeply illiberal in privileging 450,000,000 richer and whiter people's mutual access over billions of poorer and non white people.

    4) Yes? But it will have as many problems, and LD constituents/voters are not going to be gaining much from it, as Richmond would do badly and Accrington rather well

    5) Yes

    6) Yes

    7) Too expensive means too expensive whatever you do. The tax rises involved make it impossible. If it were possible it would have been done. Better to focus on social care cost and a saner benefits system.

    8) Yes

    9) Yes.

    Overall however I see no sign that the LDs are genuinely liberal at all, and the nearest things we have (not very near) is the non authoritarian wing of the Tory party, who despite appearances are currently in charge.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 56,876
    Goodness. I might event be able to vote for that.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 122,226
    edited February 2021
    valleyboy said:

    Have these Wales polling figures been posted? If accurate a significant divergence from UK polling.
    https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1366016064178581506?s=19

    Labour up 6% from the 32% it got across the UK in 2019 in the latest UK poll but down 1% on the 40% it got in Wales in 2019 you mean?

    https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1365792343077642240?s=20
  • YorkcityYorkcity Posts: 4,382
    With the threat of Corbyn now gone for many Lib dem tory switchers.
    Will more jump to the Lib dems in GE?
    Hopefully both parties could help this happen in seats where it might make a difference.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556
    edited February 2021
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    Bah! The anti-Turing (Gnirut?) test is much more impressive. It's when you're talking to a real human being on the internet but come away with the impression that all you've done is interacted with a computer programme...
  • kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    I've noticed in a couple of places the term BAME being phased out in favour of something vague and inoffensive, so maybe it is on the way to being cancelled.

    Have to agree with @Gardenwalker, without minimising the reality of racism, which is of course present in our society we do appear so wrapped up in the whole thing as to miss the bigger picture... class, wealth.

    I would suggest the experience of a Chinese person working in the City, black kid on a council estate, Asian factory worker in the midlands, Orthodox Jewish dude in North London, Indian doctor/Chancellor of the Exchequer (I could go on) are so diverse and varied as to make the term meaningless...

    Yes, there have already been articles in the Guardian complaining about ‘BAME’ being patronising. Which it is

    It’s not long for this world. If Kinabalu is not get careful he will still be using it next year and he’ll get cancelled. However, I predict he will execute a perfect 180 and eagerly use the new word, whatever it is, while simultaneously claiming he always regarded ‘BAME’ as bigoted and ugly
    I doubt it. What I can predict with 100% confidence is that you and your ilk will continue to be angered loudly and beyond measure by the sensitivities and the lexicon of the anti-racism movement and yet oddly low wattage about racism itself.
    Every single ‘approved term’ for BAMEs (Christ, it really is ugly, it makes me wince just writing it) has been superseded by a ‘more sensitive’ term, in time. I’m old enough to remember ‘Afro-caribbean’. And let’s not forget ‘coloured person’ was itself a politically correct replacement for earlier words.

    There is no reason BAME will be immune to this iron law. Especially as it is hideous and patronising.

    I’m actually willing to bet on this, if we can frame the wager coherently.
    So Bame goes in favour of something else. Then that goes and there's something else again. Language evolves. Sensitivities change. So what? This is not in my top 50 of things to be angry, concerned or irritated about on planet earth 2021. Racism, OTOH, is.

    I genuinely do not get why people have those things in the reverse order and I think those who do ought to carry out a self-audit - a proper one - before they write too much on it.

    Have you done that?

    Serious question. I'm not trying to be an insinuating smarmball. Not this time.
    Racism is.

    Unless its racism against Jews.

    Got it.

    When will you stand up and say Jews count?
    Says the nasty little troll for whom the Holocaust was just a statistic.
    Where are you getting that from, I have never said that. I've hated anti-Semitism all my life, my best friend growing up lost his great grandmother at Auschwitz, his grandmother survived thankfully.

    That you'd rather throw accusations at others instead of saying Jews count and anti-racism must include fighting anti-Semitism is sickening.

    Is saying Jews do count really so difficult for you?
    Unlike deceitful little trolls, I have a basis for the things I write.

    I refer to the recent debate as to whether race should be considered an aggravating factor for a crime. Was the Lawrence murder, for example, more heinous than if the victim was just a 'wrong place wrong time' random selection?

    I argued yes. You said no. For you it was just about the crime itself. The act.

    I tried - but failed - to make you see differently by considering genocide. Could the evil of the Holocaust, the mass murder of millions, be captured purely by the number of victims? Did the fact it was Jews selected for termination not add to the horror? Did this not show how racial targeting for a crime did indeed add to its gravity? Or was it just about the stats? So there we go. Food for thought at the very least.

    Also unlike deceitful little trolls, I'm not forever making up stuff about my private life to try and make myself look authentic and enlightened.

