It feels like we’re on the brink of something

bear_delune@beehaw.org to Chat@beehaw.org – 184 points –

Covid, WFH, Musk, The fall of Twitter, Netflix plateau, Reddit Blackout, Crippling interest rates, Trump, Decentralisation, Tech Antitrust, Ukraine

Adding in Edit: AI, Climate Crisis, Nazis, Fascism, Democratic backsliding, automation, mass unemployment, rising homelessness, wild fires

How are you feeling these days?

We sure do live in interesting times

179

I guess we're transitioning from the fuck around to the find out stage

The annoying thing is that those who fucked around aren’t the ones suffering from finding out. They prospered while the rest of the world suffered from the consequences.

I humbly protest as someone finding out for someone else's fuck around.

i am tired

This, more than anything. But I do try to fight that because I know that's apart of the strategy to keep people docile. (In a non conspiracy theory way?)

It's not a conspiracy theory. This is exactly what's happening.

(Verse 1)
Covid pandemic, life's tragic,
Work From Home, no more traffic,
Elon Musk in the space race,
Twitter falling from its grace.

Netflix plateau, lost its glow,
Reddit blackout, a serious blow,
Interest rates, an upward hike,
Donald Trump, another strike.

(Chorus)
We didn't start the fire,
It was always burning, since the world's been turning,
We didn't start the fire,
No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it.

(Verse 2)
Decentralisation, global reformation,
Tech Antitrust, digital conflagration,
Ukraine crisis, world’s at bay,
In this whirlwind, we lose our way.

Artificial Intelligence, the next experience,
Climate crisis, deadly seriousness,
Nazis, Fascism, old fears return,
Democratic backsliding, when will we learn?

(Chorus)
We didn't start the fire,
It was always burning, since the world's been turning,
We didn't start the fire,
No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it.

(Verse 3)
Automation, job annihilation,
Mass unemployment, rising desperation,
Homelessness in the city streets,
Wildfires burning, the heat repeats.

(Chorus)
We didn't start the fire,
It was always burning, since the world's been turning,
We didn't start the fire,
No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it.

(Bridge)
From the pandemic to the space frontier,
Through the crises that we all fear,
From the ashes, we'll still rise,
In our hearts, the human spirit never dies.

(Chorus)
We didn't start the fire,
It was always burning, since the world's been turning,
We didn't start the fire,
But when we are gone, will it still burn on, and on, and on, and on...

(Outro)
We didn't start the fire,
But we hold the power, in this defining hour,
We can tame this fire,
Though we didn't light it, we have the strength to fight it.

It’s scary how greed has made the world so hostile. It’s hard to stay ignorant about these issues because it’s just one search away on a phone. Yet, people still choose ignorance. I feel a little lost and hopeless sometimes even though I try to do my part. Finding a safe space online seems crucial for my mental wellbeing. Glad I can be here

edit: grammar

Don't blame people for choosing to be ignorat. Empathy fatigue does not make you a bad person. We didn't envolve to process so much shit.
I try to focus on my local irl more. There I have some influence.

Hello friend, I also struggle with feeling alone in a vastness of apathy and sometimes hostility. I'm glad we are here together to shine our candles in the dark - when everything else seems hopeless, one thing we always have within is our ability to choose our mindset and reactions. Sometimes it can help to focus on the things we can change in the here and now, rather than those we have no influence over. The difficulty lies in telling which is which. It is okay to be tired! But I hope you can find the strength to march on - together we can make the world a friendlier, kinder and better place :)

Notice how 90% of that are rich people causing or amplifying those situations to happen?

COVID - Trump sabotage any effort made to prevent the spread and we lost 1 million people due to that.

Climate Crisis - Oil Giants/Automobile industry sabotage the public transportation which would have a long term ramification to reduce oil consumption overall.

Nazis/Fascism - Rich People fund/outright purchase mass media to create chaos in public perspectives and polarize the political parties. Koch Brothers are funding far right politic and pushing hard for nazism. And of course, don't forget about Sinclair broadcast.

