Pun Salad

I'm a fan of the prolific video blogger Sabine Hossenfelder. I usually prefer text to video, because I can read faster than most people talk; she's a rare exception. She usually posts on physics-related topics. But her recent video gets outside that comfort zone:

Her blurb on the blog post (What Everyone Gets Wrong about AI):

Sabine's argument is unconvincing handwaving. I'd need a lot more details on how (exactly) privately-owned AI "frontier" models will inevitably lead to a worldwide dystopia before worrying.

But her solution, "publicly-owned" AI models, almost certainly would be worse than her imagined disease. Governments not only already have "power", they have (say it with me) a monopoly on coercive power.

And, as P.J. O'Rourke memorably quipped: "Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."

I could be wrong however. Sabine is a very smart lady. Maybe this is an example where the AI-aided state will benevolently save us from those nasty AI barons.

Meanwhile, at Reason, Ron Bailey wonders: will we have Artificial Superintelligence in 4 Years, thanks to "StarGate"?

So is this the kind of thing Sabine would be OK with? Or…

Also of note:

• "You see, in this world there's two kinds of people, my friend: Those with loaded guns and those who dig. You dig." The NR editors classify Trump’s Executive Order Blitz into, yes, the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Or, specifically, "(1) clearly legal; (2) probably legal — but deserving of more attention; and (3) presumptively illegal."

  Since Pun Salad declared Trump's honeymoon over at 12:05 on January 20, let's skip down to…

  And, finally, there is the bad. On Monday, Trump announced that he would decline to enforce Congress’s ban on TikTok for 75 days while he looks for a buyer. By the plain terms of the ban — a ban that was upheld 9–0 at the Supreme Court — he does not enjoy this authority. It is true that Congress gave the executive branch the capacity to delay the implementation of the legislation for up to 90 days. But that grant came with strings — namely, that the delay be invoked only in such case as TikTok had a buyer who was under contract. Despite having been available for 270 days, TikTok is not under contract — or anything close to it. That being so, Donald Trump is obliged to honor his oath of office and faithfully execute the law. By declaring a pause that has no plausible basis in the statute, he has taken the opposite course.

  But he has the loaded guns, so… J.D. Tuccille is also EO-irritated, but probably unsurprised: With executive order avalanche, Trump continues trend toward a monarchical presidency.

  If a president wants to use the power of office to tell federal minions to mind their manners and respect individual rights, nobody should object.

  But other orders seek to exercise power beyond the boundaries of presidential authority—or even the power of the federal government. One executive order purports to redefine birthright citizenship so as to exclude those who are born to parents illegally, or legally but temporarily, in the United States.

  "This is blatantly unconstitutional," argues George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin, since the 14th Amendment "grants citizenship to anyone 'born … in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.' There is no exception for children of illegal migrants." The issue has also been addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court, which found that the provision applies to anybody subject to American law—basically, all non-diplomats.

  Fortunately, I was born in Iowa, to non-diplomatic parents.

• So I noticed this in my local paper. It's a plea from two state representatives, David Paige and Ellen Read, both Democrats, who want to Protect renters, stop HB 60.

  Did you know that a recent survey on housing costs found that 87% of rental properties in New Hampshire are unaffordable? […]

  Well… the report actually only reported this number for two-bedroom apartments, not all "rental properties". And compared that to a "median renter household income" (apparently, whether those renters are renting two-bedroom apartments or not). If your rent > 30% of your income, you are living unaffordably. By definition.

  But going on, forgiving the oversimplification:

  The truth is undeniable: affordable housing is the most urgent issue facing our state today. And make no mistake, even if you're not a renter, this statewide crisis is driving up your property taxes. For renters, finding an affordable place to live is nearly impossible. Many are paying more in rent than they would for a mortgage. When the majority of housing is out of reach, and there’s nowhere else to turn, renters are forced into debt and poverty just to secure basic shelter — or worse, face homelessness. This situation is unacceptable. The priority of legislators in Concord should be expanding access to affordable housing, reducing rent costs, and keeping Granite Staters out of poverty. Yet, instead of focusing on this critical issue, Republicans are, for the fourth time in three years, attempting to change the law that has protected tenants from unjust evictions for the past 40 years.