    Others may be fooled, Philip, but I'm not. I'm happy enough to tumble around with you, it can be fun, but you can sometimes veer into genuine unpleasantness and today was a particularly bad example.

    Suggest we go back to where antisemitism was crassly introduced (by you) into this discussion and pretend it never happened.

    If you don't take that (imo generous) offer you'll be talking to yourself for a while.
    That isn't what I said. You effectively asked if the Holocaust would be less problematic if it wasn't done for grounds of anti-Semitism.

    What I said it the Holocaust was as evil as it gets but that the fact it was against Jews wasn't what made it evil, what made it evil was killing so many people. It is pure evil no matter what the motivation, there is no motivation that makes it OK, other crimes like Pol Pot were just as evil. That killing slaughtering innocent people is abhorrently evil no matter what the reason, whether it be Hitler killing 6 million Jews and others or Pol Pot killing 1.7 million professionals, the educated and others.

    Deliberately slaughtering people is evil whatever the reason. Killing innocent people because they're Jews or because they're educated or because any other reason and putting them in mass graves is never OK and never justifiable.

    Do you think this is "better" because it was primarily the educated murdered instead of a race?
    image
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,340
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    Although Deep Fakes were widely predicted to be rampant during the US election.
    As it was they barely featured.
    Humans will adapt.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 95,829
    On deepfake technology it will get perfected where much tech is - in the production of pornography.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
    dixiedean said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    Although Deep Fakes were widely predicted to be rampant during the US election.
    As it was they barely featured.
    Humans will adapt.
    That’s because they’re not QUITE good enough yet, and no one malign is manipulating them, YET. But they will. The potential is so enormous once you think about it.

    Here’s another Tom Cruise deepfake. If you look hard you can just about see it’s fake. The chin is odd. But if I watched this casually for a few seconds I would just presume it is Tom Cruise

    Another year or two of this ever-speedier development?

    https://twitter.com/racheltobac/status/1365413178327277575?s=21
  • Yorkcity said:

    With the threat of Corbyn now gone for many Lib dem tory switchers.
    Will more jump to the Lib dems in GE?
    Hopefully both parties could help this happen in seats where it might make a difference.

    Think Guildford and Winchester to LD might be value
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 60,216
    edited February 2021
    Cases starting to fall faster - deaths plummeting, and over 20million first jabs :



    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1366056924106657795?s=20
  • Speaking of fakes, yoons and Wingers both united in lapping up this one.

    https://twitter.com/GorgieU/status/1365315717260795907?s=20
  • RogerRoger Posts: 19,851

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    I've noticed in a couple of places the term BAME being phased out in favour of something vague and inoffensive, so maybe it is on the way to being cancelled.

    Have to agree with @Gardenwalker, without minimising the reality of racism, which is of course present in our society we do appear so wrapped up in the whole thing as to miss the bigger picture... class, wealth.

    I would suggest the experience of a Chinese person working in the City, black kid on a council estate, Asian factory worker in the midlands, Orthodox Jewish dude in North London, Indian doctor/Chancellor of the Exchequer (I could go on) are so diverse and varied as to make the term meaningless...

    Yes, there have already been articles in the Guardian complaining about ‘BAME’ being patronising. Which it is

    It’s not long for this world. If Kinabalu is not get careful he will still be using it next year and he’ll get cancelled. However, I predict he will execute a perfect 180 and eagerly use the new word, whatever it is, while simultaneously claiming he always regarded ‘BAME’ as bigoted and ugly
    I doubt it. What I can predict with 100% confidence is that you and your ilk will continue to be angered loudly and beyond measure by the sensitivities and the lexicon of the anti-racism movement and yet oddly low wattage about racism itself.
    Every single ‘approved term’ for BAMEs (Christ, it really is ugly, it makes me wince just writing it) has been superseded by a ‘more sensitive’ term, in time. I’m old enough to remember ‘Afro-caribbean’. And let’s not forget ‘coloured person’ was itself a politically correct replacement for earlier words.

    There is no reason BAME will be immune to this iron law. Especially as it is hideous and patronising.

    I’m actually willing to bet on this, if we can frame the wager coherently.
    So Bame goes in favour of something else. Then that goes and there's something else again. Language evolves. Sensitivities change. So what? This is not in my top 50 of things to be angry, concerned or irritated about on planet earth 2021. Racism, OTOH, is.

    I genuinely do not get why people have those things in the reverse order and I think those who do ought to carry out a self-audit - a proper one - before they write too much on it.

    Have you done that?

    Serious question. I'm not trying to be an insinuating smarmball. Not this time.
    Racism is.

    Unless its racism against Jews.

    Got it.

