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Not once in all that time did I consider using a program with hostile default settings. Weird how hard this might be for an image viewer.

Expressing a viewpoint necessitates a downvote?

Maybe I’ll get some hate for this, but years ago when I worked at a civil engineering firm this was the default image viewer IT had mapped every image file to open with - it was a nightmare! Every coworker I had (myself included) would constantly complain about the number of times they had to change to [literally anything else]. There were three distinct things I remember we all hated: 1. The image never opened full size, the window was always small and you had to manually drag the window frame to make it viewable. 2. It didn’t “zoom in” when you used your mouse wheel correctly, it would instead cycle through all of the images open in the folder you were working in. 3. When you clicked the arrows at the top to flip through a group of photos in the folder you were in (I recall the keyboard arrow keys not working for this, too), once you reached the end it would go to a black “fake” image, that you then couldn’t arrow back. It didn’t just cycle through the images, you had to close the window and reopen the image you were on.

Needless to say, I have zero fond memories of this program. Maybe these were nuances of our particular setup (many other such cases at that firm, sadly), but…eh, whatever. There’s better out there.

Could you provide some examples of what you think these hypothetical AI’s are going to give/grant/allow these hypothetical governments that warrants the usage of enough energy they’ll actually starve people to achieve? What “competition” are these governments going to be in to necessitate this?

Comments like this are becoming far more common it seems amongst the tech community, to me anyway, that I really want an answer of what this hypothetical god-like entity is going to enable that also somehow will only be limited to a select group of people/nation/whatever and not spread throughout the rest of the world. It’s a weird dichotomy wherein “AGI” will somehow solve climate change, enable cold fusion, end human aging, spread us to the stars, but also inflict mass death, use all of the global energy if unchecked, and now, starve humans to achieve those things.

I think “backbone” in this context is a stand-in for “integrity” and/or “honor”. I think the fact that they can “buy, sell, and eliminate people and governments as they see fit” is the obvious proof that they don’t possess any real integrity, dignity, or honor for themselves or other people - so, no, they don’t have “backbone”. Power, wealth, sure. But not backbone.

> all the popular explanations stop just short of really grappling with the real weirdness of the theorem.

No offense, but if I’m reading your comment correctly you’re making it out that nobody familiar with the proof has ever considered what “truth” really is. That’s…well, there’s a saying amongst physicists that, “you’re not even wrong.” The semantics of language and math have a copious amount of literature behind them. Not to mention that even asking the question is, forgive me, a tad juvenile.

Also, recursively applying known unknowns back into the statement (? If I understood that correctly) is itself incomplete: how could a system be “complete” if there are unknowns?

Forgive me if it seems I, too, have ventured into the cranky side of the discourse.

When did the US take it over?

This comes across as a really aggressive comment for no real reason.

A lot of people find too much free time distressing. Even with a lot of projects to pursue, or come up with, it can be difficult to focus on any particular one for the simple fact that the mind can be preoccupied with the constant weighing of opportunity costs, and become stagnant (only now with even more anxiety about opportunity being wasted).

Sometimes people reveal things about themselves because they’re looking for the validation only others commiserating can bring. Unfortunately this often invites needless criticism.

A really nice write up! I’m a professional land surveyor and it was interesting reading an outsiders perspective; for the most part you really nailed it!

(Current) Geodesist and Professional Land Surveyor (formerly employed as; license retained) here chiming in. While I appreciate the sentiment that we will never go out of business, I’d like to proffer a couple points related to this statement and the more technical one that followed (they’re integrally linked). While tectonic plates do move more than one might assume, it is actually those same surveyors who model this movement utilizing Continuously Operating Reference Stations (CORS) (and other technologies) that are strategically placed and constantly collecting positional data - the National Geodetic Survey, in my opinion, is one of the most remarkable and important scientific agencies the USA maintains. Land surveying measurements rely upon the datum’s and (soon) projections NGS publishes, which indeed does account for these movements, provided the user correctly applies the velocity movement and temporal changes to the epoch desired. However, it is less this movement that keeps surveyors employed and far more their legal expertise that does. Land Surveyors are the front line maintainers, interpreters, and, in a sense, the creators/subdividers of the cadastral system responsible for private property. So long as their are (on-the-ground) boundary disputes over land and title, a surveyor will be needed. Coordinates may one day be the controlling aspect of those boundaries, but unfortunately that is not for the land surveyors to decide (I digress…a simple comment on this forum could never account for the nuances needed in that discussion).

Also, apologies, but a correction: a multi-station DOES incorporate GNSS along with a theodolite (and Electronic Distance Measurer, which, when all three are combined is marketed as a “multi station”). I believe you meant a Total Station is more precise, which is a combination theodolite/EDM, excluding GNSS, and which does, locally, produce more precise standalone measurements though at the cost of being limited to direct line of sight. Each plays an integral part of survey field work and their application.

How does having a “digital twin” of the physical object prevent the object from being counterfeited?

This is so true.

Thank you for sharing this nice story. What an amazing uncle to find her and help her like that.