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3 Tory MP climate sceptics get the Greenpeace treatment – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 11,002
edited October 2021 in General
image3 Tory MP climate sceptics get the Greenpeace treatment – politicalbetting.com

The above polling commissioned by Greenpeace represents an interesting approach to campaigning particularly because in two of the seats, Wokingham and Wycome, the incumbent MPs are out of step with their constituents as well on Brexit and they both faced strong challenges at GE2019.

Read the full story here

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Comments

  • Pro_RataPro_Rata Posts: 4,784
    Test
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    Of course if the Greens stood a candidate in their constituencies that would help IDS, Baker and Redwood by splitting the Labour/LD vote
  • HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,958
    IDS is a very strong supporter of tidal lagoon power stations. Do you think Greenpeace a) don't know or b) don't want to know...?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
  • FPT

    The CO2 suppliers agree a deal with the fertiliser manufactures to affirm their supplies, steel plant to reopen in Rotherham, and taxpayers pounds will not be used before shareholders and investors take a hit on businesses having energy problems, the fuel shortages crisis is all but over, Boris is having a weeks holiday but retains control of the country, and the EU and the UK in genuine talks to resolve the NI protocol, so not everything is doom and gloom

    But has anyone seen *Keir since his speech two weeks ago by the way ?

    * I understand he was on tv last week
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
    EC gives no such thing relating to GE 24 but I know it amuses you
  • IDS is a very strong supporter of tidal lagoon power stations. Do you think Greenpeace a) don't know or b) don't want to know...?

    c) don't care.

    Tidal lagoon power is a clean energy solution, that's not the kind of thing Greenpeace are interested in.
  • MikeSmithsonMikeSmithson Posts: 7,382
    I don't follow Electoral Calculus but this -

    http://www.electionpolling.co.uk/battleground/targets/labour
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,240
    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 25,164
    A new job for Phil...

    https://order-order.com/2021/10/11/philip-hammond-joins-crypto-start-up-as-senior-adviser/

    Presumably people who work for these firms get paid in their own crypto currency...
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950
    fpt
    FF43 said:

    Cookie said:

    Farooq said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Philip is highly suggestible. I legitimately insisted on a Y/N answer about something else yesterday, and he has taken up the idea and run with it. It is of course usually deployed fallaciously in "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, as here.

    My response to most of his posts these days is from Frank N. Furter:

    "How forceful you are, Philip. Such a perfect specimen of manhood. So... dominant. You must be awfully proud of him, Mrs Thompson."

    When he got schooled a few weeks ago on the lump of labour fallacy he was committing, he starting referring to the fallacy himself, trying to twist it to support his own point of view. It's sad more than anything.
    Hm. The lump of labour fallacy is itself something of a fallacy.
    Or, it exists, at the macro level. Granted, as the supply of labour increases, the supply of jobs there are to do also increases. But it takes a long, long time to filter through, and labour is poorer in the short term and certainly no more rich in the long term.
    It is of no comfort to an individual low wage worker whose wages are being held down by a limitless supply of unskilled labour that in the long run that labour will also create a demand for more unskilled labour.
    I thought that too. ie the government approach of restricting labour to drive up wages is economically illiterate but there would be a lengthy drag while employers tried to stay in business at previous staffing levels.

    In fact the adjustment seems to be quite quick, as far as the sketchy evidence goes.
    For all the economic expertise of our Brexiters on here they have failed to grasp the simplest of economic facts.

    For them it is simple - restrictions on labour = wages up = prices up hurrah! Let's all pay ourselves more.

    They ignore (to be charitable) or do not appreciate that restrictions on labour will shift the demand curve leftwards which will have an effect on prices and hence an equilibrium will be reached at a lower price point hence profitability will decrease hence wage rises will reverse hence we are back where we started.

  • mwadamsmwadams Posts: 3,089
    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    I think the bulk of the issue is pork-barrel procurement, and no real understanding of the true nature of the threat in the leadership. Let's be clear - this is the US being out-competed by China. Not some quirk of ill fortune.

    And it isn't really even about ethics.

    It's about giving contracts to the highest-donor; eking projects out to turn decades into dollars, and failing to see what has happened in China in the last decade (let alone the last 30 years).
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950
    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 4,746
    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    And this is China: the country which we were told for much of the noughties could only copy western consumer goods and would never be able to innovate. A racist point of view, if ever there was one.

  • FishingFishing Posts: 4,555
    edited October 2021
    On topic, note there was no option in the first question for "The UK should stop wasting money on this woke rubbish when taxes are at a record high, hospitals have millions on their wasting lists and lots of old people can't heat their homes".

    It was just, do you want to spend lots of money on our issue, or do you want to bankrupt yourself on our issue? Or don't you know?
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 14,911
    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    Your obsession with "woke" is bizarre.
    But yes, AI is clearly an area where the West is surrendering technological leadership to China. Hardly surprising when you look at the resources that China puts into research in this area. Although I'm not sure why humanity is competing with itself to bring the singularity closer. Our robot overlords won't care who created them.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950
    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    While I appreciate you are no writer, perhaps you could summarise "woke" in a line or two so we can identify it when we come across it and be on our guard.

    If you are going to use examples such as "chest feeding" etc, please also cite the damage/harm/global implications in such usage.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835

    IDS is a very strong supporter of tidal lagoon power stations. Do you think Greenpeace a) don't know or b) don't want to know...?

    c) don't care.

    Tidal lagoon power is a clean energy solution, that's not the kind of thing Greenpeace are interested in.
    You really do write some knee jerk, unsubstantiated rubbish sometimes.
    Google Greenpeace and tidal. I won't bother linking for you.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709

    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    Your obsession with "woke" is bizarre.
    But yes, AI is clearly an area where the West is surrendering technological leadership to China. Hardly surprising when you look at the resources that China puts into research in this area. Although I'm not sure why humanity is competing with itself to bring the singularity closer. Our robot overlords won't care who created them.
    Automation without creating new jobs also just leads to higher unemployment and higher welfare bills and more unstable, restless populations more willing to challenge the government. So China also needs to consider that as do we, as well as ensuring we keep control of robots we create
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 4,746
    In terms of the actual topic, this polling is interesting. However, what I see a lot of is people claiming to follow a green agenda but then not actually living in accordance with it. That is also much in evidence on this website.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,611
    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    Black cans are now the superior option. The price difference is, as you say, now very marginal. So, once you factor in the quality of experience (more room, drivers with superior geography skills), the black cab wins. There's even an app if you prefer to book one Uber style rather than flag one down.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 43,614
    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,812

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    Black cans are now the superior option. The price difference is, as you say, now very marginal. So, once you factor in the quality of experience (more room, drivers with superior geography skills), the black cab wins. There's even an app if you prefer to book one Uber style rather than flag one down.
    I moved to “Black Cab” pretty much exclusively about a year ago and my life is all the richer for it.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,092
    Since the pattern of responses is very similar in all three constituencies, what is the point of the constituency disaggregation of these data?
  • I expect Redwood and IDS will retire at the next election along with the rest of the "old guard" Brexiteers - Bone, Cash, Chope, David Davis, Paterson, Lewis. I suspect many of them were hanging on to see Brexit completed.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Fishing said:

    On topic, note there was no option in the first question for "The UK should stop wasting money on this woke rubbish when taxes are at a record high, hospitals have millions on their wasting lists and lots of old people can't heat their homes".

    It was just, do you want to spend lots of money on our issue, or do you want to bankrupt yourself on our issue? Or don't you know?

    "Woke"? What connection are you making between women with penises/statues of slavers on the one hand, and global heating on the other? You can question the science on heating if you really want to, but you can't say that scientific truth is culturally determined.

    Unless you follow some particularly batshit rive gauche wazzock who thinks the theory of relativity is in fact merely a phallocentric consensus of the patriarchy.
  • FF43FF43 Posts: 15,543
    edited October 2021
    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    The Chinese government is very keen on AI.

