Scattershots – 2sep23

George Rebane

‘How the AI Revolution Will Reshape the World’ is an essay in the 1sep23 issue of Time that presents an excellent summary of how the advent of generative AI is launching “the greatest redistribution of power in history.”  Not only is this new wave of technology based on large language models sufficient to found the greatest revolution in human civilization all by its lonesome, its redistribution of power will be abetted by accompanying technological breakthroughs in synthetic biology, quantum computing, and “abundant new sources of energy.”  Having understood all this, it is remarkable that today “this is the most underappreciated aspect of the technological revolution now underway.”  What’s more, previous technological leaps were reserved to the capital rich elite or national governments.  That’s no longer the case.  “We are facing a step change in what’s possible for individual people to do, and at a previously unthinkable pace. AI is becoming more powerful and radically cheaper by the month—what was computationally impossible, or would cost tens of millions of dollars a few years ago, is now widespread.”  For the sanguine among us, snooze on at your own peril.  (H/T to reader)

Blinders on black governance.  It’s with some trepidation that I offer this observation motivated by the recent slum apartment building fire in Johannesburg that killed over seventy poor immigrants to the Union of South Africa. (more here)  Over the last generation (i.e. post-apartheid) that nation’s largest city has turned from a crown jewel of Africa into the country’s, perhaps the continent’s, largest favela.  And here is the observation to which no one dare give voice – are there any black-governed countries in Africa, or anywhere for that matter, that compare favorably with first-world nations like those in Europe, North America, and Asia?  To carry this observation even deeper, the same may be asked of black-run cities in the United States.  Instead, these questions remain unasked and unexamined.  From an academic or demographic perspective such enquiries remain on terra incognita, and their causal factors define one of our culture’s growing number of forbidden territories.  Anyone daring to even explore whether there is any truth to the basis which such questions imply is immediately tagged as a racist or worse.  As evidence, I offer the comment stream below.

Comments

[The Estonian Fox]

Botswana has been a republic since its independence from Britain in the 1960s. One of the better-run countries on the continent. HIV is high though, but country is more crime-free than its neighbor RSA.

Islam is about 2-3% of the current populace, so it may be another 30 years before religious rights start to be restricted by a then-Muslim majority.

[D. Pecker, Enquirer]

One issue is the probability (since I don't know the countries) that previous generations were woefully undereducated in anything related to having power and running governments, or any other western theories. There was no educational base to build on, no role models to learn from. Previous generations were not much more than slaves.

Graft and corruption is rampant in many countries of the world so I would not be surprised to find that much of the "new" wealth is in private offshore accounts and the common folks are left with substandard "everything".

[Paul Emery]

George asks in his post: "are there any black-governed countries in Africa, or anywhere for that matter, that compare favorably with first-world nations like those in Europe, North America, and Asia?" Of course we had that experience with Obama as our President fr 8 years. He pulled us out of the economic mess left by Bush and was an intelligent and resourceful President during his term and was a man of intelligence and integrity.

[Don Bessee]

So why did the ponytail of ignorance feel the need to say it twice, frudian slip or quiet racism? The world wonders? -

and was an intelligent and resourceful President during his term and was a man of intelligence and integrity.

;-)

[Paul Emery]

Who cares Bessee. I was just applauding Obama as a man of intelligence and integrity during his 8 years as President. Sorry you can't handle that without diverting to some silly grammar lesson.

[Scott O]

Paul - "I was just applauding Obama as a man of intelligence and integrity during his 8 years as President."

Yes indeed - this, from a man who constantly reminds us Obama turned out to be so odious to Paul, he wouldn't vote for the man for a second term.

Obama is a phony baloney. If he had to sit in a room by himself and write something, he wouldn't do better than doggerel. Impromptu speaking was never his style. He would stutter and stammer - totally clueless.
He was a two bit ward healer elevated to position through old school power politics Chicago style.
He is nothing more than the dog shit I would scrape off my shoes. Literally slammed most all conservative Americans by saying - disdainfully - "they cling to their guns and their bibles". Damn right fool - that's what made a nation and a place far elevated above the rest of the world.
Notice that once the Obama family had achieved F-you money they quickly bedded down among the wealthiest of whites they could find. Following Scott Adam's counsel - "stay the hell away from black people".
Right by the ocean Obama claimed would rise and ruin ocean-front property.
There are no end of good conservative African Americans to lead our country, but the left wants nothing but step-n-fetchits that cow tow to the blob.
As Biden himself said - "you vote for me or you aren't black".
I can not imagine a self-respecting intelligent black for a minute putting up with crap like that.
And - to the left's amazement - they don't.

[Scott O]

Mr Pecker 4:45 - "There was no educational base to build on, no role models to learn from. Previous generations were not much more than slaves."

Hilarious!

And yet the white boys managed just fine under the same exact circumstances.