    When will you stand up and say Jews count?
    Says the nasty little troll for whom the Holocaust was just a statistic.
    Where are you getting that from, I have never said that. I've hated anti-Semitism all my life, my best friend growing up lost his great grandmother at Auschwitz, his grandmother survived thankfully.

    That you'd rather throw accusations at others instead of saying Jews count and anti-racism must include fighting anti-Semitism is sickening.

    Is saying Jews do count really so difficult for you?
    Even by the sometimes bizarre standards of PB craving in aid a friend who lost their Great Great Grandmother in Auschwitz has to be a first
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    I've noticed in a couple of places the term BAME being phased out in favour of something vague and inoffensive, so maybe it is on the way to being cancelled.

    Have to agree with @Gardenwalker, without minimising the reality of racism, which is of course present in our society we do appear so wrapped up in the whole thing as to miss the bigger picture... class, wealth.

    I would suggest the experience of a Chinese person working in the City, black kid on a council estate, Asian factory worker in the midlands, Orthodox Jewish dude in North London, Indian doctor/Chancellor of the Exchequer (I could go on) are so diverse and varied as to make the term meaningless...

    Yes, there have already been articles in the Guardian complaining about ‘BAME’ being patronising. Which it is

    It’s not long for this world. If Kinabalu is not get careful he will still be using it next year and he’ll get cancelled. However, I predict he will execute a perfect 180 and eagerly use the new word, whatever it is, while simultaneously claiming he always regarded ‘BAME’ as bigoted and ugly
    I doubt it. What I can predict with 100% confidence is that you and your ilk will continue to be angered loudly and beyond measure by the sensitivities and the lexicon of the anti-racism movement and yet oddly low wattage about racism itself.
    Every single ‘approved term’ for BAMEs (Christ, it really is ugly, it makes me wince just writing it) has been superseded by a ‘more sensitive’ term, in time. I’m old enough to remember ‘Afro-caribbean’. And let’s not forget ‘coloured person’ was itself a politically correct replacement for earlier words.

    There is no reason BAME will be immune to this iron law. Especially as it is hideous and patronising.

    I’m actually willing to bet on this, if we can frame the wager coherently.
    So Bame goes in favour of something else. Then that goes and there's something else again. Language evolves. Sensitivities change. So what? This is not in my top 50 of things to be angry, concerned or irritated about on planet earth 2021. Racism, OTOH, is.

    I genuinely do not get why people have those things in the reverse order and I think those who do ought to carry out a self-audit - a proper one - before they write too much on it.

    Have you done that?

    Serious question. I'm not trying to be an insinuating smarmball. Not this time.
    Racism is.

    Unless its racism against Jews.

    Got it.

    When will you stand up and say Jews count?
    Says the nasty little troll for whom the Holocaust was just a statistic.
    Where are you getting that from, I have never said that. I've hated anti-Semitism all my life, my best friend growing up lost his great grandmother at Auschwitz, his grandmother survived thankfully.

    That you'd rather throw accusations at others instead of saying Jews count and anti-racism must include fighting anti-Semitism is sickening.

    Is saying Jews do count really so difficult for you?
    Unlike deceitful little trolls, I have a basis for the things I write.

    I refer to the recent debate as to whether race should be considered an aggravating factor for a crime. Was the Lawrence murder, for example, more heinous than if the victim was just a 'wrong place wrong time' random selection?

    I argued yes. You said no. For you it was just about the crime itself. The act.

    I tried - but failed - to make you see differently by considering genocide. Could the evil of the Holocaust, the mass murder of millions, be captured purely by the number of victims? Did the fact it was Jews selected for termination not add to the horror? Did this not show how racial targeting for a crime did indeed add to its gravity? Or was it just about the stats? So there we go. Food for thought at the very least.

    Also unlike deceitful little trolls, I'm not forever making up stuff about my private life to try and make myself look authentic and enlightened.

    Others may be fooled, Philip, but I'm not. I'm happy enough to tumble around with you, it can be fun, but you can sometimes veer into genuine unpleasantness and today was a particularly bad example.

    Suggest we go back to where antisemitism was crassly introduced (by you) into this discussion and pretend it never happened.

    If you don't take that (imo generous) offer you'll be talking to yourself for a while.
    That isn't what I said. You effectively asked if the Holocaust would be less problematic if it wasn't done for grounds of anti-Semitism.

    What I said it the Holocaust was as evil as it gets but that the fact it was against Jews wasn't what made it evil, what made it evil was killing so many people. It is pure evil no matter what the motivation, there is no motivation that makes it OK, other crimes like Pol Pot were just as evil. That killing slaughtering innocent people is abhorrently evil no matter what the reason, whether it be Hitler killing 6 million Jews and others or Pol Pot killing 1.7 million professionals, the educated and others.

    Deliberately slaughtering people is evil whatever the reason. Killing innocent people because they're Jews or because they're educated or because any other reason and putting them in mass graves is never OK and never justifiable.