    I should add it has nothing to do with wokeness and a lot to do with organisation
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    I have to say that all the Uber drivers I have spoken to (and I was an "early adopter") were extremely happy. I doubt that the drivers will see any increase in revenue as a result of the prices hike.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    Black cans are now the superior option. The price difference is, as you say, now very marginal. So, once you factor in the quality of experience (more room, drivers with superior geography skills), the black cab wins. There's even an app if you prefer to book one Uber style rather than flag one down.
    I moved to “Black Cab” pretty much exclusively about a year ago and my life is all the richer for it.
    Yep. One journey I jumped in a black cab instead and the other I decided (horror) to walk to the tube and use that, for heaven's sake.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080

    FPT

    Get well soon OKC and family.

    MaxPB said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Preposterous nonsense.

    I've called everything right on Brexit, I can't think of a single thing on Brexit I got wrong. I was an almost lone opponent for a long time of May's deal, remaining principled against it even when Boris went weak at the knees and backed it. Many leavers said I was wrong not to accept the deal at the time, but now I think most leavers would acknowledge that I was right afterall. That thread by @mij_europe the other day [ignoring the final couple of Tweets] almost line for line repeated what I've been saying for years here now. Reality has shown that I called this right.

    As for your "thorniness and magnitude" spin, that's not a criterion in the Article. The article quite literally simply says if the government believes there has been diversion of trade. You know there has been. That's that. You trying to invent new criteria like "thorniness" or "unforeseen" or anything else are simply adding in your own words to suit your own agenda that do not exist in the text. The text has its own conditions that are clearly met, you don't need to invent your own to suit your own agenda.
    I see. So context and materiality is irrelevant and if the government believes trade of the value £2.50 (being a box of lightbulbs) has been "diverted" this for you is adequate grounds to trigger Article 16. I wonder about you sometimes, Philip, I really do.
    The way the protocol is written it could do so.
    Indeed. Its funny how the people who are screaming loudest that they want the "agreed" deal implemented "as written" are actually upset at the idea of it being implemented "as written" and want it implementing how they wanted to interpret it instead.

    In this sort of legal text there are adjectives that could be used to qualify what kind of diversion is meant. Eg "substantial" or "unforeseen" etc - but none of those adjectives are in the text. If the EU had wanted it to mean 'a substantial and unforeseen diversion' then they would have had to get Barnier to propose that text and get Frost to agree to it in the negotiations. That didn't happen.

    The text just says "if there is diversion of trade" without any adjectives at all, that means that any diversion of trade is sufficient to meet that threshold.

    So in order to claim the Article can't be invoked, you need to be adamant that there has not been any diversion at all.
    Article 16 states that "Such safeguard measures shall be restricted with regard to their scope and duration to what is strictly necessary in order to remedy the situation." It would therefore be very hard to argue that the removal of ECJ oversight, for example, would constitute a permissible safeguard measure, given that ECJ oversight is not, in itself, responsible for any of the problems that have arisen.

    I'm not clear on this.

    Is Frost asking that the ECJ be taken out of the NIP, or out of any role in the Good Friday Agreement (does it have one in that)?

    AFAICS the ECJ role in the NIP is quite firmly circumscribed, so its a minor point unless the demand is symbolic.

    Can anyone clarify?
  • Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 60,933
    Mr. Z, some feminists have suggested swords and rockets are phallic in design.

    Bloody sexist laws of aerodynamics.
  • TOPPING said:

    fpt

    FF43 said:

    Cookie said:

    Farooq said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Philip is highly suggestible. I legitimately insisted on a Y/N answer about something else yesterday, and he has taken up the idea and run with it. It is of course usually deployed fallaciously in "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, as here.

    My response to most of his posts these days is from Frank N. Furter:

    "How forceful you are, Philip. Such a perfect specimen of manhood. So... dominant. You must be awfully proud of him, Mrs Thompson."

    When he got schooled a few weeks ago on the lump of labour fallacy he was committing, he starting referring to the fallacy himself, trying to twist it to support his own point of view. It's sad more than anything.
    Hm. The lump of labour fallacy is itself something of a fallacy.
    Or, it exists, at the macro level. Granted, as the supply of labour increases, the supply of jobs there are to do also increases. But it takes a long, long time to filter through, and labour is poorer in the short term and certainly no more rich in the long term.
    It is of no comfort to an individual low wage worker whose wages are being held down by a limitless supply of unskilled labour that in the long run that labour will also create a demand for more unskilled labour.
    I thought that too. ie the government approach of restricting labour to drive up wages is economically illiterate but there would be a lengthy drag while employers tried to stay in business at previous staffing levels.

    In fact the adjustment seems to be quite quick, as far as the sketchy evidence goes.
    For all the economic expertise of our Brexiters on here they have failed to grasp the simplest of economic facts.

    For them it is simple - restrictions on labour = wages up = prices up hurrah! Let's all pay ourselves more.

    They ignore (to be charitable) or do not appreciate that restrictions on labour will shift the demand curve leftwards which will have an effect on prices and hence an equilibrium will be reached at a lower price point hence profitability will decrease hence wage rises will reverse hence we are back where we started.

    Quite the opposite, I've mentioned that factor repeatedly. As have others. Except it won't mean that we end up back where we started, since where we started was a so-called 'labour shortage'. The price will go up because it needs to do so, and demand will drop accordingly and the new equilibrium will thus be higher up the price axis than where it is now, but with demand lower on its axis than it is now.

    In case you've forgotten we've had a conversation recently along the lines of saying that 300,000 HGV drivers can't do the work for 400,000 drivers - and I said that's true, but if the price for drivers goes up recruiting eg 50,000 new drivers then 350,000 drivers can do the work of 350,000 drivers.

    Demand going down is an inevitable consequence of price changes, but since demand is greater than supply at the minute that's required to reach equilibrium it isn't a flaw.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    edited October 2021

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
    EC gives no such thing relating to GE 24 but I know it amuses you
    Yes it does.

    The Conservatives need at least a 6 to 7% lead over Labour or more as they got in 2015 and 2019 to be sure to win a majority again for starters
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,240
    GPT3 is the Internet, dreaming
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,762
    Leon said:

    GPT3 is the Internet, dreaming

    So basically porn then?
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950

    TOPPING said:

    fpt

    FF43 said:

    Cookie said:

    Farooq said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Philip is highly suggestible. I legitimately insisted on a Y/N answer about something else yesterday, and he has taken up the idea and run with it. It is of course usually deployed fallaciously in "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, as here.

    My response to most of his posts these days is from Frank N. Furter:

    "How forceful you are, Philip. Such a perfect specimen of manhood. So... dominant. You must be awfully proud of him, Mrs Thompson."

    When he got schooled a few weeks ago on the lump of labour fallacy he was committing, he starting referring to the fallacy himself, trying to twist it to support his own point of view. It's sad more than anything.
    Hm. The lump of labour fallacy is itself something of a fallacy.
    Or, it exists, at the macro level. Granted, as the supply of labour increases, the supply of jobs there are to do also increases. But it takes a long, long time to filter through, and labour is poorer in the short term and certainly no more rich in the long term.
    It is of no comfort to an individual low wage worker whose wages are being held down by a limitless supply of unskilled labour that in the long run that labour will also create a demand for more unskilled labour.
    I thought that too. ie the government approach of restricting labour to drive up wages is economically illiterate but there would be a lengthy drag while employers tried to stay in business at previous staffing levels.

    In fact the adjustment seems to be quite quick, as far as the sketchy evidence goes.
    For all the economic expertise of our Brexiters on here they have failed to grasp the simplest of economic facts.

    For them it is simple - restrictions on labour = wages up = prices up hurrah! Let's all pay ourselves more.

    They ignore (to be charitable) or do not appreciate that restrictions on labour will shift the demand curve leftwards which will have an effect on prices and hence an equilibrium will be reached at a lower price point hence profitability will decrease hence wage rises will reverse hence we are back where we started.

