I cut aluminum with mine (and professional aluminum sellers cut theirs with their saw, but it likely costs thousands), but I will second the “be careful” part.

Aluminum can snag your saw blade (especially if you use a blade meant for wood, which I don’t recommend because it also produces messy output). Snagging can have dangerous results (saw jumping upward and losing teeth or more in the process).

Ensure the work piece is clamped down very well. Ensure that the saw is either on a large level surface or better yet - bolted or clamped down. Ensure that the saw jumping cannot hurt you in any way.

When cutting aluminum, push very gently. And when the raw material gets too small, don’t try cutting the last little piece. Small working material will increase the chance of accidents. I set my limit around 20 cm.

The concerns are legit. :(

Then again, empires and wars make for great story material. Persistent peace… not so much. So I believe science fiction has a bias towards epic messes.

As for when this was written - wow, 1978. Probably before Iain M. Banks brought a typewriter home and started typing his first Culture novel…

…but as a result of his typing, even libertarian / socialist viewpoints of science fiction contain empires (often defeated) and wars (sometimes resolved without mass casualties, but not always). The damnable reality of literature tends to be: if there’s no gun on the wall in chapter 1 and someone isn’t shot by chapter 3, you have to figure out what sells the story. :(

It was meant to be humorous framing, given the impossibility of making humans from magma or the iron core. :)

Which ethnicity’s population are we going to reduce?

I honestly believe that “we” aren’t going to do jack s**t. It’s a process which is nearly unsteerable. People are going to live longer and longer, and use resources that would otherwise be used by children they might have had. Society is going to be burdened by caring for the old, and this is going to reduce chances of caring for the young.

In nearly every developed country, population growth is slowing or population has already started decreasing. Only in the least developed regions (some areas of Africa) does the opposite still apply, but UN predictions (made by competent people) suggest the process just reaches there later.

So, every ethnicity’s population is going to be reduced. Every ethnicity can also consider if their numbers are adequate, too high or too low. If a nation feels threatened by disappearing from the maps, they can try to reorganize their society. Random ideas: a few laws that give parents various health and social security guarantees regardless of their employment status, especially in case they’re single parents, then maybe create a few dating sites that actually try to help their users find people they like, etc…

There is plenty of resources to support humanity.

I cannot say I agree, and I think I recall that some indicators currently suggest we’d need about 3 planets to keep going at the same pace.

I think we shouldn’t use up every atom on Earth to churn out more humans. Our species has experienced a massive population explosion and is at peak numbers.

Usually this kind of events are followed by a hurtful population crash. It seems considerably better if growth ends due to a (subconscious?) decision to stop expanding, rather than a war for remaining resources.

The founder of the Antinatalism International, Anugraha Kumar Sharma, argues that “there is absolutely no hope whatsoever in this world.”

Well, that’s hard to argue against. I might disagree, but I cannot artificially give him any hope, even if he wants some.

For some, the progressive embrace of antinatalism might just be a reaction to the pronatalism espoused by the Right. Because Vice President J. D. Vance wants you to have more children, the only natural reply is that we ought to have none.

Not for me. They can want all they want, but to consider children, I imagine I would need to find a society relatively free of strife, a society with lower risk. I would need to feel somewhat secure in my own future, because you have to raise children for a hefty amount of time. Most importanly, I’d have to find someone who’d like to do this together.

Some creatures respond to environmental stress by breeding earlier and faster, and trying to do that more desperately. I cannot find such a response in my own “code”. I respond to environmental stress by saving resources to overcome hardship, and focusing effort to defeat the source of hardship. If that means a decline in population by 1.7 people, so be it.

I think that in the modern times, more people have started thinking this way. Having children is expensive and can effectively put you below the poverty line, and stop you from pursuing goals, whatever they are.

I’m not even anti-natalist. I’m just not interested in reproduction - precisely because I still have a future that I might influence for the better - but not if I waste my resources on reproduction.

Also, I think a scarcity of humans might actually cause society to value humans more. In the Middle Ages, when the plague reduced populations, serfs were able to obtain better conditions and break the pattern of slavery in many lands. Feudal lords struggled because their vast empty lands could not be managed by their dwindling crew - someone could till a field or hunt game without paying taxes or asking for permission out there. Of course, this pattern might not apply in modern times, however.

the global democratic left has been incapable of developing an economic agenda that looks beyond the next election cycle.

Not sure if I can agree. Over here, the agenda looks pretty clear. Achieve progressive taxation. Achieve higher taxation of capital than labour. Achieve lower taxation of worker-owned companies. Achieve universal health insurance. Beyond the economic, achieve a governing system not disproportionately influenced by the wealthy. Preferably, achieve all this without violence.

(and reaching those goals is prevented by the disproportionate propaganda capability of the economic right, mostly financed by the wealthy)

Regarding AI, some simple examples of likely computing expense:

• performing 1 + 1 in assembly language: 1 CPU cycle
• performing 1 + 1 in a high level interpreted language: maybe 10 CPU cycles
• performing 1 + 1 using an LLM: millions of CPU cycles
• asking “why was the rabbit an animal after 1 + 1”: probably priceless, maybe a billion cycles

Некоторые мысли:

• скорее всего, по-русски здесь говорят немногие (но, конечно, есть автоматический перевод). Я говорю, но это не мой родной язык. Чтобы побудить людей к дискуссии, я бы порекомендовал английский.

