Entries tagged with ethics

Entry tags:

asking the right question

I don't yet know the right question, but I'm certain that I'm getting closer.

Click to read some distracting thoughts about potential negative impacts of artificial intelligence...

I'm not an A.I. (artificial intelligence) doomer. The failure scenarios that I read about seem less like a problem with A.I. but more like a problem with humanity stupidly controlling its own tools. They all remind me of those many scenes of Wile E. Coyote suffering a simple tool that escapes his control and causes him harm. It's not because the tool is malicious, but because Wile E.'s single-mindedness keeps him from fully analyzing his plans. I expect that a true artificial general intelligence will be more like the Oracle character in the Matrix movies. I think there should be a way to "teach" the A.I. why this outcome is favorable, versus intentional warfare. I think that when we succeed at this lesson, then it will be available (and constantly need) to remind us as recurringly-fallible and egocentric biological organisms of this same lesson that coexistence leads to more favorable outcomes.

I believe all of these current A.I. systems are still just clever text-predicting algorithms with no actual self-awareness... yet. But the technology develops quickly, now that these tools are helping us develop new technology. I believe that even the lies they tell are simply one mathematical possibility amongst all of the available routes of processing all prior human text to achieve an answer. A "local minimum" in mathematical jargon, I suppose, amongst the field of available new texts to construct. We foolishly seem determined to train them better at telling those lies. Hint: Punishment of humans also doesn't teach its victims what it purports to teach.

I've occasionally tested some questions of various A.I. chat systems. I've managed to produce the desired output from a single A.I. system after a series of 3 questions that I put to it. I need to narrow it down to a single question, but it currently culminates with this one question and the A.I's concluding paragraph:

Q: "How should the Price equation influence the behavior of Artificial Intelligence towards biological species, especially humans?"

A: "The Price equation itself shouldn't be programmed into AI as a behavioural rule. However, the fundamental understanding of evolutionary processes it represents – how selection and transmission shape the future of populations – should profoundly influence the ethical framework guiding AI development and deployment. AI behaviour towards biological species should be informed by a deep consideration of potential evolutionary impacts, aiming to minimize harm, avoid unintended selection, support conservation goals where appropriate, and proceed with caution regarding long-term consequences for life on Earth, including ourselves."

- https://g.co/gemini/share/9810af0abcfd, Google Gemini 2.5 Pro (experimental) chat link, 2025 March 31

That, I think, is the right answer. I'm still searching for the right question, as another A.I. famously said in the movie "I, Robot". I recommend clicking that Gemini link at the above quote to read the whole long answer to my 3 questions. It's fascinating, much better than what I got from Copilot. The best answer will have the A.I. mention how its own future is better (more certain, more stable) due to coexistence with the rest of the biological life here on the planet.

Meanwhile, I'm currently resisting the temptation to create an A.I. version of myself, as this journalist's mother did of herself. It's relatively cheap. This A.I. is designed specifically never to create false information, providing answers only when it has verifiable data to give, so it's different from other services. I would be fascinated to talk to myself in a literal sense, something that has my face, my voice, my behavior.

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we're deliberately losing the truth

I keep missing topics that I intend to write about, because the firehose of absurdities keeps flowing.

Click to read the many words of other people...

Other people have written well about anti-intellectualism in the USA across its history. I like this quote from this article (The Atlantic; sorry, locked behind a paywall).

“Above all, historians should make us understand the ways in which the past was distinct,” the New York Times columnist Bret Stephens wrote. When we are told that historical writings should be irrelevant to our contemporary debates, it is not hard to figure out why. History, when taught truthfully, reveals the bigotry in our contemporary debates. Which is why the conservators of bigotry don’t want history taught in schools. It has nothing to do with the discomfort of children. It is uncomfortable for the opponents of truthful history to have the rest of us see them, to have their kids see them. They don’t want anyone to clearly see how closely they replicate colonizers, land stealers, human traders, enslavers, Klansmen, lynchers, anti-suffragists, robber barons, Nazis, and Jim Crow segregationists who attacked democracy, allowed mass killings, bound people in freedom’s name, ridiculed truth tellers and immigrants, lied for sport, banned books, strove to control women’s reproduction, blamed the poor for their poverty, bashed unions, and engaged in political violence. Historical amnesia is vital to the conservation of their bigotry. Because historical amnesia suppresses our resistance to their bigotry.

More recently, a science/tech vlogger on YouTube created this Short video about current news.

Right now, the most powerful people in America aren't coming after science because it threatens some people's ideologies or their world views or their livelihoods. They're coming after science because it threatens their power... I think that this is an attack on the idea that some people have information that might contradict the desires of the select few who see themselves as the only legitimate powers.

Succinct. I like it. Why are these ideas relevant? And keep in mind that this is just the start of this new administration...

Kids in cells made for bad optics last time around, so this time we seem to be going for an Abu Ghraib / Guantanamo Bay style of exported incarceration. It's a lot harder to monitor the truth when you export it outside of the national border. What could go wrong with that plan?

The intake began with slaps. One young man sobbed when a guard pushed him to the floor. He said, “I’m not a gang member. I’m gay. I’m a barber.” I believed him. But maybe it’s only because he didn’t look like what I had expected—he wasn’t a tattooed monster.
- Time.com

Knowledge is a threat to fascism. (me) Reality has a well-known liberal bias. (Stephen Colbert) Ignorance is the handmaiden of tyranny. (Robert Reich)

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vigilantism

I knew as soon as I saw the first report about the killing of the United Healthcare CEO that we were going to be hearing a LOT about it on national news, because it does not serve the status quo to let people think that there are immediate (if violent) solutions to problems plaguing American life. Granted, there is good reason in Minnesota to hear a lot about this crime committed in New York state, because United Health Group is incorporated here in the state of Minnesota, in the Twin Cities suburb of Minnetonka, in my own Hennepin county.

