Cambodia 1

Disaster came to Cambodia in 1975. Here's how it happened.

A boy who had been educated in Cambodia's elite schools went to Paris, France, and became a follower of Marxist-Leninist communism there. Returning in 1953, he joined communist forces fighting the Cambodian government. The boy was Pol Pot.

Eventually he led his armies to defeat the government, and took control of Cambodia's politics and economy in 1975. His goal was to create an "agrarian socialist society," so he forced people out of cities and onto collective farms. 

His vision demanded social uniformity. His solution to dissent was to kill dissenters.

photo of mass grave

"Following the examples of Stalin and Mao, Pol Pot brutally murdered more than one million Cambodians in the infamous Killing Fields of 1975-1979 as he implemented his vision of communist utopia. He abolished private property, money, prices, commerce, and even cities—a full descent into barbarism.

"Death sentences were levied against any number of “class enemies.” Simply being a former civil servant, student, artist, or capitalist of any variety—including a “street noodle vendor or a motorcycle taxi driver”—was enough to earn a spot in one of Pol Pot’s mass graves."

(cont'd tomorrow)

Got banking 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Tala is not a non-profit charity. It's a business that must make profit to stay in business, so its banking services are not free. Customers must buy their services and pay for them.

Amylene Dingle, one of their customers, paid interest and a small fee for her first ($20) and subsequent loans. Like all business owners, she took a risk when she bet that people would want her product and that she could generate a profit of her own.  She was right, it was well worth it, and her family is much better off.

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In a "free enterprise" or "free market" economic system, people like Amylene are free to do as she did. She is entitled to use her own intelligence, to act on her idea - and she's entitled to the rewards of her own work.

In socialism's "control or command economy," somebody in the government decides if she should be allowed to pursue her goal. And her business will never actually belong to her. Private ownership is abolished, and the business will belong to the collective which of course is run by the government.

Got banking 1

Just a few years ago, Amylene Dingle and her family lived in an impoverished part of Manila, the Phillippines. Her life changed when she saw an ad on Facebook for "Tala," and she responded to it.

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Amylene was granted a small ($20) business loan from Tala. She used it to buy cold cuts/hamburgers/hot dogs and then re-sold them. Her business grew, and today she's making about $70 per week in profit. They now live in a cleaner, quieter neighborhood.

Tala was founded in 2011 by Shivani Siroya, a former Wall Street analyst who was raised in New York by Indian immigrant parents. After working at the United Nations, she started Tala specifically to provide banking services (like loans) to people in parts of the world where banking is not accessible to them.

from Forbes

(cont'd tomorrow)

Still socialism

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

 If socialism is called by another name, like "democratic socialism," is it better? 

Will the outcomes be good if people actually vote for it in an election? No, the outcomes still won't be good.

Who is Marx?

Seems there's some confusion about what Marxism is. 

Why are so many people against it? How do its supporters defend it? Is it the same as communism? Or is it just about equality of incomes? 

Has it ever really been tried? Why do people associate it with violence? 

Let's start with the man whose ideas laid the foundation for socialism and communism - and inspired the Russian revolution of 1917.

Blind to it

A young woman sits in a hipster coffee shop, puts her phone down, and looks around. She sees "people talking freely, working on their MacBooks, ordering food they get in an instant, seeing cars go by outside, and it dawned on me. We live in the most privileged time in the most prosperous nation and we’ve become blind to it."

Even the American poor can hardly compare to the the poor of the rest of the world. "Virtually no one in the United States is considered poor by global standards. Yet, in a time where we can order a product off Amazon with one click and have it at our doorstep the next day, we are unappreciative, unsatisfied, and ungrateful."

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A young politician claimed recently that her generation has never seen American prosperity.

"Never saw American prosperity. Let that sink in. When I first read that statement, I thought to myself, that was quite literally the most entitled and factually illiterate thing I’ve ever heard in my 26 years on this earth."

from "Thoughts from a Hipster Coffee Shop"

Is it fake? 4

Google has the trust of most Americans. Their search engine produces neutral, unbiased, reliable, factual results. That's the perception. But Dr. Epstein tells a different story when it comes to the last presidential election.

He starts out strongly identifying himself with one political side. It's necessary, because otherwise he will be dismissed as purely partisan. His message is bad news for his own party.

That's our state of affairs. Partisanship, manipulation, and outright lying are broadly expected from each side of our political divide. 

Sadly, the difficulty of finding out what is true now saps the moral energy of a pretty big segment of "we the people." They throw up their hands and refuse to engage in public debate at all because they have given up.