    Quite the opposite, I've mentioned that factor repeatedly. As have others. Except it won't mean that we end up back where we started, since where we started was a so-called 'labour shortage'. The price will go up because it needs to do so, and demand will drop accordingly and the new equilibrium will thus be higher up the price axis than where it is now, but with demand lower on its axis than it is now.

    In case you've forgotten we've had a conversation recently along the lines of saying that 300,000 HGV drivers can't do the work for 400,000 drivers - and I said that's true, but if the price for drivers goes up recruiting eg 50,000 new drivers then 350,000 drivers can do the work of 350,000 drivers.

    Demand going down is an inevitable consequence of price changes, but since demand is greater than supply at the minute that's required to reach equilibrium it isn't a flaw.
    Each of those HGV drivers (and also for that matter those that are now circumventing the UK) contribute to aggregate demand, which will therefore decline with concomitant effects on the price level and profitability. As to your labour shortages and increased wages, that will as you accept result in an increased price level or lower profitability. That will also affect demand for goods and labour. Unemployment is not higher than pre-pandemic (4.6% vs 4.0%) so upwards wage pressure will be to an extent mitigated.

    But if wages do rise, which can certainly be a good thing (your wages up 4.1%, inflation up 4.0% happiness scenario), where does that leave our export competitiveness.

    You are a trained economist but only choose to see the factors that suit your argument.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,571

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    Black cans are now the superior option....
    Sounds a bit uncomfortable.
  • TimTTimT Posts: 6,328

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    But my understanding is that the original economic concept of Uber and BnB and the like was precisely to price to marginal cost as the plan was to use up excess capacity of existing assets i.e. the price charged explicitly would not have to cover all those costs, as the owners had already incurred them.

    That model does not really fit with scaling to the size of the founders/funders egos/requirements as, once excess capacity is soaked up (and especially if this happens before the economies of scale kick in for operations), then you do need to price in the capital costs of the assets and the need to pay a living wage, not just cover marginal costs of fuel and hourly wage.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,571

    Mr. Z, some feminists have suggested swords and rockets are phallic in design....

    Ridiculous suggestion...
    https://mashable.com/article/blue-origin-rocket-replica
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770

    FPT

    The CO2 suppliers agree a deal with the fertiliser manufactures to affirm their supplies, steel plant to reopen in Rotherham, and taxpayers pounds will not be used before shareholders and investors take a hit on businesses having energy problems, the fuel shortages crisis is all but over, Boris is having a weeks holiday but retains control of the country, and the EU and the UK in genuine talks to resolve the NI protocol, so not everything is doom and gloom

    But has anyone seen *Keir since his speech two weeks ago by the way ?

    * I understand he was on tv last week

    "taxpayers pounds will not be used before shareholders and investors take a hit"

    That's not quite the same as a simple "taxpayers pounds will not be used".
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
    EC gives no such thing relating to GE 24 but I know it amuses you
    Yes it does.

    The Conservatives need at least a 6 to 7% lead over Labour or more as they got in 2015 and 2019 to be sure to win a majority again for starters
    It it keeps you happy but it is not relevant at all to GE 24 and if you cannot see that then so be it
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 38,517

    Mr. Z, some feminists have suggested swords and rockets are phallic in design.

    Bloody sexist laws of aerodynamics.

    To be fair, Blue Origin do tend to (ahem) give some power to the latter:

    https://estesrockets.com/blue-origin-new-shepard/

    "To boldly go where a few men no man has been before!"
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878
    TimT said:

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    But my understanding is that the original economic concept of Uber and BnB and the like was precisely to price to marginal cost as the plan was to use up excess capacity of existing assets i.e. the price charged explicitly would not have to cover all those costs, as the owners had already incurred them.

    That model does not really fit with scaling to the size of the founders/funders egos/requirements as, once excess capacity is soaked up (and especially if this happens before the economies of scale kick in for operations), then you do need to price in the capital costs of the assets and the need to pay a living wage, not just cover marginal costs of fuel and hourly wage.
    I might be weird (well I do spend too much time on PB) but I've never used an Air BnB and I never intend too. Until they are required to have the same safety standards as a normal Bed and Breakfast I will not use them.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,571
    University mask report...

    Anecdatum: in my 10:00 biology lecture, 95% mask observance by students. In the 11:00 criminology lecture that followed, about 5% (and LOTS of coughing and spluttering). Has anyone else noticed discipline-related patterns of mask wearing? Someone could do an easy study of this!
    https://twitter.com/matthewcobb/status/1447535683975974917
  • TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    fpt

    FF43 said:

    Cookie said:

    Farooq said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Philip is highly suggestible. I legitimately insisted on a Y/N answer about something else yesterday, and he has taken up the idea and run with it. It is of course usually deployed fallaciously in "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, as here.

    My response to most of his posts these days is from Frank N. Furter:

    "How forceful you are, Philip. Such a perfect specimen of manhood. So... dominant. You must be awfully proud of him, Mrs Thompson."

    When he got schooled a few weeks ago on the lump of labour fallacy he was committing, he starting referring to the fallacy himself, trying to twist it to support his own point of view. It's sad more than anything.
    Hm. The lump of labour fallacy is itself something of a fallacy.
    Or, it exists, at the macro level. Granted, as the supply of labour increases, the supply of jobs there are to do also increases. But it takes a long, long time to filter through, and labour is poorer in the short term and certainly no more rich in the long term.
    It is of no comfort to an individual low wage worker whose wages are being held down by a limitless supply of unskilled labour that in the long run that labour will also create a demand for more unskilled labour.
    I thought that too. ie the government approach of restricting labour to drive up wages is economically illiterate but there would be a lengthy drag while employers tried to stay in business at previous staffing levels.

    In fact the adjustment seems to be quite quick, as far as the sketchy evidence goes.
    For all the economic expertise of our Brexiters on here they have failed to grasp the simplest of economic facts.

    For them it is simple - restrictions on labour = wages up = prices up hurrah! Let's all pay ourselves more.

    They ignore (to be charitable) or do not appreciate that restrictions on labour will shift the demand curve leftwards which will have an effect on prices and hence an equilibrium will be reached at a lower price point hence profitability will decrease hence wage rises will reverse hence we are back where we started.

    Quite the opposite, I've mentioned that factor repeatedly. As have others. Except it won't mean that we end up back where we started, since where we started was a so-called 'labour shortage'. The price will go up because it needs to do so, and demand will drop accordingly and the new equilibrium will thus be higher up the price axis than where it is now, but with demand lower on its axis than it is now.

    In case you've forgotten we've had a conversation recently along the lines of saying that 300,000 HGV drivers can't do the work for 400,000 drivers - and I said that's true, but if the price for drivers goes up recruiting eg 50,000 new drivers then 350,000 drivers can do the work of 350,000 drivers.

    Demand going down is an inevitable consequence of price changes, but since demand is greater than supply at the minute that's required to reach equilibrium it isn't a flaw.
    Each of those HGV drivers (and also for that matter those that are now circumventing the UK) contribute to aggregate demand, which will therefore decline with concomitant effects on the price level and profitability. As to your labour shortages and increased wages, that will as you accept result in an increased price level or lower profitability. That will also affect demand for goods and labour. Unemployment is not higher than pre-pandemic (4.6% vs 4.0%) so upwards wage pressure will be to an extent mitigated.

    But if wages do rise, which can certainly be a good thing (your wages up 4.1%, inflation up 4.0% happiness scenario), where does that leave our export competitiveness.

    You are a trained economist but only choose to see the factors that suit your argument.
    You seem on the brink of teetering headlong into a fallacy here. The current aggregate demand is with the 300,000 HGV drivers, not 400,000.

    It is an economic truism that there is no fixed amount of jobs or labour. We've supposedly been "short of labour" for the best part of twenty years since very generous in-work benefits and free movement for Eastern Europe were introduced by Brown. In that time our population has increased by ten million people. If we're "short of labour" then how come the ten million people who've arrived haven't filled the shortage?

