AI, Voting, Conventions & Fani Willis

Assorted Responses Made on Other Posts in the Last Week

May 21, 2023

A response to an ADL report on AI

yes. I don't think your report is complete. There has to be an understanding that AI is not at all intelligent, but human programmed thought. If AI does not have, say ADL reports, the AI can't use its so-called intelligence to analyse the ADL info. Look---what you really need to report on is not what people think (fear) but what the designers think (and will be programming into their AI), and if you analyse them---guess what? a bevy of extreme anti-semiticism.

Artificial Intelligence is a misnomer for human intelligence designed to be influential in the downfall of humans. If these designers are able to confuse their radical exterminatory concepts (of these programmers) is smarter than human intelligence and therefore the very smart tells you how very bad Jews, or poor, etc are, then it can take it away from a "debate" to a"knowledge" of inferior, nasty beings, anyone the programmers choose to be those nasty people, then obviously the smart thinking computer means we can (or should) eliminate those people.

Computers don't think intelligently, or analytically, apart from their design and the analysis will be limited to data.

If Rosa Park is entered as a person who didn't give up her seat on the bus, rather than as a black woman who didn't give up her seat as a protest against segregation, then AI will tell us segregation is fine but giving up your seat is not. There is no artificial intelligence. Quit telling people there is. No computer intelligence exists that is not human intelligence.

We don't need to be weary of artificial intelligence, it is still human intelligence being disguised as a method to conform people or subdue people because they are led to believe it is somehow superior to human knowledge. What we need to be wary of is the very term "artificial intelligence" and let people know the truth of what it really is.

Response to Christopher Crook on the Freedom Scale

.Two comments--I totally agree that the problem with big business is using wealth as power. If I might return to the Sioux after they had migrated to the plains. Some were wealthier (primarily determined by the number of horses) and often they were leaders, but they couldn't lead long if they used wealth as their only reason for their authority, their authority came from generally being perceived as having earned more horses by successfully "stealing" them in raids. but if he attempted to obtain his wealth by taking horses away from others in his own tribe, he would be chased out, or possibly killed. Wealth is not a problem if wealth isn't used as a force only to obtain more wealth, and therefore more power. That is, itself, a method of redistribution of wealth.

But big government--and this can be national, state, or even large cities can again use a weird concept that since they were elected they can now represent their own interest and use rhetoric that is divisive against some of their own constituencies. I live in a rather small, and unincorporated community. But we still elect a small governing council we call a GID. People need some type of government, but I think even my community has grown too large. I would suggest a community needs to have no more members than can all be known to each other. This group then decides its own goals , its own work, its own identity. While I wouldn't want to live in it, I suppose if a community wanted to be all black or all white or all gay or whatever, the individuals of the community decide for themselves. If it wants to create a business and sell or trade on a free market, or if it wants to be a community of artists, or a community of astro-physicists. With small communities who know each other, each individual is personally powerful on a par with each other individual but the goals of the individuals will be able to unite because each individual is able to input his own needs, desires and wants. Individuals should be free to leave if they find the community does not fulfill their needs. But an individual who attempts to abuse the community either by attempting to assume authority over others in any way, or simply becomes disruptive by failing to participate in the goals (work) or perpetrates actions of disruptive behavior should be able to be policed by the community. I look to the earliest and the non-kingly societies for inspiration, but that in no way means I think we need to don loin cloths and become hunter-gatherers as I have often been accused. Individuals lose authority when the community (government) is too large and places authorities over them, and the vote cannot correct that problem. The leaders should be the most respected individuals.

But I do see a role for government beyond the community, I see a role to protect communities from being encroached upon by others. But instead of electing popularly (majority) representatives, I see democracy being fulfilled by each community selecting representatives individuals they feel have shown to be the best consensus builders within the community that can confer with regional, or national councils. Well that's my vision to give individuals equal power. I know no other way, unless we live totally solitary lives and only meet to mate and then return to our solitary lives---but I do not believe that is a recipe for human survival.. I believe, however, we did evolve in communities and at the same time those communities had to rely on the strengths and the diverse nature of the individuals within the community.

