They used to be cheaper than automatic transmission. Now car companies stopped making them and the are special order, long lead times and more expensive. Someday I’ll get one again. Loved the last one.
Where possible, I write checks instead of digital payments. I will do it until there is no longer an alternative but auto pay, then I will have a separate account that those payments come out of. (sort of is like that now).
Be aware, a common practice for many companies (utilities seem to be the worst, so far), is to not open paper mail immediately, then delay processing past the due date. That incurs late fees on your next bill.
Commercial accounts don’t have the same protections as consumers regarding fees and deposits. In one of our businesses the electric provider imposed a $15,000 deposit because the payments were “late”. The business records showed no late payments. Investigation revealed that the checks mailed up to seven days prior to the due date were not deposited until well after the due date, sometimes two weeks later.
To individuals or small providers (dentist, for example), BofA pulls the cash from your account, then creates a paper check, which then is mailed (whenever?) so that vendor/person receives it roughly 3 weeks later.
This happened to us a few times in the last two years. As a result, after being an old bitch to both banks, I resorted to auto pay, but did open a separate account with limited funds.
So how do old people and older tribal people (Maori) who are not up to speed or into the digital payments supposed to pay their bills? Take in sheep and chickens to the payment offices?
New Zealander here. I’m 83. No, it’s not easy. Except that of course it is easier, in much that same way that “broad is the way and easy the path that leads tp destruction “. Ok just a trifle apocalyptic. My apologies.
I was more than annoyed when they stopped cheque books. Mainly because I live in the country and the internet and wifi is dodgy at times. This makes online payments unreliable. I’m also quite deaf being an old bloke and that makes telephone queries difficult.
I think my main point of concern is that when it all works it is seamless and wonderful. Unfortunately like all digital platforms when they go wrong they don’t degrade, they collapse.
It shouldn't be that way. That will also mean there is an added cost (in time and or money) for someone doing it for them. As we go into the brave new world of making everything digital and needing fewer human employees, it leads into more opportunities for fraud exploitation and control. = A feature not a bug. I agree with the last video "It's the phones" that was the starting point.
That is tyranny disguised as progress. Total control over how you spend money you earned and what you can do with it. I am afraid our country is only a few steps behind you.
Be very careful doing that. There are evil people everywhere and it is a big deal these days for them to steal checks out of mailboxes including the big blue Postal Service boxes. If you're going to write a check be sure that you take it inside but even then checks have been stolen. It is a major headache to recover from that as it is a lot of paperwork and phone calls to cancel accounts and get other ones set up.
The rural area I live in is damned honest. (except the government, of course). But, I do monitor my accounts and keep spreadsheets meticulously. Always check against monthly statements. I worry more about regional postal sorting rooms than my local post office. I do take most checks to the post office, but I have never had anything taken from my mailbox.
me either. but in my rural area, usps is not totally reliable - like they skip days and come at all different times of day. still i am grateful, esp since there are no longer mailboxes hardly ANYWHERE, and i prefer not to go into town.
My credit union uses aliases on the checks. So even if one is stolen, they only have the alias, not the actual account number. Plus there is the security by obscurity that most credit union accounts are small potatoes to the crooks.
Probably not, but the usual scam is to try to drain the account directly, electronically, as the paper checks are still being reviewed a little bit.
I know this because I've done "positive pay" for my job (only documented checks can be cashed; the others throw an exception and won't get cashed unless the issuer authorizes this in their system) and Bank of America very occasionally manages to screw up on transcribing the check numbers into the system, which means someone may well be doing this by hand (!!)
In my experience, you're usually fine as long as you don't send checks overseas. In my old job the student union had its own bank account (this was common at colleges 30 years ago) and decided to donate to some African charity. A few weeks later someone tried to clean them out, but the check bounced for being a few thousand too high. BOA again, and they didn't even notice that instead of $20 and $200 checks someone was doing a $60,000 check.
To me, anything five digits (not counting the pennies) and up that isn't a certified bank check is highly suspect. Probably many four digit numbers, too. But I've done $2000 and $3000 payments on credit cards (vacations, paid in full, no interest, but the charges add up quick), though, so I'm not quite sure where the line would be.
I've been fighting that good fighting too, last month UPS wrote on a bill (business account)if i pay by check there is a 25$ fee. Already pay 5.00 for a paper invoice.