    Because you can't fill a shortage via immigration on aggregate, any more than you can cause job losses on aggregate by having immigration either (the "they're stealing our jobs" fallacy).

    If you import 100k new HGV drivers, and new abattoir staff, and new everything else, then those drivers and everyone else would increase aggregate demand and lo and behold there will still be a labour shortage. Then we'd be back to saying 400k drivers aren't enough to do the job of 500k.

    The reason there's a shortage isn't because there's a shortage of people, its because the prices are out of equilibrium. Trying to fill the shortage by bringing in more people hasn't fixed the root cause of the problem as to why prices are out of equilibrium (since its not just 1 sector needing people) so the problem has never been resolved.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    Just entered meter readings on my suppliers portal as rumour has it BP are about to let their energy company (Pure Planet) go bankrupt as with a different name there is little downside (unlike say Shell Energy).
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,183
    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    TimT said:

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    But my understanding is that the original economic concept of Uber and BnB and the like was precisely to price to marginal cost as the plan was to use up excess capacity of existing assets i.e. the price charged explicitly would not have to cover all those costs, as the owners had already incurred them.

    That model does not really fit with scaling to the size of the founders/funders egos/requirements as, once excess capacity is soaked up (and especially if this happens before the economies of scale kick in for operations), then you do need to price in the capital costs of the assets and the need to pay a living wage, not just cover marginal costs of fuel and hourly wage.
    Uber's model was based on cars rapidly becoming self driving at which point the labour costs that are the most significant part of the costs disappeared to become a software driven capital intensive business which Uber's deep pockets would be able to dominate.

  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    fpt

    FF43 said:

    Cookie said:

    Farooq said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Philip is highly suggestible. I legitimately insisted on a Y/N answer about something else yesterday, and he has taken up the idea and run with it. It is of course usually deployed fallaciously in "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, as here.

    My response to most of his posts these days is from Frank N. Furter:

    "How forceful you are, Philip. Such a perfect specimen of manhood. So... dominant. You must be awfully proud of him, Mrs Thompson."

    When he got schooled a few weeks ago on the lump of labour fallacy he was committing, he starting referring to the fallacy himself, trying to twist it to support his own point of view. It's sad more than anything.
    Hm. The lump of labour fallacy is itself something of a fallacy.
    Or, it exists, at the macro level. Granted, as the supply of labour increases, the supply of jobs there are to do also increases. But it takes a long, long time to filter through, and labour is poorer in the short term and certainly no more rich in the long term.
    It is of no comfort to an individual low wage worker whose wages are being held down by a limitless supply of unskilled labour that in the long run that labour will also create a demand for more unskilled labour.
    I thought that too. ie the government approach of restricting labour to drive up wages is economically illiterate but there would be a lengthy drag while employers tried to stay in business at previous staffing levels.

    In fact the adjustment seems to be quite quick, as far as the sketchy evidence goes.
    For all the economic expertise of our Brexiters on here they have failed to grasp the simplest of economic facts.

    For them it is simple - restrictions on labour = wages up = prices up hurrah! Let's all pay ourselves more.

    They ignore (to be charitable) or do not appreciate that restrictions on labour will shift the demand curve leftwards which will have an effect on prices and hence an equilibrium will be reached at a lower price point hence profitability will decrease hence wage rises will reverse hence we are back where we started.

    Quite the opposite, I've mentioned that factor repeatedly. As have others. Except it won't mean that we end up back where we started, since where we started was a so-called 'labour shortage'. The price will go up because it needs to do so, and demand will drop accordingly and the new equilibrium will thus be higher up the price axis than where it is now, but with demand lower on its axis than it is now.

    In case you've forgotten we've had a conversation recently along the lines of saying that 300,000 HGV drivers can't do the work for 400,000 drivers - and I said that's true, but if the price for drivers goes up recruiting eg 50,000 new drivers then 350,000 drivers can do the work of 350,000 drivers.

    Demand going down is an inevitable consequence of price changes, but since demand is greater than supply at the minute that's required to reach equilibrium it isn't a flaw.
    Each of those HGV drivers (and also for that matter those that are now circumventing the UK) contribute to aggregate demand, which will therefore decline with concomitant effects on the price level and profitability. As to your labour shortages and increased wages, that will as you accept result in an increased price level or lower profitability. That will also affect demand for goods and labour. Unemployment is not higher than pre-pandemic (4.6% vs 4.0%) so upwards wage pressure will be to an extent mitigated.

    But if wages do rise, which can certainly be a good thing (your wages up 4.1%, inflation up 4.0% happiness scenario), where does that leave our export competitiveness.

    You are a trained economist but only choose to see the factors that suit your argument.
    You make a fair point.

    And road haulage is a particularly acute area where - like it or not - driver productivity is going to take a hit in a post-Brexit world, because British drivers (and to a lesser-extent EEA ones) are going to have more empty loads. Now, at some point the world will change as we implement autopilot type systems (initially for highways, but presumably for an increasing number of things), but that is still some way off.

    Fortunately, this is only a very small part of the overall costs of a business. Still, it will need to be shared our across the economy in terms of higher prices and lower profits.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    edited October 2021
    Selebian said:

    Anyone else slightly disappointed to discover that in this case 'the Greenpeace treatment' means havng some polling done in their constituencies? I'm sure Greenpeace action used to be a bit more exciting.

    What could be more exciting than constituency polling, pray tell?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    edited October 2021

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
    EC gives no such thing relating to GE 24 but I know it amuses you
    Yes it does.

    The Conservatives need at least a 6 to 7% lead over Labour or more as they got in 2015 and 2019 to be sure to win a majority again for starters
    It it keeps you happy but it is not relevant at all to GE 24 and if you cannot see that then so be it
    Of course it is relevant as it accurately translates the poll results now into seats.

    If you don't want reflections on poll results on here then I suggest you find another website as that is rather much of the point of this one
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080
    On the OP (thanks, TSE), is there a link to the tables?
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    "it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. "

    Wait, what?

  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 43,614
    dixiedean said:

    Selebian said:

    Anyone else slightly disappointed to discover that in this case 'the Greenpeace treatment' means havng some polling done in their constituencies? I'm sure Greenpeace action used to be a bit more exciting.

    What could be more exciting than constituency polling, pray tell?
    Subsamples of constituency polling, obviously.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,256
    edited October 2021
    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
  • TimTTimT Posts: 6,328
    Nigelb said:

    University mask report...

    Anecdatum: in my 10:00 biology lecture, 95% mask observance by students. In the 11:00 criminology lecture that followed, about 5% (and LOTS of coughing and spluttering). Has anyone else noticed discipline-related patterns of mask wearing? Someone could do an easy study of this!
    https://twitter.com/matthewcobb/status/1447535683975974917

    Go to a biosafety conference of diagnostic and research lab professionals who handle high consequence pathogens and you won't see much touching of mouth, hair or face. This pre-dates COVID.

    Within healthcare, I think you'll find variations in compliance based on specialty: I am fairly certain you'd find higher adherence to correct PPE use and social measures among anaesthetists, critical care nurses, and pulmologists as opposed to, say, orthopaedic surgeons.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950
    edited October 2021

    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    fpt

    FF43 said:

    Cookie said:

    Farooq said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    FF43 said:

    FF43 said:

    Gentle reminder that #Brexit is important, but still not no.1 priority for the EU. Those whose job it is to focus on Brexit will be following this week's developments closely - the rest will be focused on Poland, new leadership in Central Europe, coalition talks in Germany, etc.

    https://twitter.com/GeorginaEWright/status/1447473662735659013?s=20

    Which is yet another reason to add to the list shared here by @mij_europe the other day (which was basically parotting what I've written here for the past four years) as to why the UK 'holds all the cards' in these forthcoming negotiations.

    The UK government cares passionately about what is going on and speak with a single voice. The EU's 27 governments do not.
    That thread suggested that the EU had gone so far and no further, and that any rejection from Frost will lead to a trade war.

