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Current Affairs

My word

Britons work from home more than any other comparable economy but are still wildly unhappy. Nine in ten British workers lack enthusiasm for their jobs, a Gallup survey found this summer. Remote working was supposed to eradicate much of that misery, but instead it has proved to be lonely and a bit boring.

You mean human beings are social animals?

Gosh now, that is a surprise.

The stupidity on display here is marvellous

Marvellous in the proper meaning, something to marvel at:

AI promises incredible benefits, but also terrible risks. It’s not luddism to rein it in
Sonia Sodha

How?

All you need for AI is some code and some computing run time. How can you – how can anyone – limit access to those two so as to rein it in? There is absolutely no way that that is globally possible. Therefore musing over whether we should do it is a nonsense.

I wonder

Musk’s own trans daughter, Vivian Jenna Wilson, changed her name on her 18th birthday to disaffiliate from her billionaire dad, citing “Gender Identity and the fact that I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form.”

She given up the money too?

Well, yes, we can see this

A single tenant in a Montreal apartment block has halted a multimillion-dollar development project in a standoff that has focused fresh attention on the lack of affordable housing in major Canadian cities.

Bird in a rent controlled bedsit refuses to move without lots of compo. Well, play the system etc. This means 176 “luxury” apartments won’t get built.

So, as housing markets go, this means there won’t be 176 affordable places either. Because 176 richer households won’t be able to move up into hte luxury flats, leaving the less luxury ones for poorer people to move into.

This bird is the reason there are 176 homeless households that is. But, you know, play the game by the rules already set, she’s looking for compo.

Of course they will, don’t be stupid

Elon Musk wants to put chips in our brains – but will anyone let him?

People will cut their cocks off to get a bit of attention these days.

The ones you want to watch out for though are those who head for the blackjack tables as soon as they’ve got that chip. One use would be to make card counting much easuer……

Incentives, eh?

British society needs all the help it can get
Social participation has plummeted, leaving young people lonely and disconnected — time for a volunteering revolution
William Hague

So, let’s roll back all the rules and bureaucratic costs that make volunteering such an expensive proposition.

The big question is whether we can ever brace ourselves for mandatory service.

How did I know that Billy Hague wasn’t going to say that?

Interesting

Ms Reeves said: “At a time when families across the country face rising bills, higher costs and frozen wages, this gilded giveaway is the wrong priority, at the wrong time, for the wrong people.

“That’s why a Labour government will reverse this move. We urge the Chancellor and the Conservative government to think again too.”

She promised, however, that Labour would introduce a separate scheme allowing doctors to pay into pension pots tax-free, amid fears that hundreds of NHS consultants are considering early retirement.

These people, here, should not be allowed to save for their pensions because they’re bad people.

These people, here, should be allowed to save for their pensions because they’re good people.

Nowt like the rule of law, is there?

Oh Aye Mr Daszak?

“This is incorrect. Experiments at WIV involved bat coronaviruses related to the original SARS-CoV, not SARS-CoV-2, and there is no evidence that any lab in the world had a virus genetically close enough to SARS-CoV-2 that is could be manipulated to become that virus.”

The Wuhan lab wiped its database of virii…..that dbase being where any evidence would be

Oh, Cool!

So, to praise Gaia we’re going to change British architecture:

Salad shortages? They don’t worry me – I grow my own in a 8x5m plot. You can, too
Alessandro Vitale

When vegetable shortages hit supermarkets earlier this month, I was probably less concerned than most salad lovers. I’ve been an urban gardener for seven years, growing my own food in an 8x5m space in London.

Tear down those stack a prole Brezhneviki! Build the des res with front and back garden again!

Hang the planners and put the British in the housing the British want to have. Why not?

Grasp the point, but no

Artists should not be cancelled if their work is extraordinary, Cate Blanchett has argued – citing Picasso as an example of a problematic genius.

Why does genius get protection? Why not just rather good ceramics, or even just a decent pot pie? That someone’s entirely vile – along any axis you desire to think of, gender, politics, sporting views – is entirely consistent with their doing other things as well. So, their politics, gender views, support for Bath City, can all be evaluated, as can their pot pies and ceramics. The one doesn’t really flow over into the other does it?

We can and should evaluate Hitler’s treatment of Blondi as Hitler’s treatment of Blondi. As also individually all the other things.

Now that we’re free will you come back and save us?

The west must ditch its “double standards” and act decisively against the violence worsening in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Dr Denis Mukwege, the Nobel prize-winning surgeon, has said.

In a stinging criticism of the international community’s “negligence”, Mukwege urged Britain and its allies to impose sanctions on neighbouring Rwanda to help ease the growing crisis in the east of the country.

Pick up the burden again……

Compared to the UK, perhaps

Gary Lineker calls USA ‘extraordinarily racist country’ and reignites row between BBC and Qatar

The US is more racist than Britain, that’s true. The most obvious, checkable, indicator of this is that intermarriage rates are grossly lower (although increasing).

But here’s the problem for those who claim racism. Pretty much everywhere is more racist than Britain. OK, I’ve not personal experience of everywhere but nowhere I’ve been is less so. That producing a problem for those who insist that Britain itself is racist – compared to what?

Not much of a defence

Journalist and conservative commentator Bari Weiss published the latest thread, hyped up by Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk, writing that “teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics—all in secret, without informing users.”

The defence being deployed being – Yes.

Hmm, well, no

So pulses will be racing with the latest offering on the Bath property market — not just one Georgian townhouse but an entire Georgian square. Beauford Square,

Well, no it’s not actually a square, it’s a street. Nice, tho, right in the centre of town, but little to no through traffic.

comprising 13 houses, four apartments and two commercial units,

OK.

That’s not all, though. The sale comes with Lark Place, an unbroken row of nine Georgian cottages next to Royal Victoria Park,

Well, yeeees……artisans’ cottages facing directly onto a major road – Upper Bristol Road I think. Heavy traffic.

and Royston House, 13 period apartments near Bath Abbey.

Close to Bath Abbey’s a bit rich. It’s actually on Duke St, just by St John’s. Distinct lack of natural light on one side of that.

Still, at £18.5 million that’s not a bad deal. We’ll take two, shall we?

A possible solution

More than 90 per cent of children and young people feel lonely, a survey has found, as the cost-of-living crisis impacts their social life.

Researchers found that many young people say not having the money to take part in activities is having a negative impact on how lonely they feel.

Take part in activities that don’t cost any money…….it is, in fact, possible.

It’s not actually any good any more

The clarion call of justice is sounding across America once again, thanks to the tireless efforts of its finest purveyor of made-up news.

The Onion, the long-running satirical publication, has filed a very real legal document with the US supreme court, urging it to take on a case centered on the right to parody. And in order to make a serious legal point, the filing does what the Onion does best, offering a big helping of total nonsense.

The Onion’s gone very tame. Not enough punching against the current orthodoxy.

The Babylon Bee however…..