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A new community that I'm hoping will take off. Please be respectful to others and feel free to post your beliefs (as long as they have the proper scientific data and logic)

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https://t.me/soniah_hub/7806

Aviation works on all directions. French democracy annihilated the FSB bastards [russian security service]

#AASMHAMMER

Location: Kursk region, Tyotkino

(51.26959, 34.28507)

Archived version

Even before Gabbard left the Democratic Party, ingratiated herself with Donald Trump and secured his nomination to become director of National Intelligence (DNI), she was known as a prolific peddler of Russian propaganda.

In almost every foreign conflict in which Russia had a hand, Gabbard backed Moscow and railed against the US. Her past promotion of Kremlin propaganda has provoked significant opposition on both sides of the aisle to her nomination.

Her journey from anti-war Democrat to Moscow-friendly Maga warrior began in Syria.

[...]

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group with a network of sources on the ground, documented the deaths of 503,064 people by March 2023. It said at least 162,390 civilians had died in that same time, with the Syrian government and its allies responsible for 139,609 of those deaths.

But Gabbard, a veteran of the Iraq War, viewed it all as a “regime-change war” fueled by the West and aimed at removing the dictator from power. She saw Assad – and Russia, when it entered the conflict – as legitimate defenders of the state against an extremist uprising.

[...]

Charles Lister, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute who testified twice on Syria to the House Foreign Affairs Committee when Gabbard was a member, spent years debunking her various conspiracy theories about the war.

“Her consistent denial of the Syrian regime’s crimes is so wildly fringe that her potential appointment as DNI is genuinely alarming,” he said.

[...]

They included a suggestion that Syrian rebels staged a false-flag chemical weapons attack against their supporters to provoke Western intervention against Assad — something the US intelligence agencies she will soon lead had concluded was false. She declined to call Assad a war criminal when pressed, despite masses of evidence, and used a video of Syrian government bombings to criticize US involvement in the war.

[...]

When Russia invaded Ukraine, Gabbard again defended Russian aggression.

“This war and suffering could have easily been avoided if Biden Admin/Nato had simply acknowledged Russia’s legitimate security concerns,” she posted on Twitter in 2022.

Gabbard appeared to fall for various conspiracy theories about the conflict that were promoted by Russia, as she had done in Syria. One of those conspiracy theories was a Russian claim about the existence of dozens of US-funded biolabs in Ukraine that were supposedly producing deadly pathogens.

She later walked back on those remarks, suggesting that there might have been some “miscommunication and misunderstanding.”

Gabbard’s frequent echoing of Kremlin talking points has earned her praise in Russian state media. Indeed, an article published on 15 November in the Russian-state controlled outlet RIA Novosti went so far as to call Gabbard a “superwoman.”

[...]

Larry Pfeiffer, the director of George Mason University’s Hayden Center for Intelligence, Policy, and International Security, said Gabbard’s apparent susceptibility to foreign disinformation and her affinity for strongmen will give pause to American allies with whom the US routinely shares intelligence on common threats. [...] "I think they wouldn’t feel like they’ve got an American confidant that they can deal with on a mature level,” he said. “I can guarantee you that the foreign intelligence services of Europe, including the Brits, are all having little side conversations right now about … what is this going to mean, and how are we going to operate, and what are we going to do now.”

[...]

"She is, hook, line and sinker, a Russian puppet.”

...

Xu says that while it is likely studies that received AI-generated responses have already been published, she doesn’t think that LLM use is widespread enough to require researchers to issue corrections or retractions. Instead, she says, “I would say that it has probably caused scholars and researchers and editors to pay increased scrutiny to the quality of their data.”

“We don’t want to make the case that AI usage is unilaterally bad or wrong,” she says, adding that it depends on how it’s being used. Someone may use an LLM to help them express their opinion on a social issue, or they may borrow an LLM’s description of other people’s ideas about a topic. In the first scenario, AI is helping someone sharpen an existing idea, Xu says. The second scenario is more concerning “because it’s basically asking to generate a common tendency rather than reflecting the specific viewpoint of somebody who already knows what they think.”

If too many people use AI in that way, it could lead to the flattening or dilution of human responses. “What it means for diversity, what it means in terms of expressions of beliefs, ideas, identities – it’s a warning sign about the potential for homogenization,” Xu says.

This has implications beyond academia. If people use AI to fill out workplace surveys about diversity, for example, it could create a false sense of acceptance. “People could draw conclusions like, ‘Oh, discrimination’s not a problem at all, because people only have nice things to say about groups that we have historically thought were under threat of being discriminated against,’ or ‘Everybody just gets along and loves each other.’ ”

The authors note that directly asking survey participants to refrain from using AI can reduce its use. There are also higher-tech ways to discourage LLM use, such as code that blocks copying and pasting text. “One popular form of survey software has this function where you can ask to upload a voice recording instead of written text,” Xu says.

