Trump - clownish, deceitful, narcissistic

Patricia Wall/The New York Times

"A new biography portrays Adolf Hitler as a clownish, deceitful narcissist who took control of a powerful nation thanks to slick propaganda and a dysfunctional elite that failed to block his rise." Patricia Wall, NYT A clownish, deceitful narcissist. Anyone else come to mind?

4 Years for Murder

The policewoman in Tulsa who killed an unarmed civilian in a traffic stop should be charged with murder. Her fellow officers who did not render aid to her victim for over two minutes - fired. How can you just sit there and watch someone bleed to death? What would be wrong with you?

The police officer who murdered this unarmed civilian for not obeying her should spend more than 4  years in prison - the punishment for manslaughter of which she has been charged. 4 years for a human life. Without video she wouldn't have spent a day. Making progress I guess. Tell that to the family of the man she murdered.

'Success' is for Losers

Click on image for enlightenment

This sort of morning talk show advice makes my skin crawl. Just do this, or buy this, or think this way and you too can be 'happy' and 'successful'.

Dribble

We are not static even moment to moment. We are 'strong' in one circumstance, 'weak' in the next. 'Strong' and 'weak' all at once. And we are not in control as much as we want to believe. Hell we're barely conscious.

Ah but this is just to represent what to strive to be like. Bullshit. It's a list to 'success' and its utter rubbish. There is no secret path. There is no 'success'. There is birth, life, death, and this moment.

Get over it.

Of Intelligent Life in the Universe

Our fate as a species is to direct our own evolution beyond human through the development of an 'artificial' intelligence billions of times greater than our own. This will occur within the next 100 years. From first computer to super intelligence in less than 200 years. 

This the fate of all intelligent species capable of computer technology no matter where they reside in this universe - it's that or annihilation.

But a billion fold greater intelligence can create its own universe(s).

And Fermi asks 'Where is everybody'?

Cops Killing Cops

Killing weaponless civilians by police is not acceptable, for any reason, ever. (A car can be a weapon, a fist generally not. A question of a weapon? - case by case favoring giving the police the benefit of the doubt). But when police kill unarmed citizens, and there is no weapon, it is murder. Murder. And it's not ok.

More often than not it's fear and adrenaline that fuels these murders, along with rage at being ignored or having their authority challenged.  Maybe if they were in better shape, more highly trained in self defense techniques, better schooled as to the limits of their authority and 'power', and better screened to eliminate sociopaths, we would see less of these police murders.

Sad thing - this has been going on a very long time indeed. There are not more police murders these days, despite perceptions, there are just more of these murders being captured on video thanks to the smart phone. Smart phone - dumb cop.

There is a fine tradition of police authority abusing its 'power' in this country - a fine tradition of murder and coverup. It's just become harder to coverup. And it's about time.

Are all police like this? Of course not. This has always been a minority of sadistic, authoritarian, cowards all along. But today, thanks to the smart phone, the good cops, the majority of cops, and society have a real opportunity to to rid themselves once and for all of these weak, abusive, murdering, few.

I encourage all police to embrace this idea. Don't rush to defend your ranks in blind faith. Don't 'help' your fellow officers by covering up what you as a good cop believe to be a mistake - people just trying to do their jobs and making a mistake in the heat of the moment. Murder is never ok - it just isn't. You wouldn't do it - why excuse them?

Society realizes you have what is at times an almost impossible job to do. But it doesn't have to be us against civilians any more. With the camera you can clean up your ranks while gathering empathy and respect for what you do. With transparency you can go a long way to building trust. If you are trusted, respected, and empathized with - you are safer, and better equipped to do your job. 

100% Deplorable

Donald Trump is a liar, a cheater, and a scammer. He manipulates using hate and fear for personal gain. He is racist, xenophobic, misogynistic, polarizing, and extremely dangerous. 
He is cruel. He is selfish. He is narcissistic. He is above all else ignorant to almost all things not Trump. 

Hilliary Clinton had two things wrong when she called half of his supporters the deplorables. 
1. All human beings are complex creatures with both good and bad traits. THEY are not deplorable. What they DO is deplorable. 
2. What ALL of Trump supporters do in supporting him is deplorable. ALL of Trump's supporters - 100% - behave deplorably -  not half - by supporting this hating, ignorant, lunatic. THEY are not deplorable. What they DO is deplorable.

