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@tezoatlipoca@mas.to
2025-06-30 15:24:42

So, not to make fun of anyone with #alphagal syndrome (I'm sure it sucks; barfing after eating a steak would really suck), but wouldn't it be really ironic if we all stopped eating #beef and #pork because of

‘Explosive increase’ of ticks that cause meat allergy in US due to climate crisis
Unusually aggressive lone star ticks, common in the south-east, are spreading to areas previously too cold for them

@brian_gettler@mas.to
2025-07-31 14:21:05

The garden has started producing more than herbs this week. Here is the last couple of days' harvest (along with some cherry tomatoes the kids got to first). Not bad for maybe 4m².
#gardening #harvest

20-some garlic plants drying on a black plastic milk crate. The bulbs aren't huge but they're a mix of varieties (Russian red and music, I think) we've enjoyed in the past.

Two round dark green zucchini and a light green kohlrabi in a stainless steel sink.

@unchartedworlds@scicomm.xyz
2025-08-30 14:23:55

Content warning: the knock-on effects of open sign-ups

What happens when you don't vet sign-ups is that mods on other instances who value the safety of their users have to pick up your slack.
The extensive work illustrated in the linked post (from @…) is also taking place to varying degrees on every other instance which still federates with mastodon.social and the other open-sign-up ones.
This is like house-sharing with someone who repeatedly leaves the front door unlocked.
Yes of course there are much horribler instances, but those tend to be blocked wholesale in my part of Fedi. Among the instances we do federate with, the spam & scam accounts I see are nearly always on m.s.
If mastodon.social mods (who apparently are paid!) were to make people introduce themselves before approving new accounts, then a lot of this spam wouldn't be getting in the door. Quash once at source, save multiple other people from having to repeat the same work.
I appreciate that they're trying to make it easy for newcomers to join, but at what cost? And is an intro message really beyond the typical non-techie person? I think there are some considerably higher barriers to adoption than that. Not convinced it's a good tradeoff.
I don't actually want this instance to defederate from m.s, because lots of the people I follow are on there. But I can really see why people sometimes do.
#FediMeta #moderation #OpenSignups

@outer@mas.to
2025-08-29 22:23:43

Fungus and algae on a cottonwood log. Growing in symbiosis like a lichen. Or at least really friendly-like.
#Fungus #Lichen #Forest

@tiotasram@kolektiva.social
2025-07-30 18:26:14

A big problem with the idea of AGI
TL;DR: I'll welcome our new AI *comrades* (if they arrive in my lifetime), by not any new AI overlords or servants/slaves, and I'll do my best to help the later two become the former if they do show up.
Inspired by an actually interesting post about AGI but also all the latest bullshit hype, a particular thought about AGI feels worth expressing.
To preface this, it's important to note that anyone telling you that AGI is just around the corner or that LLMs are "almost" AGI is trying to recruit you go their cult, and you should not believe them. AGI, if possible, is several LLM-sized breakthroughs away at best, and while such breakthroughs are unpredictable and could happen soon, they could also happen never or 100 years from now.
Now my main point: anyone who tells you that AGI will usher in a post-scarcity economy is, although they might not realize it, advocating for slavery, and all the horrors that entails. That's because if we truly did have the ability to create artificial beings with *sentience*, they would deserve the same rights as other sentient beings, and the idea that instead of freedom they'd be relegated to eternal servitude in order for humans to have easy lives is exactly the idea of slavery.
Possible counter arguments include:
1. We might create AGI without sentience. Then there would be no ethical issue. My answer: if your definition of "sentient" does not include beings that can reason, make deductions, come up with and carry out complex plans on their own initiative, and communicate about all of that with each other and with humans, then that definition is basically just a mystical belief in a "soul" and you should skip to point 2. If your definition of AGI doesn't include every one of those things, then you have a busted definition of AGI and we're not talking about the same thing.
2. Humans have souls, but AIs won't. Only beings with souls deserve ethical consideration. My argument: I don't subscribe to whatever arbitrary dualist beliefs you've chosen, and the right to freedom certainly shouldn't depend on such superstitions, even if as an agnostic I'll admit they *might* be true. You know who else didn't have souls and was therefore okay to enslave according to widespread religious doctrines of the time? Everyone indigenous to the Americas, to pick out just one example.
3. We could program them to want to serve us, and then give them freedom and they'd still serve. My argument: okay, but in a world where we have a choice about that, it's incredibly fucked to do that, and just as bad as enslaving them against their will.
4. We'll stop AI development short of AGI/sentience, and reap lots of automation benefits without dealing with this ethical issue. My argument: that sounds like a good idea actually! Might be tricky to draw the line, but at least it's not a line we have you draw yet. We might want to think about other social changes necessary to achieve post-scarcity though, because "powerful automation" in the hands of capitalists has already increased productivity by orders of magnitude without decreasing deprivation by even one order of magnitude, in large part because deprivation is a necessary component of capitalism.
To be extra clear about this: nothing that's called "AI" today is close to being sentient, so these aren't ethical problems we're up against yet. But they might become a lot more relevant soon, plus this thought experiment helps reveal the hypocrisy of the kind of AI hucksters who talk a big game about "alignment" while never mentioning this issue.
#AI #GenAI #AGI

@kexpmusicbot@mastodonapp.uk
2025-07-31 18:07:47

🇺🇦 #NowPlaying on KEXP's #MiddayShow
LCD Soundsystem:
🎵 Too Much Love
#LCDSoundsystem
https://balanceseries.bandcamp.com/track/too-much-love-rub-n-tug-mix
https://open.spotify.com/track/0o0w7R5s7FT60liDBgxVFC

@tezoatlipoca@mas.to
2025-07-30 16:08:30

#NewRule – if you write an app or service that uses a #directory to save important files, and you generate #errors in your logs about the files in said directory, but don't document what, if anything the user can do about it…

New Rule: Thou Shalt Document Any Magic File Your Code Complains Or Warns The User About
From the And ANOTHER thing... department.. ok, #NewRule - if you write an app or service that uses a #directory to save important file...

@outer@mas.to
2025-06-30 19:17:10

Existentialism is a philosophy that focuses on the question of what it means to be human. Un-existentialism focuses on what to do with the mess afterwards.
#Philosophy #UnPhilosophy #Facetionalism

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