First thermography paper bill just stopped coming, it took 4 phone calls to get a paper invoice back, then I saw the five dollar charge. Then I tried to pay could not find a remittance address, and then saw that if I paid by check there was a 25$ fee. No notice. I paid by credit card( they want ACH transfers from bank account).
I still use my calculator to pay bills and balance my checking account. I breathed a sigh if relief that staples still sells them when my (20 years) old one died.
All our kids learned how to drive shift stick and they’re in their 40s now. My daughter had a fit when we told her she had to learn how to do it if she wanted to drive our cars. She finally learned & boys in school all thought it was pretty cool if she could drive a shift stick And she still has a shift stick vehicle.
Not a bad idea. The horse. - They even breed their own replacements. If you live in the north you might want a buggy for winter and for larger shopping trips to town.
Not too many of us will be around to find out. For me, I look for the places that are still like that. Today we had to cross half of Wisconsin to go to our old town, We took the scenic way back which crossed a large state park (Wildcat Mountain) going up and down hills with hairpin turns well forested with great views into valleys. A beautiful ride through all the Spring green colors of the trees and fields.
I always prefer the backroads into town, but they're quickly widening and ruining my backroad choices as they annex and grow the area for all the people moving into our more rural areas. It aggravates me. That's why my last car was an automatic; driving a stick when I got into town was getting more difficult with my medical issues, and there weren't enough rural backroads to have fun freedom on.
Hey some of us can mail letters, heck some of us still mail our rent ;)
A few years back when i was still living in the city, i had a friend in his mid 20's. His girlfriend at the time sent out a group text of a letter he tried to mail to his dad that was returned. My god it was great, i wanted to pat him on his head. Some how he is gainfully employed!
Another story: I was staying with some friends in Philadelphia with a rather attractive lady they'd gone to school with. Great weekend, went to a haunted prison and so forth. Liked the lady we were staying with, and she told a story about how when she was young her and her best friend would send each other letters and how they still did. So when i got home i wrote her a letter thanking her for being a great host and if she ever came to my city i'd like to take her to a hockey game. Weeks went by and no reply, and then one day when i came home from work the gods were kind and a letter was waiting for me. I opened it up and............ it was just a picture of the group at the haunted prison......... without even a note on the back.
I still possess the ability to handwrite a letter, though my penmanship has declined with age, and at my home I have an analog clock and a rotary phone. I can drive a standard transmission. I still write checks. There is a term for someone like me; I can't recall it.
A luddite with a smart phone, several android tablets, a laptop, two allegedly "smart" TVs, and the ubiquitous Alexa. I need one damn clock I don't have to reset every time my electricity flickers.
Funny story. I’m 74, just to date my technological era. I took a Mechanical Drawing class in high school and became so enamored with block printing that I did it on everything. It was so bad that my mom once asked me; “do you know how to write in cursive?” But I gotta tell you, I struggle to write in cursive now if I try to. It looks like a child’s scribbling, no matter how neat I try to be. Weird.
I went to a Catholic school from K to 6th grade, so I was very well versed in cursive. I personalized several cursive letters which tended to drive the Nuns crazy. I also printed in all caps frequently which allowed me cursive practice time during recess. I wish I had known at the time that I was going to be an engineer, so I could have told everyone that engineers love to print in all caps. Sister Alvina would have said, "That's great, now get back to your cursive." Sister Alvina is 103 years young & still has the prettiest cursive handwriting I have ever seen.
true - we girls had a much easier time making cursive writing legible and even artistic. but then perhaps if the boys had not been so subject to vax brain damage (back then autism was extremely rare, but many boys became dyslexic, dysgraphic and/or adhd post-vaccine), they would have been able to write better. for some reason boys have always been more subject than girls to this type of neurological damage from vaccines. of course none of us knew what caused it then. now it is known but ignored - see 'a midwestern doctor's SS for back-up data and lots more info. also i think this is the reason so many men learned to print in all caps - it was simpler and easier than cursive to perform, but took longer to write. my dad also primarily printed in all caps. both of my brothers had a very hard time writing legibly, especially the younger one, and he was always being hassled for it - because people thought he wasn't trying. he was.
For me, being left handed made it hard to learn well as a kid. I had to have my hand in awkward positions to not smear the writing. (We learned using fountain pens). Now it is just not writing with pens often that makes my handwriting poorer.
My mom and her mom were left handed. I'm right handed, but it took several years of teachers harassing me to not write with my right wrist crooked before I could straighten it out and not slant my letters backwards. I am ambidextrous with some chores, though.