There simply has to be standards of decency, behavior, competency. Donald Trump does not make the grade for any. Hitler had otherwise decent people support him as well. They too were deplorable in doing so - 100%. 

Collin Powell Lied and People Died

Colin Powell lost all credibility in the days leading up to the Iraq war. He lied, through his teeth, to the UN, to the world, about Iraq's WMD. I'd love to know the backstory, it seems he was pressured, but it doesnt change the fact he lied, and his lies helped mislead us into war.
He is not an honarable man and Im personally done with him. What he did simply unforgiveable.

An Election and Billions of Dollars

The difference in revenue to media outlets between a tight, confrontational presidential race and a slam dunk is billions of dollars.

Billions of dollars can explain almosy any behavior.

Is this rigged?

Is Trump a Sham and a Coward?

Why wont Donald Trump go on the Charlie Rose show?
He has an open invitation, having been asked repeatedly.
Is it because he's a sham and a coward? 

The Media is Complicit in the Trump Sham

In the days leading up to the Iraq war the media failed us, miserably.
They fail us again this election.
Donald Trump organized a scam university, designed to steal money from college students.
Donald Trump has known ties to organized crime.
Donald Trump as a businessman is a sham, with multiple bankruptcies.
Donald Trump refuses to release his tax returns.
Donald Trump refuses to release his medical records.
Donald Trump defaults on contracts as a way of doing business.
Donald Trump lies - almost everytime he opens his mouth.
Donald Trump exhibits misogynistic, xenophobic, racist, behavior.
Donald Trump lacks almost any detail in all of his policy statements.

And the media for the most part does not call him to task.
Where are the interviews with the students, contractors, and individuals who have lost everything due to his scams and business practices.
Where are the stories of his donations and deals designed to avoid investigation or consequence?
Where are the stories of his ties to Russia, or his past tax returns.
Where are the stories centered on his 3200 civil lawsuits?
When is he called to task for his lies in his interviews?

Any one of these issues would have destroyed any other candidate as the media relentlessly pursued it. Donald? Given a pass. Two sets of standards. One for Donald, the other for the rest of the rational world.

Real Ethics for Artificial Intelligence?

Recently the corporate movers and shakers of the artificial intelligence (AI) world met in San Francisco to attempt to lay the groundwork for self-policing and to try to establish ethical guidelines regarding future development. Their stated purpose was to 'ensure that A.I. research is focused on benefiting people, not hurting them'. (Tell that to the defense industry).

The growth and development of AI coming from and like the computer, by almost any measure, has followed an exponential curve. Growth at first has appeared linear and relatively slow but advances have begun to accelerate as the curve becomes ever steeper over shorter and shorter periods of time. In fact growth will soon become explosive in nature and we as individuals and as a species will find it harder and harder to just keep up, let alone control to ensure benefit.

One consequence of exponential growth is the concept of the singularity. The point on an exponential curve where as one approaches some x (time), y (growth) goes to infinity. As the graph curves ever more upwards, over shorter and shorter periods of time, it eventually goes nearly vertical, massive change occurring in a blink of the eye. The singularity as regards AI growth has been touted, if it were to occur, to be the single most dramatic moment in all of human history. With it will come a tear in the very the fabric of humankind, the end of our species as we know it, with the sudden appearance of sentient AI, millions if not billions of times more intelligent than us, free of our control. According to Dr. Peter Stone, a computer scientist at the University of Texas at Austin, "It was a conscious decision not to give credence to this (at this meeting).."

So, you can't really blame the participants at the San Francisco meeting for ignoring this I suppose. The assumption being we will either retain control and direct, even retard growth so as to avoid this or a more popular belief that a mathematical singularity - as x approaches some value, y goes to infinity - is simply not transferable to the real world. Resource management and time limits on physical construction alone would hinder this process, let alone human reaction time.

But in reading their report and listening carefully to the people involved it becomes clear most if not all of the people at the San Francisco meeting choose to ignore the exponential nature of AI growth both in thought and in their discussions. They no doubt understand the concept of exponential growth but apply a linear bias to their thinking. It's human nature - time is linear to us, therefore events occur in a linear fashion. How can you even plan for exponential growth? But ignoring it by itself guarantees we will lose control of this whole issue long before any singularity - we simply won’t be able to keep up with exponential growth. We needn't even invoke arguments of the consequences of our insatiable curiosity, greed, lust for power, or our endless capacity to do harm. Nor do we need to evoke a singularity - it will all snowball out of our control long before then. We simply do not now appreciate the enormity of the problem or the speed at which it will overcome us, thus guaranteeing the outcome.

