What do you think a lightly armed infantry battalion basically can do where IDF has failed (like in 2006)? That simply is ludicrous. UN can do it's work, if sides comply. You obviously don't understand the difference between blueberets and national armed forces.If the blue berets are not going to do their mission — BitconnectCarlos
How many UN resolutions haven't been enforced?It doesn't even look like they attempted to enforce resolution 1701. — BitconnectCarlos
With a recorded vote of 124 nations in favour, 14 against, and 43 abstentions, the resolution calls for Israel to comply with international law and withdraw its military forces, immediately cease all new settlement activity, evacuate all settlers from occupied land, and dismantle parts of the separation wall it constructed inside the occupied West Bank.
The General Assembly further demanded that Israel return land and other “immovable property”, as well as all assets seized since the occupation began in 1967, and all cultural property and assets taken from Palestinians and Palestinian institutions.
The resolution also demands Israel allow all Palestinians displaced during the occupation to return to their place of origin and make reparation for the damage caused by its occupation.
Ermm... You might start doing that with Russia. :wink:It's obvious once you simply look at their actions rather than their words. — Tzeentch
Lol, Biden just showed again why the Democrats sidelined him (or the people who sponsor the party). Yet how could he remember the classic gaffe made by Hillary Clinton?Trump capitalizes on Biden calling his supporters garbage. — NOS4A2
Lol.It's obvious that the US/NATO insistence on a military rather than a diplomatic solution is a guarantee for Ukraine's eventual collapse. — Tzeentch
Just like there's a difference between data and information, I think there's also a difference between "memory" or memorizing something and the knowledge (and the understanding) of something. And this understanding defines how we act, how we view the World and things in it, which surely then passes on to the distinguishing character or personality that we have.Apart from education as a formative process in the young mind, I would like to ask the reader about how does the reader suppose that knowledge can influence one's identity? My personal belief is that knowledge is a form of "memory" encoded in the brain, more specifically the hippocampus. — Shawn
Really??? :yikes:Pulling the rug on the Ukrainians wouldn't weaken NATO. It would strengthen it. — Tzeentch
This is really crazy, really. Somehow you seem not to understand that it's an European objective to not let Russia defeat and conquer Ukraine (or take the parts it wants and put a "denazified" puppet regime in the carcass state that is left). How cannot you fathom this? NATO members simply would be worse of if Russia wins the war. The Baltic States would be worse. Finland and Sweden would be worse off. Something as totally evident like this comes somehow to be blurred in this anti-Americanism. Or Trumpism, for that matter. That Trump gave Afghanistan on a platter to the Taleban seems not to matter at all.What's weakening NATO is the fact that we're trying to drag Ukraine in even though it would lead to endless conflict with the Russians, undermining the security of everyone involved. — Tzeentch
And this is the cause of this delusional thinking. The sheer hubris to think everything evolves around the US and that everything happening in the World because of the West is the real problem here. This creates the World where the West loses. Because for you the US is the reason for all the troubles in the World. And other countries don't matter... especially if they agree on something with the US.And yea, Ukraine is hardly the first disaster Washington has created, but that's their problem. — Tzeentch
. It seems that people sometimes either forget that something cannot exist prior to its conception, or can reason with a distorted vision of time, leading them to enter a reasoning of how something was created as if it did not already exist and was not used throughout the reasoning. As if things could exist and not exist at the same time.
It's kind of like the liar paradox “this sentence is false” that implies the attribution of a truth value before the sentence is created, which creates some kind of weird time distortion where future and past events get mixed up and circle back to each other because they are contradictive.
"This sentence" refers to a future reference which is "this sentence is false". So it's attributing a truth value to itself that is not constructed yet. And the analysis after the creation contradicts the analysis based on events that did not happen yet so it's continuously changed — Skalidris
The worst thing for him is to pull out the rug from the Ukrainians and weaken NATO while getting more entangled in the Gaza genocide and with the war with Iran in the Middle East. And yes, he can do both, even if it's not the likeliest outcome.Trump would be better for Europe. The worst thing he can do is pressure European countries to pay for their own security, which we ought to be doing anyway. — Tzeentch
The truth is that the UN can perform only a limited things well. It can be between two sides, when both sides accept this. But it's laughable to think the UN could act like a superpower. Really, the Korean war fought under the UN flag happened only because China was represented by the nation now known as Taiwan and the Soviets had foolishly boycotted the Security Council and wasn't there to veto the thing.The UN sat by for years while Hezbollah constructed terror installations when it was in the UN's deliberate mission to disarm them. — BitconnectCarlos
The US politicians are just in the pocket of the Israel lobby thanks to mainly the Pro-Israeli Christians in the electorate, not just the American Jewish community. It's quite obvious that the US doesn't want the kind of "final solution" which the Netanyahu government hopes it can do somehow. These things take a lot of time to change, but I think they are changing.I think the better explanation is that Israel / US simply have no practical way to defeat Iran.
