I sure hope they don't. Even just the hint of connecting this achievement to the supposed Christian nature of the US would reinforce a lot of the bad things in the world right now. Namely, that we're actively at war in the middle east (Christianity and Judaism vs Islam), in a burgeoning cold war with China (more Christianity vs "godless" communists), and run by an increasingly fascistic administration (the ties between religion and government are a hallmark of fascism).
I am not a Christian, but it was arguably the Christian value system which forged the government and institutions that made these achievements possible. Such progress happens only in high trust societies.
> but it was arguably the Christian value system which forged the government and institutions that made these achievements possible.
Many of the founders were specifically anti-Christian. They were deists, and believed in a higher power, but specifically rejected the idea of a divine intervention of God or Jesus.
Christians do not own the idea of being nice to others and trusting others.
Of the 45 delegates to the continental congress, only two (Benjamin Franklin and another) were known to be deists. One's membership records couldn't be found. The other 42 were active members and on the books in their churches.[0]
Jefferson also was a deist, but he wasn't present at the constitutional convention of 1787 (though he earlier authored the Declaration of Independence).
[0] M. E. Bradford. Founding Fathers: Brief Lives of the Framers of the United States Constitution, second edition. University Press of Kansas, 1994.
I stated that the United States is based on Christian values. Not that the United States is a Christian state.
Do you value separation of state and religious authority? Women's rights? Minority rights? Human dignity? Equality before the law? Sanctity of life? Individual moral responsibility? Monogamous marriage? The objective study of history? Fair trial? Witnesses at trial? Tolerance of alternative viewpoints?
Those are all Christian values. For what it's worth, I'm not Christian.
> I stated that the United States is based on Christian values. Not that the United States is a Christian state.
And I said:
> Christians do not own the idea of being nice to others and trusting others.
But let's look at your list:
> Do you value separation of state and religious authority? Women's rights? Minority rights? Human dignity? Equality before the law? Sanctity of life? Individual moral responsibility? Monogamous marriage? The objective study of history? Fair trial? Witnesses at trial? Tolerance of alternative viewpoints?
First of all, these are all Jewish values that Christian's adopted. And secondly, none of these are exclusive to Christianity. In fact they appear in many religions worldwide, as well as secular societies.
These are all just common decency, which is why they appear in most religions, and non-religions.
> These are all just common decency, which is why they appear in most religions, and non-religions.
You and I both wish these decencies were common. Some cultures have some variations on some of these decencies, but they are not common. Assuming that they are common is projecting your culture onto others.
This is why I mentioned the importance of high trust society.
Christian values are always whatever individual Christians say they are.
There's really no such animal in practice. Over time Christian values have included charity for the poor, rapacious capitalism, slavery, the abolition of slavery, anti-science, science, war, peace, and the rest.
> stated that the United States is based on Christian values. Not that the United States is a Christian state
I believe most of the founders expressed disdain at the notion that the United States was built on Christian values. They were privately Christian. But publicly American. They were trying to break the cycle of history that building countries on religious values brings.
Saying we were built on Christian values is arguing for a continuing role for Christian values. Which, in turn, leads to a Christian state. And then we’re back to popes and mullahs in charge, and the SecDef and Speaker of the House giving sermons.
Actually a lot of the enlightenment ideas (which our government is based on) came from native American critiques of European societies. Read The Dawn of Everything for the details.
I was addressing values, not religion, but I seem to have touched a nerve. I'm not Christian, but I recognize that Christian values lead to high-trust society, leads to innovation in industry and science.
> I suggest you look up the founding fathers' views on religion
Alright:
"Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports."
- George Washington
"It is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favors."
- George Washington
"Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
- John Adams
"The Bible contains the most profound philosophy, the most perfect morality, and the most refined policy that ever was conceived upon Earth."
- John Adams
"I hold the precepts of Jesus, as delivered by himself, to be the most pure, benevolent, and sublime which have ever been preached to man."
- Thomas Jefferson
"Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, and that His justice cannot sleep forever."
Can you explain what "Chinese fascism" is? Not citizen of any super-power, but how can you be sure you're not fallen under some propaganda where you see "them" as being evil and not just some other-way-of-living?
China may be authoritarian (I would agree that they are), but they're not fascist. They're also a much smaller threat to anyone living in the US. I'm more worried about the jackbooted thugs on my own streets than the ones halfway around the world.
Nobody wants to be the guy who got the nation caught with its pants down if conscription needs to come back in a hurry. The same reason the military budget always ratchets upwards.
Measured as a percentage of GDP (which I'd say is the most sensible way to measure it) the US's current military budget is lower than at any point since WWII aside from a few years between the end of the Cold War and 9/11.
Then you might like Obsidian. When the cursor is in some bit of formatted text, it displays all of the characters. When the cursor is elsewhere, it just shows the formatted text.
In the worst case, the barrier to entry and exit are pretty low.
First you can switch from WYSIWYG to text editor instantly.
Then you have an outline where you can manipulate your “markdown blocks” [i.e title and its content] by drag n drop. Or extract a “markdown block” as a new note, and leave a reference where it originally was extracted from.
And then [the killing feature], it displays the content of a link, web link or internal link, as a [kind of] iframe, if you prepend a ! to the link.
On this subject, they won't, because they mostly want this war too. Most members of both parties have taken AIPAC money. Most of them are also glad somebody is finally attacking Iran, especially without them having to sign their name on a use of force authorization or declaration of war.
Your comment history suggests you're in the US, so you should be pleased to learn that you weren't included. The visible landmass is northern Africa, with a smidge of the Iberian Peninsula visible.
Oh, good point. I missed South America under the cloud cover. I guess the Eastern edge of the US would indeed be visible as a highly distorted smudge on the edge of the visible surface.
