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Interesting news topics.

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leicsmac

leicsmac

Posted
Posted

Not exactly an interesting news article, but I figured this thread would be best for it...has anyone heard of the company United Fruit?

 

Once you start reading about them, you can't seem to stop - the whole thing reads like a conspiracy thriller novel...except it actually happened. A corporation backing coups, helping install friendly dictators in fruit-producing countries, massive corruption...it's unreal. Apparently, it's where the phrase 'Banana Republic' actually originated from.

 

Fruity stuff.

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MC Prussian

MC Prussian

Posted
Posted

Maybe not "interesting" per se, unless you're into the more freaky stuff like death or mummification, but I read an article in today's free daily about a German sailor dying on board his yacht somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, only to be found months or even years later by some fishermen near the Philippine coast:

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=298_1456701198#23fBK44PvGl6PBpg.99

 

Don't click on the link if you're of the squeamish kind - there's a mummy in that picture.

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leicsmac

leicsmac

Posted
Posted (edited)

http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/10/11191184/lee-sedol-alphago-go-deepmind-google-match-2-result

 

A computer program goes 2-0 up in a best of five series against the worlds best human player in Go.

 

Go is much, much more complex than, say, chess, so this represents another big step in computer advancement...up until now, programs hadn't been able to match the worlds best players.

 

What's even scarier is that according the the professional commentators, the human player made no bad moves of any kind - almost as optimal a game as a human can play - and he still lost.

Edited by leicsmac
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Thracian

Thracian

Posted
Posted

http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/10/11191184/lee-sedol-alphago-go-deepmind-google-match-2-result

 

A computer program goes 2-0 up in a best of five series against the worlds best human player in Go.

 

Go is much, much more complex than, say, chess, so this represents another big step in computer advancement...up until now, programs hadn't been able to match the worlds best players.

 

What's even scarier is that according the the professional commentators, the human player made no bad moves of any kind - almost as optimal a game as a human can play - and he still lost.

I'm not at all surprised given that humans still use only a fraction of the brain's potential capability and that they continually make bad decisions that, if examined, would defy logical sense.

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Guest MattP

Guest MattP

Posted
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Even though these things don't really shock anymore it always seems to hit harder when it's a place you've spent time in yourself.

Belgium seems to have a serious problem getting to grips with this.

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Carl the Llama

Carl the Llama

Posted
Posted

Even though these things don't really shock anymore it always seems to hit harder when it's a place you've spent time in yourself.

Belgium seems to have a serious problem getting to grips with this.

Yeah let's play the Belgium blame game; terrorist threat edition.  Don't you have anything better to do?

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Rincewind

Rincewind

Posted
Posted (edited)

Birmingham had a problem with it when the IRA left bombs in pubs.

You cannot predict what is going to happen. Like the majority of murderers  before them these bastards do not give warnings or have their intention stamped on their forehead.

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Guest MattP

Guest MattP

Posted
Posted

Yeah let's play the Belgium blame game; terrorist threat edition.  Don't you have anything better to do?

 

Sorry mate but the nation is clearly going to have to talk about this and try to solve the problems that cause it, a head in the sand approach or trying to blame Donald Trump for it isn't going to stop innocent people being blown up.

 

Belgium does have problems, for a start they have sent more fighters to Syria than any other country in Europe per capita, you need to work out the reasons for that, the Prime Minister has said the security services are not upto the standard of other nations and the country clearly has a problem with controlling radicals ( http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/22/why-was-belgium-targeted-by-bombers) as it appears to be quite well known in the community various clerics returning from Syria are openly preaching around the country and no one has bothered to stop them.

 

On a personal level I found it quite worrying that Abdesellam could organise the Paris attacks and manage to flee and still end up back in Molenbeek despite being one of the World's most wanted men, ghetto's full of ISIS sympahisers are not "vibrant multicultural areas" no matter how much you want to believe they are.