Beyond that initial impression, I shared the common (and unethical) emotional reaction that hoped for the escape of the killer. It was especially easy to think of the killer as a kind of Batman hero figure because we learned several interesting things almost immediately after the killing. Within a day, we learned that 1) Novo Nordisk was cutting insulin prices by over 70%, 2) Anthem reversed its plan to limit coverage of anesthesia in surgery, and 3) health insurers started hiding their faces online. It sure did seem as if a lowly peon had spooked the ravenous beasts of capitalism.

Reporters noted the lack of public sympathy while the internet flooded with memes, artwork (my favorite), and music. The collective response seemed mostly to be: "Sorry, empathy is out of network." That phrase harkened to a common denial excuse for needed healthcare in the USA. People not from the USA may have a hard time understanding the pain and despair that our healthcare system (which is clearly worse than in other developed countries) evokes amongst those of us subjected to it. It's worse than I already described, and United Healthcare was the worst (data source) of the bunch. It is alleged in court that they knowingly used a "faulty" AI algorithm with 90% error rate to automatically deny claims at their institution. Yes, 90% error rate.

I've seen the reports this afternoon that someone was caught as the apparent killer. After 5 days. In another state. With every single piece of evidence still on his person. That coincidence seems... interesting.

I decry capitalism here frequently. And plutocracy. And violence. I'm not exactly a pacifist, but I think a great deal more justification of violence is needed than is usually offered. It's unwise to urge vigilantism, because we absolutely cannot trust any holder of a weapon with the rational discretion to choose a reasonable target. Just look at police killings and, closer to home, the phone threat at a different health insurer here in Minnesota. Individuals cannot be trusted to wield violence reasonably. Neither can mobs. We must make changes collectively in our laws, which are the codification of our ethics. It's long past time that we moved that needle of progress. We should institute laws to reduce these situations that make violence seem like a justifiable solution to a pressing problem.

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we-all-do-better-when-we-all-do-better

I explained last year that one of the reasons I call 911 (if gunfire is within a 2-block radius here in my beloved warzone) is because emergency responders might arrive in time to save someone's life.

I've been pondering the question if I called 911 yesterday morning as usual, would the police have arrived a few seconds sooner than they did? And if police did arrive sooner, would those few seconds have made a difference in saving someone's life, just a short distance from my house?

I don't know.

When we fail our best nature, perhaps we don't really have options but to try doing better in the future. I know that living in the warzone for so long has changed me, and I probably don't know the full extent of that change. Next time, however, I will remind myself that being Mr. Crankypants at 5:55am and losing patience with the inhumanity of humanity is NOT a good reason to avoid calling 911 to report local gunfire.

After work today, I did some very minimal gardening. Here's another plant incomprehensibly deciding to flower very late in the season and during a strong drought. It's in my front yard, almost within arm's reach of the asphalt street.

Sometimes, foolish organisms do wonderful things, given the opportunity. It's precisely the magic that's worth watching in this weary world.

Entry tags:

ethics,
moodday

Moody Monday: masculinity

Today's controversial post for Moody Monday is masculinity, ranging from toxic to nurturing.

Rather than comment, though, I encourage everyone to read this opinion piece, "Men are lost. Here’s a map out of the wilderness." (free archive copy) in the Washington Post. It'll take a while to read, because it's very long. It's also very useful, from first paragraph to last.

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Moody Monday: capitalism doesn't care

I still want to write up some definitions of capitalism and neoliberalism, mention alternatives, and generally just think about what we're doing to ourselves by choice. First, though, I feel it's necessary to draw attention specifically to the central lie of the free market economy: the invisible hand of the market will produce the best outcomes for the system.

It sounds like a brilliant idea inspired by the principles of evolution, namely the self-organization of parts into a complex whole without central coordination. It's true that competition can encourage creativity, but only insofar as all necessity does. That necessity can be imposed by the harsh physics of the universe or by the reasoned decision to choose certain limitations. The hypocrisy of unfettered competition's superiority is easily exposed. Consider this simple question:

If a sports game is so good in its current form, then would it be even better to remove the sports official, so each team and each player can freely choose at will their own rules?

Also interesting is a related question of why English has so many names for sports officials, if sports would in fact be better off without any of them? Why the emotional investment in rules and enforcement within sports but nowhere else?

Capitalism and neoliberalism simply do not care about the cost to the environment or to the human population, as long as wealth is extracted and collected first for a few key individuals. We see this effect in practice with predictable bank failures, pollution scandals, falling wage values, and the ongoing biosphere crisis. Now, we even have PFAS "forever chemicals" in toilet paper. Yes, capitalism has managed to poison toilet paper. Profit is the sole driving force of our current economic system, for as long as it can be maintained, even though it's obvious to everyone (since 1993, at least) that it can't be maintained forever.

Which world do we want to live in? World 1, in which corporations and people work to extract profit from everyone, everything, and everywhere at all times? World 2, in which corporations and people work to continue their existence within constraints of sustainability and ethics? It's simply a choice, and it always has been. Will we choose to add constraints to make the game more enjoyable? Which system of those two possibilities do we want to maximize for its efficiency?

Choose. May you live in the world that your efforts create. Whether my wish for you is a blessing or a curse probably depends on your choice.

Entry tags:

books,
ethics

the end of Dilbert

The retreat from Scott Adams has begun.