  The bill's text, by the way, is here. Apparently there are current rental restrictions on landlords that the bill would undo.

  Fine. But reader, is there any doubt in your mind that those current restrictions discourage the supply of rental units? And do supply restrictions cause … what to happen to rent levels? Anyone? Bueller?

Recently on the book blog:

This was on the Wall Street Journal's list of best 2024 mysteries. So, despite my mediocre impressions of the two previous books I've read by Joël Dicker, I decided to give this one a try. This book is a sequel of sorts to The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair, which I read back in 2014, and (apparently) The Baltimore Boys (which I haven't read).

This book is set mostly in New Hampshire, with side trips to Maine and Massachusetts. Locations are a mixture of the fictional and real: Conway, Wolfeboro, Rochester, etc. (The "dangerous part of Rochester" earns a visit; I didn't even know Rochester had a "dangerous part", but I haven't been everywhere in the city.)

The "affair" is the grisly murder of the titular Alaska Sanders in 1999. She was pretty, a beauty pageant winner, an aspiring model/actress, but things don't work out: our first view of her is being a corpse on a lakeshore, being eaten by a bear.

Things get resolved quickly: one suspect is shot, another confesses and goes to prison for life. Swift New Hampshire justice!

Over a decade later, the book's narrator, author Marcus Goldman, visits the murder scene, and reunites with his cop buddy, Perry Galhalowood. But there's this one little detail unearthed that causes the murder investigation to be reopened, and we are off into a very twisty plot.

So thumbs up for the plot, which (I assume) is hole-free. That's a Dicker trademark. Also (as I've noted in the past): leaden, unrealistic dialog, plastic characters, soap-opera scenarios. As Marcus and Perry proceed, startling revelations pile up, each sending their attention in a different direction, to new suspects. ("Why didn't you tell us this before now?" seems to be said a lot.) I followed along.

I know: it's fiction. However, at a certain point the plot twists seemed too-conveniently contrived. There's a limit. By the end, my page-turning was driven by a mixture of "Sigh, what's gonna happen now?" and "Let's get this over with."

One NH-based plot point struck me: a murder confession is coerced by a threatened death penalty. But (in actual fact) New Hampshire has not executed a murderer since 1939. (Want to know more about Capital punishment in New Hampshire?) I thought this was an obvious botch by Dicker, but guess what? No spoilers, but by the end of the book I realized—maybe not!

The author, historian Victor Davis Hanson, tells the story of how four civilizations were destroyed via wartime destruction of their cities: (1) Thebes, by the Macedonians in 335BC; (2) Carthage, by Romans, 149-146 BC; (3) Byzantine Constantinople, by Ottomans, in 1453; (4) Aztec Tenochtitlán, by the Spaniards, in 1521.

Those were blood-soaked times indeed! Hanson goes into meticulous detail describing each scenario, how the doomed societies were perceived by their conquerors, the tactics used, the resulting death and slavery.

Although widely separated in time and space, these four examples allow Hanson to draw some sobering common themes in his epilogue "How the Unimaginable Becomes the Inevitable". (1) The victims naïvely hoped for outside help, which failed to arrive; (2) They were not simply naïve, but also overconfident in their own defenses; (3) They were weakened somewhat by internal disagreements; (4) They were unrealistic about the capabilities of their opponents; (5) They tried to come to "understandings" with their enemies, which eventually fell apart; (6) Eventually, the losing side resorted to their own savage tactics, fruitlessly (but bloodily) trying to avoid annihilation.

Hanson is no Steven Pinker-style optimist, drawing hope from The Better Angels of our Nature. Also in that epilogue, he runs down a list present-day potential/actual hotspots, some obvious (Ukraine, Taiwan, Korea) and others less so (Turkey vs. Greece?)

I was impressed by VDH's scholarship; since I am not even at a dilettante-level student of history, I'm easily impressed. His style is a little dry. And not getting all hippy-dippy on you, but I was struck by the massive waste of human life and wealth that went into wars, on both sides. Especially that Thebes chapter; what the heck were they fighting about? Can't they all just get along? It's as if Omaha suddenly decided to conquer and destroy Des Moines!