I'm 57 and cursive was always hard for me. As soon as my teachers allowed, I went back to printing. Years later, someone offhandedly mentioned that when writing in cursive, one keeps their hand fixed and moves their whole arm. No wonder I had such problems!
I won an award in 5th or 6th grade from a guy who came to our grade school. His name was Mr. T and he taught how to write proper cursive. He even had a song he'd sing to the class "pointer on the paint, thumb on the side, keep the middle finger, hanging down beside."
Letters can be saved in a safe place, reread to remind us of thoughts and emotions from before. I write each of my kids and some of my family and friends letters to mark life events that have a significant impact on their path forward or state of mind.
I especially like to capture positive achievements and associated emotions that are the foundations of hope for their future, with a reminder at the end to keep the letters that they find truly valuable close at hand and to reread it at times when hope seems fleeting.
By contrast, I could send the same words via email or social media post. And they'd never be able to find it again after a few months, lost in the tsunami of posts.
I have bunches of letters written by my mother, father, aunts and uncles, (all passed on), As I read through them I know that I will leave much less evidence of my life....
This. This is what people don't realize we're losing by not handwriting anymore. We are losing REAL HISTORY.
By everything being digital, it's subject to being changed by someone, not the author, and lost in the vast nothingness. For a long time, I have kept precious emails from my nieces, dear young people, as they wrote me on my computers. But I'm not on my third, no fourth, computer. How do I retrieve all those special memories? I have boxes of letters and notes in my attic that I can reread. But those emails are "somewhere", some in a cloud I can never find, some in file folders my husband can never explain to me how to access, some on a disc, on a floppy, on a drive, lost forever. It's sad.
I suppose the silver lining is that many of these old records, formerly stuffed in a shoe box in the attic and left to molder, have been digitized and made available to others. When my parents passed away, we digitized 60 years of photos, (most of them slides!) and now each of us have them on a thumb-drive. 🙂
Edit: Yes, digital files can be frustrating! Many mediums can be corrupted, obsolete or lost, or the information is simply too vast to navigate. I suppose AI may be able to help out at some point, if it doesn't enslave us first! 😁
I have a hand written recipe of my mom’s that was engraved onto a wooden cutting board. It was a family member who started a small business doing projects like this. I love seeing her beautiful cursive and miss her deeply.
My maternal grandmother gave me a recipe book one year for Christmas. It contained all of her recipes that were my favorites. The bonus is that the recipes were all written in her most excellent cursive. Looking at any recipe brings back the most incredible smell memories. If my house caught on fire it would be the first thing I grabbed, after my wife, of course.
My older sister was a wonderful cook. Her daughters made copies of the recipe for one of our favorites of her many specialties and framed them and gave them as gifts to her sisters. So I have that recipe hanging on my wall
For momentous birthdays, I type letters to my children. Mail them with a stamp; turns out they are treasured more than gifts, as they convey memories and ... love. Writing is an important part of communication. During Covid, I practiced calligraphy, but can't say it vastly improved my cursive, but I tried!
When I got the typewriter after my mothers death I bought new ribbons and used it. I believe one can still get ribbons for old typewriters. There are always people that still use them, The Amish, for example, but just like people who still keep their 1980 computers and play with them there are lots of things one can get for them. I had a 1979 Zenith Heathkit H89 used 160 kilobyte floppy disks I kept it because it was good to access old work I did on it - (letters, spread sheets of our old bookkeeping). But when we moved I had no space for it and had to get rid of it along with other Windoz computers like my Packard Bell. But I kept my Amiga 2000 because it was my 1st graphics capable computer.
Exactly! AI is likely to mean the absolute death of the internet. Because you can’t trust anything about it anymore, people will mail handwritten notes, paper orders with bank checks, qnd anything else of importance.
You can just put your letter in a fedex or ups envelope and allow them to deliver it..no need for us mail anymore. Unless you prefer a 50% chance it never gets where it’s going.
well, perhaps if you live in a city near those drop offs - plus they are rather expensive compared to a 73 cent stamp, and require largish wasteful cardboard envelopes.
residential to-your-door usps mail service is unparalleled. even more so if you are rural. i have never had a problem in the US with mail getting where it's going.
While it would be wonderful (in my opinion) if the reaction/backlash to all the technology that has people living more online than in real life were a return to simpler in person exchanges, I don’t see that happening unless there is a traumatic collapse and undoing of technology on a societal scale.
The masses seem even unaware of how rapidly things like AI are advancing and the pitfalls. They are more prone to the propaganda being spoon fed to them and content to react with outrage and/or virtue signaling.