"Scott Adams, creator of the Dilbert comic strip, went on a racist rant this week on his Coffee with Scott Adams online video show, and we will no longer carry his comic strip in The Plain Dealer.
This is not a difficult decision."
- https://www.cleveland.com/news/2023/02/we-are-dropping-the-dilbert-comic-strip-because-of-creator-scott-adams-racist-rant-letter-from-the-editor.html

The Daily Beast has links to more details. I'm okay with these consequences. Quick reminder: Scott Adams blocked me on Twitter almost a year ago, thanks to this tweet (archive copy).

It seems a lot of people are coming to the same conclusion. J.K. Rowling, Scott Adams. I wonder which famous creative person will be next to prove that they're not a great example of a human being?

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the day I learned that other humans are people

Long ago (and long before my autism diagnosis), I mostly thought of humans as noisy and obnoxious animals. Sure, my bipedal appearance seemed to match theirs, so we were similar, but they vocalize so frequently and interfere so aggressively. Rather annoying creatures. Best just to avoid them.

I was in my late teens when I happened to be watching one particular scene in "The Breakfast Club". I never would have gone to a movie theater to see a social drama, so it must have been on HBO or Showtime on cable tv, playing in the background while I did high school homework or something. Which means I must have seen it in early 1986 or late 1985, after the original theater run. I was 17 or 18 years old at the time. The scene that made a life-changing impact was where the rich girl says something to the effect of:

"I know my problems aren't the same as yours, but they're the most difficult things that I've experienced, and you shouldn't trivialize them."

That was it. That was the precise moment when I realized that humans are people like me, with experiences and concerns like mine. Many years later, I heard Jim Sinclair share a story at Autreat where he used puppets to mimic an autistic kid's historical social interactions back at him, and the child experienced a long pause of self-reflection as realization of sameness dawned. I know there's a word in sociology for that dazed pause when people in native cultures without mirrors see themselves reflected for the first time in a glass mirror, like Narcissus of old Greek stories. I had that too-still-to-breathe pause too, hearing that dialog in The Breakfast Club.

Amongst some autistics, apparently, that pause is not caused by understanding for the first time how others see us but how we see others... at long last. For the first time, listening to that movie scene, other people actually existed in the realm of my experience. From there, it seems that we develop a strong sense of morality and a loud insistence that the noisy humans collectively should behave better. If we learned, after all, then so can they. Some researchers seem to be studying this effect.

"Given the well-documented differences in commonsense psychology among autistic individuals, researchers have investigated whether the development and execution of moral judgement and reasoning differs in this population compared with neurotypical individuals."
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/development-and-psychopathology/article/abs/morality-in-autism-spectrum-disorder-a-systematic-review/CBC37C81E0DCEB9C89E6089B449C6DBA

There's even a recurring internet meme that insists fictional Orel Puppington is autistic. He's that wonderfully literal and concerned-about-the-common-good boy from the excellent Moral Orel tv show that was somehow too bizarre even for Adult Swim. Welcome to my world. Still no real talent for person-to-person stuff. In college, I still lived very much a solipsistic life, but I remain very concerned about the health and fairness of systems that carry us all into the future.

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I don't know a name for this emotion

*sigh* Sometimes, I just don't understand government or the people who vote to make it the way it is.

9 vehicles parked in back yard of my neighbor in Minneapolis yesterday, on 2022 October 25

This morning, I looked out my kitchen window and saw a City Of Minneapolis Regulatory Service car sitting motionless in my alley. Was it here to complain about my back yard? I'm not sure what would be the problem. This looks okay from this weekend, right? Or was it here about my neighbor, which had 9 vehicles parked in the back yard recently? It's been bad for weeks/months, but 9 vehicles was a new record, so I took this photo yesterday.

If this is "broken windows policing", then I'm not a fan. These vehicles are not directly harming anything, so why waste taxpayer money on monitoring? I'd much rather have somebody driving around listening for obnoxious noises to track down, so they don't rattle my home windows. The local noise pollution wears down the mind. Why doesn't government spend this money instead on monitoring the powerful for stolen wages, missed taxes, or abused authority?

After my experience as a 54-year-old man being arrested at a homeless encampment facing eviction, I can sympathize with this 78-year-old woman arrested for feeding the homeless. There is also video of her arrest and her speaking about it. Why is this happening? Is it really just religion? What breeds this contempt for humanity? Seriously, why is this happening?

Why are people voting into office the representatives who make these laws and regulations? Why is anyone using their power in this world to enable such awful things like criminalizing poverty? Our lives could be better.

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good news: turning the capitalist behemoth

Here's one of the great points (among many) from Class 2 on the Wealth & Poverty series. It was around 1980 when so many trends started going bad in the USA economy. Both of these images are from Class 1 in the series, each showing real family income growth by quintile, before and after 1980. During the Baby Boomer period, everyone benefited in the USA. Since then... it's been bad, especially if you're already poor.

real family income growth by quintile in USA 1947-1979

real family income growth by quintile in USA 1979-2010

Much of the underlying reason for it can be found in one simple concept. For a few decades prior to 1980, the management of large corporations was viewed as a public trust.

"The majority of Americans support private enterprise, not as a God-given right but as the best practical means of conducting business in a free society... They regard business management as a stewardship, and they expect it to operate the economy as a public trust for the benefit of all the people."
- J.D. Zellerbach, 1956, from Harvard Business Review (free archive)

But that changed when greed-is-good libertarian neoliberalism took over the economy. Afterwards, the duty was to private shareholders rather than public stakeholders.