Thank you. I have having trouble making sense of the orientation. My first thought was misshapen Australia, but where Spain nears Africa is much different than Australia and Tasmania. Also, they forgot New Zealand... while common for maps, I would expect it to show up in a photo.
Not even close. Territorial disputes are incredibly common in nature. Humans are relatively rare in that we're capable of understanding that depriving competitors of resources will eventually lead to their deaths, but that is the ultimate result of winning a territory dispute in nature too.
Ecologist and botanist here. While intraspecific territorial behaviour is a common thing, murder and organised murder is rare. Using biological patterns to explain behaviour in society is called biologism and extremely dangerous because it implies there are natural laws in existence for the behaviour of societies.
The laws our societies rely on are constructions based on ideas, not on universal laws which are true everywhere in the universe (even without humans). And there is the main difference to animal territorial behaviour: not an ideology is the driving force behind the territorial behaviour e.g. of a goose but genetics based instinct. Developed over hundreds of thousands of years to be optimally fitted to their niche in an ecosystem (That is what is meant with "suvival of the fittest": To fit in a role within a very complex system of collaboration and dependencies).
While instinctive behaviour can be observed in humans too - like the urge to protect small children and cute animals from harm - all of us grow into a culture with its own constructed logic (and paradoxes).
To return to the topic of the article: If drafting is a thing or not is a question of the culture you are living in. As long as a society is administering itself by voting for those who decide about the set of rules (laws) for everyone, it is the responsibility of everyone to discuss the rules, ask for adjustments and vote accordingly.
As I am a late child my parents were both born in NAZI-Germany. My mum in Düsseldorf (Germany) and my father in Innsbruck (Austria). Their fathers and brothers were drafted to fight the Allies. No matter what their actual believes were. My grandfather was the only child of many to survive the first world war. He was orphined as a toddler.
You can imagine that "calling to arms" has no positive reputation in my family.
And still I see a point in drafting, if it is about defence.
But (and that is a huge BUT): Going to war means to violate existing international laws (remember: human made). Therefore it can't be won (it is not a game, there is no judge or score that defines the rules for winning and loosing). It can only be ended by decision! That's why it is called peace treaty and not win-certificate.
As both - peace and war - are not natural laws but human constructs, it is the responsibility of those who (co)decide about the culture they are living in.
Most people on earth will agree that breaking peace is a bad thing and the ability to keep peace is a sign of strength. To change the mood of a population to pro-war a lot of time and money has to be invested in lies and propaganda.
If our government is weak and struggles to keep peace we can vote for a better one. If your society doesn't allow votes, there is the right to revolt to (re)establish a government that serves everyone (not rules everyone). (It's not a human right per se, but e.g. Germany has the right to revolt in its Grundgesetz/constitution due to what its people learned from the past).
As the executive power (police) needs to be counterbalanced, I am strongly pro professional armies and vice versa. Police must be strong enough to protect the government from the army, just in case of an attempt to establish a dictatorship via armed forces. (Power makes corrupt, societies have to be resilient against corruption).
But what I find lacking in all those discussions about drafting, (re)arming and warfare, is an honest discussion about peace keeping.
Peace keeping needs all of us. It is the true sign of a powerful society. It needs the ability to listen to everyone, no matter how far left or right, to identify the actual needs and find solutions that don't involve the abuse of power.
It is easier as it sounds. Most societies are (still) peaceful even when facing many (resource based) challenges.
Humans don't like to kill other humans, if they know them. If our societies would agree to include spending for peace keeping into the budget for wars (let's say half of it), I am sure (opinion!) most conflicts wouldn't result in open war.
Just imagine what would happen, if the EU would invite the whole russian youth for a summer holiday at host families within all EU countries? Would they return and confirm that "we" are all evil fascists" as the propaganda states? I doupt it.
Naive, you say?
Take an example from history: After WWII the French and the German decided to end the centuries long Erbfeindschaft (inheritance of being enemies). One of their measures was to establish pupil and student exchange programs. Also cultural "clubs" like brass music groups established exchange programs. It didn't matter that they were not able to speak each others language. Food, drink, music, socialising, playing games and sports together - there are many ways to interact even without a common spoken language. With todays technology even (simple) conversations are possible between "strangers" (or "aliens" as the current wording tends to frame it).
Just look at this platform: many people from many countries interact respectfully. Why? Because it is each persons decision to keep peace.
So much from me. Sorry if my contribution happend to be a bit long.
May peace be with you.
Is the listed salary monthly? For a contract term? Missing a digit? The high end listed ($48k) works out to about $25/hr, which isn't much higher than minimum wage in SF ($18.45) which is your listed location.
The first AI company to cram their product full of ads will get roasted over the coals for it. My guess is they're all playing chicken and waiting to be the second to do it. I'd also guess that they're all already thinking about ways to introduce it that will generate the least backlash.
Google could do it in 2000 because their search was legitimately so much better, and also because their ads were comparatively more relevant and unobtrusive than modern ads. In comparison, LLMs are relatively similar in performance unless you're picky enough that you're probably already paying and thus wouldn't be in the ad-supported tier.
That said, I wonder if ads are even lucrative enough to move the needle relative to how much training costs are increasing with each generation.
Yep. Finally someone who knows how to think straight.
Google built up immense surplus and ate into it slowly.
OAI can't suddenly start cramming Ads as it fights to survive. Im sure they are employing questionable tactics to keep users hooked. Won't really work on a large enough user base to make the economics viable given the competition they face.
I agree that that's what it would take, but compute would need to get very cheap for it to be feasible to keep models running locally. That's an awful lot of memory to have just sitting with the model running in it.
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