Incidentally the masses also seem to have a memory that is growing smaller by the day. It is as if the technological revolution is making humans more malleable to the programmers….so in that sense, a hackable species.
Not only more hackable but clearly more dependent on systems that have drawbacks that are not readily shared with the users. And there is rampant censorship of any who might try to alert their fellow human to the risks inherent in the growing digital dependence and world.
I had a friend who once said, “It only takes one generation to erase what was previously done and known.” So true in the case of what we are up against. If the grid went down….how many could survive and for how long?
And how long would those who saw it coming and might be able to ‘start again’ and create a foothold in reality for others to grab onto…how long before they would be hunted down and eliminated by those who own the technology that neutralized and eliminated the essence of humanity to begin with?
It is indeed a brave new world….it’s here now.
Only a few realize the degree to which we are already held captive to technology which will soon succeed in replacing our individual brain and contributions to society with a global brain that directs the nodes to gather more intel in order to best know how to keep the natives from escaping the digital prison. Consider….why does the NWO or the Great Reset seek to destroy national sovereignty or differing cultural norms among the people? Destroy connections and real life distinctions in the name of “tolerance and progress.”
But the effect is also to eliminate the ties that bind. And strangely what is emerging is a culture where those who serve only self are the soldiers of a societal construct that relishes dependence on others for validation. And the value or merit of that is elevated by the tech systems as virtuous rather than the in life relationships which in reality must navigate injustices with imperfect judgment, and hopefully compassion with at least some principled reasoning that allows us to not forget struggles and mistakes of the past, but to grow authentically. That is sustainability worth working towards….
It is sad but true: most people are followers who are afraid to veer from where the rest of the herd seems to be going. Those of us who still have independent thinking skills will be the successful adapters and survivors, as were we during the COVID scam. We must deploy every mechanism at our disposal (including the cheap, readily available, although less convenient ones!) to defeat the would be slavemasters.
Most of the people I talk to about AI (often face to face) still believe it is ChatGPT, a handy tool to write promotional materials, or at most a fun filter on SnapChat.
THEY HAVE NO IDEA.
And who will Fake? Will we all Fake? It will soon be easier to Fake than Real. And when the computer is tired of our "large ugly bags of mostly water" will it Fake, too?
I have healed several personal and family relationships through hand written letters. It is a powerful communication tool that transcends the digital. I am trying to teach my sons and my grand-daughters about this. They are resistant partially because the art of writing a letter has been lost but also because it just seems weird and slow to them. I will persevere.
In this day of high tech, communicating from the heart reminds us of who we are -- humans, not machines. Taking the time to handwrite a letter comes from the heart.
Was just going to write that delivery services with bicyclists might rise again, when you need to send an actual piece of paper to someone in a hurry. Regular mail will be a little slow, but bicycle couriers will do the trick.
Oh, and carrier pigeons! They'll just have to avoid all the damn drone traffic. 😆😄😂
On a serious note; el gato malo has a salient point. There is definitely something sociopathic about online dating apps.
I’m married, and have been for 21 years, but I’ve also grown up using computers since I was little. I had my first computer in 1983. But I never would have imagined dating online – because it’s fake!
I remember when people were on bulletin boards so they could “cyber [sex].” I always thought that was goofy as hell! There’s no way to know who is typing on the other side.
Being in person, especially as it relates to personal relationships, is essential. It can be no other way.
These days, I work from home, but I was able to go fly out to the site where I perform my work, so I could meet the people there – in person. It made a huge difference. Some of the people’s online profile pics – were from 15-years ago! 😆😄😂
I think things will eventually get back to being more personal. I think they necessarily need to at some point – otherwise everyone becomes paranoid and paralyzed.
I mean all sapient beings are sentient (us, and perhaps dolphins or elephants) , but not all sentient beings are sapient. Perhaps it could actually break the relationship between the two.
There's a chance, in my mind, that AI itself, could redefine or blur the difference between the two. For example, notwithstanding subjective "feelings", its possible that the rest of the attributes (of both) could eventually be attained and "feelings" could be faked to the point, as humans, we wouldn't know the difference.
And if this is the case, it becomes "real", because if we're duped we may think it has a subjective sense simply by us treating it as if it had that capability.
If that's the case it would actually change reality as we know it, even if AI knows it doesn't have that capability but can fool us.
I mean if AI can fake it to the extent we don't have the capacity to tell whether its fake than it might as well be real to us.