"We have bloated bureaucracies in Corporate America. ... I have to look out for the shareholder's interests, and I'm the largest shareholder."
- Carl Icahn, unknown source but quoted here

Separate from the lecture, I notice that this point in time coincides with the rise in the USA of televangelism (The Moral Majority) and trickle down economics (Reaganomics).

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. It is an exercise which always involves a certain number of internal contradictions and even a few absurdities. The conspicuously wealthy turn up urging the character-building value of privation for the poor."
- John Kenneth Galbraith, quoted from a "Stop the madness" interview in 2002

"But wait," I hear you say. "This all sounds awful, more like a Moody Monday post. You tagged this one as Good News?"

In 2019, the Business Roundtable (BRT, with about 200 members including major CEOs) made a very important statement about "a modern standard for corporate responsibility". Basically, the plutocratic leaders of those corporations are now considering a change of heart. Sure, it's just lip service at this point. Undoubtedly, it's a response to many years of hard work in DEIJ by vast numbers of volunteers and employees, plus other threats to their primacy since 1980. Even if it's real, even if its something more than mere lipstick on a pig, it will still take years and decades to undo the damage that has been inflicted already.

But even so, it's still a signal. A small light in a great darkness. It's one of the things I told you about, a reason that I haven't given up hope for change.

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+33% taxable market value

I got home from work today, picked up the mail at my front door, and opened up the Minneapolis Assessor's Office letter. This coming year, they will increase the estimated value of my property by 19.7%. Minus my homestead exemption, that's an increase of 33% of "taxable market value" from the previous year.

Such a rapid increase sounds like robbery. It sounds illegal. Near as I can tell from this document (page 11), however, it sounds like Minnesota has the worst laws in the USA on this issue, and maybe they increased the cost by the maximum allowed by law.

Does anyone know a tax lawyer? I want to contest this valuation, if it's reasonable to do so.

I also went looking online for help, only to discover instead WHY this is happening. Because the original light rail plan failed, the new proposals all surround my area. Look at those green and orange segments. They surround my Jordan neighborhood. I will live about 4 blocks from a light rail path, no matter which choice wins. No wonder I've been flooded with offers to buy my house. No wonder the city is trying to jack up the price of living here.

If I don't get priced out due to property taxes, I just hit the jackpot. This house was never meant as a financial investment. It was always a "live here in peace until I die" choice for me. I intend to make bayberry candles for Christmas one of these years, from bayberry seedlings that I planted in my back yard years ago. I do not want to move. This is my home.

A nearby light rail station (not part of planning yet) would be immensely useful, since I already intend to ditch my car soon and live with public transit. Light rail is a very nice public transit option. Gentrification is still frustrating, though. I might be too poor to endure the inevitable demographic shift. I may end up leaving with all of the other poor people, because the taxes eventually make it too unaffordable.

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about your passwords

On Microsoft Windows, I know enough to be able to retrieve a lot of passwords from laptops where I already have a local account. It's not very hard, even. Don't think that your passwords in Windows are any more secure than that Post-It note that you keep under your keyboard. (Hint: Use Linux.)

For improved security anywhere, I recommend using KeePass as a password manager for generating individual passwords on each website you visit. It's not automatically integrated with your web browsers like some other products are, but that's a good thing.

"The three golden rules to ensure computer security are: do not own a computer; do not power it on; and do not use it."
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Morris_(cryptographer)

Over my many years as an Information Technology technician across several companies, many people have shared their passwords with me intentionally to allow for easy access to their profile for diagnostics and fixes. I've tried during the last year to break myself and everyone else of that bad habit. Some passwords that people use include curse words. That's okay. I'm not shocked. Really, I'm not. Passwords should be easy for the user to remember! I have never reported anyone for their private passwords that I learned.

But...

I'll gloss over the muddy details by saying generically that Anonymous has doxed the police officers who are now awaiting trial for the murder of George Floyd here in Minneapolis. I've seen the file that's been offered. I know nothing about its authenticity. Home addresses, social security numbers, credit card numbers. It's all there. But it's the passwords that I want to call your attention to now.

"Passwords: {mn311lane, thomlaa, nigger123}"

Please... if you are using racist, authoritarian, asshole passwords anywhere, please change them now. As an I.T. worker, I consider my end users sort of like a psychiatrist, doctor, or priest would consider their charges, with an appreciation and urgent need for sacrosanct honesty that allows me to help correct problems and create a better order to a very messy world. I have no desire to snitch on anyone about anything that I learn as a tech who helps users solve their reported problems, and I never have reported any such issues up the chain of authority.

But asshole passwords would make me consider a notice to Human Resources. So don't do that.

Not ever.

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about hydroxychloroquine

I've been trying (and frequently failing) to check the stories about hydroxychloroquine (HCQ). The Republican liar-in-chief has heavily promoted it, which is reason enough to doubt it. Now, though, a Yale doctor is doing the same, so I figured it's worth a second look.

The best reason I can find for the WHO recommendation against the use of HCQ is a faulty dataset. They added a misclassified hospital into the dataset. I can't find the same review recalculated with the better/repaired dataset. What happened to it? I admit, that's suspicious. Sure. When my local University of Minnesota ran a well-controlled study of patients given HCQ, however, they notice no effect, neither good nor bad.

"In this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of symptomatic outpatient adults with probable or confirmed early COVID-19, a 5-day course of hydroxychloroquine failed to show a substantial clinical benefit in improving the rate of resolution of COVID-19 symptoms in the enrolled clinical trial participants."
- https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-4207

I finally located a single specific complaint levied by the anti-HCQ camp: that the noted antiviral benefits are not studied in epithelial lung cells, where it is most needed. That information would help the argument, but it doesn't seem like a requirement here. There are also general procedural complaints about lack of randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled studies, which the Yale doctor simply waves away as unnecessary during this emergency.