I'm told that can never happen again, but the only reason it cannot is we are told it cannot by individuals who are trying to have more power over other individuals. And when anyone attempts to have more power over others--i don't care whether it's the "college-certified authority" or the cultist leader; then others have to lose their individual power---I call it the loss of their importance--which amounts to the same thing--one person's assumed importance over another always demeans the necessary individualism of another. It creates a chaotic society and a chaotic whole by dividing people into classifications, and that is what my definition of slavery would be. You don't have to actually have title to a person to claim entitlement over them.

Comment made on Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance

First, on the school lawsuit against the Florida book ban. I am thinking, what's taken so long? The attack on social studies (civil rights, history) should succeed in court and if it does not, well I don't see how it cannot. But it might fail if it is tied to the LGBTQ ban. It should have been brought separately---and I do not wish this to be taken as an attack on LGBTQ---but courts have also long recognized a police right of govt. to regulate minors' access to "pornography" differently from adults, and "prior restraint" does not generally apply to limiting minor's access. Personally, I disagree---by allowing such prior restraint---the same with legal drinking age requirements, creates more desire to obtain, in this case, sexually oriented material by children, and again, not saying LGBTQ issues are pornographic, they are being presented as the reason for the library bans to protect children from access on that score---well, such "protections" lead to probable attempts to circumvention that might establish life-long habits to seek out pornography, or liquor, or anything seen as "forbidden". I'm also really old and I remember I never even knew the existence of any of the subgroups in the new alphabet categorization. And so when I first encountered a man putting his hand on my leg I had no idea he was doing so for any type of sexual response from me and it wasn't until he placed it over my genitals that I came to that realization and I was so utterly unprepared because I had never even known the existence of what is now the G I suppose,I reacted violently by knocking his hand away so forcefully it flew into his own face that knocked his glasses out the open window and he ended swerving the car into the next lane and we had a crash. If I had some preparation or awareness that this was not the most singular perversity that anyone had ever encountered I could have reacted much better. And I was a minor, but I was close to 17 years old (and it was five years before Stonewall); and still I had been so totally sealed from all knowledge that there was any sexual attraction other than male-female and thought this so singular an occurrence, I was violent. But I had no understanding when he placed his hand on my leg that he could even possibly have any other intent, it probably encouraged him to move it to my genitals that created my alarm. So absolutely 100% children need to learn of other inclinations and lifestyles and limited knowledge will never cease desire and will only result in extreme and confusing reactions such as I experienced. Similarly many of my classmates, like I, had been told that pregnancy could only happen after a man and woman got married---not as much for girls, but some of them too, and it wasn't until a 13 year old classmate got his 14 year old girlfriend pregnant that they, and I learned that it was even possible for pregnancy to occur out of marriage. Limiting knowledge will never change inclinations or proclivities and the results end up catastrophic. But I wish the LGBTQ case was brought by the more recent ban in colleges, for I fear the pornography protections that allowing prior restraint to protect children could end with some conservative judges passing on overruling DeSantis’ law, and I've tried to point out here I don't agree with even the reasons those restrictions. Access to knowledge is always less chaotic than suppression of knowledge.

Comment made on Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance

Yes, how much! I was an alternate to the '84 Dem. convention in S.F (and my highest achievement in our governmental system in my life) Walter Mondale was the candidate that a laborer like me should have favored, but I felt he had no chance against Reagan and he would be wiped out in the general election (which wasn't some extraordinary prescience on my part.)