They've been in a delusional driven genocide with constant escalation to try to distract from the Genocide internationally (new enemies to continue to be the victim) and also maintain credibility domestically of being the superior race that can go around killing all their enemies. — boethius
I have to agree with you. Those missiles hitting Nevatim Air base really were hitting Nevatim air base. And the US is in no position to occupy Iran.The spell of invincibility broke between due to Iran's missile attack demonstrating Israeli air defence doesn't work so well (so Iran can cause significant damage conventionally) and also the pentagon simply having no plan to actually defeat Iran (Israel overconfidence likely includes overconfidence in US capacity as well). — boethius
Yeah, Trump will probably win. :meh:Most of us seem to agree Trump is winning as things stand, me, Mikie, the betting markets, Nate SIlver etc. — Baden
Yet the issue here is that they have to have in their program instructions how to learn, how even to rewrite the algorithms they are following. And that's the problem with the order for a computer "do something else". It has to have instructions just what to do.There are levels of 'controlled by'. I mean, in one sense, most machines still run code written by humans, similar to how our brains are effectively machines with all these physical connections between primitive and reasonably understood primitives. In another sense, machines are being programmed to learn, and what they learn and how that knowledge is applied is not in the control of the programmers, so both us and the machine do things unanticipated. How they've evolved seems to have little to do with this basic layered control mechanism. — noAxioms
A computer cannot be given such an order! Simple as that.A decent AI would not be ordered to do something else. — noAxioms
An algorithm is an mathematical object and has a mathematical definition, not a loose general definition that something happens. A computer computes. So I'm not rejecting the possible existence of conscious AI in the future, I am just pointing at this problem in computation, following arithmetic or logical operations in a sequence, hence using algorithms. I'm sure that we are going to have difficulties in knowing just what is AI and what is a human (the famous Turing Test), but that can be done by existing technology already.I don't think you understood how I explained algorithms. — Christoffer
As I said, the World can be deterministic, but that doesn't mean that we don't have free will. The limits in what is computable is real logical problem. Or otherwise you would then have to believe in Laplacian determinism, if we just had all the data and knowledge about the World. Yet Laplacian determinism's error isn't that don't have all the data, it's simply that we are part of the universe and cannot look at it from outside objectively, when our actions influence the outcome.No, we do not have free will. The properties of our universe and the non-deterministic properties of quantum mechanics do not change the operation of our consciousness. Even random pulls of quantum randomness within our brains are not enough to affect our deterministic choices. — Christoffer
This is a very interesting paper on the subject. Thank you, @Count Timothy von Icarus! :grin: :up:Barry Mazur has a really neat paper on this question, and at least parts of it are quite accessible. He ends up advocating (maybe just "showing the benefits of" is a better term) of an approach grounded in category theory. — Count Timothy von Icarus
Just like with alchemy, people could forge metals well and make tools, weapons and armour, but we aren't reading those antique or medieval scriptures from alchemy to get any actually insights today. Yes, you can have the attitude of an engineer who is totally satisfied if the contraption made simply works. It works, so who cares how it works.It's important, but not needed for creating a superintelligence. We might only need to put the initial state in place and run the operation, observing the superintelligence evolve through the system without us understanding exactly why it happens or how it happens. — Christoffer
What other way could consciousness become to exist than from emergence? I think our logical system here is one problem as we start from a definition and duality of "being conscious" and "unconscious". There's no reasoning just why something as consciousness could or should be defined in a simple on/off way. Then also materialism still has a stranglehold in the way we think about existence, hence it's very difficult for us to model consciousness. If we just think of the World as particles in movement, not easy to go from that to a scientific theory and an accurate model of consciousness.As per other arguments I've made in philosophies of consciousness, I'm leaning towards emergence theories the most. That advanced features and events are consequences of chaotic processes forming emergent complexities. Why they happen is yet fully understood, but we see these behaviors everywhere in nature and physics. — Christoffer