Ukraine - Putin and the Oligarch

I could go on. Almost all of the problems begin and end with the rich people. #EatTheRich

I have been trying to mention this trend to people as much as possible when they bring up issue X. A divided populace is easier to control, and here we are with various "culture war" topics constantly on the news, more and more fear mongering etc etc. But for every divisive cultural issue, there's a group of rich people who stand to gain, in one way or another, from the division itself and the fact that it keeps us (the poor-er majority) from solving real problems.

The fact is, if we fix the wealth inequality problem we fix a lot of others, and we would also be able to focus our collective energy appropriately at the others which may not naturally fall away.

That's not to say we shouldn't focus on everything -- but our best bet for a livable future is to start eating the rich now.

Edit: a word

It really does sound like a new version of We Didn’t Start the Fire.

We didn't start the fires, it was Shell and Exxon, BP and Mobil

To be perfectly fair, the world has always been screwed up in a hundred different ways at any given time. It's just more immediately visible to every single person these days

True, at least now more people are taking notice. But those working against the populous are more brazen than ever too

I think the main difference is that now we have the technological power to fuck things up irreversibly (hope we still have chance against climate change, but im not sure a mass extinction could be prevented and not just moderated at this point)

Not feeling optimistic, but trying to stay positive and do good in the world regardless.

Remember to use these hard times to focus on the things that really matter. Enjoy nature, have empathy for others, be kind and supportive, stand up for what's right.

We'll all endure, some how some way. Peace and love to y'all.

This is true. If our days are really numbered, why spend them indoors doomscrolling and musing over what-could-be scenarios when we could just be living our lives the best we can while we have the chance?

History oft repeats itself. By reading a lot about the past, I feel more relaxed about the future.

A book I read recently was a history about a moral panic starting, how people became marginalized, how there were times of extreme terror, how a social movement started, and eventually entered the mainstream. Laws were reversed, the group of people became normal, and became part of greater society.

The goverment had gone from decade+ of progressivism with a opposition party in decline, to the accidental discovery of a powerful social tool to tap into the hate built into humans. They leveraged that tool to bring their party back to relevance in the face of declining power.

It's victories were temporary though, and their very tapping into that hate was what undermined them. The boy that cried wolf couldn't keep crying about it when people realized it was just a ruse.

Almost the exact same things are happening today. A similar moral panic kicked off. Someone is crying wolf and is trying to be the constant victim. Most people will be exposed to the alleged "wolf" (who turns out to be floofy and nice!) And America calms down again for another 20-40 years.

That sounds really hopeful. Where and when did the events covered in the book take place? Also, what was the name of the book?

It's the Lavender Scare by David K. Johnson. See if your library has it! It's kinda expensive on Amazon. It takes place in Washington DC, in 1940s-60s.

I read the hell out of that book and it's one of the ones I continually have thought about since then. I had to keep checking the copyright page and years to make sure what was happening in 1954 and not a handful of decades later, lol.

https://www.amazon.com/Lavender-Scare-Persecution-Lesbians-Government/dp/0226401901

Thank you for this - these days it's really hard for me not to be pessimistic about the future, and this reminder helps put me at ease. Nonetheless, things are absolutely scary right now - does that book go into detail about the damage done during said moral panic? Also, what book was it?

Yeah, it does go into the damage done. But it also sets up well for Stonewall and how everything was on the road to change. It's the Lavender scare by David K Johnson! More about it in the comment above. :) https://www.amazon.com/Lavender-Scare-Persecution-Lesbians-Government/dp/0226401901

I believe trans rights are currently in 1954 ish. But unlike 1954, it's much, mucher harder to fully slam the door on this one because being queer has been normal for so long, hateful people have a much more difficult time siloing people this go around. And this time, people aren't ashamed, they're fiercely protesting this, which is a healthy sign that we aren't as authoritarian as places that have recently fallen, like Hong Kong.

The idea that it's likely to repeat again even if it dies down is terrifying, I don't get how people are finding that to be hopeful. Am I missing something here? ~Cherri

Sometimes I feel like things are just moments away from falling apart. I worry that the leaders are doing their best to cover it up, but one day it will fall apart and it will fall apart suddenly.

