democracies past, present, and future inevitably crumble as the need to cater to the demos grows greater and greater with every generation of voters.
i know this is a contrivance but nevertheless: we don't consult the entire hospital how to treat my heart condition yet we accept on face value that obeying the vagaries of the hoi polloi is the best way to decide who controls the levers of power in civil society.
duh. why is this always phrased as if the populace is unaccountable for the very existence of these elites? why is it always assumed that these unaccountable elites are better held in check by the farce of democracy than a proud genuine elite in place of the ignoble “””elite”””?
the people get what they deserve. if democracy was a functional system of government then by its own underlying assumptions the citizenry right now would be shooting, bombing, & stabbing these so-called elites. But we are held in subjugation as a result of our own fealty. It is a choice.
Having grown up rural, fixing farm equipment, rebuilding cars, which propelled me towards a degree in electrical engineering (and after that an MSc in math), my colleagues the last 20 years have watched a lot of TV and played all the video games but can barely bake a potato.
"Unaccountable elites" are enabled by know-nothings in corporate management, software engineering teams, accounting, HR "just following orders".
The lack of muscle memory to be self sufficient keeps people in their lane and unable to look away, fix their own stuff, make their own stuff.
When labor knows nothing but just following orders leadership is empowered to build and fill gulags; what are the people going to do? Resist en masse? Not when they are addicted to GrubHub delivery of Subway.
I think it says we need more time in the evolutionary oven. With how fast tech and education have accelerated we're running Ubuntu 24 on the Enigma machine.
Yeah, that seems to be a better conclusion - that we're not built with enough sophistication to deal with everything we're currently dealing with. But I think that's also due to the fact that the things we're dealing with are intentionally built to take advantage of our weaknesses. You can't out evolve technology.
If such being does exist, then how could it possibly not matter? If there's an architect and we are the architect's creation, then how could our belief alone be the important thing?
That's immaterial to the discussion. The comment I replied to simply stated: "Displacing God as the center of life." They aren't arguing that god matters, it's our displacement of them.
So, on the existence of god, we have two possiblities: God does exist, god doesn't exist.
1. If god doesn't exist, then we're unhappy because we're displacing a false god as the center of life.
2. If god does exist, then we're unhappy because we're displacing a real god as the center of life.
In that discussion, god's existence in fact doesn't matter, it leads to the same outcome.
If God does exist and is our creator, then we're designed to recognize him (at least to strive to, or have some innate need to); failing to do so or radically abdicating from this need would lead to disaster.
In other words, in the God-exists scenario, we are not merely observers of a phenomenon who can be detached from it.
But that framing only really works if we assume a Abrahamic world view.
Other cultures don't and didn't relate to their deities in the same way. Do we then have to assume they all suffered lower life satisfaction than a 11th century German peasant because of their detachment from a singular god the creator? Why didn't they strive for the relationship you're describing?
Trying to put God with a capital G at the center of our lives as some innate need doesn't make sense from a historical context.
I don’t know about religions in the general sense, and you’re right to point out that I very much have the “Abrahamic world view”, though my case is much much more specific than that but that’s not relevant here.
What we might more safely assume is that the Creator is revealed through history and a group to whom it he’s not revealed might pursue him more ignorantly (I appreciate the language might sound offensive or condescending but that’s not the intention) but in that pursuit they’re still better off than someone who willfully rejects him.
This I believe is relevant to the post, as these societies have not gone from one god to another, but to none.
That's a lot of assumptions, and really only make sense if you're trying to put your own beliefs as the "correct" choice. Somehow, all these other cultures got it wrong, but the ones who believe one single god, they got it right.
> This I believe is relevant to the post, as these societies have not gone from one god to another, but to none.
I don't know what you mean by this. Particular God's importance rose and fell out of fashion in ancient societies.
meaningfully, this is equivalent to the parent commenter. "technology"
I loathe the "pop critique" employment of the phrase, but this is definitionally late-stage capitalism.
obviously capitalism is named as such because it is founded upon the concept of (private) capital. capital serves to lower margins and increase profitability. it has been remarkably successful and has immensely raised QoL for virtually the planet's entire population. we are now reckoning with its inevitable consequences. manpower is unreliable. it gets sick. it has children. it has eccentricities. it is fundamentally unpredictable. Capital seeks efficiency and reliability. What percentage of the population is capable of building data centers? Of engineering massive scale LLMs?
It's got nothing to do with that. People that don't need it are hoarding wealth.
It's real estate value all the way down. Apartments getting tinier while getting more expensive, homes being out of reach or taking up an enormous amount of total pay in order to finance.
People who own aren't living off their own labor's fruits saved for the future but on the massively increased value they're selling something they didn't have to pay nearly as much for. (not talking about inflation but actual hours of labor)
You have middle aged people doing not much better than introductory jobs because the people who needed to retire haven't.
without human influence or directive, capital ceases to be become anything meaningful beyond [insert data type] at which point, it spreads like a cancer, ie: universal paperclips
Capitalism is revered due to how it has significantly impacted the living standards of populations that participate in it. But increasing the living standards of populations was never the purpose of capitalism, it was a simply a side-effect.