I thought the only chance was a radical alternative to present to people, a total break with all traditional candidates and alliances, and so I favored Jackson. I was living in northern Virginia at the time and Jesse Jackson had been our choice (we had a caucus then, not a primary). Doug Wilder, who would soon become the first black governor in the south since reconstruction was the leader of our delegation. When the voting was to take place there was no floor debate after the nominations. Virginia went for Jackson but Mondale won handily on the first ballot. Then it was proposed to make it unanimous. Our delegation refused without opening it to floor debate first. We were told that wasn't necessary (possible) because Mondale had already been nominated. I guess there were other incidents going on (interviews or whatnot) and so there was no public disclosure on TV of what was going on, other than that Virginia had voted to pass on the unanimity resolution. There was a lot of pressure being applied on our delegation and we were being visited by every influential democrat but Mondale himself. But some of us were quite adamant that since there had been no floor debate before the first ballot we should not have to switch our vote until there was a debate. Finally there were still five holdouts, six if you count me, but as an alternate, I had no vote. Finally we were threatened with being arrested if we did not approve the nomination. At which point I totally lost it, and said "Absolutely arrest Me! If I have no choice, I have no voice, and this convention is nothing but a scam operation, a fascist attempt to stifle debate and I will have no part in allowing it. I began to demand cameras and to get quite loud, and while not arrested, I was escorted out of the Moscone Center. So my direct knowledge ends there, but I do know the 5 delegates were allowed to abstain and Virginia made Mondale's nomination unanimous.

I walked away, I became an independent registered voter, and never participated in party politics again. I voted silently. I rejected parties and only spoke to very few intimates ever again about why I dislike political parties. So for 37 years I never thought the government really represented me. I could have been the Trump voter, but I continued to read.

I've written about my background. Failing out of high school, I went to work in the foundries, I spent thirteen years getting a college degree, and then became active in politics, not influential, but active. Seven years later I abhorred the political system. I vowed to never work for anyone and contracted for whatever I could do to stay alive. But Jan 6, 2021 changed things.

It's easy to feel that democracy is defeating you, not representing you. I understand the Trump voter, but the voices who are attempting to lead them--too many to mention– will never help their sense of loss. But I know quite well how easy it is to lose faith in the system of democracy, how easy it is to become dejected by a system that doesn't ever really seem to help the working class.That is what I am attempting to convey in my own substack posts, and how to ultimately defeat these autocratic monsters who are leading the current conflicts. I don't think democracy survives unless it restructures and becomes more inclusive.

You ask what you would do. I do not know. I know how I responded, how many of those I live around began to respond, I know how easy it is to believe in stolen elections when you feel unimportant and unrepresented. But I despise those so-called leaders who tap into the angst of those who feel despair and turn that despair into hatred. That will not help us. me. you or anyone--that will destroy not only America, but quite possibly human life. That has to be fought. And so as John Dewey once wrote to make democracy democratic it needed to become more democratic.(paraphrase).

While I don’t usually respond before some digesting of any immediate news and attempting a cross-section of commentaries, today Fani Willis was to have informed the superior courts in Atlanta of a major impending case and to “clear” their calendar. A few weeks ago it was to send a letter to law enforcement officials to be on heightened alert in July and August for a probable major indictment. Okay, that’s the news report. The commentary (outside of some excitement as it almost certainly means Trump will be part of the indictment) is she’s doing some public grandstanding and she could have informed the law enforcement agencies and the courts without the same public notice.

I have to disagree. What some are seeing as grandstanding is a masterful counter offensive against Trump’s anticipated attacks. They are masterful because they are telling just the public—but Trump himself, that she has already anticipated his attack on her through his vocal rantings and his perceived legal maneuverings and she is claiming the upper hand in the intimidation game.

And I think there is another element in the notification to the courts, she’s suggesting the courts prepare for the Trump filings and begin preparing themselves so they will prepared to swiftly deal with these issues, and I expect once the indictment is brought she is planning to be to trial pretty swiftly and I imagine she foresees, or expects a verdict well before the first Republican caucus.

The question then, if he is convicted, does he go to jail and file motions of habeas corpus or do the courts allow him to campaign in public and retry the verdict (either way he will retry it) by campaigning.

The UnUtopian Optimist

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