Google manipulated politically-related searches in 2016. Voters were fed results which delivered huge numbers of votes to Google's preferred political party. 

"Democracy, as originally conceived, cannot survive big tech as [it is] currently empowered," says Dr. Epstein. He's right.

Is it fake? 3

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

To be clear, is earth's polar bear population declining? No, so far that's not happening.

"[M]ost of the world's 19 populations [polar bear population groups] have returned to healthy numbers . . ," according to the WWF.

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Is it fake? 2

Headlines tell us that polar bears are in trouble because their sea ice habitat is warming. They've been on the endangered list since 2008. World Wildlife says, "The survival and the protection of the polar bear habitat are urgent issues for WWF." Urgent.

That narrative went viral due in part to this sad video about a starving polar bear:



It's been viewed two-and-a-half billion times, National Geographic's most viewed video ever. "This is what climate change looks like"  - that's the message. But is that actually happening in this video? 

No (see the details here). A year later, National Geographic admitted that they "went too far in drawing a definitive connection between climate change and a particular starving polar bear. ." The writer said, "we were looking for a picture that foretold the future . ."

An image carries big impact. This video is not really fake, but its message is not supported  by the facts. They had an agenda and they used this image to make it convincing.

(cont'd tomorrow)

Is it fake? 1

When we see a video clip of a celebrity making a statement, we don't even question whether that really happened because we see them saying it. But an element of doubt is creeping in.

The video below shows technology can convincingly place someone else's face on a movie character. Could it be used to misrepresent something more important, like a political candidate's statement? Sure.

Note: the video can't be embedded right now, maybe youtube has a problem - I'll keep trying

Technology is a tool that can be used for good or bad purpose, but it's hard to come up with a noble use of this particular technological tool.

"There's potential to lose all trust." But society must rely on a high level of trusting relationships to function. 

(cont'd tomorrow)

Upward trend 1

People of the world are wealthier and healthier by far than they were centuries or even decades ago. In the last ~30 years, global extreme poverty has been reduced by about half. It may be the best (but least reported) news ever. But it was reported in this blog years ago, as you may remember.

Hans Rosling, the charismatic Swedish statistician, created Gapminder to correct the pervasive ignorance about this phenomenal news. His bubble charts entertain as they educate.

Here's one that I've never posted before. His data was current for 2009, but ten years later the trend still continues today:


(cont'd tomorrow)

9-11 kindness

"We just fell out of the sky onto their town."

On September 11, 2001, after the attack on New York City, all flight traffic stopped. Planes were ordered to land at the nearest airport and wait.

Thirty-eight airplanes landed at Gander, Newfoundland, Canada, a small town of 9,000 people. The planes brought 7,000 strangers from 90 different countries, all in need - and Gander was up to the task for what turned out to be five days.

Sandwiches were made, travelers were housed in gymnasiums, high schools, and even homes. The people of Gander put their normal lives on hold to serve these strangers, out of the goodness of their hearts.



from "Hope is Contagious"

9-11 ship 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

"Every ship in the Navy has a namesake room or a legacy room, but on our ship the whole ship is a legacy to what happened." The Command Master Chief is talking about the USS New York, one of three ships built to remember the unprovoked attack on New York in 2001.

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"We talk to all of our sailors when they initially check in and explain to them the significance of what they are a part of . . . You can't help when you walk around the ship to notice all the things meant to remind you of why you serve." Things like:

• a steel plate from the World Trade Center rubble is mounted in a hallway
• a fire fighter's helmet
• the bow stem below water surface at the front of the ship

That last item was made from 7.5 tons of steel salvaged from the rubble of one of the Twin Towers.

9-11 Ship 1

It's been eighteen years since the attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. A commercial jet was flown into each of the Twin Towers, igniting about 10,000 gallons of jet fuel. 

"Jet fuel burns at 800 to 1,500 degrees Fahrenheit. This temperature is not hot enough to melt structural steel. But engineers say that for the World Trade Center towers to collapse, its steel frames didn't need to melt—they just had to lose some of their structural strength from the intense heat."

The north tower collapsed an hour and 43 minutes after the strike, and the south tower collapsed in 56 minutes. 

First responders ran into the danger while those inside ran out. Listen to first-hand memories of fire fighters who survived:



(cont'd tomorrow)

Child & robot

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Artificial intelligence won't be taking over the world any time soon. All AI in use at this time is "narrow," a tool made by humans to help accomplish something.

They're used in classrooms, where children as young as kindergarten are using robots to better and more quickly grasp mathematical concepts. But the kids also need to be educated about the robots they use, the difference between themselves and the technology.