• создание бренда, который передает какую-то информацию о продуктах (напр. “произведенный компанией, которая следует этическим и экологическим нормам”), на мой взгляд, решение проблемы не с того конца - бренды так не появляются

• типичный бренд (например, Raspberry Pi) начинается с одного продукта (часто экспериментального) и расширяется. Добавляют новые продукты. Если они лучше, бренд получает репутацию.

• в ходе жизни типичной компании в какой-то момент возникает соблазн обменять репутацию (форму социального капитала) на деньги, сделав что-то дешево и не выполнив обещаний

• однако, иногда существующие компании создают регуляторные альянсы, чтобы донести до потребителей мысль: “мы не те ребята, мы сохранили некоторые этические принципы”

Но, повторюсь, мне это кажется очень абстрактным и “высоко в облаках”.

— translation —

Some thoughts:

• most likely, few people can speak Russian here (but of course, automatic translation exists). I can, but it’s not my native language. To get people to discuss, I would recommend English.

• creating a brand that conveys useful information about products (e.g. “made by a company that follows ethical and ecological guidelines”) is, in my opinion, solving the problem from the wrong end… brands don’t appear like this

• a typical brand (e.g. “Raspberry Pi”) starts from a single product (often experimental) and expands. New products are added. If they are better, the brand gets a reputation

• a classic problem awaits then: in the course of a typical company’s life, at some point, there comes a temptation to exchange a good reputation (a form of social capital) into money, by doing something cheaply and not fulfilling promises

• sometimes, however, existing companies do establish regulatory alliances to communicate to consumers “we are not those guys, we have retained some ethics”

But I repeat, this seems very abstract and “high in the clouds” to me.

Reuters (the second link) reports the news as “rogue communication devices”, but also mentions battery packs with “undocumented cellular radios”.

Are we talking offline devices that were stealthily loaded with a 5G simcard or a Lora device waiting for a bricking code?

To my understanding, they found undeclared communication interfaces. Something that shouldn’t have been there according to specs, but was.

Investigating how those could be used to brick a device would take a bit longer.

I guess that security researchers will be taking apart a lot of inverters in the near future.

Then we’ll know.

Considering previous incidents, e.g. the cyber-sabotage performed in Poland by a train repair company Newag to prevent third party repairs, this kind of matters should be taken seriously. Back doors and logic bombs have been done before, and will be regularly re-visited as soon as people forget about their risk.

Sounds like a nice material. :)

It would be a method of representing trust or distrust in a structured way that’s automatically accessible to the end user.

The user could right-click an image, pick “check trust” from a menu, and be presented with a list of metainfo to see who has originally signed it, and what various parties have concluded about it.

Negative proof: the AI company signs it with their watermark.

Positive proof: the photographer signs it with their personal key, providing a way to contact them. Sure, it could be a fake identity, but you can attempt to verify and conclude that.

Cumulative positive and negative proof: on top of the photographer, news organizations add their signatures and remarks (e.g. BBC: “we know and trust this person”, Guardian: “we verified the scene”, Reuters: “we tried to verify this photo, but the person could not be contacted”).

The photo, in the end, would not be just a bitmap, but a container file containing the bitmap (possibly with a steganographically embedded watermark) and various signatures granting or withdrawing trust.

The concept is new to me, so I’m a bit challenged to give an opinion. I will try however.

In some systems, software can be isolated from the real world in a nice sandbox with no unexpected inputs. If a clear way of expressing what one really wants is available, and more convenient than a programming language, I believe a well-trained and self-critical AI (capable of estimating its probability of success at a task) will be highly qualified to write that kind of software, and tell when things are doubtful.

The coder may not understand the code, though, which is something I find politically unacceptable. I don’t want a society where people don’t understand how their systems work.

It could even contain a logic bomb and nobody would know. Even the AI which wrote it may tomorrow fail to understand it, after the software has become sufficiently unique through customization. So, there’s a risk that the software lacks even a single qualified maintainer.

Meanwhile some software is mission critical - if it fails, something irreversible happens in the real world. This kind of software usually must be understood by several people. New people must be capable of coming to understand it through review. They must be able to predict its limitations, give specifications for each subsystem and build testing routines to detect introduction of errors.

Mission critical software typically has a close relationship with hardware. It typically has sensors coming from the real world and effectors changing the real world. Testing it resembles doing electronical and physical experiments. The system may have undescribed properties that an AI cannot be informed about. It may be impossible to code successfully without actually doing those experiments, finding out the limitations and quirks of hardware, and thus it may be impossible for an AI to build from a prompt.

