leicsmac

Well, judging by that article on the previous page, the benefit fraud and errors, tax gaps and bank bailouts, to name but three, are greater strains on the exchequer. (The MoD budget is too, but the funding of that is a whole other debate.) I'm inclined to think that none of them carry the same space in the public consciousness than some idea of "foreigners" getting a "free ride" - even when those three things above cost the average UK citizen far, far more. The single-minded hyperfocus on one policy area doesn't actually end up helping anyone long term. Or even medium term.

And quite a bit of Latin America and South Asia, too. Of course, they'll have other problems of their own at a similar time.

I think that it won't just be the Western world that falls if there is some kind of digital catastrophe. All these systems are codependent. Another reason nationalism is becoming outmoded.

There are bigger problems, much bigger problems - to the exchequer, to social discourse, to the future itself - than the migration of people into the UK. It's deeply frustrating, and detrimental, that it appears to have a focus of singular importance that it simply does not deserve among so many. It's about time more was done to either disabuse or treat that focus with the attention it deserves. I would say facts help, but the discussion above appears to indicate otherwise.

Attention? Absolutely. As per above, wildly disproportionate attention at the expense of those bigger problems? I'm not so sure.

Is there any way of substantiating/quantifying this? Genuinely interested.

Depends on whether you think in this case Appeal to Bigger Problems is a fallacy or not. I'm inclined to think that it's not on this one given the wildly disproportionate levels of attention given to the one in comparison to the others, but each to their own.

The current US administration is really leaning on AI and digital manipulation to appear more popular than it actually is.

Yeah, this is going to be the Chinese century - they're simply planning for the future more, and better, than western democracies are. And that is a critically deciding factor.

I think he's underrated by the fanbase rather than the comms or selectors tbh, his name doesn't seem to come up often when mentioning important England one day players.

Also, Adil Rashid is a wildly underrated one day bowler. Almost always seems to make good economical and/or wicket-taking contributions.

There's a few that are hugely destructive when on form right now IMO, but he's certainly on that list.

... oh hey, another thing that Years and Years got right! I'm wondering what they all have in common that would make them all susceptible to simultaneous attack though, unless this is the mother of all DDoS attacks - I wouldn't have thought an attack on that scale was even possible.

Harry Brook in berserker mode again.

Piers Morgan going on about how toxic social media is (right) and then in the very next sentence praising Felon#47 as a politician for having "unfiltered" views. Little bit of a contradicting viewpoint there? And have you forgotten your own (correct) comments in the aftermath of January 6th 2021 so easily, Piers?

I mean, strictly speaking the principle of MAD means that the nuclear option is no option for anyone, them included. However, I do think that claims of victimisation are a little hollow when a party can still choose that mutual destruction over subjugation at any time. It's not a great choice, but the choice still exists to them.

Honestly, I think the thing will be bigger than that and the whole offers of the working paradigm that we have now is going to have to change because there simply won't be enough jobs that aren't automated, but we're going to be lucky enough to find out!

Possibly because there's a further problem regarding age demographic change which is going to require a big shift in which jobs are needed and where as well. So there's a triple whammy of critical societal matters looking to hit the fan, and all the while growing food and sourcing enough potable water for everyone is going to get harder too. Interesting times.

And nor am I in this case, and to be clear, I don't consider it to be an existential threat in of itself, but the human response to it causing civilisational collapse is. What you speak of here is another such threat which is very real ( personally I'm thinking more The Expanse than The Hunger Games though) and you're right to draw attention to it. Increasing inequality will result in collapse the same way as lots of places becoming functionally uninhabitable will - and if we're not careful, both will feed off each other.

Hopefully that wouldn't wash as has been said already, but then it's entirely possible that we end up with a situation where AI ends up running everything and most people don't even knew it, dystopia sci-fi style anyway. One world, or no world.

To add to this, the movers and shakers, the "Patriots" if you will (know you'll get that reference) have a lot invested in AI, so for them it being used and sold is a matter of necessity, so you can imagine they're leaning on governments to utilise it more.

As mentioned on the Sci thread, on a scale of 1 to omnicidal maniac, how sociopathic is this, exactly? I think the casual disregard for anything outside of short term gain for one very specific demographic puts it up there.

Probably. As has been said before, the whole thing would be darkly hilarious were the consequences not so horrendous.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3vnl0yxg53o A landmark deal to cut global shipping emissions has been abandoned after Saudi Arabia and the US succeeded in ending the talks. More than 100 countries had gathered in London to approve a deal first agreed in April, which would have seen shipping become the world's first industry to adopt internationally mandated targets to reduce emissions. But US President Donald Trump had called the plan a "green scam" and representatives of his administration had threatened countries with tariffs if they voted in favour of it. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared the outcome a "huge win" for Trump. Just when they couldn't get any more loathsome...

On the topic discussed earlier: "The idea that a civilization might destroy itself is both ludicrous and likely. We are pathetically inadequate at long-term planning, idiotically primitive in our destructive urges and pathologically incapable of simply getting along." - Brian Cox