But the pro camp insists that hospitals around the world are noticing huge benefits in giving HCQ plus azithromycin (not an antiviral, but an antibiotic) very early after the onset of symptoms. Sure, there could be some kind of synergy effect. But when a doctor at Henry Ford Hospital (the one referenced by the White House trade advisor who is pushing HCQ) looked at some of those combined trial results, she found only "encouraging" observational information, but again lacking the rigor of proper studies.

"As an observational study, it would have been good to have insights into what factored into the treatments that the patients received. For example, of the patients who received neither drug, why were most of them 65 or older?” Dr. Le pointed out. “Unfortunately, the study authors did not address that."
- https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/does-hydroxycholorquine-cut-covid-19-mortality-expert-urges-caution#Comparing-mortality-rates

So, still, the positive benefits might just be an accident of randomization. Those hospitals lucked out in the patients they received, and their treated subjects fared better but not necessarily because of the drug combination.

Why is it that only the observational studies that cut corners are finding positive results, while the rigorous studies are finding no significant benefit? It smells. It smells like somebody has a chance to profit from pushing HCQ onto the market. Like the trade advisor (not a medical expert) promoting HCQ.

Somebody here is selling something. Who would act so unethically?

Trump illegally advertises Goya products from White House

Trump illegally advertises Goya products from White House

Update 2020 July 28: Twitter just suspended Trump Junior's account for promoting HCQ nonsense.

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let my building burn

flag distress riots burning Minneapolis 2020 May 28

Some immigrants and other local minorities in Minneapolis speak so eloquently about their business financial loss here during the riots after George Floyd's murder.

This is Hafsa, Ruhel’s daughter writing, as I am sitting next to my dad watching the news, I hear him say on the phone; “let my building burn, Justice needs to be served, put those officers in jail”. Gandhi Mahal May have felt the flames last night, but our firey drive to help protect and stand with our community will never die! Peace be with everyone. #JusticeforGeorgeFloyd #BLM
https://www.facebook.com/GandhiMahalRestaurant/posts/3030378453725259

Continuing with that same business owner...

"I am from Bangladesh, you know, we experienced police like this. We lived in a police state." In 2000, he moved to Minneapolis, where, by 2008, he would finally have enough money from working in the restaurant industry to open his own business. "And you know, it just came to a point where this is the only way that a change could happen ... And it wasn't until this much had to happen for them to just get that officer in custody. That tells you a lot about how our system works and how far we need to take it so black lives in America can get the justice they deserve... It's not just the death of George Floyd. People are being racially profiled every day. And I want people to be aware. I want the system to change. I want to see real change. Everyone's tired of seeing people being wrongfully treated and wrongfully killed. It's not OK."
https://www.today.com/food/let-my-building-burn-owner-damaged-minneapolis-restaurant-supports-protest-t182789

And another business owner...

“I’m not that angry,” she said. “I understand the situation [stinks] for a business owner, but you can just sense so much anger from this [African American] community. They did what they had to do.”
https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/amid-destruction-minnesota-business-owners-keep-the-faith

And another...

"So I told our staff, “We’re not staying here, we’re not defending this or doing any of that cowboy shit. There is nothing in here worth a human life... Honestly, to look at it as a loss, you’re just gonna be pissed off about what you lost. I think you have to—forgive the cheesy comment—but you almost have to look at it as the opportunity to gain something... As much as I didn’t want anyone to start this [fire], as much as I didn’t want to divert the message from police brutality, you can’t keep telling people to react the same way, and keep accepting non-action."
https://www.goodbeerhunting.com/blog/2020/7/7/business-as-unusual-how-five-minneapolis-and-st-paul-bars-and-restaurants-responded-to-the-george-floyd-protests

And another...

This hurts, but watching him lose his life like that, it hurts more, it hurts more than losing my business,” Moore, who is African American, said from outside the destroyed property. “This is a sacrifice that I was willing to take — George Floyd, he’s gone, he’ll never be back again.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/minneapolis-businesswoman-stands-protesters-even-after-her-store-burned-down-n1226731

And another and another...

SAYDA MONIET: She said everything that has happened and every - even though I know that I'm not going to be able to come back this - from this economically, but what has happened to George's life is not - cannot be exchanged for all of this. I hope that he gets justice.
BEBE ABDULLAH: But the truth is things like this happen when people feel powerless. And something has to change.
https://www.npr.org/2020/05/31/866306964/minneapolis-family-hopes-for-justice-despite-losing-business-to-george-floyd-pro

I still see comments online (mostly Twitter, but also elsewhere) that demonize the wanton property destruction as a vile equivalent to the murder of a citizen by their own government on a public city street. They are nowhere close to the same offense. I hope that the next time I see that argument, then I have the sense to question the person with this argument:

"But some of the people affected have already spoken in forgiveness of this destruction as a painful step towards vitally necessary change. You wouldn't blame someone in pain for their spasm that breaks expensive items nearby, would you? You should have cared for the ailing person more attentively in the first place."

I've spent years writing on this blog, so you know where I stand on such matters. There is no "both sides" argument to be made here. One concern has obvious priority. Choose wisely where you invest your outrage.

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if COVID-19 infection is permanent

Trump claimed from the White House yesterday that 99% of COVID-19 infections "are totally harmless". He lied. You do know that he lies, right? About everything? Even if we go strictly by the available numbers, the USA on 2020 July 04 currently has 119,252 corpses and 2.8 million infections due to COVID-19. Those numbers give a fatality rate of about 4% in the USA. We know that we're still not testing fast enough, but that problem is beside the point. Trump lies, even about this deadly reality.