I often think about how, if there was a planet-killer asteroid on a collision course with Earth, it's very likely it would be kept secret. At least if we had no way of stopping it.

I truly believe that if global warming is already past the point of no return, there would be a lot of powerful people out there with vested interests in keeping it under wraps. They'd definitely want to at the very least maintain their lifestyle while the boat sinks...

It would be so difficult to silence that news nowadays though, all it would take is 1 leak for scientists around the globe to start shouting about it, they couldn't even stop snowden back in the 2000s from revealing the goverments attempt to spy on Americans and now we have youtube, the fediverse, more independent news sites then you could shake a stick at. Its crazy how fast info can travel now.

I'm sorry, I agree with you.

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We didn’t start the fire, it was always burning since the worlds been turning

🎵Schools close, Tom Hanks, trouble in the big banks,

no vaccine, quarantine, no more toilet paper seen.

Travel ban, Weinstein, panic COVID-19,

NBA, gone away, what else do I have to sayyyyyy🎵

This was my reaction. There has always been a revolution brewing among the discontents. Everyone alive realizing they need to be part of it is late to the party, because the party started long before any of us were born.

Yup, but on the other hand as technology progresses the consequences for screwing everything up get more and more severe. If we don't put out this fire soon, we're gonna burn the whole house down.

It think we have cycles because people remember things that happen in their lifetime but fail to adequately instil that knowledge in the next and subsequent generations. The wealth inequality of the 1920s was the catylist for much of the economic turmoil of the great depression and laid some of the context for the New Deal era. The strong rules for antitrust and managing monopolies were put in place to prevent a repeat and while the generations who lived through the great depression were dominant they survived. As those older generations died out and as the following generations grew in influence those protections were weakened and eventually mostly dismantled, resulting in massive changes from the 70s onwards. Those protections were eroded and wealth and income inequality grew until we reached and surpassed the levels of the 1920s.

I think the same happens for other things like the idea that Nazis are bad or must be resisted, or that religious ideologies should ve kept seperate from the government, or healthcare is something we can help each other to gain, or that workers can have power by working together. What I find hopeful is hearing discussion of all of these ideas in fairly accessible places and people do seem to be studying history in order to avoid repeating it.

just try to keep my head down and focus on what I can realistically influence

It’s the only way to stay sane tbh.

I’ll often do a “digital detox” and remove myself from all events for a while. Unfortunately that’s not a privilege many are afforded

To be honest, 2023 has feel relatively calmer than the past few, I guess covid being that all encompassing to life. Of the things on your list I do think AI is probably the first thing that comes to mind when I think of what we are "on the brink of". This leap that happened the past couple years in LLM was shocking enough, wondering what the next couple are going to look like.

The cyberpunk stuff I was reading back in the 90s is happening now. We are in cyberpunk.

Ok, so I live in a third world country but I am from America.

My wife and I moved to a new part of the city and were walking around to check out the area.

Well there is this massive condo complex. Like earlier 30-40+ floors. There have to be thousands of units and there are a few building like this in their compound.

It’s right next to the river and you walk past them when you walk over the bridge.

Well directly on the other side of the river there were a few young teenagers picking the fruit or maybe it was the leaves off of the tree for food.

It was super dystopian.

Additionally at night most of the lights in that condo complex are off. The building must be 95% empty.

Depressing walking past the newly-built housing that is out of reach for almost all of us. Family member lived in a modest apartment with their partner in 2019. They moved out, we check it now years later, it's almost twice as expensive per month to rent.

The country where I live, prices have not really increased but there are tons of vacant units.

I still get energy bill alerts for the old property I lived in and close to a year later it is vacant.

I think property developers made all these condos and sold them to people who wanted an investment property. But they sell price was too high so the rent price is too high.

Since there are all these vacant places, rent is cheaper than buying by a significant amount.

If I purchased my current condo with 20% down, my rent would more than double.

Empty overpriced housing makes me sick honestly. It stifles the economy and social mobility of everyone so much as well (by design probably lol).