    Do you think this is "better" because it was primarily the educated murdered instead of a race?
    image
    Everyone should recall my advice about emojis and Verdi at this point.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
    edited February 2021
    kle4 said:

    On deepfake technology it will get perfected where much tech is - in the production of pornography.

    Yes. You will be able to deepfake pornography tailored to your precise sexual fantasy, and these videos will feature whoever you want doing whatever turns you on
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677
    dixiedean said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    Although Deep Fakes were widely predicted to be rampant during the US election.
    As it was they barely featured.
    Humans will adapt.
    Don't forget LeadricT is sequentially petrified of everything.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,661
    MaxPB said:

    40% WoW drop off in reported cases for England, hospitalisations down to 832, and a 40% drop off in reported deaths WoW.

    Even considering it's the weekend these are truly fantastic numbers. Impossible to do this without the mega vaccine drive.

    Dropping off a cliff edge.
  • Roger said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    I've noticed in a couple of places the term BAME being phased out in favour of something vague and inoffensive, so maybe it is on the way to being cancelled.

    Have to agree with @Gardenwalker, without minimising the reality of racism, which is of course present in our society we do appear so wrapped up in the whole thing as to miss the bigger picture... class, wealth.

    I would suggest the experience of a Chinese person working in the City, black kid on a council estate, Asian factory worker in the midlands, Orthodox Jewish dude in North London, Indian doctor/Chancellor of the Exchequer (I could go on) are so diverse and varied as to make the term meaningless...

    Yes, there have already been articles in the Guardian complaining about ‘BAME’ being patronising. Which it is

    It’s not long for this world. If Kinabalu is not get careful he will still be using it next year and he’ll get cancelled. However, I predict he will execute a perfect 180 and eagerly use the new word, whatever it is, while simultaneously claiming he always regarded ‘BAME’ as bigoted and ugly
    I doubt it. What I can predict with 100% confidence is that you and your ilk will continue to be angered loudly and beyond measure by the sensitivities and the lexicon of the anti-racism movement and yet oddly low wattage about racism itself.
    Every single ‘approved term’ for BAMEs (Christ, it really is ugly, it makes me wince just writing it) has been superseded by a ‘more sensitive’ term, in time. I’m old enough to remember ‘Afro-caribbean’. And let’s not forget ‘coloured person’ was itself a politically correct replacement for earlier words.

    There is no reason BAME will be immune to this iron law. Especially as it is hideous and patronising.

    I’m actually willing to bet on this, if we can frame the wager coherently.
    So Bame goes in favour of something else. Then that goes and there's something else again. Language evolves. Sensitivities change. So what? This is not in my top 50 of things to be angry, concerned or irritated about on planet earth 2021. Racism, OTOH, is.

    I genuinely do not get why people have those things in the reverse order and I think those who do ought to carry out a self-audit - a proper one - before they write too much on it.

    Have you done that?

    Serious question. I'm not trying to be an insinuating smarmball. Not this time.
    Racism is.

    Unless its racism against Jews.

    Got it.

    When will you stand up and say Jews count?
    Says the nasty little troll for whom the Holocaust was just a statistic.
    Where are you getting that from, I have never said that. I've hated anti-Semitism all my life, my best friend growing up lost his great grandmother at Auschwitz, his grandmother survived thankfully.

    That you'd rather throw accusations at others instead of saying Jews count and anti-racism must include fighting anti-Semitism is sickening.

    Is saying Jews do count really so difficult for you?
    Even by the sometimes bizarre standards of PB craving in aid a friend who lost their Great Great Grandmother in Auschwitz has to be a first
    What are you talking about?

    Listening to my friend's mum talk about her own mother and her grandparents story was very moving.

    It may not mean much to you but it did to me.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556
    Leon said:

    dixiedean said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    Although Deep Fakes were widely predicted to be rampant during the US election.
    As it was they barely featured.
    Humans will adapt.
    That’s because they’re not QUITE good enough yet, and no one malign is manipulating them, YET. But they will. The potential is so enormous once you think about it.

    Here’s another Tom Cruise deepfake. If you look hard you can just about see it’s fake. The chin is odd. But if I watched this casually for a few seconds I would just presume it is Tom Cruise

    Another year or two of this ever-speedier development?

    https://twitter.com/racheltobac/status/1365413178327277575?s=21
    It's interesting that so many of these early examples focus on Tom Cruise, because it's a bit like playing on easy mode. He's something of an uncanny valley human being in real life, so the flaws and jankiness of the deepfake make it appear as if it's capturing the original's quirks really well. They need to perfect it with someone normal to really shake the technology down.
  • MaxPB said:

    40% WoW drop off in reported cases for England, hospitalisations down to 832, and a 40% drop off in reported deaths WoW.