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If AI can confuse adults, kids are definitely more vulnerable to confusion.  Many children think robots are smarter than humans or imbue them with magical powers. 

But children as young as four years old can, when taught, recognize that they remain “smarter” than a computer that beats them at a game.

Ideas to help raise an "AI-savvy" child:

• refer to a robot as "it"
• be positive about the benefits of AI
• encourage kids to understand how a robot was built, that humans are the source of its "intelligence"

taken from Mind Matters

Robot is "It"

(cont'd from Friday's post)

None of us have a problem with artificial intelligence (AI) that organizes data so we can  improve human lives, which is how it's used right now, and which is all it can do. This is "narrow" AI. 

But it's hard/impossible to stop technology. Some think that a true consciousness, having an independent will, might someday spontaneously develop from growing intelligence. That would be AGI, artificial general intelligence, like the intelligence of humans.

That is what scares people. Understanding these two levels of AI, narrow and general, will help us to think clearly about what is dangerous and what isn't. It will make the distinction between human and AI robot as well.

So . . a robot of our current technology is not a "he or she." This author says we should teach children to call a robot "It", despite its animal or human appearance.

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(cont'd tomorrow)

Is AI evil? 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

"Is AI [artificial intelligence] evil?" Oren Etzioni devoted his career to studying AI and says this question is "very much on my mind." He explains his answer in this TEDx talk.



The nature of AI must be understood more accurately than as a creepy robot character in movies.  He says that his 6-year-old son is more autonomous than any AI system. The boy has free will and real creativity, a consciousness that recognizes itself.

All of that is missing in AI today. Our AI systems have a narrow intelligence that finds and organizes information for us, like Semantic Scholar. He thinks a program could be built that prevents medical errors, which cause one-third of hospital deaths.

But . . could AI eventually develop a true consciousness? An independent, threatening free will? That's AGI - artificial general intelligence - and a subject for a different post.

(cont'd on Monday)

Is AI evil? 1

There will be another "Terminator" movie in two months (trailer). Artificial intelligence (AI) is definitely the bad guy in that movie series, the brain behind the network of machines trying to exterminate humanity. 

Is AI evil? As you know, Elon Musk says that it will probably develop intelligence way beyond ours, leaving humans helpless to defend ourselves or to stay in control. He thinks it's demonic.

But Ray Kurzweil, a director of engineering at Google and proponent of AI, sees it differently. He agrees that artificial intelligence will surpass human intelligence (maybe in 2029), but he thinks it's a good thing because . . then humans can merge with it and live forever!

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Kurzweil, and others who agree with him, are materialists, i.e., only the material and natural world exist. There is no transcendent, all-powerful God, and the death of a human is just like the death of an animal. Humans are not exceptional. We were not created in the image of God (Imago Dei), as the Bible states.

from "Will We Become Mere Apps of Our Smart Machines?"

(cont'd tomorrow)

HK hope 2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

Protesters in Hong Kong have no chance of obtaining the freedom they want so badly. "They are unarmed and trapped on all sides by either water or mainland China . . . There’s simply no way out for the protesters, and China understands this well."

So . . since China will not restore Western style freedoms, what does the future hold for Hong Kong? How will China's Pres. Xi handle this crisis?

1) Propaganda is first. State-run media frames the protests as causing chaos that threatens security and stability. They even recruited movie star Jackie Chan to say that the protests make citizens "sad and depressed."

2) Armed gangs are being sent to attack and frighten Hong Kongers.

3) They will try to keep order until the crisis wears out both protesters and the populace.

China will manage this crisis . .  and Hong Kong will kneel in the end to the heavy hand of its totalitarian government.

Taken from a pessimistic article at Human Events

Hong Kong hope

Hong Kong was ruled by Britain for 99 years, a free and prosperous city. On July 1, 1997, that ended and Hong Kong was handed over to the rule of Communist China pursuant to an agreement signed by Britain back in the 1800's. 

They're losing the freedoms they had. You've seen videos of the protesters. The hideous memory of Tiananmen Square looms. We're hopeful that these brave people can retain their freedoms, but this article says, "Xi Xinping will have his way with Hong Kong." Xi is China's ruler and he doesn't like freedom.

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"It may not require a massacre or even a severe crackdown, but the totalitarian Chinese government will prevail in Hong Kong, regardless of the means required to do so."

(cont'd tomorrow)

Electors

"In a pure democracy, majorities can easily tyrannize the rest of a country." It would be like two wolves and a lamb voting on what's for dinner.