When they offered to sell the house, at first I was excited, but then then the selling price was like 3x more than I expected. I didn’t even respond to the realtor. There are also a bunch of vacant units for run and for sale.

I think the price is so high because rich people were tricked into buying an investment property which they could not rent and now they are stuck with a huge loan.

And I don’t mean rich like they can afford to lose 200k. I mean like upper middle class who really need to sell for the amount of their loan.

Wintermute is going to destroy Tassier-Ashpool, won’t it?

At this point we should have a "We Didn't Start The Fire" parody for all the nonsense that's happend over the last 3 years. Feels loke the Roaring 20s, but just more cbaotic and socially conscious.

All I'm trying to do is just find myself and enjoy life, and I'm a little anxious to see where we end up. Hopefully it's somewhere where we come out better as a society.

Wouldn't be a parody, just a reboot... ugh... reboots...

We could indeed be on the brink of something. The conditions are there but for what? Will we end capitalism, make a new system and try for a better world? Or will we fall into fascism once more?

Even if it's finally the day we move on from this system that keeps threatening to collapse on itself every 6 months... it's gonna get a whole lot worse before it gets better...

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Honestly, we are potentially on the cusp of the next great societal shift not only in how countries are ran, but probably also where the sphere of global influence resides. I don't know how it will all end it, whether it will end with China superseding the US as a global influencer and power, or if we will go the way the Nazis have been trying to direct us since the 30s and the entire world takes a dramatic shift to the far right.

Quite frankly, it's terrifying. Being in the United States and watching our political climate dissolve into a party who is afraid of embracing the young and go further left, and a party whose only interest is owning the libs and helping the 1% become even wealthier while the rest of us have to suffer through greedflation is really frustrating. My wife and I have talked about leaving, but we have JDs, and American JDs are basically useless outside of the U.S. unless you went to Harvard/Stanford/Yale and can land a job in Big Law, which we did not.

I've thought about going back to school and getting a degree in programming, or trying to find another way to learn and get the experience/certifications I would need, but I have absolutely no idea where to start with that or how to look for those kinds of jobs.

I do not advise going to college for programming degree, it could easily be the worst financial decision especially now that the jobs and pays are not guaranteed anymore, programming positions are getting flooded and wage are tanking. More often than not, college does not teach you standard practices in the industry, the tech stacks that we use, and so forth.

My advice instead is to get some certifications for programming or system administration and save up for like a $7000 classroom course for some of those certifications, it's expensive, but helluva a lot cheaper than college at least. Once you have the certification and some basic understanding, do some projects like:

If you're system admin, try and set up a whole new office network by configuring the routers, firewall, group policies, ADAP, RADIUS, and so go on and so forth. Get comfortable doing it in a virtual setup.

if you're programmer, try and develop some common web applications since that is easily 90% of the job in programming nowaday, it almost always going to be web application everywhere you go.

A WGU computer science degree costs about 3800 per six month period, btw, which is a decent option. I'm with you on avoiding a typical expensive college degree, though. I would personally recommend considering WGU after getting some experience so you can get through it faster (since it's self paced).

It's about $30,400 for 4 years study, so it's not as bad as other college courses could've been. That a good option, I might consider doing that then. Thank you :)

Won’t most countries require you to have a degree in order to immigrate there? I generally agree with what you said otherwise, but as a tech worker with lots of experience and no degree, I think it’s limited my options for leaving the US, while otherwise being a good move overall.

In that case, you would likely need a bachelor degree anyway, and I would suggest getting a degree in "backup" career that have a solid forecast for wages and employ-ability, the programming industry are getting flooded now that everyone is trying to get good money in IT.

I'd skip the programming. The tales coming out of Silicon Valley on Blind have convinced me the gold rush is basically over. If you have something you like doing that exists as a trade; Things like woodworking, electrical, plumbing, I'd look into that. The rules around them as a profeasional might change but the fundamentals are great for anywhere you go. Programmers are useful but we are about to fall off a tradesperson cliff. You'd be able to command 100 an hour at least if you are competent and polite.