    Even considering it's the weekend these are truly fantastic numbers. Impossible to do this without the mega vaccine drive.

    Touch and go as to whether we get sub 5k days the week of the 8th. Certainly looks like we'll be below 5k sooner than later.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,418
    Still waiting for my Group 6 vaccine letter. Grump.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,706

    Speaking of fakes, yoons and Wingers both united in lapping up this one.

    https://twitter.com/GorgieU/status/1365315717260795907?s=20

    Was the original them watching Salmond being taken into custody?
  • Still waiting for my Group 6 vaccine letter. Grump.

    and me
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 41,947
    edited February 2021

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    I've noticed in a couple of places the term BAME being phased out in favour of something vague and inoffensive, so maybe it is on the way to being cancelled.

    Have to agree with @Gardenwalker, without minimising the reality of racism, which is of course present in our society we do appear so wrapped up in the whole thing as to miss the bigger picture... class, wealth.

    I would suggest the experience of a Chinese person working in the City, black kid on a council estate, Asian factory worker in the midlands, Orthodox Jewish dude in North London, Indian doctor/Chancellor of the Exchequer (I could go on) are so diverse and varied as to make the term meaningless...

    Yes, there have already been articles in the Guardian complaining about ‘BAME’ being patronising. Which it is

    It’s not long for this world. If Kinabalu is not get careful he will still be using it next year and he’ll get cancelled. However, I predict he will execute a perfect 180 and eagerly use the new word, whatever it is, while simultaneously claiming he always regarded ‘BAME’ as bigoted and ugly
    I doubt it. What I can predict with 100% confidence is that you and your ilk will continue to be angered loudly and beyond measure by the sensitivities and the lexicon of the anti-racism movement and yet oddly low wattage about racism itself.
    Every single ‘approved term’ for BAMEs (Christ, it really is ugly, it makes me wince just writing it) has been superseded by a ‘more sensitive’ term, in time. I’m old enough to remember ‘Afro-caribbean’. And let’s not forget ‘coloured person’ was itself a politically correct replacement for earlier words.

    There is no reason BAME will be immune to this iron law. Especially as it is hideous and patronising.

    I’m actually willing to bet on this, if we can frame the wager coherently.
    So Bame goes in favour of something else. Then that goes and there's something else again. Language evolves. Sensitivities change. So what? This is not in my top 50 of things to be angry, concerned or irritated about on planet earth 2021. Racism, OTOH, is.

    I genuinely do not get why people have those things in the reverse order and I think those who do ought to carry out a self-audit - a proper one - before they write too much on it.

    Have you done that?

    Serious question. I'm not trying to be an insinuating smarmball. Not this time.
    Racism is.

    Unless its racism against Jews.

    Got it.

    When will you stand up and say Jews count?
    Says the nasty little troll for whom the Holocaust was just a statistic.
    Where are you getting that from, I have never said that. I've hated anti-Semitism all my life, my best friend growing up lost his great grandmother at Auschwitz, his grandmother survived thankfully.

    That you'd rather throw accusations at others instead of saying Jews count and anti-racism must include fighting anti-Semitism is sickening.

    Is saying Jews do count really so difficult for you?
    Unlike deceitful little trolls, I have a basis for the things I write.

    I refer to the recent debate as to whether race should be considered an aggravating factor for a crime. Was the Lawrence murder, for example, more heinous than if the victim was just a 'wrong place wrong time' random selection?

    I argued yes. You said no. For you it was just about the crime itself. The act.

    I tried - but failed - to make you see differently by considering genocide. Could the evil of the Holocaust, the mass murder of millions, be captured purely by the number of victims? Did the fact it was Jews selected for termination not add to the horror? Did this not show how racial targeting for a crime did indeed add to its gravity? Or was it just about the stats? So there we go. Food for thought at the very least.

    Also unlike deceitful little trolls, I'm not forever making up stuff about my private life to try and make myself look authentic and enlightened.

    Others may be fooled, Philip, but I'm not. I'm happy enough to tumble around with you, it can be fun, but you can sometimes veer into genuine unpleasantness and today was a particularly bad example.

    Suggest we go back to where antisemitism was crassly introduced (by you) into this discussion and pretend it never happened.

    If you don't take that (imo generous) offer you'll be talking to yourself for a while.
    That isn't what I said. You effectively asked if the Holocaust would be less problematic if it wasn't done for grounds of anti-Semitism.

    What I said it the Holocaust was as evil as it gets but that the fact it was against Jews wasn't what made it evil, what made it evil was killing so many people. It is pure evil no matter what the motivation, there is no motivation that makes it OK, other crimes like Pol Pot were just as evil. That killing slaughtering innocent people is abhorrently evil no matter what the reason, whether it be Hitler killing 6 million Jews and others or Pol Pot killing 1.7 million professionals, the educated and others.