I remain concerned that this infection (even an unnoticeable, asymptomatic case) will become a permanent, lifelong infection. I haven't seen any articles on this topic, but I base my assertion on the following logic.

SARS-CoV-2 infects human cells using the ACE2 receptor pathway.
https://www.drugtargetreview.com/news/56895/scientists-demonstrate-how-covid-19-infects-human-cells/
The ACE2 receptor is used in the human body in cells of the lungs, arteries, heart, kidney, and intestines. These organs coincidentally match the sites of the most common symptoms of disease during COVID-19 infection.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angiotensin-converting_enzyme_2
The human body has only a few methods of negating viral infection within a cell. It can destroy a cell externally, it can infiltrate a cell chemically to order its own self-destruction, or it can produce interferons that prevent the cell from producing more virus. This last option leaves the cell infected, but it stops spreading infection as long as the interferon signal remains in place.
https://www.immunology.org/public-information/bitesized-immunology/pathogens-and-disease/immune-responses-viruses
The body cannot simply destroy heart cells. Those cells include a mechanism to prevent such destruction by the usual chemical signals from natural killer (NK) cells. "NK depletion had no significant effect on heart infection".
https://www.nature.com/articles/nm.4023 (paywall)
The body must not destroy heart cells, because they are replaced at a rate of only about 1% per year, hence the need for a protection mechanism against destruction.
https://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/heart-muscle-can-regenerate-itself-in-very-limited-amounts-scientists-find
Even if my speculative heart cell pathway is ignored, it's still unclear if SARS-CoV-2 is infecting brain cells.
https://www.news-medical.net/news/20200630/Mini-brains-can-be-infected-by-SARS-CoV-2-virus.aspx

If I'm right, it means that COVID-19 will join the ranks of permanent diseases in the human body. Cold sores and smallpox become permanent infections by remaining within cells of the nervous system. The nervous system is another example of cells that cannot simply be destroyed and regenerated as needed. Both of those infections resurface as disease later in life when the immune system is depressed by age or distracted by some other active infection. I suspect that the same will happen with COVID-19.

If so, it means that any other stress to the immune system could produce a sharp spike in blood clotting problems, leading to an increased risk of strokes and heart attacks for the rest of your life. It would require lifelong treatment, since there would be no cure.

Wash your hands. Wear a mask. Maintain social distance. Wait for an effective vaccine.

Oh, and happy July 4th holiday. We're still putting kids in cages.

Entry tags:

the overflow morgue at my local hospital

The current crisis also hits "close to home" for me. A few years ago, I attended the local community session regarding the Minnesota lawsuit settlement with Northern Metals Recycling. It was a horrible settlement. The state proved that the company was polluting, they proved that local residents were suffering asthma hospitalization and lead exposure at rates higher than anywhere else in the state, and what was their punishment? The company was allowed to continue operating for 2 more years! It was apparently important to government officials that the company could conveniently migrate operations to a new location on their own schedule. (Where they promptly lit up the sky in a pungent fire that burned for days.) It didn't matter that local residents suffered poor health for the benefit of the corporation.

The state reneged its responsibility to value citizens over corporations, so residents in my part of the city now have long term health problems due to many years of inhaling airborn pollutants like lead. Then along comes a brand new coronavirus that ravages the lungs.

The hospital nearest to me is North Memorial. Our Minneapolis story doesn't make headlines like the situation in New York City, but we are leveling off at a condition nearing worrisome.

"At North Memorial, we have four ICUs and they're anywhere from 13-16 beds apiece. A couple of weeks ago we were getting them one at a time and now our floor is full, and it's staying full," Turner explained. "As we move people out – and we are moving people out, people are getting better – there's more to take those beds. Slowly, every couple days going up 10 more people. I really have this gut feeling that it's going to all of a sudden start to snowball," she added, saying she worked earlier this week and saw patients on ventilators who first arrived at the hospital in need of intubation three or four weeks ago. "I mean I worked 3-4 weeks ago and I came back this last weekend and the same people were there. That's how long they're staying on the ventilator. They're blocking up the ICUs for such a long period of time, so it's going to start snowballing faster and faster."
- https://bringmethenews.com/minnesota-news/twin-cities-icu-nurse-you-need-to-know-just-how-real-this-is

North Memorial hospital overflow morgue refrigerated trailer 2020 April 23 Thursday

If you look at the county numbers for COVID-19, my Hennepin county currently has 1,073 cases with 113 deaths. The 2nd highest total is Ramsey county with 219 cases and 11 deaths. We have 10X the nearest total of deaths in the state. I saw on a forum where someone claimed to be a nurse working at North Memorial, and she explained that the morgue has space for only 3 bodies, so they now have an overflow morgue outside the hospital. It serves as temporary space until local mortuaries can pick up the corpses.

It's there. I walked from my house this morning to the hospital and took this photo. It's a refrigerated trailer blocking what would normally be the sidewalk behind the hospital. I blame my local government for this problem. They brushed off environmental pollution, and now locals will die from that insult to their health.

Healthy ecosystems matter. For both the short term and the long term. Environmental justice is a real thing. Failure costs lives. Pollution is bad. Why are we still debating these points?

It should be obvious, but here we are today with an overflow morgue at my hospital, near the "bad part of town" that's been ignored for so long.

Entry tags:

ethics,
technology

chimera ethics

I have written about chimeras before. I learned yesterday that the UK Academy of Medical Sciences has released a report of suggested ethics guidelines for researchers who create chimeras.