I'd be wary of the trades as well. I am now an engineer, previously a welder. Unless you operate your own business, a trade is super unlikely to match the standard of living that a couple JDs would be used to. Also, most EU countries have very regimented training and qualification systems for tradespeople that start when you're pretty young.

In the US, there is a labor shortage of skilled tradespeople and manufacturing workers, so there is a huge push to get more people into it. The nasty secret though, is that there is a labor shortage because pay has not been rising and benefits are a joke.

Corporations push high school kids and laid off tech workers towards the trades with promises of good prospects, high wages, and solid benefits. The reality though, is that most of them will end up trapped in mind numbing dead end jobs where their labor and emotional/physical health will be exploited until they aren't useful to the company any more.

Manufacturers in particular are extremely reluctant to give their floor workers a bigger piece of the pie. So expanding the labor pool is an important long term strategy to ensure that wages stay low and that they can continue exploiting their workers as efficiently as possible.

Not trying to be a bummer, but I've lived both sides of this. The Association of Equipment Manufacturers, chambers of commerce, etc have a very strong and widely accepted narrative when it comes to the manufacturing labor shortage, so I think it's extremely important to spread a counter narrative when I can.

On the positive side, there are some really simple things that can be done to help alleviate the labor shortage: increase pay and benefits. We finally started to see a tiny bit of that during covid, and I'm hopeful that the trend will continue. It's frustrating though that it takes a near collapse of industry before manufacturers will even consider raising compensation.

Things to add:

  • war on Cash
  • impending CBDCs
  • government banning of decentralized currency
  • possibility of UBI
  • high profit medical care
  • uninsureable assets in places that are fastly becoming at risk.
  • retirement/death of the baby boomers and surplus of assets that no one will be able to afford
  • all rain water on earth is contaminated by dangerous chemicals
  • many consumer products are made with plastic/acrylic that leaks EAs
  • sprinkle in some non human aircraft recoveries as a seasoning

war on Cash: I don't like this one bit. Privacy = Gone.

Democratic backsliding?

Prime examples being the stuff around Brexit or Roe v Wade

Or Poland's PiS party and their anti-democratic partisan judge nominations and the currently ongoing attempted elimination of the largest opposition party through McCarthyism.

The wave of populists across the democratic world has lead to more corruption and complacency at the top and more distrust and disconnection with the average voter.

Honestly, I'm starting to think the Nazis may have won, and they just shifted their strategies to playing the longcon.

I read a book maybe 20 years ago called the 4th Turning. This kind of feels like it and it is when the book said it was going to be.

What did it predict?

Yeah, I want to know to. Don’t leave us hanging.

It like that one book I read that predicted

The premise of the book is that US history goes through more or less periodic phases and there are common generational changes. The book I think predicted the start of the 4th turning about now. Turnings generally start with weakening goverments and some crisis and often often wars. This is all from memory.. Someone else may know more.

Van Neistat just did a short on the 4th turning. Good read.

I think the Beehaw mods are on the brink of a nervous breakdown. With the influx of reddit users (like me), running the site must be like working retail on Black Friday - but it’s happening EVERY DAY.

Lots of opportunities for improvement!

I like the way you think. There have been similar times of social unrest. The late 60s comes to mind. There were problems and yet there was no downfall of civilization. The slow trickle of reforms and changes pushed us out (along with resolve). The rise in political polarization has me worried but there's no guarantee trends will continue. As problems have cropped up in the past, we've slowly fixed them so they become less of an issue. I think the one thing that can make it worse for yourself as an individual is to let it consume you to the point of a defeatist attitude. Focus on the narrow window you have control over and keep informed enough to make smart choices within that window.

My personal, uneducated opinion is that we are going to have a period of ever-worsening crises, mainly because climate change is nowhere near to being at max ferocity yet. But I mean, humans are great at adapting to change. Maybe once things get bad enough, once people realise just how badly we fucked up and there's absolutely no reason to believe in the lie of capitalism anymore, humanity will rise from the ashes and things will get better. But I'm not looking forward to seeing what's next.