I think our (present) view of mathematics is the real problem: we focus on the computable. Yet not everything in mathematics is computable. This limited view is in my view best seen that we start as the basis for everything from the natural numbers, a number system. Thus immediately we have the problem with infinity (and the infinitely small). Hence we take infinity as an axiom and declare Cauchy sequences as the solution to our philosophical problems. Math is likely far more than this.I'm leaning towards the latter since the mathematical principles in physics, constants like the cosmological constant and things like the golden ratio seem to provide a certain tipping point for emergent behaviors to occur. — Christoffer
But the machines we've built haven't emerged as living organisms have, even if they are made from materials from nature. A notable difference.Everything is nature. Everything operates under physical laws. — Christoffer
A big if. That if can be still an "if" like for the alchemists with their attempts to make gold, which comes down basically to mimicking that supernova nucleosynthesis (that would be less costly than conventional mining or the mining bottom of the sea or asteroids etc).If we were able to mechanically replicate the exact operation of every physical part of our brain, mind and chemistry, did we create a machine or is it indistinguishable from the real organic thing? — Christoffer
Exactly. It cannot do anything outside the basics of operation, as you put it. That's the problem. An entity understanding and conscious of it's operating rules, can do something else. A Turing Machine (a computer, that is) following algorithms cannot do this.The algorithms need to form the basics of operation, not the direction of movement. — Christoffer
You're not using here the term "algorithm" incorrectly or at least differently than me here.A balanced person, in that physical regard, will operate within the boundaries of these "algorithms" of programming we all have. — Christoffer
We do have free will. Laplacian determinism is logically false. We are part of the universe the hence idea of Laplacian determinism is wrong even if the universe is deterministic and Einstein's model of a block universe is correct.We are still able to operate with an illusion of free will within these boundaries. — Christoffer
How would we perceive them?Could there be other factors involved in perception apart from the the object of perception, sensory organs, memories and experiences? — Corvus
Oh yes, many times scientists stumble into something new. And obviously we can use trial and error to get things to work and many times we can be still be confused just why it works. Yet this surely this isn't the standard way of approach, and especially not the way we explain to ourselves how things work. This explanation matters.But we invent things all the time that utilize properties of physics that we're not yet fully able to explain. — Christoffer
Yet understanding why something works is crucial. And many times even our understanding can be false, something which modern science humbly and smartly accepts by only talking of scientific theories, not scientific laws. We being wrong about major underlying issues doesn't naturally prevent us innovative use of something.To say that we can only create something that is on par with the limits of our knowledge and thinking is not true. — Christoffer
In a similar way we could describe us human being mechanical machines as Anthropic mechanism defines us. That too works in many cases, actually. But we can see the obvious differences with us and mechanical machines. We even separate the digital machines that process data are different from mechanical machines. But it was all too natural in the 17th Century to use that insight of the present physics to describe things from the starting point of a clockwork universe.So, in essence, it might be that we are not at all that different from how these AI models operate. — Christoffer
I agree, if I understand you correctly. That's the problem and it's basically a philosophical problem of mathematics in my view.if we're to create a truly human-like intelligence, it would need to be able to change itself on the fly and move away from pre-established algorithm-boundraries and locked training data foundations as well as getting a stream of reality-verified sensory data to ground them. — Christoffer
To reach this point, however, I believe those calculations must somehow emerge from complexity, similar to how it has emerged in our brains. — Carlo Roosen
I think the major problem is that our understanding is limited to the machines that we can create and the logic that we use when creating things like neural networks etc. However we assume our computers/programs are learning and not acting anymore as "ordinary computers", in the end it's controlled by program/algorithm. Living organisms haven't evolved in the same way as our machines.Yes, my challenge is that currently everybody sticks to one type of architecture: a neural net surrounded by human-written code, forcing that neural net to find answers in line with our worldview. Nobody has even time to look at alternatives. Or rather, it takes a free view on the matter to see that an alternative is possible. I hope to find a few open minds here on the forum.