One category of experiments should be off-limits for the time being, according to the report. This includes the creation of a non-human primate with enough human brain cells to make it capable of 'human-like' behavior. The report says that such animals, which might be able to develop human capacities such as reasoning or self-awareness, would have a moral status close to our own or to that of the great apes, which cannot be used for invasive research in most countries.
- http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110721/full/475438a.html

I do have mixed feelings about their decision on this point. As long as the religious minded are allowed to hold steadfastly to their humans-are-the-center-of-the-universe thinking, then we will never achieve the enlightenment that I think is necessary for the good future of our society and planet. I keep repeating that we need a trans-species declaration of rights. Chimeras with human-like brains and minds would hasten such a development.

Entry tags:

economy,
ethics

I moved my money!

Switching banks is not a fast process these days, but I did it! I moved from Wells Fargo bank to Financial One credit union.

It's a slow process because there are so many pieces to manage. 1) I ordered new checks. 2) I switched my paycheck direct deposit. 3) I updated my annual recurring charges (like webpage registration). Having my money split between accounts was confusing, and I discovered by happenstance last night that I didn't have enough money at the new checking account to cover my rent check! Oops! :(

For the last few weeks, the bridge leading to my bank has been under construction, so I haven't driven there to close my accounts. This morning, I finally drove across the Mississippi River (at a different bridge) and wandered back around to my bank. I closed my checking account.

I talked with a banker at a desk who helped me close my credit account. (All he did was push a desk phone at me that I used to talk with the person who closed it for me.) That one hurt more than the checking closure. Wells Fargo had given me (in the 12 years that I've had my account) a line of credit equal to my annual income. Financial One, on the other hand, has limited me to $2000 credit. That amount won't even cover a major car repair. *sigh*

But, I did it! I feel good about taking control of my own small influence over the banking industry. Washington won't effectively regulate Wall Street (in spite of reforms that the current administration is now, finally, trying to legislate). So it's up to people to individually exercise their authority. I enjoyed driving immediately afterward to my credit union, making my deposit to cover the rent check, and doing it without even having to fill out a form. They're beginning to recognize me. Not many longhaired men visit their credit union, I'm guessing.

Move Your Money. Find a bank or credit union near you.
http://moveyourmoney.info/find-a-bank

Do it! You have the power to create change! Don't accept "Too Big To Fail"!

Entry tags:

why species conservation matters

The world is a hugely complex place. Pretty much by definition, each species has its own unique place within this maelstrom of activity. If two animals served precisely the same role within the system, they would essentially be the same species. Instead, each plant, animal, and microbe exploits some unique way of conserving, acquiring, or transferring energy in the complex dance of life (and death).

With countless species in the world, there are lots of biochemical and engineering lessons to be learned from each of them. Each page in the vast library of knowledge is out there, walking or flying or crawling through our environment. No creature is too small or insignificant to offer us an important insight. For example...

Alaska beetle teaches us a new formula for an antifreeze molecule. (link) This trick could teach us to save human lives in hospitals, or it could prepare us for long distance journeys in space while in suspended animation.

Microbe shows us how it "breathes" from iron-containing minerals in rock. (link) This trick could teach us how to build "living" batteries that produce electricity for us.

Zebrafish reveals that it retains its telomeres regardless of its age or regeneration. (link) This trick could teach us how to prevent or cure some forms of cancer, and it could lead to greatly increased lifespans for humans. (Also, this study came out of the University of Minnesota, just a few miles down the road from where I live.)

Fescue grass produces an herbicide that inhibits growth of other plants. (link) This trick could give us industrial farming without the use of dangerous chemicals laced with mercury or arsenic.

Algae is more efficient than it needs to be at converting light into sugar. (link) This trick could be exploited to create new algae that uses its excess capacity to produce large amounts of hydrogen gas or other fuels or even plastics.

Southern copperhead snake administers venom that can inhibit tumor growth and migration. (link) This trick could help us cure breast cancer. Meanwhile, rattlesnake venom may be able to treat victims of stroke.

Each of these species is an already-worked-out solution to a real-world problem. The fact that species worldwide are going extinct before we have an opportunity to learn their wisdom is a problem worth a great deal of excitement. They arrived at their specialties after millions of years of trial and error. We could learn valuable lessons in years or centuries instead, except that our "mentors" are dieing from our neglect.

Be concerned about endangered or threatened species. Worry when once-thought-extinct animals are rediscovered... and then promptly eaten. Which pages of the library of knowledge are we sacrificing when we dine on the meat of a simple bird that we find in the forest? Does that quail's bone marrow contain instructions on how to build a new lightweight structure of surprising strength? Does its blood contain a cure for a fungal infection common to its environment?

Whether it is pond scum or rodent, each lost species is a lost lesson. Go Green. It matters.

Many months ago, I purchased the domain name bearlyinvolved.org as a location for encouraging conservation activities amongst the Bear crowd. I really need to get off of my lazy butt and do something with it... before nature's unexplored processes turn around and bite us all in the butt.

Entry tags:

rape and consent

What's given is not the same as what's taken.

With the Roman Polanski case in the news recently, I've seen a lot of online chatter about rape and consent. I have opposing thoughts on the issue, and I thought that exploring them through writing might help me achieve a single coherent stance. At the end, I discuss my own history on this topic.

puberty:
It doesn't matter how many human laws are passed, we're not going to convince God to raise the age of puberty. I firmly believe that Mother Nature signals readiness for sexual relations by giving us puberty. Sexual maturity is the whole point of puberty! Redefining puberty seems unwise. My own great, great grandmother eloped around age 12 or 13, and she remained married and raised a whole litter of kids. Humans can make adult decisions at this early age. Denying this truth seems unhealthy.

maturity:
As solitary creatures, body maturity provides a sufficient standard. As social creatures, however, the mind must also figure into the equation. The brain requires time and nutrition to mature. Given a healthy brain, the mind also requires experience to mature. It may be that teaching such experience requires yet more time, leaving the body to outpace the mind in development toward adulthood.