Where does the word "slave" come from?
Not from Africa, fool. From the Slavic people who were thought to make the best slaves.
Intelligent, but poorly defended so they could be snatched away and made to be subservient.
White lefties have absolutely no idea of history and are totally clueless as to reality.

[D. Pecker, Enquirer]

Scott O is clueless

[Individual Juan]

Corruption and Trumpian style governance did it,

In 2021 "South Africa witnessed the worst violence since the end of the apartheid era. More than three hundred and thirty died over a week of escalating tensions. Forty thousand businesses—including stores, banks, factories, and post offices—were vandalized or burned; damage to the economy was estimated in the billions of dollars. The government eventually had to deploy twenty-five thousand troops to contain the violence in the provinces around Durban, the largest port in sub-Saharan Africa, and then Johannesburg, the financial hub, and Pretoria, the administrative capital. On July 16th, President Cyril Ramaphosa accused instigators of fomenting instability to “weaken, or even dislodge,” the democratic state. “Using the pretext of a political grievance, those behind these acts have sought to provoke a popular insurrection,” he said, after touring the damage in Durban.

The spark was the imprisonment of former President Jacob Zuma, a close Mandela ally during the long slog against apartheid. South Africans often compare Zuma, a charismatic populist who maliciously exploited the country’s political, racial, and ethnic divisions, to Donald Trump. Zuma had a long-standing reputation for political thuggery and corruption. In 2005, he was dismissed as Deputy President in connection with a bribery scandal. He was separately charged the same year with raping the H.I.V.-positive daughter of a family friend. On the stand, he claimed that he had minimized his risk of infection—at a time when South Africa had five million H.I.V. cases—because he had taken a shower afterward. aids activists were horrified. Zuma was acquitted in 2006 and, three years later, was sworn in as President.

After nine years in office, Zuma was forced to resign, in 2018, amid new corruption allegations. An estimated thirty-four billion dollars went “missing” during his tenure, Ramaphosa, his successor, claimed. Under Zuma, “government came to resemble an organised-crime gang,” The Economist noted last week. A commission investigating the allegations summoned Zuma, but he refused to testify and was sentenced to fifteen months for contempt of court. The violence erupted after he reported to prison, on July 7th, and his supporters in the province of KwaZulu-Natal—using social media to mobilize mobs—went on a rampage. “The unrest was orchestrated, instigated, and planned,” Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, a cabinet minister, said. “It almost brought our country to its knees.”The contempt charge is not the last of Zuma’s legal problems—nor the last potential trigger for unrest. The former President is due to appear in court next month to face more than a dozen charges of corruption, fraud, racketeering, and money laundering from an arms deal when he was Deputy President. The separate investigation into his Presidency—the one for which he refused to testify—could produce others.

Zuma is only a symbol of South Africa’s myriad challenges. The country was long viewed as an exception to the poor governance and graft that plagued other parts of the continent—much like the United States long claimed to be an exceptional state, even in the West. Both were illusions. Over the past month, South Africa proved that it is not superior to other African countries, just as Americans have learned, amid our own turbulence, divisions, and failures, that we aren’t politically special, either. Three decades after Mandela was freed, the racial, class, education, and economic divisions spawned by apartheid still define the country. “The Mandela formula—if we can call it that—failed to deal with a series of issues linked to the country’s political economy,” Peter Vale, the Nelson Mandela professor of politics emeritus at Rhodes University, wrote to me, in a tough assessment of his country. “In particular, the century’s long question of white wealth and black poverty: until (and unless) serious efforts are made to address this issue and its attendant features, the pattern of politics will be convulsion followed by impasse, convulsion-impasse, etc.”

[fishanthrope]

Posted by: D. Pecker, Enquirer | 06 September 2023 at 10:13 AM

Scott O is clueless

Strong words from F. Packer....."Proud Defender of Valuths....San Franthithco Thtyle".

[Scott O]

I'm clueless - because?

Waiting...

[Scott O]

Lonesome Johnny - get a clue, moron - When the blacks took over Rhodesia, it went down the tube. The same thing is happening with So Africa. Here's one of their biggest ongoing disasters:
https://www.npr.org/2023/02/07/1155014891/south-africas-power-grid-is-collapsing-and-outages-are-disrupting-the-economy

[Scott O]

Dick Pecker 4:25 - "that previous generations were woefully undereducated in anything related to having power and running governments, or any other western theories"

OK - now where did the white boys get their info and theories? From the space aliens?

I have a friend who is AmerIndian. He would always complain about the fact that when he would visit the rez, no matter which one - there was brown water from the tap. He would allude to the cause being something to do with white people. I pointed out that white people used to have brown water, but they did something about it.

Has anyone on the left thought about the time when countries like Great Britain had mostly all people living in hovels unable to vote or own much of anything and a handful of "lairds" running the show. Basically, they were all slaves. Who came along and lifted them out of their mess?
Missionaries from Africa?