Actually, this reminds me of ANOTHER story, this one I learned from a crusty old networking greybeard back in the day before *I* was a fresh-faced young hacker kiddie learning about networks and routing for the first time.

1/

Another long thread. Bear with me till the end please. These are my views, and not necessarily of those associated with me. Though those associated with me have been incredibly supportive. I thank everyone who messaged me. I thank @databoydg for inspiring me to say this next. 1/n

First, @databoydg: I hope this makes justice to what you've tried to teach me. I'm sorry if I'm a slow student. In this second part of the story, I'm a privileged academic having a drink in Montreal after a #neurips conference with @sindero 2/n

Simon says to me: I feel we need to do something about this (stark lack of minority representation in ML). We agree we'll do something about it, but it feels like we're at the bottom of Everest and have to climb it without any gear 3/n

Time goes by and with the creation of the @turinginst I suggest in the first meeting that we should use it as a public platform to improve the numbers of Black people in UK universities. I encounter a lot of resistance (to be honest, it felt aggressive) and defensiveness 4/n

I was told that was an Oxford and Cambridge problem only by another academic. I felt silenced. Ironically, by both men and women. 5/n

THREAD: Now that @Amazon @awscloud has announced they will no longer host @parler_app, many have speculated that they will just “find another host.”

Here is why that’s not so simple and what it will likely mean for the app’s future. First, let’s look at where things are...

2/ Google and Apple have removed the app from their app stores, effectively terminating growth on mobile devices. People can still access the (not good) web UI until Amazon terminates them today. CEO Matze has said they may be down “up to a week” while they find new hosting.

3/ Translated to English, that’s code for “we have no idea what’s going to happen next.” No US cloud provider (Microsoft, Google, IBM, Digital Ocean) is likely to touch this, as it could be seen as providing material support for sedition. No CEO or counsel wants to get near this.

4/ They could potentially “roll their own” data center by buying servers and putting them in a co-location facility. But that’s a single point of failure, and many colo providers would be just as likely to decline their business. It would be hard and risky to pursue this.

5/ Imagine, after they sweated like pigs to get this hardware all setup, if they get told their colo provider is booting them. That’s a lot of metal to then move somewhere else. Meanwhile, the user base is deteriorating because chaos and dying apps. They will go to other venues.

If you're looking at GA EV data and thinking maybe the reason D turnout looks strong relative to 11/3 is because after 2 months of Trump/GOP officials trashing mail-in ballots GOP voters are ditching it for E-Day instead...

Boy do I have some mindblowing statistics for you...

I compared the current mail-in voting tallies for each Congressional District against November mail-in votes for those districts.

The statewide figure currently sits at 62%. Guess which district leads the state?

You guessed it!

GA-14 at 69%. Marjorie Taylor Greene's district.

#2 is GA-8 at 68%.

Jody Hice of "I'm joining Marjorie Taylor Greene in her effort to throw out the Electoral College vote" fame.

GA-9 (Doug Collins) is above the state average at 64%.

IF Republicans were ditching absentee balloting en masse to vote on Election Day, you'd expect to see it by now. But the early *in-person* voting totals are what's actually lagging, not mail-in voting.

Pardon the sloppy spreadsheet, but those last 4 columns are what I'm looking at. The last one in particular.

*Thread* - the hack is wack

The Master Life 'Hack' to Solve All Problems

What's easier?

Developing psychology & exerting willpower to not eat a pantry full of your favorite snacks

or

Not having those temptations in the house

Many 'solutions' being presented to people don't work

Designed to cope with the problem instead of resolving it

Darkness is the absence of light

You can't resolve or remove the darkness

You can only add more light

Recent viral obsessions with 'healing', 'being stoic', 'mental models & psychology'

They all serve their place AFTER the root has been handled

Before adding things to increase testosterone, remove what inhibits it

Before adding 'hacks', remove things causing conflict

If a person fears confrontation & is not assertive

Techniques & thinking offer some support, but the real question is

Why is this the default behavior?

Without starting with this question

All solutions are merely Band-Aids to mask & cope with the symptoms

In reality the real root of his fear of asserting himself & confrontation may likely be:

Chess may be a good analogy for explaining the difference between a descriptive model of reality and a generative model of reality.

A descriptive model of chess will describe the rules (i.e. initial setup, allowed moves, points per piece, objectives). This tells you how a chessboard might evolve and also narrows the combinations of realistic chess positions.

In contrast, a generative model involves the actual gameplay between competing players that follow the rules. It generates new styles and patterns. It establishes new strategies and tactics. It generates new openings, middle gameplay, and end game tactics.

A generative model is an evolutionary model that leads to emergent behavior. As a consequence, a master of chess is able to recall the layout of chess positions in a real game in an instant, yet is unable to remember pieces placed in random positions.

That is because causality is present in the movements of pieces in a chessboard. An intuitive system like the human mind is able to capture that causality as a means to understanding and recall.