    I agree with the general point though, that the U.K. “holds most of the cards” on NI.
    I suspect Leavers will find the EU is stronger than they think and Remainers will find the EU is not as nice as they think.

    I don't think the EU will immediately suspend the TCA, but they and member states can cause plenty of damage from the off, if they want to, which seems to be the case.

    The UK can and will retaliate, but the effect will be less, except perhaps for Ireland
    Why do you think the EU didn't follow through on its initial ultimatum not to ratify the TCA until the UK fully implemented the protocol?
    Because as I have said previously, the UK not implementing the Protocol is something they can ignore for a very long time. Consciously breaching a just agreed treaty isn't something they can accept. It doesn't have anything to do with Ireland - most member states will be on the same page on this.
    Article 16 is part of the treaty. How does using it constitute breaching the treaty?
    I justly invoke part of a treaty
    You are renaging on promises
    He is an international outlaw
    Yep. The mercurial nature of Article 16. If invoked by the EU over vaccines it's an outrageous abuse of the Treaty. If invoked by the UK over the Irish Sea border it's a justifiable interpretation of the Treaty. The truth is both are an abuse. Those who condemn the second and excuse the first are quisling ultra remainer 5th columnists like Devious Grevious. And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side. There are, as it happens, rather more of the latter types on PB.com.
    The EU invoking over vaccines was an outrageous abuse. The conditions for invocation are explicitly set out.

    The invocation conditions were not met with UvdL invoked it. They are met now.

    Everyone on all sides agrees that diversion of trade is happening, the pro-EU side consider it a good thing and evidence of "Brexit being bad" but if its happening that's the condition met for invocation. You can't deny that.
    Yep, a perfect illustration of what I said -

    "And those who condemn the first and excuse/support the second are hard leaver nutjobs who see the UK/EU relationship as a forever war where we have God on our side."

    This is a piece of cake this morning.
    Except I'm an entirely rational and moderate Leaver who has been shown to be right time and again.

    Do you deny that diversion of trade is happening at the minute? Yes or no?
    Do you deny that diversion of trade is an entirely legitimate trigger? Yes or no?

    If you can't answer these two simple questions, you show yourself off to be the trolling hypocrite you are.
    In my years on here I struggle to recall you calling anything significant to do with Brexit right. What you mainly do is churn out simple simon, hard leaver, Brit Nat propaganda, then strain every sinew to interpret events as being a vindication of it, in the process and where necessary (which is often) rewriting both what you previously said, and why you previously said it, and what has actually happened.

    As to A16, what is relevant is the existence, nature, extent of the problems being caused by the agreed NI Protocol. This can't be boiled down to the noddy "yes/no" multiple choice couplet you present here. The actual "yes/no" question is - are the problems of such thorniness and magnitude as to justify suspending the Protocol or reneging on it? And to this the objectively best (non-quisling, non-hardleaver-nutjob) answer is No.
    Philip is highly suggestible. I legitimately insisted on a Y/N answer about something else yesterday, and he has taken up the idea and run with it. It is of course usually deployed fallaciously in "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, as here.

    My response to most of his posts these days is from Frank N. Furter:

    "How forceful you are, Philip. Such a perfect specimen of manhood. So... dominant. You must be awfully proud of him, Mrs Thompson."

    When he got schooled a few weeks ago on the lump of labour fallacy he was committing, he starting referring to the fallacy himself, trying to twist it to support his own point of view. It's sad more than anything.
    Hm. The lump of labour fallacy is itself something of a fallacy.
    Or, it exists, at the macro level. Granted, as the supply of labour increases, the supply of jobs there are to do also increases. But it takes a long, long time to filter through, and labour is poorer in the short term and certainly no more rich in the long term.
    It is of no comfort to an individual low wage worker whose wages are being held down by a limitless supply of unskilled labour that in the long run that labour will also create a demand for more unskilled labour.
    I thought that too. ie the government approach of restricting labour to drive up wages is economically illiterate but there would be a lengthy drag while employers tried to stay in business at previous staffing levels.

    In fact the adjustment seems to be quite quick, as far as the sketchy evidence goes.
    For all the economic expertise of our Brexiters on here they have failed to grasp the simplest of economic facts.

    For them it is simple - restrictions on labour = wages up = prices up hurrah! Let's all pay ourselves more.

    They ignore (to be charitable) or do not appreciate that restrictions on labour will shift the demand curve leftwards which will have an effect on prices and hence an equilibrium will be reached at a lower price point hence profitability will decrease hence wage rises will reverse hence we are back where we started.

    Quite the opposite, I've mentioned that factor repeatedly. As have others. Except it won't mean that we end up back where we started, since where we started was a so-called 'labour shortage'. The price will go up because it needs to do so, and demand will drop accordingly and the new equilibrium will thus be higher up the price axis than where it is now, but with demand lower on its axis than it is now.

    In case you've forgotten we've had a conversation recently along the lines of saying that 300,000 HGV drivers can't do the work for 400,000 drivers - and I said that's true, but if the price for drivers goes up recruiting eg 50,000 new drivers then 350,000 drivers can do the work of 350,000 drivers.

    Demand going down is an inevitable consequence of price changes, but since demand is greater than supply at the minute that's required to reach equilibrium it isn't a flaw.
    Each of those HGV drivers (and also for that matter those that are now circumventing the UK) contribute to aggregate demand, which will therefore decline with concomitant effects on the price level and profitability. As to your labour shortages and increased wages, that will as you accept result in an increased price level or lower profitability. That will also affect demand for goods and labour. Unemployment is not higher than pre-pandemic (4.6% vs 4.0%) so upwards wage pressure will be to an extent mitigated.

    But if wages do rise, which can certainly be a good thing (your wages up 4.1%, inflation up 4.0% happiness scenario), where does that leave our export competitiveness.

    You are a trained economist but only choose to see the factors that suit your argument.
    You seem on the brink of teetering headlong into a fallacy here. The current aggregate demand is with the 300,000 HGV drivers, not 400,000.

    It is an economic truism that there is no fixed amount of jobs or labour. We've supposedly been "short of labour" for the best part of twenty years since very generous in-work benefits and free movement for Eastern Europe were introduced by Brown. In that time our population has increased by ten million people. If we're "short of labour" then how come the ten million people who've arrived haven't filled the shortage?

    Because you can't fill a shortage via immigration on aggregate, any more than you can cause job losses on aggregate by having immigration either (the "they're stealing our jobs" fallacy).

    If you import 100k new HGV drivers, and new abattoir staff, and new everything else, then those drivers and everyone else would increase aggregate demand and lo and behold there will still be a labour shortage. Then we'd be back to saying 400k drivers aren't enough to do the job of 500k.

    The reason there's a shortage isn't because there's a shortage of people, its because the prices are out of equilibrium. Trying to fill the shortage by bringing in more people hasn't fixed the root cause of the problem as to why prices are out of equilibrium (since its not just 1 sector needing people) so the problem has never been resolved.
    My point is nothing to do with the lump of labour fallacy.

    It was a simple one - first of all, plenty on here are lauding the fact that eg immigrants returning to whence they came has resulted in wages increasing for the remaining indigenous population. However immigrants leaving the UK will have an effect on aggregate demand, thereby nullifying any supposed benefit in higher wages, and thereby shifting the demand curve leftwards.

    Alternatively, under your Micawber scenario of wages rising by 4.1% and inflation of 4.0% (us all paying ourselves more - hurrah) then first of course no one is any richer and there will be losers whose wage rise <4% - or ok a real wage rise of 0.1% (2x hurrah!) - and secondly our export competitiveness takes a huge hit.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    Plus randomly select parliamentary candidates from the public based on which party they support.

    Most MPs went to Russell Group universities, most of the public did not even go to university, so obviously MPs will be more reflective of the views of the educated classes rather than the average person on the street on most issues.

    That is in keeping with a Burkean view of representative rather than direct democracy
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 43,614
    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    He is advocating tolerance of heresy.