I’m currently building a drone system and I’m up to my neck in undocumented hardware interactions, but even a heating controller will encounter some. I don’t think people will experience success in the near future with letting an AI build such systems for them. In principle it can. In principle, you can let an AI teach a robot dog to walk, and it will take only a few hours. But this will likely require giving it control of said robot dog, letting it run experiments and learn from outcomes. Which may take a week, while writing the code might have also taken a week. In the end, one code base will be maintainable, the other likely not.

For starters, under the title link, you’ll find The Guardian.

But I also warmly recommend the BBC. They are state-owned, but the UK has kept itself out of their business.

The executive order in question is likely no. 14215, currently disputed in court by the DNC. Among other things, it says:

"(b) “Agency,” unless otherwise indicated, means any authority of the United States that is an “agency” under 44 U.S.C. 3502(1), and shall also include the Federal Election Commission.

…and also…

The President and the Attorney General, subject to the President’s supervision and control, shall provide authoritative interpretations of law for the executive branch. The President and the Attorney General’s opinions on questions of law are controlling on all employees in the conduct of their official duties.

No employee of the executive branch acting in their official capacity may advance an interpretation of the law as the position of the United States that contravenes the President or the Attorney General’s opinion on a matter of law, including but not limited to the issuance of regulations, guidance, and positions advanced in litigation, unless authorized to do so by the President or in writing by the Attorney General.

It’s easy to foresee that he wants to alter the constitutional order and establish an authoritarian regime.

Some sound advise to people in the US:

• observe what becomes of the legal challenges to this and other executive orders
• see what political action you can take within established frameworks
• get in touch and establish communications with like-minded people

If the situation worsens, you will benefit from secure communications between people, to hold your councils, make smarter decisions and organize action.

Also, some controversial advise:

• if you’re into tech, find a nice hobby involving something like drones, model planes, airships, tethered blimps, kites, rockets, RC cars, boats, subs or even stationary robots - something that is interesting and fits your budget (let’s hope you’ll use your skills for fun and wholesome things, but life could make corrections)

• it also benefits to know your way around communications: how to participate in a mesh network, how to establish a radio link to some distance, how to lay single mode bare fiber between 2 points exceptionally fast

I think they’re aiming for storing and transporting a large amount of energy (e.g. enough energy for the whole winter). Which you conventionally do as fuel.

It’s making syngas (mix of hydrogen and CO).

So it begs for a next step. Syngas on its own is not a practical fuel. Unlike methane, it can’t be liquefied (hydrogen does not liqefy under economically feasible conditions). Due to free hydrogen, it makes metals brittle. Due to CO, it’s poisonous. And like most fuels, it’s flammable - I think we can’t blame a fuel for that. :)

The next step is hydrogenation of carbon monoxide. I’ve browsed literature and read my fair share via Sci-Hub, and this step tends to have various issues: reactivity, selectivity, catalyst cost and catalyst lifetime.

Reactivity: often, you have to raise either the pressure or the temperature to levels which complicate industrial production. Directly reacting CO2 with H2 faces those issues, but the catalyst (Cu + ZnO) is cheap.

Selectivity: suppose you want to get methanol, the simplest alcohol. Unfortunately your catalyst gives you a mix of methane, methanol, ethane, ethanol and buthanol. To build an industrial process, you need an extra step to separate them. If you get too much byproducts, your fuel production plant could become considerably bigger and more costly. So you definitely want good selectivity.

Catalyst lifetime: suppose that 1 kg of catalyst manages to produce 100 kg of fuel. That’s nice in a lab, but clearly unaccepable in industry.

Catalyst cost: for example, you better not need appreciable quantities of rare metals (e.g. rhenium, nice catalyst, but 2500 euros per gram).

Recently, much has been written about hydrogenation of CO in its liquid phase (at high pressure, not low temprature). For example here. The catalyst is manganese (price OK) and the “total turnover number” (representing catalyst lifetime) is 12 000, which I’d describe as “good enough to go out of the lab, if cheap enough”. In the summary, I can’t find their batch time. In another study about CO + H2 via manganese, people used a batch time of 8-12 hours. So there is a reactivity issue present, but maybe it can be overcome.

They have made the fences tall, which creates an impression of fragility, but we don’t see how deep the posts run into ground. :)

I have a solar fence in operation for 1 year. My version is 1 panel width tall - about 1.2 meters tall, and I built it extremely cheap - 5 cm rectangular wooden posts with a metal screw tip running 30 cm into ground. Assembly using household screws and luck. During storms, it does change position, but I haven’t noticed disassembly.

During hail, it would survive events that would smash my other panels, because a vertical surface exposes less target area and offers more oblique angles of collision to hailstones.

As for efficiency, my vertical array is the most efficient array I have during winter. It’s never covered by snow and catches low sunshine better. In summer, it is the coolest (but not most efficient) array that I have, because it creates verticial convection and gives away heat more efficiently. But it differs from theirs because it’s an east-west array (they seem to have used a north-south geometry to catch morning and evening sunshine).

As for what they said of their results:

The panels generated much less electricity than a standard tilted array, but it was produced in mornings and evenings. “It matches better when there is high electricity demand in the system,” says Victoria.