And yes, I admit it is a leap of faith. — Carlo Roosen
Ok, I perhaps I could have better defined the axiom of choice, but in the latter you get the point.You're conflating non-equivalent theorems. — TonesInDeepFreeze
That basically was my question. And I think comes to this thread's main question, because mathematics is quite connected.This brings up an interesting question: If two things are equivalent, A<->B, does that mean they represent the same math object? — jgill
I think it's quite obvious that where UNIFIL has stations and observation posts is known to everybody and in the maps. Let's take for example just some of the attacks at UNIFIL troops by the IDF:I am curious about that. I think 5 were injured last time I checked. Perhaps a mistake? Fog of war? I don't know. I'd be horrified if Israel viewed the blue berets as valid targets alongside Hezbollah. — BitconnectCarlos
(October 10th, POLITICO) ROME — Two United Nations peacekeepers were hospitalized after an Israeli tank fired at an observation tower Thursday, according to the U.N. mission in southern Lebanon.
The U.N. peacekeeping mission UNIFIL has been operating along the “Blue Line” that separates Lebanon and Israel since the 1970s, with a mandate to restore security in the area. - The U.N. said in a statement that Israeli forces have "repeatedly hit" its positions in recent days, including two Italian bases and the mission headquarters in Naqoura, a coastal town in the southwest of Lebanon.
(Oct 16th, Al Jazeera) UN peacekeepers in southern Lebanon say Israeli forces have fired at one of their positions in the south in a “direct and apparently deliberate” attack that damaged a watchtower.
The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said on Wednesday its peacekeepers near southern Lebanon’s Kfar Kila observed an Israeli Merkava tank “firing at their watchtower”, adding that “two cameras were destroyed, and the tower was damaged”.
Let's try an example to clarify this idea:Yes, the similarities don't define the object, however. Is an "object" its' representation picked at random? Or, is there a more metaphysical meaning of the one object having representations? Is there an Object Theory? Just thinking of a way this thread might proceed. — jgill
(Times of Israel) The Prime Minister’s Office confirms that the premier’s private residence in Caesarea was targeted in a drone attack from Lebanon earlier this morning.
In a short statement, the PMO says that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara were not home at the time of the attack and that there were no injuries in the incident.
Formation of the Hezbollah was the result of the last occupation of Lebanon. That in itself shows how obvious this is.What the Israelis don't seem to understand is that it goes both ways. How many Oct 7s have happened to the people in Gaza and now Lebanon and how many civilians have been radicalized as a result? — Mr Bee
Whether UNIFIL is successful or not isn't the question here. It's attacking UN blueberets. It's just shows how absolutely reckless Netanyahu has come.UNIFIL needs to leave. — BitconnectCarlos
Ummm....have you noticed that it's colder when the sun isn't up?Where is your evidence for this? Have you just made up this claim because you want it to be true? I have done a lot of researching about this and the biggest problem is that they don't specify the time of day that the maximum temperature occurs. So you can't tell if the maximum temperature happened during the day or during the night. Can you prove otherwise? — Agree-to-Disagree
See Death Valley may have just had the hottest recorded midnight ever(New Scientist, 2023) Between 12am and 1am on 17 July, a weather station in Death Valley, California measured temperatures of 48.9°C (120°F). If confirmed it would be the hottest recorded temperature at that time
See hereIsraeli forces fired on the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon for the second time in two days on Friday, injuring four peacekeepers.
US President Joe Biden has said he is "absolutely, positively" urging Israel to stop firing at UN peacekeepers during its conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon, following two incidents in 48 hours.
Well, that article basically states what this is about: attempt to get job positions. What better way is there to accuse a field of study, mathematics, to itself be "white and patriachial", or whatever. But it works. What can the head of a mathematics department say when accused that there are too few if any women or minorities represented in the staff? Stop hiring your male buddies and follow the implemented DEI rules!How bad has it gotten when Scientific American, of all outlets, publishes Modern Mathematics Confronts Its White, Patriarchal Past. — fishfry
Good that you agree with the Fischer equation. Yet it's actually very important to understand it, because the increase in the money supply doesn't automatically mean that it's value goes down. For example when a speculative bubble bursts creating a banking crisis, the velocity of circulation tanks. Banks won't be lending anymore, but will sit on their money like Scrooge McDuck. Hence if the Central Bank prints more money or in the Nordic model, creates a "bad bank" where all the toxic garbage loans are parked, this doesn't create inflation.And yet in the quantity theory of money graphic you posted, both scarcity (money supply) and velocity determine price. I agree with the graphic. — hypericin
This is a policy decision. If you just bail out the people that where carelessly creating the bubble at the first place, then the game will just continue. If you let large banks go bust or put away to jail the most reckless bankers, that sends a totally different message.This increase in supply does not sit stagnant like you suggest. It is invested in the stock market, in real estate, and other assets. — hypericin
Well, usually inflation is measured by an average of what people consume and the price of housing ought to be taken into account. Usually it isn't and statisticians use things like hedonics to lower the inflation statistics. There is a real economic and political incentive to report inflation being far lower than it actually is.If you measure inflation by the cost of goods you need to survive, inflation might actually be 2.59. If you measure by your ability to buy a house, inflation is quite a bit higher. — hypericin
Right.That vision has existed before and after Roman rule. It a Jewish constant. Whether it's Hertzl or bar Kohkba (or others in between), the goal is 1) Remove foreign hegemons from the land and 2) Re-establish Jewish self-rule. — BitconnectCarlos
Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed the treaty Wednesday, during Putin’s visit to Pyongyang.