Yeah, it seems likely to me that humans as a species will survive through the various climate crises, but I think the question is - at what cost? A lot of the scientific research and tech developments that might help us cope with or reduce the impact of climate change seem pretty reliant on our global system of trade / supply chain, and COVID showed how fragile that system is. I worry that by the time it gets bad enough that everyone is on board with doing what we can to reduce our impact, it'll be too late because the systems that could create those new options will not be capable of operating at the level we assume is normal today.

It feels like that time at a party where everything escelates. But not in a good way, more like something resulting in the worst hangover of humanity. Being over 30 I dread this hangover.

This whole discussion reminded me of this game - SEASON: A letter to the future

One can learn from it that when the world ends, another one begins. It does not negate all the tragedy, broken dreams, suffering, violence, etc. It's also a kind of a curse because all mistakes will be made again at some point, all achievements will be lost inevitably. But at least the life goes on

I'm fine. Covid isnt causing chaos anymore, WFH is optional (thankfully, i don't like it), I don't really care about Twitter or Netflix, reddit is a shame but there are alternatives, my mortgage rate is fixed at 1.8% for 30 years, Trump is on the other side of the ocean...

Most of the sh*t going on the in the world doesn't have very big impact on my life. Some do, but when I can't influence it (on my own) I try to not let it affect my mood.

30 years fixed at 1.8%?! Damn you you lucky bastard, that was never even at option over here lol

Rates were ridiculously low in 2020. 10 years would have been 1.3%. The mortgage rules and requirements are quite strict, so banks can keep the rates low.

Canadian wild fires as well.

The fires are the worst for me. When the world feels bad I just want to escape outside...so when it's smoky I just feel really trapped.

Considering the COVID pandemic is still mass infecting people (with somewhere around 1/10 people getting Long-COVID, and some percentage of those people being disabled long-term) and now it's leading to weakened immune systems and fungal infections, my guess is another mass health-disruption event is what we're on the brink of.

Or maybe mass homelessness and poverty. Does anyone remember that two-parter from Deep Space Nine where they go back in time with ghettos in San Francisco? Past Tense. It was set in 2024.

The development of AI as well.

This is the biggest worry in my head.

We will absolutely not be able to continue with our way of life. Significant portions of society will NOT be able to contribute “value” (the the capitalistic sense) to society.

What happens then? A bunch of young, lonely, disenfranchised people? Just bread and circuses with AI proliferated entertainment to keep the masses placated?

Or, the more optimistic post scarcity outlook. What if AI improves our lives so much anyone can live any life they want? (Very very optimistic)

Then billionaires will hoard it for themselves and maybe give some crumbs to the peasants. ~Cherri

How on earth did I forget that one!

Also automation more generally

My opinion on the AI (ML) is that is lift up all the bad things, most people are focusing on what it have given the general public with the most common dataset and forget about the more specialized dataset. For example, they have an AI that can do brainscans in MRI and convert it to video, aka we can scan coma patients brains and see what they are thinking while in coma, record dreams and other cool stuff.

Eh, I do think it's possible for it to fizzle out. People freak out over ChatGPT but I haven't had great experiences with it and question exactly what sort of job it can reliably automate out. Fundamentally it's just a quicker way of querying the internet but with a loss in accuracy. There's the argument that the technology will improve and become exponentially greater - which is certainly possible - but there's also the possiblity of it just being overblown hype.

I try not to get too caught up in world events. Right now I'm trying to make some improvements in my personal life. I got a new job which I haven't started yet, and I want to buy a new car once I get paid.

Global issues are obviously important, but don't neglect your own life and your own community.

At least the dread of the end has encouraged me to change my tune mentally. I want to work on myself.

I saw the title and thought it was going to be exciting/positive haha

Whoops! Sorry!

Maybe it will be something positive, who knows!

I'm good. Helping in local community, which makes those global issues less touching. However I know, they're important, but I'd gone mad if I was thinking about the all the time.

I had a thought about all the alien stuff and if its true why the US government kept it a secret, and I was like "oh of course, its because the government is made of aliens"

I had to take a moment and think about how plausible that now feels lol.