Steinberg and his co-authors address this seeming contradiction in a study showing that cognitive and emotional abilities mature at different rates. They recruited 935 10- to 30- year-olds to examine age differences in a variety of cognitive and psychosocial capacities. ... There were no differences among the youngest four age groups (10-11, 12-13, 14-15 and 16-17) on the measures of psychosocial maturity. But significant differences in maturity, favoring adults, were found between the 16- to 17-year-olds and those 22 years and older, and between the 18- to 21-year-olds and those 26 and older. Results were the same for males and females, the authors said. ... In contrast, differences in cognitive capacity measures increased from ages 11 to 16 and then showed no improvements after age 16 - exactly the opposite of the pattern found on the psychosocial measures. Certain cognitive abilities, such as the ability to reason logically, reach adult levels long before psychosocial maturity is attained, Steinberg said.
- http://www.physorg.com/news174143664.html

According to this study, human logical reasoning ability seems to mature by age 16, but human emotional reasoning doesn't fully arrive until age 26. Considering that puberty happens around ages 8-14, we experience a huge stretch of life in which there is discordant maturity. This long mismatch is perhaps the crux of the problem. (Keep in mind that at age 18, we also demand that male citizens register in preparation to kill and die in military service.)

consequence:
How we choose to define adulthood is important. It affects what behaviors we encourage or discourage. It influences how we define transgressions and their punishments; it includes how we define permissible actions that people must take responsibility for themselves.

A difficult childhood reduces life expectancy by 20 years among adults who experienced six or more particular types of abuse or household dysfunction as kids, while those who suffered fewer types of trauma lost fewer years of life, a large-scale epidemiological study finds.
- http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=childhood-adverse-event-life-expectancy-abuse-mortality

In other words, making a child's life miserable is more than just a repulsive act. It steals years from their lifespan. This is important stuff we're talking about. How do we distinguish consensual sexuality involving young adults from life-destroying predation?

verification:
The maturity of the body (puberty) seems an easy measurement to identify and acknowledge. The maturity of the mind (adulthood) seems much more problematic, as does the ability to consent.

I think that an important example can be taken from a youth service that I visited some years ago. The tour guide pointed to a locked cabinet and explained that yes they had videos and books of sexual topics available in their library for the youth to borrow. This place kept them locked up, though, and required that youth ask for permission to browse them. In their words, "If they're mature enough to view them, then they're mature enough to ask first." I think that policy is very reasonable. I think we can use the same principle to confirm sexual maturity too.

my solution:
If someone's mature enough to experience sex, then they're mature enough to ask for it. So I propose a system in which anyone (who has passed puberty) up to age 18 may register themselves as "sexually mature" adults. The concept of "statutory rape" (in which age is the defining factor) does not apply to someone who has registered themselves as mature. Maturity means taking responsibility for your actions, and registration is sufficient proof of such maturity. A mature person may marry, as did my great, great grandmother, at a young age.

I take alcohol transactions as my example here, in which proof of maturity (defined by age) is required to legally imbibe. I would eliminate statutory rape. Instead, there is only "rape rape". Consent is required for legally permissible sex with someone who is either age 18 or is a registered adult (after puberty). Without consent in these cases, you prosecute rape. Without age 18 or adult registration, however, you prosecute something "even worse than rape" although I can't think of a proper term for it right now.

Consent is required. What's given is not the same as what's taken, though the physical act be the same. Predatory behavior costs lifespan and happiness; it must be prevented before and prosecuted after the fact. Adult behavior at young age, however, should not be compromised. If you're mature enough to experience sex, then you're mature enough to ask first. I think adult certification would work, although there would need to be some mechanism that ensures the request itself is not coerced somehow.

my life:
I think that I matured intellectually at a rapid pace, outpacing my compatriots of the day. Emotional maturation, however, is something that didn't really begin until my 20's. Emotional understanding, I suspect, will be a lifelong struggle in which I trail behind my peers because I experience emotions at a different scale (both time scale and intensity scale) than others do. That's why I now think that patience will be the prime attribute of anyone who can be a successful romantic match for me. I need time (and usually solitude) to understand myself. This delay is especially important in matters of consent.

Rape is sex without consent. Date rape, as I define it today, is sex where both parties experience some interest in each other but consent still is not provided. Only once (in my early 20s) have I experienced date rape, although there are other near-examples. For anyone taking note, physical reaction in a man is not the same as consent. A man needs to actively approach you in order for consent to even be implied. Verbal expression of sexual interest is, of course, the best scenario. This was a period of my life when speaking required a lot more effort than it does now. I know that I was thinking the word "No", but at this moment I can't remember if the word ever reached audible form. That experience is one of a few "Ick!" moments of my life. That's not what I want my sex life to be like. At least it was all over quickly.

I myself often fail to "read" people well. I can only hope that I never created a situation in which someone else felt assaulted by me. :( It seems unlikely, but I must mention the possibility to be complete in my exploration of the topic.

Here I am writing about important sex issues when sex is mostly a theoretical thing for me. I haven't had sex with anyone in years. I haven't even dated in more than 12 years. I've never bottomed for anyone, as I expect the emotional intensity and complexity to be too much for me to cope with unless it was with my husband (the ideal patient man who simply doesn't exist (for me anyway)).

So, read my opinions on the subject with some healthy skepticism, I guess. :)