The treaty upgrades the countries' relationship to a “comprehensive strategic partnership.” It specifies that if either side goes to war after being invaded, “the other side shall provide military and other assistance with all means in its possession without delay,” according to a treaty text published Thursday by North Korean state media.
Is that decolonization, really? What's the Roman colony that they wanted to decolonize? Actually those colonial efforts of Rome came later when the revolts were put down. The Jewish diaspora into Europe started during those times, so Jews have been part and parcel of Europe for a really long time.Tell that the Jews who fought the Romans in the 1st and 2nd centuries in order to re-establish an independent Jewish kingdom in the land of Israel. Is that not the basic idea of Zionism? — BitconnectCarlos
I would say Netanyahu is far more capable and better politician than Milosevic.The Serbs tried to justify their violent ethno-nationalism in exactly the same way during the Balkan wars. Netanyahu is literally a Jewish Milošević. — Tzeentch
In Serbian folklore, the Kosovo Myth acquired new meanings and importance during the rise of Serbian nationalism in the 19th century as the Serbian state sought to expand, especially towards Kosovo which was still part of the Ottoman Empire. In modern discourse, the battle would come to be seen as integral to Serbian history, tradition and national identity. Vidovdan is celebrated on June 28 and is an important Serbian national and religious holiday as a memorial day for the Battle of Kosovo.
?Zionism has long been understood as a decolonization movement. — BitconnectCarlos
Was in reality the one trillion, doubling of the Fed balance sheet, flagged instantly? Nope. We actually only later found out close the system had been at a total collapse. Or that corporations that didn't have any financial problems were given money, because it otherwise "would look bad".I don't think so. Of course in reality this loan would have been flagged instantly. — hypericin
First of all, the Fed doesn't have to announce and it didn't announce just how much it aided the markets during the financial crisis. Then it loaned over 1 trillion dollars. I remember that time well, nowhere was it stated that the Fed lent 1 trillion dollars. And furthermore, the way it really did assist the banks and financial institutions was very generous:Just imagine that the Fed announced that they were stimulating the economy by printing 100 trillion dollars. — hypericin
Broadly stated, the Fed chose to provide a "blank cheque" for the banks, instead of providing liquidity and taking over. It did not shut down or clean up most troubled banks; and did not force out bank management or any bank officials responsible for taking bad risks, despite the fact that most of them had major roles in driving to disaster their institutions and the financial system as a whole. This lavishing of cash and gentle treatment was the opposite of the harsh terms the U.S. had demanded when the financial sectors of emerging market economies encountered crises in the 1990s.
Not actually...money doesn't work that way. It's not about scarcity, it's money moving in the economy and being used to buy stuff.If the belief spread that they might do this, the value of the dollar would plummet to 0, due to the belief in an imminent loss of scarcity. — hypericin
Don't forget South America, Central America and the Caribbean. The Continent of America isn't just the US.. In any case, yes North America was colonized — BitconnectCarlos
?but it also underwent large-scale decolonization. — BitconnectCarlos
You're really serious? New interpretations for Zionism. Besides, without going to Biblical times, it was the Romans and Emperor Hadrian, that started rooting out Jews from their land (for example banned Jews from Jerusalem) and settling other people to the land, so that's a bit earlier than the Muslims. Like half a millennium earlier or so.The idea of decolonizing Muslim lands (e.g. Zionism) — BitconnectCarlos
Not actually.They are willing to buy to the degree it is scarce. As I said scarcity is a necessary but insufficient condition for value. — hypericin