 

It's not nice to say obviously but this is with you now, you'll have to get used to it.

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Guest MattP

Guest MattP

Posted
Posted

A very interesting and quite gripping read on how Friends helped to bring down Western civilisation, take it however you wish.

 

https://medium.com/@thatdavidhopkins/how-a-tv-sitcom-triggered-the-downfall-of-western-civilization-336e8ccf7dd0#.iwtpcx2ea

 

How a TV Sitcom Triggered the Downfall of Western Civilization

BY DAVID HOPKINS

 

I want to discuss a popular TV show my wife and I have been binge-watching on Netflix. It’s the story of a family man, a man of science, a genius who fell in with the wrong crowd. He slowly descends into madness and desperation, lead by his own egotism. With one mishap after another, he becomes a monster. I’m talking, of course, about Friends and its tragic hero, Ross Geller.

You may see it as a comedy, but I cannot laugh with you. To me, Friends signals a harsh embrace of anti-intellectualism in America, where a gifted and intelligent man is persecuted by his idiot compatriots. And even if you see it from my point of view, it doesn’t matter. The constant barrage of laughter from the live studio audience will remind us that our own reactions are unnecessary, redundant.

 

The theme song itself is filled with foreboding, telling us that life is inherently deceptive, career pursuits are laughable, poverty is right around the corner, and oh yeah, your love life’s D.O.A. But you will always have the company of idiots. They will be there for you.

Don’t I feel better?

 

Maybe I should unpack this, for the uninitiated. If you remember the 1990s and early 2000s, and you lived near a television set, then you remember Friends. Friends was the Thursday night primetime, “must-see-TV” event that featured the most likable ensemble ever assembled by a casting agent: all young, all middle class, all white, all straight, all attractive (but approachable), all morally and politically bland, and all equipped with easily digestible personas. Joey is the goofball. Chandler is the sarcastic one. Monica is obsessive-compulsive. Phoebe is the hippy. Rachel, hell, I don’t know, Rachel likes to shop. Then there was Ross. Ross was the intellectual and the romantic.

 

Eventually, the Friends audience — roughly 52.5 million people — turned on Ross. But the characters of the show were pitted against him from the beginning (consider episode 1, when Joey says of Ross: “This guy says hello, I wanna kill myself.”) In fact, any time Ross would say anything about his interests, his studies, his ideas, whenever he was mid-sentence, one of his “friends” was sure to groan and say how boring Ross was, how stupid it is to be smart, and that nobody cares. Cue the laughter of the live studio audience. This gag went on, pretty much every episode, for 10 seasons. Can you blame Ross for going crazy?

 

And like a Greek tragedy, our hero is caught in a prophecy that cannot be avoided. The show’s producers, akin to the immutable voice of the gods, declared that Ross must end up with Rachel, the one who shops. Honestly, I think he could’ve done better.

Why such sympathy for Ross?

The show ended in 2004. The same year that Facebook began, the year that George W. Bush was re-elected to a second term, the year that reality television became a dominant force in pop culture, with American Idol starting an eight-year reign of terror as the No. 1 show in the U.S., the same year that Paris Hilton started her own “lifestyle brand” and released an autobiography. And Joey Tribbiani got a spin-off TV show. The year 2004 was when we completely gave up and embraced stupidity as a value. Just ask Green Day; their album American Idiot was released in 2004, and it won the Grammy for Best Rock Album. You can’t get more timely. The rejection of Ross marked the moment when much of America groaned, mid-sentence, at the voice of reason.

Yes, my theory is that Friends may have triggered the downfall of western civilization. You might think I’m crazy. But to quote Ross: “Oh, am I? Am I? Am I out of my mind? Am I losing my senses?” Did you know the song that originally accompanied the Friends pilot episode was R.E.M.’s “It’s the End of the World as We Know (And I Feel Fine).” A blissful song with an apocalyptic message that goes largely ignored.