I usually lean the opposite way - aliens exist but mask their presence because they look at our world and it’s just monkeys throwing fecies at each other

The intro to the game “Disco Elysium” has a monologue that basically says, You live on a ball full of apes. The apes are all beating each other. The only way to win is to beat the other apes.”

It totally feels like that.

It’s far more plausible that they’re all just profit driven sociopaths

Whatever we are the brink of, I just hope the people come out better on the other side. Yes I know lizard aliens running the state sounds crazy, but today it sounds less crazy lol. Alas, we live in such a boring dystopia.

Can we not do the whole "evil is caused by mental illness" thing please? It was annoying enough seeing it on Reddit. ~Cherri

Sorry, I did edit that out of my comment there. did not mean any form of abalism in my comment. I did not consider being a sociopath a mental illness, now I know better. thank you.

What is this, We Didn't Start The Fire?

Imo it's the great filter. Like the universe is performing pincer movement on human civilization.

From what I heard, the netflix password sharing change ended up being a net-increase in subscribers even accounting for the exodus caused by it.

So while they were going downhill for a while I think their password sharing crackdown surprisingly benefited them.

I think that's a tricky one; I technically still have an active account despite canceling. I feel like the fall-off will happen on people's next billing cycles

oh absolutely. how many people got blindsided by the crackdown and setup their free trial to binge the last of their shows fully planing to cancel before they get billed? They count as new subs.

I'm honestly finally looking at getting a NAS and going back to physical media the high seas

Terrified... I don't know what to do. I don't know what anyone can do about all of this... Can anything be done about this mess? People have been trying to make things not relentlessly terrible all the time starting from their local levels for decades, centuries even, and things are still fucking awful. Less awful, of course, but that's not the same as not awful. And it seems like a lot of the bad news is a lot bigger, more frequent, and goes on longer than any good news I've seen and it feels like all anyone has to say on it is either "OH GOD WE'RE ALL DOOMED" or "[insert vague platitude here]". That or "MWAHAHAHA I'M GOING TO MAKE THINGS WORSE" because apparently a lot of politicians love acting like Hitler and a cartoon villain had a baby and they're what came out. Ridiculous. ~Cherri

Jesus will soon return and take his chosen. I personally doubt that list will include me because while i think "god" may exist i dont think he pays attention to or really cares about us. He is just playing World of Tanksor something

I prefer this quote because, IMHO, a god does not exist..

"Is god willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him god?"

-Epicurus

Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?

This part is quite scary when you think about it. If he did exist, and was able and willing to help, but he didn't consider anything the world was doing as even a blip on his radar, what horrors are yet to come?

I'm a hard core atheist but those kinds of sayings always bug me as just being semantic word play. They essentially equate a higher being's power with the ability to do something that is impossible simply based on the definitions of the words themselves.

Can god create a square that's a circle?
No?
Must not be a god then!

Just silly. There's endless valid arguments against the existence of gods without having to resort to linguistic trickery.

If God was truly benevolent, why did he allow all those kids to die in Sandy Hook & Uvalde, as well as allowing toddlers to starve to death across the entire country of Sudan?

Because there is no God. If there's something out there, it's not benevolent. Reality is far more than what we understand even in physics. Just read up on Roger Penrose but moreso, I don't think there is any sway towards good or evil. Existence is just this.

Behind me, I heard the same man asking:

“For God’s sake, where is God?”

And from within me, I heard a voice answer:

“Where is He? This is where – hanging here from this gallows…”

The times we live in are riddled with problems but I have to continue on with my life regardless.

Like there's an impending economic shift coming due and the powers that be are doing everything they can to try and prevent it. Unfortunately for them this is inevitable.

I've been waiting for an AI that can usher us into the technological singularity, and I think we're finally on the cusp of evolution and immortality.

I keep hearing about the singularity, I've read up on it, but I still don't get it. What is it/does it do?

Basically it's the concept that AI becomes "sentient", has it's own motives, and ability to learn

TL;DR: It's an expansion on Moore's law that theorizes science, especially AI, will continue to advance itself in an exponential feedback loop. It's also been called The Law of Accelerating Returns, by Ray Kurzweil. His estimate was sentient AI by mid 2020's and singularity around mid 2040's.