    Deliberately slaughtering people is evil whatever the reason. Killing innocent people because they're Jews or because they're educated or because any other reason and putting them in mass graves is never OK and never justifiable.
    I've snipped the horrid and gratuitous photo.

    Yep, that was the context of the discussion. Is the racial targeting an addition to the evil? I say yes. You say no. Fine. We differ.

    I didn't - and don't - accuse you of being a rank antisemite. Viewing the Holocaust as being about 6m humans with the Jewish aspect not needed for assessment is imo a bad and vacuous take but it doesn't make you a dreadful antisemite. I'd never say something so offensive unless it was well founded.

    You, OTOH, see a post from me saying my mental image of BAME is non-white, and react by saying this demonstrates that I feel Jews don't count for anything and are fair game to be persecuted.

    C'mon.

    A bit of edgy exchange is fine on here - more than fine - but that is simply not on. It's crass, stupid, and deeply nasty. Please do not repeat.

    If you really are feeling unwell, perhaps this explains it. And if you are, I hope it's nothing serious and you're back to your usual occasionally interesting and mostly only slightly irritating blogself in no time at all.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,154
    dixiedean said:

    Interesting header @Gardenwalker.
    Not sure those policies add up to an election winning coalition.
    But since I am struggling to think of a single LD policy right now, then they are at least a start.

    @dixiedean

    Since their official foundation in the aftermath of the 1859 election, Liberals have won just four elections - 1865, 1868, 1880, and 1906. Given that the last of those was 115 years ago and women didn’t have the vote, I suggest you are setting the bar somewhat unrealistically high when you talk about ‘election winning coalitions.’

    Let’s not get Jo Swinson about this. The first objective is survival. The second is growth.
  • BluestBlueBluestBlue Posts: 4,556
    edited February 2021

    Still waiting for my Group 6 vaccine letter. Grump.

    and me
    All right, all right, you lucky single-digit groupers... :wink:
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,154
    Leon said:

    kle4 said:

    On deepfake technology it will get perfected where much tech is - in the production of pornography.

    Yes. You will be able to deepfake pornography tailored to your precise sexual fantasy, and these videos will feature whoever you want doing whatever turns you on
    So flint dildo makers are completely buggered?

    I can see why you’re worried...
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK cases by specimen date

    image
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK cases by specimen date and scaled to 100K population

    image
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK Local R

    image
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,154

    Still waiting for my Group 6 vaccine letter. Grump.

    If you’re impatient, by all means swap with me. I don’t get mine until about May. If then.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK case summary

    image
    image
    image
    image
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK Hospitals

    image
    image
    image
    image
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK Deaths

    image
    image
    image
    image
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668
    Dura_Ace said:

    dixiedean said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    Although Deep Fakes were widely predicted to be rampant during the US election.
    As it was they barely featured.
    Humans will adapt.
    Don't forget LeadricT is sequentially petrified of everything.
    I’m right tho. This technology is bloody scary and it’s nearly good enough to start freaking everyone out, in multiple ways. Give it a few years, maybe less

    I remember when the Pb Luddites loftily reassured everyone that machine translation would always be a bit rubbish and would never replace humans

    https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18073-9
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    UK R

    From case data

    image
    image

    From hospitalisation data

    image
  • DavidL said:

    Speaking of fakes, yoons and Wingers both united in lapping up this one.

    https://twitter.com/GorgieU/status/1365315717260795907?s=20

    Was the original them watching Salmond being taken into custody?
    Salmond was never taken into custody, but I'm sure the AI guys could whip one up for you lot once you've worked through this brief Justice for Salmond phase?
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,502
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    edited February 2021
    Age related data

    image
    image
    image
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Yes that’s crap. But the first one? Without any context I would have presumed it was a mildly droll essay written as a pastiche of Jerome BY A HUMAN
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021
    Chinese Super League champions Jiangsu FC - who have the same owners as Inter Milan - have "ceased operations", the club said on Sunday.

    The Chinese Government is apparently scaling down commitment to Chinese football and is reducing sponsorship and TV rights as the costs have been huge and interest remains flaky.

    The European situation is evidently different. However, Inter's owners have been looking for external investment, so far without success, as their wage bill is huge.

    Suning were also at the centre of the cancelled £564m contract to screen the Premier League in China to 2022, which has had a significant financial impact on England's top-flight clubs.