The paper’s results are instructive to survey creators as a call to create concise, clear questions. “Many of the subjects in our study who reported using AI say that they do it when they don’t think that the instructions are clear,” Xu says. “When the participant gets confused or gets frustrated, or it’s just a lot of information to take in, they start to not pay full attention.” Designing studies with humans in mind may be the best way to prevent the boredom or burnout that could tempt someone to fire up ChatGPT. “A lot of the same general principles of good survey design still apply,” Xu says, “and if anything are more important than ever.”

Comments

Contrary to my distaste for them, but I wouldn't mind advertisements now and then. By now and then, I mean, like once every other hour or if they're displayed in a way that isn't obstructing. Obviously that is not how they are these days.

I know companies need to still get out there and be known but I do not need to know that much and I don't really care of your business if I have to hear, see and have spoken to me of it at every single turn. I would especially love it, if everything wasn't a paywall to not see any.

Advertisements are just simply a disease.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/22457627

Summary

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau opposed any deal letting Russia keep Ukrainian land, saying it would encourage other countries to break international rules.

Speaking to a NATO meeting, he highlighted Canada’s $19.5 billion aid to Ukraine and stressed the need to defend global stability.

Trudeau defended his plan to raise military spending to 2% of GDP by 2032 after criticism of Canada’s low defense funding.

He warned against isolating Ukraine, saying continued support is crucial to stop further global conflicts.

Comments

Something one can expect as Gibson has been hawkishly defending its own patented guitar designs.

Ford has really ramped up the showmanship lately, calling for a bike lane witch hunt and making magical announcements about beer, highway tunnels and $200 cheques. Much of it, it seems, is being done in the service of getting us to look away from the reality of how things are going in Ford’s Ontario.

In particular, he’d really like us to pay no attention to the housing policy failure behind the curtain. But by the numbers, Ford’s failure on housing should be way too big to hide.

A report released last week by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation revealed that housing starts in Ontario are down 18 per cent so far this year. That stat, which measures the number of new housing units that saw construction get started, should set off loud alarm bells. Because housing, more than any other issue, has been Ford’s signature issue — the subject of lots of legislation. He’s styled himself as a builder-in-chief who will “get it done.”

This isn’t a case of Ontario’s large population skewing the numbers, either. For his excellent Data Shows newsletter, analyst Tom Parkin recently crunched the per-capita numbers for housing starts and found Ontario ranked eighth out of Canada’s 10 provinces. According to Parkin’s numbers, with just 34 new starts for every 100,000 people, Ontario’s rate of per-capita building was well below that of provincial peers like Manitoba (47), Quebec (47.8), B.C. (58.8) and Alberta (89.9).

With numbers like that, it’s no surprise that the province has dim hopes of hitting its much-ballyhooed goal of building 1.5 million homes by the end of 2031.

Archived version

Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis on Tuesday called on NATO to draw strict red lines for Russia over hybrid attacks and to send a unified message about the alliance’s response to such actions.

[...]

Lithuania’s top diplomat noted that an investigation is underway into Monday’s crash of a DHL cargo plane in Vilnius and that “no option has been excluded so far”, adding that the incident “is definitely worrying”.

Landsbergis said that, in this context, allies must send a message both to Russian President Vladimir Putin and their own citizens that attempts by the aggressor to intimidate must stop, or else concrete action will be taken.

[...]

A Spanish national was killed, three other crew members, a Spaniard, a German and a Lithuanian, were injured when the DHL cargo plane crashed near Vilnius Airport on Monday morning.

The Boeing 737-476(SF), which was coming from the German city of Leipzig, was owned by Spain’s Swiftair and used for transporting DHL parcels.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said on Monday that the crash could have been an accident or a “hybrid incident” involving outside actors.

...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/22457543

Summary

President Biden recently authorized Ukraine to use longer-range U.S. missiles to strike inside Russia, marking a small but overdue escalation in the conflict.

Analysts argue Biden’s earlier caution was excessive, and calling Russia’s nuclear bluffs is strategically necessary to counter further extortion.

From Charon Comeau

This face can make anyone smile!
Nikon Z8 -600mm with a teleconverter and Heavily cropped!
Taken from a friends second floor deck a few houses away! (Thanks Eric)

Hang tough! I believe in you!

Summary

War and climate disasters have displaced 35 million people within Africa, tripling since 2009, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC).

Conflict is the primary cause, with 80% of displaced people from five countries: DRC, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Somalia, and Sudan.

Climate disasters, especially floods, have caused 6.3 million displacements in 2023, a sixfold rise since 2009.

The report urges African governments and international partners to address root causes and assist displaced populations.