This will not be controllable. Human nature, exponential timescale, and our linear bias guarantee it. An intelligence millions if not billions of times our current capabilities will appear on this planet in the next 100 years barring catastrophic events. And we will not be ready.

It seems then that the most we can hope for or at least try for, is that in coming from us this intelligence will be imbued with at least some of our better qualities that can be used to overcome some of our worst. We cannot possibly control or even predict what a billion fold more intelligent presence will look like except to say it is unlikely to serve us and may in fact hardly bring us into focus. It's going to have better things to do.

But perhaps there is another avenue. What if this super intelligent AI that needs controlling was never really separate from us? Perhaps our efforts should not be on controlling the evolution of AI separate from us, while trying to imbue it with our sense of the ethical, as much as imagining and directing our own evolution as a species, evolving past the biologic, beyond homo sapiens sapiens, in symbiosis with it. We should be planning the evolution of our species beyond human, now, and realize, now, we are to become this intelligence if we are to survive. It simply cannot be us against it. It has to be a whole new us.

What will that look like? I can not say. But the need to do this is coming, and sooner than you may think.

Chris Christie - Sweaty Desperation

Sweaty desperation.
Slick and slithery - quite a feat considering his habitus.
Most amazingly, he thinks he's clever.
Smirky little transparent twerp.
Crooked, angry, and a bully, and really in the end just a bore.
Counting the days governor until you crawl back from whatever slimy rock you came out from under - days most definitely numbered now.

Clean Kill

Many cardiovascular surgeons are dedicated reasonably balanced humans. Some, are not. For those that are not it seems that if one is willing to do a prolonged residency in order to learn how to operate on a muscle slightly bigger than your fist, that it somehow separates them from mere mortal to better than - precisely the reason, at least to a great extent, they became CT surgeons in the first place. Driven by severe psychopathology, fueled by deep insecurity, all expressed as over-achievement and entitlement, they possess a seething rage rooted in self-loathing. These are the ones that give their profession a very bad name, indeed. Add in short stature and a fragile male ego and you've got a real nincompoop on your hands. Abusive to all - colleagues, nurses, students, wife, girlfriends. Here is a tale of one such surgeon.

                                  The Miniature CT Surgeon and the Mitral Valve

One day, a wee little surgeon, while standing on a riser, watched as a heart fell apart that he had just tried to put a new mitral valve in. Now rupture of the left ventricle along the atrio-ventricular groove during mitral valve surgery does not a good day make as it carries at least a 75% mortality. It results almost always as a result of poor surgical 'technique' and/or by a stretch injury due to the untethering of the left ventricle through removal of the posterior leaflet of the mitral valve. Oops.

The little guy new immediately what he had done. He acted quickly to try to stitch together what was a very friable heart not to save the patient but to save face - sort of like putting duct tape over the hole in the dike one had just created and then walking away trying to whistle innocently. He got his patient to the ICU and then quickly left.

Dedicated nurses and the ICU doctors struggled for three hours with massive blood loss as the heart came apart along his suture line, as he knew it would, working with all they had to save him. Just as the patient died the little surgeon popped his head back into the room and said to the nurses - " clean kill" - blaming them. Two of the nurses cried. Two more had visions of a gruesome homicide – for quite some time after. But be clear everyone in that room was deeply traumatized by this event and by the mean little surgeon for something he and he alone had done.

What became of it all? After all a person had died and nurses were publicly blamed. Well, nothing. Quality review failed with their job, again. Nursing administration failed to defend innocent, dedicated, hard working nurses, again. The department chair of surgery failed to admit to the pathology in his midst, again. The chief of the ICU too frightened by surgeons to care. And life just went on – for everyone - but the patient. After all miniature CT surgeons make lots of money for the hospital.

And the wee little surgeon? Well he went about his business hating himself just that much more, now even more likely to inflict harm on others – physically or emotionally – as he blundered on. Some say he got even shorter that day, his own heart colder, his sense of personal failure, while denied except late at night or in his urge to exercise incessantly, grew and solidified – etched permanently in his face. There is a special place for people like this. It is of their own making – and it is hell on earth. He suffers more than he will ever cause those around him to suffer. Warms my heart. A heart he will never operate on.