OpenStars

It was the way she (planet Earth) was dressed - you know she was just asking for it!

\s 🤮

Tbf, they did not desire taxation without representation, and a local king would have met the goal for them to feel "represented". At least more so than the remote one in England, who had to spend tons of money on far-away matters such as dealing with France, Spain, Portugal, etc. A local King would instead spend money on local matters, such as dealing with the indigenous peoples present in the Americas. Still taxation, but they would benefit from it more.

Democracy hadn't been a thing since ancient Greece, after which it languished under Turkish rule for several hundreds of years, and I wonder how much most uneducated people at the time knew even about that. Though some French philosophers such as Voltaire, and the English Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (I had to look him up: he was Genevan:-) were popular reading at the time, among the elites, and possibly they shared some of that as stories at the local pubs or whatnot. So anyway, it makes total sense to me that they wanted him to be a King: that was all that they really knew about, at the time, to meet their goal?

But now I am saying that the situation is reversed: the ones pushing for the RADICAL changes, especially using VIOLENT means to overthrow the government, are not trying to throw off the shackles in order to return America to a more pristine state of "democracy" - the so-called "conservative" Republicans want to overthrow democracy, and instill Trump as their emperor. That's moving backwards, towards fascism and away from democracy (VERY unlike the case with Washington, where they intended a more sideways move, not fully knowing that more was even possible).

Likewise, the UK wanted to exist within the scope of the EU but also not at the same time so... bye-bye I guess. Now they are shocked, Shocked I tell you, SHOCKED that they are "out". Even they seem to think now they have moved backwards, and many report wishing that they could undo what was done. They can do as they please yes, but they seemed not to realize that others have that same privilege as well. Especially the ones living in other countries, now shocked to find that they may be expected to pay taxes in those sovereign nations - what did they THINK was going to happen!?

Americans I presume would eventually be the same - not enjoying life under Trump's boot heels, but like Brexit, the ability to return would have been lost. The ones pushing for that WANT the democracy gone, and for it to be replaced with a more useful (to them) fascism, bc with globalization and automation, they do not have need of a large educated workforce, such as doctors and scientists, and they seem to be wanting to "streamline" the population, much as companies are currently streamlining their direct employees. An example is Trump's COVID policy of "just let them ~~eat cake~~ die". Fewer resources taken up by worthless people - like Oxygen consumption and smaller populations being less susceptible to pandemics - leave more for the rich to have whatever they want.

I don't think what you or I would do is anywhere close to an accurate measure as to what to expect from one of the richest people on the planet... But if I were swimming in money, then yeah - I'd for sure share it with others. That must be the reason why I am not a trillionaire:-).

This right here - C++ iirc is used mostly for microprocessor code in an industry setting, where EXTENSIVE testing is done so that bloated code doesn't need to constantly check for programmer errors every single time, i.e. where execution speed is prioritized over programmer development time. And whenever that is not the case, well, as OP pointed out, other higher-level languages also exist (implication: to choose from).

I dunno if every human reducing their waste would make a "big" difference anymore, at this point. I mean, I do it anyway b/c it's how I want to face the world, but I no longer have any expectations that it will affect any positive change - like even if every human being on the planet were to switch from individual cars to bicycles, how many oil spills would entirely counteract that - just one major one, maybe two more normal ones, or three "small" ones?

So I am not saying don't do the communal stuff - go nuts! It probably really would be fun, and again therapeutic. But from a "managing expectations" standpoint, it is a personal hobby, not likely to have a realistic impact.

Tbf, I was accepting that there is a situation in front of us that needs to be dealt with, i.e. accepting that there WILL be a crisis - any question on that front seems in the past. But I never said who I thought will win:-) Honestly I don't know the latter, though in either case yes I do think that a lot of people will give up rather than fight.

The REALLY odd part about all of this, imho, is that the type of person who previously fought on the side of freedom, now is mislead to be acting on behalf of the oppressors. Those who grabbed their muskets and fought to the DEATH against the external British overlords, are now the ones voting for increased corporate power, and increased non-aggression or even thoughts of aid towards the expansionist Russia, which will only be friendly in return for a few decades until it decides that it wants us as well. Yes, this side has "guns", but what good are even fully automatic machine-gun rifles when pitted against TRULY modern weapons like weaponized viruses, nukes deployable from fucking orbit, and perhaps most dangerous of all, the ability to control all flow of all money, which puts a strangle-hold on all supply lines such that failure to comply means starvation.

In short, you are correct that I do not put much stock in the mere words that people are throwing around, no matter how "tough" or "inspiring" they sound. Instead I am looking at the trajectory of actions, such as USA Republican obstructionism, UK Brexit, Russian expansionism, and the like. And to me, it seems like fascism is winning. People BLED and DIED to fight against it as recently as WWII - but that was then, while now they would be turning over in their graves to find that their children's generation (Boomers) are just handing the world meekly over to it within their/our home countries. McCarthism is back, book burning is back, and everything old it seems we are trying over again, like it was for the first time. Those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it.

It makes sense. It might also be the house of like his butler who delivers him food occasionally, while he himself lives in a plane flying around the earth that never sets down... or something. I am mostly joking here ofc:-).

I dunno, it is a plutocracy now, but why wasn't it a democracy when it started?

Well I did say that people would demand it... which as you correctly point out, is by no means a guarantee that corporations would want to accept.

I mean sure, that too but... what would it accomplish really? There is an arms race, but look at Bill Gate's house... exactly (first, where is it, second, which one(s), third, they are on like entire HUGE islands, fourth they can move the whole thing at a moment's notice, fifth there are other defensive options too, etc. etc. etc.), plus there will always be the "collaborators" who will say "but no, they are the JOB creators" as if that justifies doing, or not doing, anything at all.

Anyway, tech has reached the point that we can put it inside of our very bodies, to hide & power it, plus with CRISPR the tech flat-out becomes our bodies. At least, if you are talking about the stuff available to ~~billionaires~~ trillionaires, whereas to us "normies" all we get are cellphones to mollify & pacify us, yay (and even that privilege comes at the cost of also tracking us, plus can be taken away if we do not cooperate fully or fast enough).

Anyway, tech is neither Good nor Evil, it simply is - and automation isn't the problem, though it could be part of the solution, e.g. if it were to solve climate change for us?

Best I can offer is this:

I believe it is a self-portrait of Donald Trump's clone from 2040?

People have tried that before - every attempt at a utopian society has failed. e.g. perhaps someone will bring "homemade milk", and after the 99th time people begin to relax and whoopsie forget to check it, then a large portion of the group gets exposed to a serious illness, maybe many die, the problems with communal actions get revealed.

Or else that person decides to get REALLY serious with their milk, and people decide to help chip in each week to defray the costs... and voila, capitalism is rediscovered!:-D

Though for the therapeutic benefits alone, it's probably mostly worthwhile - and anyway I'm cynical and bitter so please don't let that stop you:-). Probably the fact that you can see people's faces that would be affected by everyone's actions may make the difference?