Oh! Apologies, I just saw that someone else said something relevant and decided to post my comment as a reply to them instead of a top level comment. Sorry for the confusion!

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This is so exciting. I worked in a lab where we were trying to do this, and so I was very aware what a gold rush we were in. I’m so glad to see that it’s actually happening.

This is truly a watershed moment in science. This is going to mark a major turning point in cellular medicine from theory to commonplace care. Eventually, this will end the pharma industry’s insulin cash cow.

But it’s even bigger than that. Because once we can engineer cells that produce a natural product, the next step is to engineer cells that produce synthetic medicines. Antidepressants, birth control, hormones, weight loss drugs, boner pills… The frontier is huge, lucrative, financially disruptive for pharma companies and life changing for patients. This is a big moment in history, and we all need to be fighting harder than ever to end for-profit healthcare. Otherwise we’re going to end up with subscription licenses to our own bodies.

I wonder if this girl considers herself Palestinian. It describes her as a Bedouin, but it’s really unclear to me whether Israeli Bedouins see themselves as Palestinians or not.

I think that historically, the Bedouins were a distinct cultural group from the non-Bedouin Palestinians, but it’s also really complicated to get any ethnographic information for me as an American, because Israeli media and middle east scholarship has traditionally erased Palestinian identities, instead calling Palestinian Israelis “Arab Israelis”. Do people like her family actually see themselves as apart from Palestinians? Or do they recognize themselves within this term, but keep their mouths shut because of how dangerous it is to say such a thing out loud? I do notice that in the article there is a screenshot from a tiktok of people celebrating her suspension, and the screenshot calls her “The Palestinian girl”. Is this because she is one? Or is that just them applying it as a slur? I’m very curious.

Either way, as you say, it’s wild that “Supporting Palestine” is such hostile accusation to be levied at her. It’s just crazy. I feel so terrible for her, and also angry at what Israel has become. I think it’s always been bad, but naked hostility and racism is so, so, SO much worse in this generation than it was even 30 years ago.

I don’t know why this sticks out to me, but it’s kind of nuts that as far as I can tell, the IDF and the Israeli government haven’t even given a pretense for what legal authority they’re drawing on.

The military referenced a “court order”, which appears to be based on the Israeli domestic court system, but officially Ramallah is entirely under the legal jurisdiction of the potempkin government of the Palestinian Authority. But the IDF didn’t even bother to go through this puppet government: they seem to have just shrugged and cited the ancient legal ruling of Bigger stick v. Smaller stick and robbed a news office of tens of thousands of dollars of equipment and office space at gun-point in broad daylight.

Everytime they get bolder, that’s a very bad sign.

As someone who has thought about this a lot, here’s what I try to do myself.

First, let’s reconcile some things. On one hand, you have a sense of powerlessness, and it’s not an illusion. However on the other, I think there is a real and valid sense among many that Israel’s situation has changed in fundamental ways that cannot be undone. And it seems realistic that the current order will fall in our lifetimes. So then how do you and I act to hasten that?

First (and really second, third, and fourth), we must bear witness. We must continue to read these articles and learn about this situation well enough to try and explain it to others. Save articles by Palestinians to use to lift up their voices when opportunities arise.

At this point, it helps to reflect on a certain model of persuasion I like. Our goals are not to convince someone who opposes us to join our side. It’s to move people along a ladder. You want to find people who already agree with you but are passive, and activate them to do the things you’re already doing. You want to convince people who are neutral to agree with you, passively. You want to convince people who are passively opposed to become neutral. And you want to convince people who are actively opposed to lose their conviction and become passive in their opposition.

This has been happening for a long time, and it’s begun to accelerate in the last year. Learn and share knowledge. I don’t mean facts: I mean listen to people and slip them time-bomb ideas tailored to where they are that will move them on the ladder the next time they read a headline that you’ve primed them to look at with new eyes.

Second: I think it’s very likely that major turning points will be accompanied by mass actions. Protests don’t do anything … until suddenly they do. Be a member of a group – DSA, JVP, PYM, etc. – to make sure that when people march, you’ll get the call.

That’s pretty much what I have now. That and conversations like this one.

Third, I try to make sure I’m visible in my politics. I wear a kippah, and I have a Palestinian flag pin on it. I’ve found that this lets fellow Jews who’ve felt silenced know that I’m safe to talk to about this, and quietly lets Muslim neighbors know I’m with them. I have a drawstring bag with a pro-Palestine message I often carry. If useful to you, consider signaling politely where you stand to let others know.

And lastly: keep the faith. That ladder I mentioned? Zionists are trying to do all this to you too. There are people who want to exhaust you and demoralize you. Take breaks if needed. Don’t burn out. Do what you must to stay active for the long haul.

This article doesn’t really answer most of my questions.

What subjects does the AI cover? Do they do all their learning independently? Does AI compose the entire lesson plan? What is the software platform? Who developed it? Is this just an LLM or is there more to it? How are students assessed? How long has the school been around, and what is their reputation? What is the fundamental goal of their approach?

Overall, this sounds quite dumb. Just incredibly and transparently stupid. Like, if they insisted that all learning would be done on the blockchain. I’m very open minded, but I don’t understand what the student’s experience will be. Maybe they’ll learn in the same way one could learn by browsing Wikipedia for 7 hours a day. But will they enjoy it? Will it help them find career fulfillment, or build confidence or learn social skills? It just sounds so much like that Willie Wonka experience scam but applied to an expensive private school instead of a pop-up attraction.

Even still. Most are like, ‘Woman (allegedly American) no longer alive due to visiting West Bank, claim some’.

Most headlines don’t even say who killed her.