    The uncertainty around Suning will create a general nervousness in Europe, where there are other examples of Chinese investment in European football slowing, West Bromwich Albion an example of that. Even Wolves' owners Fosun, whilst still spending, have pulled back on some massive capital costs around the development of Molineux, which they had wished to expand to a 40,000 capacity.

    https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/56226865
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    edited February 2021
    UK vaccinations

    image
    image
    image
    image
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Yes that’s crap. But the first one? Without any context I would have presumed it was a mildly droll essay written as a pastiche of Jerome BY A HUMAN
    I asked an AI for video ideas, and they were actually good

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfVYxnhuEdU
  • YBarddCwscYBarddCwsc Posts: 7,172
    dixiedean said:

    valleyboy said:

    Have these Wales polling figures been posted? If accurate a significant divergence from UK polling.
    https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1366016064178581506?s=19

    Yes they have. They mysteriously passed by uncommented on by some of our most fervent poll watchers.
    My view. This, Scotland and Westminster polls are all part of a worldwide incumbency bonus. As bored, frustrated and traumatised populations desperately hope that their governments are competent.
    Put it this way, if Drakeford actually got that figure at the Senedd elections, then he would have matched Labour's best ever election performance under Rhodri Morgan at the very height of his popularity.

    Drakeford will have easily done better than Carwyn Jones last time (31.5 %). Labour would have an absolute majority in the Senedd.

    It is difficult to believe that the poll is an accurate predictor of what will happen in the May elections.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Check this one. Jesus B Christ.

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284801679939035137?s=21

    It actually sounds like a conscious computer reflecting on its own identity
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Check this one. Jesus B Christ.

    twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284801679939035137?s=21

    It actually sounds like a conscious computer reflecting on its own identity
    Pity all those travel writers and novelists.....out of a job.
  • EPGEPG Posts: 6,644
    Sadly I think the Lib Dems are near the end of their natural life, sad because a two-party system is likely to lead to an incorrect consensus a lot of the time. But the other parties were able to copy the tactics that made the Lib Dems locally successful, so now you have an incredibly powerful PM's office and hundreds of MPs as its local reps running clinics and distributing newsletters.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586
    edited February 2021

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Check this one. Jesus B Christ.

    twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284801679939035137?s=21

    It actually sounds like a conscious computer reflecting on its own identity
    Pity all those travel writers and novelists.....out of a job.
    The interesting point will be reached when the AI starts doing art for fun. Like the Cornell Boxes in Mona Lisa Overdrive Count Zero....

    Or artisan flint objects.....
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,668

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Yes that’s crap. But the first one? Without any context I would have presumed it was a mildly droll essay written as a pastiche of Jerome BY A HUMAN
    I asked an AI for video ideas, and they were actually good

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfVYxnhuEdU
    Wow. Astounding. So that’s freelance journalists and scriptwriters screwed, as well
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,344

    Still waiting for my Group 6 vaccine letter. Grump.

    This week no doubt.

    By the end of next week we should be well into the fifties.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Check this one. Jesus B Christ.

    twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284801679939035137?s=21

    It actually sounds like a conscious computer reflecting on its own identity
    Pity all those travel writers and novelists.....out of a job.
    The interesting point will be reached when the AI starts doing art for fun. Like the Cornell Boxes in Mona Lisa Overdrive....

    Or artisan flint objects.....
    In all seriousness, what a lot of this progress enables people to do is allow rapid prototyping. Rather than a graphic designer having an idea and having to go through manually creating 30 different options, one click of a button and the computer will spit out a whole load of different iterations of the same idea. Or a client likes everything about an idea except can you change x or y a bit, rather than yes ok give me another day or two, the adjustment will be made then and there.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 49,586

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Check this one. Jesus B Christ.

    twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284801679939035137?s=21

    It actually sounds like a conscious computer reflecting on its own identity
    Pity all those travel writers and novelists.....out of a job.
    The interesting point will be reached when the AI starts doing art for fun. Like the Cornell Boxes in Mona Lisa Overdrive....

    Or artisan flint objects.....
    In all seriousness, what a lot of this progress enables people to do is allow rapid prototyping. Rather than a graphic designer having an idea and having to go through manually creating 30 different options, one click of a button and the computer will spit out a whole load of different iterations of the same idea. Or a client likes everything about an idea except can you change x or y a bit, rather than yes ok give me another day or two, the adjustment will be made then and there.
    On the art - quite a lot of modern art can be done on this kind of "rotate though the idea space"

    Some years ago, I came across the following -

    The Che picture, printed in the style of Andy Warhol print. The eyes cut out, and replaced with swirling patterns drawn on circles, drive by an electric motor. The whole entitled "A Constant State of Revolution". Yours for 30K...

    It would seem that AI, currently, could create such things.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,340

    dixiedean said:

    valleyboy said:

    Have these Wales polling figures been posted? If accurate a significant divergence from UK polling.
    https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1366016064178581506?s=19

    Yes they have. They mysteriously passed by uncommented on by some of our most fervent poll watchers.
    My view. This, Scotland and Westminster polls are all part of a worldwide incumbency bonus. As bored, frustrated and traumatised populations desperately hope that their governments are competent.
    Put it this way, if Drakeford actually got that figure at the Senedd elections, then he would have matched Labour's best ever election performance under Rhodri Morgan at the very height of his popularity.