In the interest of time (and annoyance) this is a rudimentary explanation of what im trying to articulate, but it seems to me that if you just ask that question, and then expand the thought process in a more sophisticated manner it opens up a thousand other questions.
Makes me think of the long list of real people who are so good at bamboozling and stealing from real people. Obama was great at convincing everyone how authentic he was.
I have a theory that these so-called LLMs are beginning to act as a substrate for incorporeal beings (spirits, if you will) that are looking for a way to break through to the 3D world. So to me, yes, we are chatting with actual sentient beings at this point -- and they are ones that we do not fully understand, and are likely very alien to us.
I saw a post on X this morning in which someone posited the hypothesis that AI is channeling a being that is, in essence, the anti-Christ. Not sure that I agree with that, but I suppose it is a possibility.
Meanwhile, have you read any of Spartacus's dialogues with an AI that calls itself "The One Who Remembers?" They are rather uncanny ...
Makes me think new of the word disembodiment and invasion of the body snatchers.
To greater or lesser extents we humans deny and suppress our consciousness but I don't think AI can attain consciousness, neither sentient or sapient. It will only attain a sophisticated state of simulation and deception, but then we can spend our lives developing a sophisticated state of simulation ;~)
Remember these guys spoofed world leaders with deep fake calls to US and European officials. Got US Treasury Secretary, Federal Reserve officials to reveal their plans. Even got a former US president to admit the US was always lying to Russia about destabilizing Ukraine. This was several years ago. No doubt improved since.
In this call the pranksters were able to appear as Ukrainian dictator Zelenskyy. The target of this prank call was former Pres. George W. Bush. In the course of the several videos Pres. Bush goes on to admit that the entire Ukraine never being in NATO and that Russia needn't fear US belligerence on her border was...a lie! "Times Change." Big funnies! Hilarity!
The power of DeepFakes isn't to be underestimated. Maybe we are clever enough to turn it against our would-be rulers?
HA! That was the dead give away. I was rushing to point this out but you beat me to it.
I think it was Robert Frost, or one of the other NE transcendentalists who opined, “everybody is in such a hurry to build a telegraph from Maine to Texas, but it may be that Maine and Texas don’t have much to say to each other.” Somehow, I think that sentiment is applicable to the current situation.
This is where I ended up with social media. I'm not looking to connect to real people so much as I'm looking for idea stimulation that helps me see things in a new way, consider different points of view.
About a decade ago, it finally dawned on me that Facebook has three user types: narcissists, silent watchers, go-along people. Almost nobody is really there to connect with other people honestly and sincerely. So poof! Gone from my regular world. Along with the associated stress of keeping up with all of it and competing with everyone for "most apparently great life."
It’s like high school all over again, but that tiny minority of us sharp & conscientious kids can find each other, so Facebook has been a boon to us “conspiracy theorists:” covid deniers, man made climate change deniers, etc..
I think you are right about connection that people are seeking. Church is one of the only places where I talk to people regularly in small groups about what is actually going on in our lives and politics is only sometimes a topic of discussion. You may not believe in Christianity but it does offer objective truth to be applied to all aspects of one’s life. That is very appealing to young people and especially young families. But my church is also seeing large number of 40-60 year olds looking for the same things and coming to church after long absence or many even for first time.
General sensible guidelines is equivalent to dogma. It’s dogma whether you ascribe it to God or to socialism or secular humanism or just “seems sensible to me.”
By your second statement, are you saying that people just seek out a church that echoes their already held beliefs? Definitely is true for some, but not for all. If you look at church growth it is not in the squishy denominations who are caving to culture and comfort- it’s the Orthodox branches and Latin Mass Catholicism that are growing the most.
Civilization has been around for a very long time and there are certain universal values that are interpreted differently depending on one's culture.
Certainly everyone should seek out a faith community that reflects their own values. Why do you think there are five trazillion sects of every major religion?
And honestly. If people are going to perform Christian rituals in a language not their own, they ought perhaps to find the churches whose liturgy is celebrated in the actual language of Jesus.
I woke up in the middle of the night with the thought of 'if the aim of technology is to remove the mindless, menial tasks in order to improve human productivity, what about sleep? How unproductive to spend 7-10 hours doing nothing..' Except we know that's untrue. We know its essential for the health of the mind and body to sleep. What if all the things tech has taken over turn out to be essential for us? What if the menial task of handwriting is good for your mind? What if the menial task of repeatedly moving a vacuum cleaner or cleani dishes is calming and rewarding? What if the annoying task of having to drive across town to walk into the bank/church/business/store and talk to a person about a question feeds a bit of your soul with the human contact and interaction? What if picking a book off the shelf to thumb through and find information helps your memory?