I agree with all of that. It’s tough to talk about because I really hate to give any impression of moral equivalence. I think the leaders on both sides are equivalent in their hearts, but in actions and outcomes there’s simply no contest. Israel’s killers are much, much, much more brutally effective. At least several hundred times so in numbers. Very possibly a thousand times so.

When I speak of Hamas, it’s largely for the purpose of trying to understand their behavior.

I’m not terribly surprised, since whatever either side says is largely detached from what is really going on on the ground.

For instance, Israel has stated that it allows the vaccinations to take place, but four days ago blew up one of the aid trucks organized by a group called Anera after it had already been authorized for transit.

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/30/middleeast/israeli-strike-gaza-aid-convoy-intl-latam/index.html

Now, the IDF claims that the truck was hijacked by armed militants. Anera said that the truck was not hijacked, it was staffed with local Palestinian delivery drivers who asked to drive at the last minute, but also admitted that they were not among the people that the IDF had pre-aproved.

So we can see here that the IDF blows people up in a deconflicted setting. But I’ll say something critics of Israel often won’t: I can’t guarantee that none of those drivers were actually part of Hamas. Would it surprise me if Hamas and the IDF agreed to peacefully allow vaccinations without interference and BOTH broke that agreement? No. Israel doesn’t follow the rules of engagement, nor does Hamas. What either side says they agree to is not a reliable source of what is happening. Both say whatever they think sounds good and then their fighters do whatever the hell they like. Neither side is honest or in control of their fighters, so nothing anyone says really matters that much.

This makes me so sad. It’s clear that the only reason that they’re doing it is because unlike starvation, unconstrained polio virus can transmit to soldiers.

They’ll allow limited aid to prevent kids from dying of this one particular thing. Not of dying of all the other horrible stuff. But just of this one special cause.

Sick.

I was trying to explain what AI alignment is to my mom, and I ended up using the behavior of companies like OpenAI, and how they’re distorted by profit motive as an example of a misaligned decision making system. And I realized that late stage capitalism is basically the paperclip maximizer made real.

This is a very good article. I think AI models have more to teach us about epistemology than people want to believe right now.

I’m concerned that this would require a continuous supply of water at a flow rate that might not be realistic.

I will also add that I think in the long run, as we try to figure out how to differentiate between humans and machines, the only real reliably solution I see is to focus on elevating the individual. Having people with long histories validate their reality by living and documenting it.

I don’t upvote something that I’d be ashamed for someone to see I upvote. I might make an exception for pornographic content, but even with that, if it’s pseudononymous in that it’s not attached to my personal public life, I don’t mind if someone can trace through and see what a specific account I use for those purposes has liked and disliked.

The whole thing feels farcical. How are we struggling to get negotiators to agree to a proposal they originally suggested while they are entirely reliant on us to do the thing that we’re asking them to stop doing?

I feel like one must have a humiliation kink to do Anthony Blinken’s job.

have espoused divisive rhetoric and advanced policies to expand Israel’s hold on the territory

It’s funny how obviously you can see the authors drawing on the NYTimes style guide when trying to find an acceptable way to say that Smotrich and Ben-Gvir are violent ultranationalists who support the use of terrorism to ethnically cleanse and annex occupied territory.

“Expand Israel’s hold”? Come. On. They have said over and over that they already believe this territory is theirs by law of might and divine right, and have called over and over for a specific favored ethnic group to drive out the undesirable indigenous population by making them choose between surrendering their land or dying for it.

It’s just maddening to see them talk about genocide and apartheid the way a parent might spell out words when trying not to let their kid know that they ate the last slice of birthday cake.

Yeah. To elaborate on this, I can’t really say where Hamas is on a ceasefire, because they’ve got new leadership. But I can say that Netanyahu and his cabinet have pretty much said that they’ll only agree to a ceasefire on the condition that every member of Hamas turns themselves in the nearest IDF soldier for a summary execution. They’ve firmly rejected Biden’s ceasefire proposal, and then whipped out their dicks and peed on it.

Biden could secure Israel’s cooperation if he wanted to. They are completely dependent on us. But unless the breakthrough that Biden is thinking of is him remember that and then telling Bibi, I don’t see what else changes. Netanyahu has firmly rejected this proposal over and over and over and made no indication that he’s moved at all on this.

Also, if he did there is no real guarantee that Hamas will go along with it. They expressed willingness before… but that was under very different circumstances, under a totally different leader.

Yeah, I think if they can hold it, it makes a lot of sense.

I would add that I imagine that it’s also a pretty strong psychological strike against the morale of Russian soldiers.

Personally, I’m typically outside the mainstream on the war in Ukraine (I’m more skeptical of the unquestioning supply of aid by the US than most people), but I think that strategically, this makes plenty of sense. And as much as I really hate war or loss of life even by the aggressors, I can’t help but wish to see the kind of progress that forces Russia to end this insane, disgusting folly of an invasion as quickly as possible.

I don’t think it’s secret. A lot of OpenAI’s business strategy is to warn of the danger of their own project as a means of hyping it.

OpenAI, despite having produced a pretty novel product, doesn’t really have a sound business model. LLMs are actually expensive to run. The energy and processing is not cheap, and it’s really not clear that they produce something of value. It’s a cool party trick, but a lot of the use cases just aren’t cost effective at this point. That makes their innovation hard to commercialize. So OpenAI promotes itself like online clickbait games.

You know the ones that are like, ‘WARNING: This game is so sexy it is ADDICTIVE! Do NOT play our game if you don’t want to CUM TOO HARD!’

That’s OpenAI’s marketing strategy.

A little bit of good news. Nice.