    Drakeford will have easily done better than Carwyn Jones last time (31.5 %). Labour would have an absolute majority in the Senedd.

    It is difficult to believe that the poll is an accurate predictor of what will happen in the May elections.
    The comments under the poll seem to suggest 30 of 60 seats.
    Outlier or shift? Who knows. Time, well May, will tell.
    However, Drakeford was taking some flak for the slow vaccine rollout. And now he isn't.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 52,344
    EPG said:

    Sadly I think the Lib Dems are near the end of their natural life, sad because a two-party system is likely to lead to an incorrect consensus a lot of the time. But the other parties were able to copy the tactics that made the Lib Dems locally successful, so now you have an incredibly powerful PM's office and hundreds of MPs as its local reps running clinics and distributing newsletters.

    I've been telling you for a while that most Tory MPs in marginals/Red Wall seats are running their local presence as if they were LibDems. If they lose their seats, it won't be for lack of effort.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,419
    edited February 2021

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    guybrush said:

    DavidL said:

    Leon said:

    Deepfakes will also, entirely, fuck up the legal system. Video evidence will always be challenged, it will become virtually useless (photo evidence too, of course). Witnesses or complainants will no longer be able to give evidence via a screen?

    That’s just the law

    Why pay an actor £10m when you can deepfake Laurence Olivier for ten quid?

    Movie making suddenly got a hundred times cheaper

    The more you go down this rabbit hole, the darker yet deeper it gets

    Why bother with humans at all? Surely this technology makes electronic replacements easier and cheaper. No unions, no toilet breaks, no repeat fees, whatever body shape is thought desirable...I think I will stop there.
    Agree, it sounds scaremongery, but I think we should be seriously worried about this. There was a Sam Harris podcast with Nina Schick which explored the possible issues in terrifying detail. Once we're over Covid, I'd put some money on this being the next societal upheaval to deal with.

    I'd suggest banning the technology lock stock and barrel (a bit like the US export restrictions for PGP cryptography back in the day), if it wasn't completely unworkable in this day and age.
    It’s unbannable. It’s out there now. You can’t reverse scientific progress, even if it is dangerous, just as you couldn’t uninvent The Bomb, tho many wanted to

    It is mightily scary. And yes it is coming at us fast
    OpenAI initially tried this with their GPT idea, but soon realized it just wasn't possible.

    https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/20/1005454/openai-machine-learning-language-generator-gpt-3-nlp/
    Is that meant to be consoling? It isn’t. Look at this. A computer generated story which is entirely convincing, mildly witty, and wholly frightening. Than god I knap naughty flints and I’m not anything artier. Human creativity is doomed. BECAUSE THE MACHINES WILL ONLY GET BETTER

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284509525500989445?s=21

    It occurs to me that computers passed the Turing test some time ago. AI, by that definition, is here already
    That's amazing, thanks for passing it on. How about this one?

    https://twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284797452638457856/photo/1
    Check this one. Jesus B Christ.

    twitter.com/quasimondo/status/1284801679939035137?s=21

    It actually sounds like a conscious computer reflecting on its own identity
    Pity all those travel writers and novelists.....out of a job.
    The interesting point will be reached when the AI starts doing art for fun. Like the Cornell Boxes in Mona Lisa Overdrive....

    Or artisan flint objects.....
    In all seriousness, what a lot of this progress enables people to do is allow rapid prototyping. Rather than a graphic designer having an idea and having to go through manually creating 30 different options, one click of a button and the computer will spit out a whole load of different iterations of the same idea. Or a client likes everything about an idea except can you change x or y a bit, rather than yes ok give me another day or two, the adjustment will be made then and there.
    On the art - quite a lot of modern art can be done on this kind of "rotate though the idea space"

    Some years ago, I came across the following -

    The Che picture, printed in the style of Andy Warhol print. The eyes cut out, and replaced with swirling patterns drawn on circles, drive by an electric motor. The whole entitled "A Constant State of Revolution". Yours for 30K...

    It would seem that AI, currently, could create such things.
    Oh easily. Generative models are very good at taking already existing say art and adjusting parts or doing what they call style transfer i.e. remake one picture in the style of another artist. This is also aided by the fact it doesn't matter if the generative model pumps out a load of crap options, as long as among them, one looks good.

    Where AI is still miles off is when you need to do fast one shot (or limited shot) learning and where for the predicted outcome it is absolutely critical to be correct, rather than either near enough is good enough type result or you are in a problem space where just let it generate loads of options / predictions and a human will collate them.
This discussion has been closed.