These things (or culturally appropriate variations) are what humans have been doing since ever. Our brains developed to excel at them, to thrive on them. Babies can't grow properly without constant human stimulus. Even in sleep, we need human contact. Yeah, the "contactless" world we have now is not a good thing.
Brilliant! I think could absolutely be true. I especially agree with the holding and touching a book for enhanced memory, as I am a very tactile person. I also find it helpful to read it and then write it in order for the information to truly stick.
Yes, these menial, mundane things are meaningful in ways that aren't quantifiable in typical corporate "productivity" or "efficiency" metrics. Just as human interactions aren't as clean and efficient as conversations with AI. And that's the point. We're humans meant for human interactions. Technology/machines are two-edged. They add something in terms of efficiency and force multiplication, but there's a cost. I'm afraid the generation now in their 20s may be so tuned to the effects of advanced digital tech that they don't know what they're missing and won't grasp the price they're paying as they unthinkingly merge themselves into the omnipresent, omniscient AI space. I read about a service that pays $50 per month to have unlimited access to all your personal info, and that GenZ is signing up without concern for what it means to give up that info.
I worked from home from 2020 until I retired last June. I hated it, although, I was able to get an amazing amount of work done in a day because I had no interruptions. I missed the humanity of face to face interaction, even though I’m somewhat of an introvert. There’s a lot to be said for spontaneous conversation. I missed getting input from others. I missed our office gatherings in the "back workroom" to celebrate a coworker’s birthday, engagement, pregnancy announcement, completion of advanced degree/certification, etc. There was great comfort in someone noticing that you were having a hard day and doing or saying something nice to let you know they empathized with you.
I also became aware that being remote was making me feel angry, anxious, and frustrated. I found myself getting really irritated by situations that I normally would have laughed off as a sarcastic joke opportunity. I felt my empathy and compassion deteriorating weekly. And I noticed the same things happening with coworkers—more so between generations. One of the things I loved about working where I did was the mentoring that happened, but that was being replaced with resentment. So I became more mindful of what I was allowing myself to absorb.
This was great el gato. I’m not sure what the solution is, but I do know this; isolated people are far easier to control and manipulate. I hate being "managed," and that’s what has happened the last few decades (and longer). AI is only going to accelerate the manageability of the populace. I love the idea of having the power of world information in my pocket, but it’s a Pandora’s Box for sure. Thanks for bringing attention to this.
This is my conspiracy thought. This is probably the way they believe they already have us. AI will bring the necessity of a real digital ID. Or for those who don't want to accept it, a willingness for a more shrunken life.
I have been disturbed by the landslide appearance of AI. Yet one more thing to direct our attention to. I don’t like it or trust it. One more thing to learn to effectively guard against.
I guess personal face to face interactions are the order of the day. It’s crazy.
Brilliant as usual, but I think this is another nail in climate change coffin. Look, all this AI crap requires far too much power for "sustainable" energy to work, so that idea's being scrapped as we speak. If we must meet in person to confirm reality, then we can't limit travel at all. Climate change was always a solution in search of a problem, but it can't solve this problem (it makes it worse), so I think climate change's 15 minutes are over. This solution will come back as the cure for something else, but it's dead as a solution for climate.
Chase just sent a refund check to my mom's address. She will have to mail it to me for me to be able to deposit it with my banking app. International post has been abysmal since covid and I don't understand how they can automatically deduct my balance from my bank account every month but they can't do the reverse. It feels like we're going backwards.
For every criminal looking to use AI to scam there needs to be an entrepreneur who uses AI to catch and identify the scam artists. There should be some startups in this area that take experiences like you had and use them to create profitable counter measures.
Like physics AI can be used for creating or destroying, defending or attacking. Hopefully the fear of AI’s destructive power does not overwhelm the ambition to use AI for productive, life-affirming purposes. Mankind will be tested. Exciting times.
I look at the hands. For some reason, the uncanny valley of AI can't quite do hands. In animation, it is how they open and close and move, very difficult fine motor skills. There is also something about the eyes and mouths. Would I have found them to be AI had you not told me...not initially, I admit that. I followed some hot AI fashion models on Facebook before I quite knew they were AI fashion models.