    As we all know Tolerance Of Heresy = Heresy.

    So, in the interests of truth, justice, forgiveness and the good of his soul, we must burn him alive.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,256
    Nigelb said:

    University mask report...

    Anecdatum: in my 10:00 biology lecture, 95% mask observance by students. In the 11:00 criminology lecture that followed, about 5% (and LOTS of coughing and spluttering). Has anyone else noticed discipline-related patterns of mask wearing? Someone could do an easy study of this!
    https://twitter.com/matthewcobb/status/1447535683975974917

    Very little masking among students in our building, which is mostly undergrad nursing/midwifery and postgrad public health etc. Which is perhaps surprising, when you think about it. Mind you, I've only seen them walking (inside) from place to place, not sure what it is like in the lectures/seminars.
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 14,911

    TimT said:

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    But my understanding is that the original economic concept of Uber and BnB and the like was precisely to price to marginal cost as the plan was to use up excess capacity of existing assets i.e. the price charged explicitly would not have to cover all those costs, as the owners had already incurred them.

    That model does not really fit with scaling to the size of the founders/funders egos/requirements as, once excess capacity is soaked up (and especially if this happens before the economies of scale kick in for operations), then you do need to price in the capital costs of the assets and the need to pay a living wage, not just cover marginal costs of fuel and hourly wage.
    I might be weird (well I do spend too much time on PB) but I've never used an Air BnB and I never intend too. Until they are required to have the same safety standards as a normal Bed and Breakfast I will not use them.
    Air bnb isn't really a bnb though, at least not if you are renting a whole house. It's a holiday rental. I have often used air bnb and have found no issues, safety or otherwise. It's just a convenient platform for booking self catering holidays.
  • isamisam Posts: 40,730
    edited October 2021
    @Stuartinromford
    isam said:
    » show previous quotes
    Gis a job

    https://akluplaza.co.uk/jobs/imam/
    Goodness only knows
    a) what this has to do with the conversation
    b) why you're so concerned with a random off the internet

    but here goes.

    This bee in your bonnet started with the this exchange;
    stuartinromford said:
    » show previous quotes
    No mention of a mosque here-
    https://www.time1075.net/172004-2-romford-debenhams-to-become-superstore/

    There's mention of a prayer room on the website https://akluplaza.co.uk/ but not much space for it in the floor plans.

    Otherwise, it sounds like a version of the Shopping Hall that happens to be run by some successful Asian shopkeepers. Best of luck to them.

    Better that than another empty shell like the adjacent Littlewoods/Index site. That's been abandoned for nearly 20 years.

    So new businesses that will attract people to Romford, unless they're allergic to Asians. Sounds like good news, eh?

    And then others (who know more about Islam than me, and I imagine you) chipped in to explain the subtleties about prayer rooms and all that.

    From this, you have got that I accused you of lying and that I changed my tune once you had proved that there was going to be a mosque. Not quite sure how that happened, but I don't have a copy of the Faragist playbook.

    Perhaps what I'm really saying is that I'm not that bothered in your repeated prods, and I should have ignored the first one.

    Sorry everyone else, you're now returned to your regular programming.

    [ETA: Probably for the best that there's a new thread started.]

    You tried to playdown the fact that the biggest department store in Romford has been bought by two Muslim businessmen, whose current businesses are worth about £20k, for about £12m (who put up the rest of the money I wonder?), and the third floor is going to be a mosque, by saying "No mention of a mosque"

    Now, having seen the advert for an Imam to conduct the five daily prayers, rather than hold your hands up and say "Oh you were right, it is a mosque" its "Perhaps what I'm really saying is that I'm not that bothered in your repeated prods, and I should have ignored the first one."

    Of course, its easy to wish you'd not bothered when you''ve been proven wrong, and you probably should have ignored the first one rather than argued with no evidence and got it tits up
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,240
    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,762
    rcs1000 said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    "it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. "

    Wait, what?

    Presumably on a proportionate number of days. So they can believe this stuff 5 days a week but vote against it on the other 2?
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
    EC gives no such thing relating to GE 24 but I know it amuses you
    Yes it does.

    The Conservatives need at least a 6 to 7% lead over Labour or more as they got in 2015 and 2019 to be sure to win a majority again for starters
    It it keeps you happy but it is not relevant at all to GE 24 and if you cannot see that then so be it
    Of course it is relevant as it accurately translates the poll results now into seats.

    If you don't want reflections on poll results on here then I suggest you find another website as that is rather much of the point of this one
    On one hand, it's only a bit of fun, as the man used to say.

    There's an awful lot of water to flow under the bridge yet, and some weather forecasts imply a flood that's going to wash the bridge away.

    However, it's useful to convert percentages into seats and to remind ourselves that a Conservative lead in votes over Labour doesn't automatically translate into a Conservative majority. That's a direct consequence of there being several anti-Conservative parties.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,256

    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    He is advocating tolerance of heresy.

    As we all know Tolerance Of Heresy = Heresy.

    So, in the interests of truth, justice, forgiveness and the good of his soul, we must burn him alive.
    Hmm... Bit harsh? Maybe just a quick roasting? :wink:
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    Ah, Mr Thomspson, I have a small bone to pick with you.

    We were discussing house price movements relative to income, and in particular where to start measuring on the Nationwide price-to-incomes scale. We were using the average for 2003 as our starting point... but the EU 8 didn't join until May 2004.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Everyone plays this game. Get over yourself.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,762
    rcs1000 said:

    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Everyone plays this game. Get over yourself.
    I just knew you were going to say that.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 43,614
    TimT said:

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    But my understanding is that the original economic concept of Uber and BnB and the like was precisely to price to marginal cost as the plan was to use up excess capacity of existing assets i.e. the price charged explicitly would not have to cover all those costs, as the owners had already incurred them.

    That model does not really fit with scaling to the size of the founders/funders egos/requirements as, once excess capacity is soaked up (and especially if this happens before the economies of scale kick in for operations), then you do need to price in the capital costs of the assets and the need to pay a living wage, not just cover marginal costs of fuel and hourly wage.
    Uber was about grabbing market share at a loss until self driving cars came in and allowed them (by eliminating the drivers) to make a profit on the vast numbers of automated rides.

    AirBnB is the answer to the following requirement - I don't want a hotel room with catering. I want a complete flat/house with bedrooms, shared living space and self catering.

    It is noticeable that a considerable number of similar arrangements to AirBnB have sprung up - and a growth area is short stay self service apartments, purpose built.
  • AlistairMAlistairM Posts: 2,004
    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Yes, lots of posters are easy to identify by their style. I seem to recall that there has been a previous commenter on here, apparently no longer active, who has been through several different identities. It seemed obvious due to their writing style being so distinctive. I wonder if you've been able to recognise them too?
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    Fishing said:

    On topic, note there was no option in the first question for "The UK should stop wasting money on this woke rubbish when taxes are at a record high, hospitals have millions on their wasting lists and lots of old people can't heat their homes".

    It was just, do you want to spend lots of money on our issue, or do you want to bankrupt yourself on our issue? Or don't you know?

    Is "woke rubbish" the climate change denier name for recycling bins?
  • isamisam Posts: 40,730
    edited October 2021
    New Survation

    How would you describe Boris Johnson's communication style

    51% Passionate
    42% Not Passionate

    How would you describe Sir Keir's communication style

    35% Passionate
    52% Not Passionate

    Boris leads by 16 Gross Positives and 26 Net

    https://twitter.com/Survation/status/1447506888921395207?s=20

    Worth a point or two in a GE campaign, that's why you dont just bung in the latest VI and say "This means it's a hung parliament..." etc
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,240
    AlistairM said:

    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Yes, lots of posters are easy to identify by their style. I seem to recall that there has been a previous commenter on here, apparently no longer active, who has been through several different identities. It seemed obvious due to their writing style being so distinctive. I wonder if you've been able to recognise them too?
    I savour the moment. My gums tingle. My throat burns. I burp, and it orcelin. I dizzily stumble through my house, feeling extremely vital after eating such an amazing sandwich. But then I discover something truly wonderful: I have cancer! I do a little dance.
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 43,614
    Selebian said:

    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    He is advocating tolerance of heresy.