Capitalism started with the East India Company. That is the real Capitalist world choice. We treat our strongly regulated society as 'Capitalism' for some reason (while the Capitalists tell us we need to get rid of all the regulation that keeps them in check).
Capitalism left to it's own authority creates payment in company scrip and company towns. Capitalism WANTS labor trapped with company script/company towns. Just because society outlawed that doesn't mean Capitalism isn't working in other ways to recreate that. What Capitalism does not want is empowered labor or labor lifted out from dire situations. Society is what has done that, not Capitalism.
Without strict government oversight Capitalism is horrible and gives horrible results to society at large. It just has done an incredible job of painting modern society as Capitalism and claiming all benefits of things that aren't inherently from Capitalism but from Government oversite.
Would you elaborate? Because my understanding is that Apple has offered outstanding support for older devices in terms of iOS support for quite old devices.
You can't release all the documentation just because the entire phone isn't supported. Many of the components come from other suppliers and aren't obsolete, and you can't just reveal all your suppliers' IP.
They don't have to - just give an option to unlock the device when it's EOL.
It's not a security problem, since they don't support it anylonger anyways!
They could even make it so, that iOS itself refuses to boot if the device is unlocked. That way you can't accidentally have an iOS running that's compromised in some way.
But you can still boot Linux or Android or whatever you want to do to it.
Apps that connect to a service over the Internet (maps, music iMessage) could stop working if Apple changes the APIs that those apps use. This is even more likely to happen to third party apps.
You won't get updates to the trusted root CAs, which means you won't be able to visit sites with certificates signed by CAs created or renewed after support is dropped. And your browser will continue trusting CAs that have had their trust revoked.
And as web standards evolve there will be websites that use features and APIs that your browser doesn't support and may break in subtle, or not so subtle ways. And there is no way for you to install a more up to date browser.
And then of course, you won't fixes for any new security vulnerabilities that are found.
So yeah, it's not as bad as getting bricked, but it as also worse than continuing to work as it always has, but with no new features.
The original post was about Apple not giving proper support to after-EOL phones.
Saying "could stop working" and "won't get updates to the trusted root CAs" is all future issues.
How long should Apple be required to provide updates, both security/vulnerability and future API support?
Currently, iPhone 6S, released in 2014, can run iOS 15, which received its latest update in 2025. The iOS 15 apps work with Apple's services, some with reduced functionality because it was never in iOS 15.
Apple don't give people the tools/keys/etc to load new OS (etc) onto a device once it's no longer supported.
So, at best the device can just be used with the latest version of the software Apple allows until it's a security nightmare and better off no longer used.
Instead, if Apple gave people the ability to load something (prob a Linux) onto those old devices, then those old devices could be used usefully for quite a few more years.
true inflection point of the already prolonged withering away and inevitable death of one of America’s great art forms.
yes i’m aware of the proud film traditions of france, italy, england, & japan (among others). nevertheless the paradigms of popular film are uniquely homegrown.
netflix is not in the film business. they are in the streaming business.
yet another example of the rape aka “enshittification” of culture. why share an experience together as a public in front of the silver screen? much easier to sit alone on our fucking couches while we doomscroll and dick around.
last sentence in your first paragraph has nothing to do with the current state of the internet and certainly not AI. first sentence? turns out governments can still get away with pretty much anything and propaganda is easier than ever.
It is so much harder now. There are people who are willfully ignorant now, almost proud to be; snooty about it. But it's impossible for governments and institutions to lie like they used to be able to. People are trading primary source documents online within the day.
It's why the popularity of long-ruling institutional parties is dropping everywhere, and why the measures to stop people from communicating and to monitor what they're saying are becoming more and more draconian and desperate.
beyond irony that you pose as some tech optimist while also mentioning “western collapse” and then speak about a uniquely American pessimism, a nation that is presently under the thumb of a government that does not respect the rule of law and actively manipulates capital/big business.
and you cannot simply hand-wave away the massive acceleration of the surveillance state and characterize it as a tool of the “institutional parties”
the article explicitly states that this original Superman #1 is the highest graded copy of all-time
it’s valuable for the same reason the mona lisa is valuable. it’s iconic, it is a singular object, it is one of a kind, it is a stable investment vehicle. they ain’t making more of them.
Stable investment vehicle I am not so sure. I think an index fund or even gold will outperform it over 100 years. Superman comics rely on people giving a shit about superman which will fade over time. Superman isnt a big thing for gen z for example.
I always wonder exactly how difficult it would be to get the paper, ink, staples, etc exactly right. I'm sure it would be difficult but 9m is a big payoff if you can.
I assume the content isn't as important as the fact the object itself is the original. Original paper, original ink, original release date. The object itself comes from the original factory, survived through time etc. I would expect some tests will verify it uses the correct paper, has the signs of age, etc.
Even if you could duplicate it down to the molecule I would assume it wouldn't hold the same value since it doesn't have the same history. Assuming you'd want to sell it in good faith as a replica.
i know this is a contrivance but nevertheless: we don't consult the entire hospital how to treat my heart condition yet we accept on face value that obeying the vagaries of the hoi polloi is the best way to decide who controls the levers of power in civil society.