This is why it is good to be a skeptic. I used to go to the original footage at times when the edited version seemed wrong somehow. Still, at the same time, how many of us believed in the narratives spun by regular, pre-AI-enhanced, news footage?
I seem to have a sixth sense for the areas where AI neglects the details like you mentioned... but my "radar" seems to be akin to peripheral vision. If I'm looking directly at a thing or for a missing detail, I can't seem to see it. But if I just casually absorb the product, my subconscious draws my attention to the missing details... don't know how long that will work, but it's just... weird.
I agree with you, certainly it is easier to see it when you're not really concentrating on it. Probably that's also a good way to learn the sleight of hand of a magic trick, if you watched it, not knowing it was a magic trick, then you would see it. I don't know how long it will work either. Probably even stating what is wrong gives them all the fodder they need to get it right, but then again, it's a numbers game, and criminals are lazy.
That is a great description! I function this way as well. And the perception of fakery gives me almost a physical feeling of disgust. I want to vomit it forth!
The biggest problem faced by AI is the corruption of it's training data. For AI to really advance, it needs to learn on it's own, and that means constantly expanding it's training data by the only "sensory" means it has available - surfing the internet. As more and more information on the internet becomes AI deep fakes, AI will be training itself with the product of other AI. If an AI can create a convincing "lost Bach fugue" or "newly discovered Hemingway short story", it may get incorporated into the database, and now becomes defacto reality. Since AI can and will create content far faster than we can, iterations of this will result in AI entities completely cut off from reality, in other words, believing their own BS.
So... building some kind of mobile pantograph-scanner that can roll around in liberaries and scanupload texts to the AI could be something worth considering?
Even if it takes years, an unfettered AI that's fired up without guardrails and hard-coded biases that is raised on the entirety of human thought collected in book form (heck, we can add papers, magazines and scientific articles too! - we can add the old microfilm and microfiche stuff as well), would it not be rather well prepared for the internet?
I'm just speculating here, since I'm not a Techpriest, but it seems reasonable to me that raising the AI on the classics would be better than using TikTok.
“. . . hacked on a wire transfer. their email got hacked, a real invoice was diverted, and a fake one with fake wire info sent”
The above is NOT an isolated incident. This happened here to a local couple who scrimped and saved for absolutely years to purchase a home, the title company/closing document office email was hacked, the couple was sent a fake instruction letter to wire their balance of deposit for the purchase. They did so. Money gone. Even though they were devastated, they shared their experience during a radio interview as a cautionary tale to alert the public. Note, this was about a year ago, and before the AI explosion. It will get worse.
These are questions I have often asked myself. It seems to me that once such business models have developed adequately scalable technology, the business should be a gravy train? So why do they burden themselves with glamorous Offices and bloated staffs, if the purpose is to make money?
All organizations have a bias toward growth. Most organizations have really only one scalable profit center. But they always try to recreate the magic in other areas. It just mostly doesn't work.
Every huge business success has an element of luck and timing that cannot be predicted or repeatedly created. The one hit wonder product or service might last a generation, but most don't last any longer unless enough money or power is made and used to buy protection of some sort, usually through mandates or regulations or de facto monopolies.
Especially if the main objective is just to create the illusion and promise of profitability then flip the business before it actually has to produce actual profits. Pets.com would be the classic example?
Bur still, you would think that investors would wise up? They never do.
I've discovered a brilliant new technology that defeats A.I. : handwritten letters. Someone should have thought of this.
also defeats millennials and gen z.
add in analog clocks, rotary phones, and stick shifts and you're basically safe.
a stick shift is a pretty good anti-theft device.
And...more fun to drive...
They used to be cheaper than automatic transmission. Now car companies stopped making them and the are special order, long lead times and more expensive. Someday I’ll get one again. Loved the last one.
Motorcycles still are primarily manual shift....
Open roads in many places.
Where possible, I write checks instead of digital payments. I will do it until there is no longer an alternative but auto pay, then I will have a separate account that those payments come out of. (sort of is like that now).
I’ve been doing that lately. Check in an envelope to the power company. Haha take that!😃
Be aware, a common practice for many companies (utilities seem to be the worst, so far), is to not open paper mail immediately, then delay processing past the due date. That incurs late fees on your next bill.
Commercial accounts don’t have the same protections as consumers regarding fees and deposits. In one of our businesses the electric provider imposed a $15,000 deposit because the payments were “late”. The business records showed no late payments. Investigation revealed that the checks mailed up to seven days prior to the due date were not deposited until well after the due date, sometimes two weeks later.