    As we all know Tolerance Of Heresy = Heresy.

    So, in the interests of truth, justice, forgiveness and the good of his soul, we must burn him alive.
    Hmm... Bit harsh? Maybe just a quick roasting? :wink:
    Being kind to heretics is Tolerance Of Heresy. We all know what that means, don't we.

    We must be cruel, to be kind.

    {Sir Thomas Moore sighs sadly and orders another round of kicking for Bilney}
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    edited October 2021
    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    That is one interpretation of karma as pre-destination in Hinduism, which is strongly opposed by other viewpoints - that at every stage our karma, as in the sum of our previous actions, spanning many lifetimes, brings us to this point, whereupon we have a choice to behave as we have done previously, or to change, by acting against our impiulses. See?. I avoided short sentences, single sentence paragraphs and the tedious repetitive use of folk, summat, owt and anyways.
    Until just now.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,226
    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    You should have learnt by now that most people aren’t interested in the really big stories.

    We’ve been directly told in the last year that there is definitely ultra tech in our skies and oceans, which either belongs to adversaries of the West or non human intelligence / life forms. And everyone shrugged.

    People aren’t going to listen too hard to a senior Pentagon official if he says the US has surrendered technological dominance to China and that a point will be reached (or may already have been reached) when their lead will be insurmountable. Forever.

    Cognitive dissonance innit. Much more comfortable to talk about IDS’s majority instead.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,256
    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    Actually, although I can't find the current figures, there may well be at least a historic over-representation of denier/sceptic views in parliament, at least on the Conservative benches
    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/10/climate-scepticism-still-rife-among-tory-mps-poll
    (smallish sample, don't know how representative etc etc - nor do I have polling for general public opinions on the same question)
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080
    edited October 2021

    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    He is advocating tolerance of heresy.

    As we all know Tolerance Of Heresy = Heresy.

    So, in the interests of truth, justice, forgiveness and the good of his soul, we must burn him alive.
    My take is that the Greenpeace poll is really a theology test.

    They don't like people who do not-Greenpeace-think.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/climate-crisis-duncan-smith-conservative-b1934219.html
  • TimTTimT Posts: 6,328
    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Our brains most definitely do use algorithms (all fear factors and all our cognitive biases are good examples of them), and data is recalled and connexion between data made based largely on the strength of existing neuron pathways between them. So we do think, to a large extent, based upon what we have experienced, and what we have experienced the most frequently spaced over time.

    But, we are capable of making entirely new connexions between data and concepts that we have not previously made. That is the essence of creativity and innovation. And we do that best at the umbra between conscious thought and empty-mindedness.

    I guess you could write an algorithm for that, but then you'd also need a screening mechanism to eliminate all the nonesense 'ideas', otherwise you'll look like an idiot or a bot.

    Out of interest, where do you think I fit on the bot scale? LOL
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,256

    Selebian said:

    Selebian said:

    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Sounds to me like PR. That's the way to get MPs with views that are roughly in proportion to the population at large.

    So, we could (and likely would*) have a deniers party. Fine.

    *Or would we? Do countries with PR tend to have at least one party that supports this view?
    He is advocating tolerance of heresy.

    As we all know Tolerance Of Heresy = Heresy.

    So, in the interests of truth, justice, forgiveness and the good of his soul, we must burn him alive.
    Hmm... Bit harsh? Maybe just a quick roasting? :wink:
    Being kind to heretics is Tolerance Of Heresy. We all know what that means, don't we.

    We must be cruel, to be kind.

    {Sir Thomas Moore sighs sadly and orders another round of kicking for Bilney}
    Good point. I am guilty. Do you think self flagellation will be sufficient in my case? Or do I need to go and gather some firewood for myself?
  • isamisam Posts: 40,730
    ...
    Leon said:

    AlistairM said:

    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Yes, lots of posters are easy to identify by their style. I seem to recall that there has been a previous commenter on here, apparently no longer active, who has been through several different identities. It seemed obvious due to their writing style being so distinctive. I wonder if you've been able to recognise them too?
    I savour the moment. My gums tingle. My throat burns. I burp, and it orcelin. I dizzily stumble through my house, feeling extremely vital after eating such an amazing sandwich. But then I discover something truly wonderful: I have cancer! I do a little dance.
    Would you be able to identify @Mick_Pork , @tim or @Roy_G_Biv if they came back under an alias?
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 10,342
    Fishing said:

    On topic, note there was no option in the first question for "The UK should stop wasting money on this woke rubbish when taxes are at a record high, hospitals have millions on their wasting lists and lots of old people can't heat their homes".

    It was just, do you want to spend lots of money on our issue, or do you want to bankrupt yourself on our issue? Or don't you know?

    The expression "We can't afford not to......" found in this slewed survey, always sounds like a decent knockdown argument but it isn't. Its frequent application is a discussion stopper, meaningless and should invite deeper questioning. Like How much. Where from. Which budgets do you cut to do it and by how much? etc

  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,256
    kinabalu said:

    Fishing said:

    On topic, note there was no option in the first question for "The UK should stop wasting money on this woke rubbish when taxes are at a record high, hospitals have millions on their wasting lists and lots of old people can't heat their homes".

    It was just, do you want to spend lots of money on our issue, or do you want to bankrupt yourself on our issue? Or don't you know?

    Is "woke rubbish" the climate change denier name for recycling bins?
    Surely for the stuff that goes into them? Rubbish demanding its self-claimed right to self-indentify as feedstock for future cans, boxes, bottles etc...
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,240
    moonshine said:

    Leon said:

    This is possibly the biggest story of the week. Or indeed the century. Completely unnoticed

    ‘US has already lost AI fight to China, says ex-Pentagon software chief’

    https://www.ft.com/content/f939db9a-40af-4bd1-b67d-10492535f8e0

    A combination of complacency, lethargy and Woke crap - ‘omg GPT3 might be racist’ - means the west has handed the race to AI to China, and it may already be too late to catch up.

    If China dominates AI it dominates the world like no power before it

    You should have learnt by now that most people aren’t interested in the really big stories.

    We’ve been directly told in the last year that there is definitely ultra tech in our skies and oceans, which either belongs to adversaries of the West or non human intelligence / life forms. And everyone shrugged.

    People aren’t going to listen too hard to a senior Pentagon official if he says the US has surrendered technological dominance to China and that a point will be reached (or may already have been reached) when their lead will be insurmountable. Forever.

    Cognitive dissonance innit. Much more comfortable to talk about IDS’s majority instead.
    Some people are INCREDIBLY resistant to the idea of artificial general intelligence. I have an extremely smart brother who is always open to new ideas but he just won't accept that this - machine intelligence - can ever happen, let alone that it is actually happening right now

    Existentially, it frightens him
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:
    Conservatives down 2 but labour down 1

    Labour need to be gaining not dropping as well

    And who cares about electoral calculus, it is wholly irrelevant to GE24
    Labour do not need to be gaining as long as the Tories drop more than them.

    For Starmer could become PM in a hung parliament with SNP, LD, PC and Green and SDLP and Alliance support even if Labour do not win most seats let alone a majority.

    EC gives an accurate reflection of how the polls translate to seats
    EC gives no such thing relating to GE 24 but I know it amuses you
    Yes it does.

    The Conservatives need at least a 6 to 7% lead over Labour or more as they got in 2015 and 2019 to be sure to win a majority again for starters
    It it keeps you happy but it is not relevant at all to GE 24 and if you cannot see that then so be it
    Of course it is relevant as it accurately translates the poll results now into seats.

    If you don't want reflections on poll results on here then I suggest you find another website as that is rather much of the point of this one
    You have already excommunicated me from the conservative party and now you are trying to do the same on here

    It is not relevant to GE 24 no matter how you protest
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878
    Nigelb said:

    University mask report...

