I’ve never heard of these boxers, but this was pretty funny
In this corner: Tyson “The Gypsy King” Fury, a bald 6’9” behemoth who resembles the Amazing Colossal Man of 1957 sci-fi B-movie infamy. Fury was born 35 years ago to Irish Traveller parents […]
I doubt that either Fury or Usyk understand the term “white” as Americans do. The main ethnic identity I’ve seen Fury claim is that of an Irish Gypsy whose people have been oppressed by the British for centuries. Fury even once let these words slip from his lips before one of his fights with Deontay Wilder when asked if there was a racial element to their matchup:
We’re all hauman beings. It doesn’t matter if you’re black, white, pink or green. We share the same blood. We are humans.
(mispelling in original)
Shocking that a pro boxer named Fury is a better human being than some self-proclaimed racist blogger.
The hypothetical here is interesting in that it shows this commenter basically being a money maximiser. Say you’re the inventor of this cure - you’re the only one who understands it, basically it’s magic. You have 2 choices:
squeeze every patient and healthcare system for as much as they can bear. After all, this is a cure for cancer, there’s an upper limit to how much people and governments are prepared to spend, just put the price $1 below that. Profit!
or you can
offer the invention for free, still live a good life as a consultant or employee of a drug company, or just spend your time handling speaking engagements at $200,000 a pop, and get remembered throughout history as one of the saviors of humankind.
That piece has been referenced here before, but thanks for diving into the comments. The one about Marx is pretty funny, I’m sure the commenter has only read the Cliff Nots of both Marx and “current leftists”.
That said, I’m mildly curious as to what influence if any the Collinses have on “real”, religious fascist pro-natalists, but not enough to go spelunking in the sewers to find out.
Yeah I’m kinda familiar with the realities of drug development and testing, which is why I prefaced my comments with the solution being essentially magic. If we find hte magic bullet for cancer I expect it will be a slow grind and a lot of trial and error, so the wealth will be diluted across many entities. Not to mention the current business of cancer care might try hard to stop it…
I think a big part of Marx’ appeal back in the day was that he was fully slotted into the rationalist milieu of the time. Identifying an impersonal, inevitable “march of progress” that wasn’t religious was a powerful idea for some people.
(btw the Communist Manifesto is 150 years old and could have been written yesterday, at least the first part)
By all accounts, postwar Soviet union was a pretty sexist and racist place. It’s no wonder the “old guard” communists look at today’s blue-haired leftists and sound just like crusty old fascists.
It’s ironic that there is a “good old days” of (state) Communism, seeing that it was supposed to be the end of history.
(side note, back in HS I saw a graph illustrating the Marxist theory that successive revolutions lifted human civilization up a series of stairs (pastoralism -> city states -> feudalism -> centralized kingdoms -> bourgeois capitalism) up until Communism where these steps became an ascending straight line… and I though “hey, why does the line straighten out just there???”)
Banks neatly sidesteps the “AI will inevitably kill us” scenario by making the Minds keep humans around for amusement/freshness. Part of the reasons for the Culture-Idiran war in Consider Phlebas and Look to Windward was that the Idirans did not want Minds in charge of their society.
OK I misremembered that part. It makes sense that after suffering trillions of losses the Culture would take steps to prevent the Idirans from doing it again.
And by “us” I meant fleshy meatbags, as opposed to Minds. Although in Excession he does raise the issue that there might be “psychotic” Minds. Gray Area’s heart(?) is in the right place but it’s easy to imagine them becoming a vigilante and pre-emptively nuking an especially annoying civilization.
Stubsack: weekly thread for sneers not worth an entire post, week ending Sunday 2 June 2024
Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid!...
In an attempt to secure the libertarian vote, Trump promises to pardon Dread Pirate Roberts (while calling for the death penalty for other drug dealers) (www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com)
we're not Nazis btw (awful.systems)
America’s premier pronatalists on having ‘tons of kids’ to save the world: ‘There are going to be countries of old people starving to death’ (www.theguardian.com)
The highlight for me is coming up with some weird pseudoscience justification for why it’s okay to hit your kids.
Maybe the real unaligned super intelligence were the corporations we made along the way 🥺 (awful.systems)