 

I was a teacher in 2004. I coached our school’s chess club. I saw how my students were picked on, bullied. I tried my best to defend them, but I couldn’t be everywhere. My students were smart, huge nerds, and they were in hostile, unfriendly territory. Other students would be waiting outside my room to ambush the chess club members who met in my room every day at lunch. During my tenure as a teacher, I gained the reputation of being a slayer of bullies and defender of nerds. I promise you: bullies can be mean, but they knew Mr. Hopkins was much worse.

 

Maybe intellectuals have always been persecuted and shoved in lockers, but something in my gut tells me we’re at a low point — where social media interaction has replaced genuine debate and political discourse, where politicians are judged by whether we’d want to have a beer with them, where scientific consensus is rejected, where scientific research is underfunded, where journalism is drowning in celebrity gossip.

I see Kim Kardashian’s ass at the top of CNN.com, and I am scared.

Maybe it’s all harmless fun. Like the good-spirited laughter of a live studio audience? Maybe. But I am sincerely worried we have not done enough to cultivate intellectual curiosity within our culture.

 

Fortunately, there’s a resistance forming. People with grit, who aren’t afraid to begin a sentence with “Did you know…” These are the Rosses of the world. I saw them in my chess club. And I see them in my city, hiding at the art museum, crouching at used book stores, exchanging sideways glances at the public libraries and coffee houses, and sneaking around at our schools, community colleges, and universities.

There was no hope for Ross. He went insane, and yeah, he did get annoying.

So, how do we retain our sanity in a dumb, dumb world? I wouldn’t be a good teacher if I didn’t come prepared with a few ideas.

 

No. 1: read a ****ing book. Something special happens when you set aside the inane distractions of modern culture and immerse yourself in a novel. You open yourself up to new ideas, new experiences, new perspectives. It’s an experiment in patience and mindfulness. The New School for Social Research in New York proved that reading literature improves empathy. It’s true. Reading makes you less of a jerk. So, read often. Read difficult books. Read controversial books. Read a book that makes you cry. Read something fun. But read.

 

No. 2: learn something. Your brain is capable of so much. Feed it. Learn something new. The greatest threat to progress is the belief that something is too complex to fix. Poverty is permanent. Racism will always exist. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is too difficult to understand. The public education system is broken. Educate yourself, so you can be part of the conversation. Learn something scientific, something mathematic. Explore philosophy. Study paleontology. Try to learn a new language. You don’t even have to make fluency your goal, just get a few more words in your head. Listen to an educational podcast. Professors from colleges — such as Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Stanford — are offering their lectures online for free. Think of what you could learn. One of my greatest challenges as a teacher was convincing students they were smart after someone had told them they were dumb.

 

No. 3: stop buying so much shit. This may seem like a non sequitur, but I’m convinced consumer culture and idiot culture are closely linked. Simplify your life. Idiocy dominates our cultural landscape because it sells more Nike tennis shoes and Big Macs. When we thoughtfully consider what we bring into our home, we are less likely to be manipulated by empty impulses.

 

And finally: protect the nerds. A computer programmer from Seattle is doing more to alleviate world poverty, hunger, and disease through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation than any other person in America right now. Nerds create vaccines. Nerds engineer bridges and roadways. Nerds become teachers and librarians. We need those obnoxiously smart people, because they make the world a better place. We can’t have them cowering before a society that rolls their eyes at every word they say. Ross needs better friends.

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Darkon84

Darkon84

Posted
Posted

A very good read there and something which I've felt in a way for quite some time now too. It's almost painful when you read something truly brilliant or see something going on in the world, and when you turn round to point it out to someone or look for conversation, everyone's heads are staring downwards in to their phones laughing at videos of minions, or which nondescript 'personality' is in the big brother house.

Without going in to the realms of conspiracy, as I'd like to keep my sanity, it's almost as if everywhere is deliberately flooded with this crap to expand on this disease we call celebrity (idiot) culture.

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