    Anecdatum: in my 10:00 biology lecture, 95% mask observance by students. In the 11:00 criminology lecture that followed, about 5% (and LOTS of coughing and spluttering). Has anyone else noticed discipline-related patterns of mask wearing? Someone could do an easy study of this!
    https://twitter.com/matthewcobb/status/1447535683975974917

    My pharmacy and pharmacologists have been good, after initial bollockings. However there is the usual continuous coughing of freshers flu (I hope).

    Our uni approach to masks is that the students wear them to protect the lecturers. They are not doing it anywhere else, so the study should be which academics get ill...
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 14,911
    Cookie said:

    On thread - what this tells me is that the proportion of climate sceptics probably doesn't vary all that much by constituency (though it would be interesting to see polling to confirm).
    We jump through considerable hoops to ensure that the ethnic identities of our representatives are broadly in proportion to the population at large - it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it should be desirable that the views of MPs are roughly in proportion to the population at large. Which implies a voice for minority opinions such as climate scepticism, albeit a minority one. Which by accident or design appears to be what we have.

    Climate sceptics puzzle me. I am not a scientist but the whole thing seems pretty open and shut to me and there appears to be a broad consensus across scientific opinion. So I wonder, what do climate sceptics really think?
    That the climate isn't warming? I can see it with my own eyes, and measurements of temperature seem to back up this impression very convincingly. Do they think that this is all lies?
    That the climate is warming but it's nothing to do with human activity? This seems even less plausible. The planet seems to be warming up at unprecedented speed and at a time that correlates perfectly with human activity that models predict should be having this effect.
    That the greenhouse gases theory isn't correct? The story seems highly plausible, whether conceptually or if you put it through a complex climate model.
    That scientists don't understand their own models and instruments? It's possible, but seems implausible that some random uninformed punter understands them better.
    That scientists are engaged in a vast conspiracy? Unlikely if you understand how science operates. If anyone was going to fund a conspiracy here, fossil fuel interests seem most plausible - they have deep pockets and strong vested interests.
    That the whole thing is real but there's no point doing anything to stop it? This is the craziest take of all, if you actually think about what life on earth would be like with say a 3 or 4 degree temperature increase.
    So, like I say, these people are a mystery to me. People are entitled to their own opinions of course, but not their own facts.
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 10,342
    On the 'Until China' question. I think you would get a very different result if you asked: Should China do much more to address climate change (eg by ceasing the programme to open new coal fired power stations larger than the whole of UK electricity supply) instead of expecting other countries like the UK to be so far ahead of them.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    Selebian said:

    Anyone else slightly disappointed to discover that in this case 'the Greenpeace treatment' means havng some polling done in their constituencies? I'm sure Greenpeace action used to be a bit more exciting.

    Yes, I was hoping for more there. Antiscience, dinosaur Tory MPs ruthlessly targeted by ... clicks into header ... polling showing them to be out of step with public opinion. Ah. Ok.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878

    TimT said:

    TOPPING said:

    Observations around and about London over the weekend:

    1. Mask wearing on the tube down dramatically, despite TfL announcements saying you have to wear masks.
    2. Mask wearing everywhere else just about non-existent.
    3. Uber has got to the stage of its business model where, having attempted to drive other players out of the market, has now raised its prices dramatically around 10% difference with black cabs.
    4. Everywhere is busy.

    3. Is due to Uber discovering a small flaw in it's business plan. It still has to pay human drivers and they need to earn enough to eat. And keep their cars on the road.
    But my understanding is that the original economic concept of Uber and BnB and the like was precisely to price to marginal cost as the plan was to use up excess capacity of existing assets i.e. the price charged explicitly would not have to cover all those costs, as the owners had already incurred them.

    That model does not really fit with scaling to the size of the founders/funders egos/requirements as, once excess capacity is soaked up (and especially if this happens before the economies of scale kick in for operations), then you do need to price in the capital costs of the assets and the need to pay a living wage, not just cover marginal costs of fuel and hourly wage.
    I might be weird (well I do spend too much time on PB) but I've never used an Air BnB and I never intend too. Until they are required to have the same safety standards as a normal Bed and Breakfast I will not use them.
    Air bnb isn't really a bnb though, at least not if you are renting a whole house. It's a holiday rental. I have often used air bnb and have found no issues, safety or otherwise. It's just a convenient platform for booking self catering holidays.
    My argument about safety standards still stands. They should have to comply to the same as any other holiday rental property.
  • isamisam Posts: 40,730

    I don't follow Electoral Calculus but this -

    http://www.electionpolling.co.uk/battleground/targets/labour

    "Next time of course the Tories will not have the threat of PM Corbyn to put put the pressure on."

    What does this mean Mike? Conservative MPs wont be able to threaten the public with "Corbyn might be PM" or the Greenpeace types wont have a Green would be PM as LotO?
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    On topic, if anything’s going to get Johnson this year or next, it’s going to be rising utility and fuel bills, to pay for what David Cameron ended up describing as the “Green Crap”.

    Those who live in Wokingham might not care too much about the bills, but those in Warrington and Workington certainly do.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,240
    edited October 2021
    TimT said:

    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    Our brains most definitely do use algorithms (all fear factors and all our cognitive biases are good examples of them), and data is recalled and connexion between data made based largely on the strength of existing neuron pathways between them. So we do think, to a large extent, based upon what we have experienced, and what we have experienced the most frequently spaced over time.

    But, we are capable of making entirely new connexions between data and concepts that we have not previously made. That is the essence of creativity and innovation. And we do that best at the umbra between conscious thought and empty-mindedness.

    I guess you could write an algorithm for that, but then you'd also need a screening mechanism to eliminate all the nonesense 'ideas', otherwise you'll look like an idiot or a bot.

    Out of interest, where do you think I fit on the bot scale? LOL
    But GPT3 also shows evidence of creativity and imagination. Even more bizarrely, if you ask it to be MORE creative, it IS. This suggests it has some inner understanding of what creativity *is*, or at least it has a sense of what we mean by "creativity"

    Of course it isn't really understanding, it is just wires and chips blah blah

    You're not particularly bot-like, to me, but you could see that as an insult, as it might mean you don't have a distinctive writing style

    I do recommend that brilliant essay. The woman that wrote it went through the exact same thoughts and reactions that I had, when I first encountered the uncanniness of GPT3, early in the pandemic. Odd. Perhaps we have the same algos
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    Leon said:

    When I am bored I sometimes play a game with PB. I go to a longer comment (avoiding the name at the top) and I read the first 2 or 3 sentences. And then I test myself: I see if I can guess the identity of the commenter from the opinion, syntax, vocabulary, style

    It is surprisingly easy, we all have a style. What is more surprising is how robotic and repetitive some commenters are, such that you can not only guess the identity of the commenter, but you can predict what they will say next, after those first 2 sentences, sometimes down to the precise word.

    Two extreme examples are Kinabalu on the left, and HYUFD on the right. No offence guys, but I suggest you are actually bots on Russia's SputnikGPT-3 in Chelyabinsk, autocompleting your comments following the prompt of a prior comment - as that is how GPT3 works. It is basically "autocomplete on crack"

    That raises a further question, one I have mentioned before. What if ALL intelligence is just autocomplete? We think we have original thoughts, ideas, concepts, but maybe all of us - not just the twin droids kinabalu and HYUFD - are just a bunch of algorithms, responding as we must?

    If all intelligence is just autocomplete, then AI is already here, and it is called GPT3, and it only going to get more intelligent

    Here's a fascinating essay exploring that exact same idea that I had last year. Or, I should say, that idea I thought i had, in reality it was just me autocompleting the new reality of Natural Language Programming


    https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-40/essays/babel-4/

    The most fun posters are those whose views on a subject are unpredictable.

    Hat tip to @IshmaelZ, who is reasonably inscrutable.
This discussion has been closed.