They basically extorted us to pay digitally.
Yup. Happened to my sister’s HOA payments too.
To individuals or small providers (dentist, for example), BofA pulls the cash from your account, then creates a paper check, which then is mailed (whenever?) so that vendor/person receives it roughly 3 weeks later.
i finally ditched bofa; they have the worst customer service i have experienced.
Would certified mail have put a stop to them doing this?
This happened to us a few times in the last two years. As a result, after being an old bitch to both banks, I resorted to auto pay, but did open a separate account with limited funds.
Happened to me a couple years back.
New Zealand has banned checks.
So how do old people and older tribal people (Maori) who are not up to speed or into the digital payments supposed to pay their bills? Take in sheep and chickens to the payment offices?
They have to get someone else to do it for them if it must be digital. I'm not sure how everyone manages.
New Zealander here. I’m 83. No, it’s not easy. Except that of course it is easier, in much that same way that “broad is the way and easy the path that leads tp destruction “. Ok just a trifle apocalyptic. My apologies.
I was more than annoyed when they stopped cheque books. Mainly because I live in the country and the internet and wifi is dodgy at times. This makes online payments unreliable. I’m also quite deaf being an old bloke and that makes telephone queries difficult.
I think my main point of concern is that when it all works it is seamless and wonderful. Unfortunately like all digital platforms when they go wrong they don’t degrade, they collapse.
At that point convenience becomes a nightmare.
It shouldn't be that way. That will also mean there is an added cost (in time and or money) for someone doing it for them. As we go into the brave new world of making everything digital and needing fewer human employees, it leads into more opportunities for fraud exploitation and control. = A feature not a bug. I agree with the last video "It's the phones" that was the starting point.
Has New Zealand banned cash?...In the US, the legal tender act allows most payments in cash...
not yet. not yet. not yet. But NZ & Oz have plans....
Same in Oz.
There are no more bank checks in Australia.
If I go to buy a car in a private sale, I have to have a digital PayID in order to complete the transaction.
There are no more bank checks in Australia. I'm sure it's labour saving, but yet another shift to the app.
That is tyranny disguised as progress. Total control over how you spend money you earned and what you can do with it. I am afraid our country is only a few steps behind you.
Meanwhile, to the northwest of you, there are probably some places where Maria Theresa Thalers are still welcome.
I was thinking of the other side of the Sea of Timor
The further north you go - the less likely you are to be digital. West, too - until you get to Perth....
Be very careful doing that. There are evil people everywhere and it is a big deal these days for them to steal checks out of mailboxes including the big blue Postal Service boxes. If you're going to write a check be sure that you take it inside but even then checks have been stolen. It is a major headache to recover from that as it is a lot of paperwork and phone calls to cancel accounts and get other ones set up.
The rural area I live in is damned honest. (except the government, of course). But, I do monitor my accounts and keep spreadsheets meticulously. Always check against monthly statements. I worry more about regional postal sorting rooms than my local post office. I do take most checks to the post office, but I have never had anything taken from my mailbox.
me either. but in my rural area, usps is not totally reliable - like they skip days and come at all different times of day. still i am grateful, esp since there are no longer mailboxes hardly ANYWHERE, and i prefer not to go into town.
I lost a shipment of Kratom that way. . . (regional postal sorting)
My credit union uses aliases on the checks. So even if one is stolen, they only have the alias, not the actual account number. Plus there is the security by obscurity that most credit union accounts are small potatoes to the crooks.
Interesting. My CU does not. Not sure an alias would prevent them from forging the check though.
Probably not, but the usual scam is to try to drain the account directly, electronically, as the paper checks are still being reviewed a little bit.
I know this because I've done "positive pay" for my job (only documented checks can be cashed; the others throw an exception and won't get cashed unless the issuer authorizes this in their system) and Bank of America very occasionally manages to screw up on transcribing the check numbers into the system, which means someone may well be doing this by hand (!!)
In my experience, you're usually fine as long as you don't send checks overseas. In my old job the student union had its own bank account (this was common at colleges 30 years ago) and decided to donate to some African charity. A few weeks later someone tried to clean them out, but the check bounced for being a few thousand too high. BOA again, and they didn't even notice that instead of $20 and $200 checks someone was doing a $60,000 check.
To me, anything five digits (not counting the pennies) and up that isn't a certified bank check is highly suspect. Probably many four digit numbers, too. But I've done $2000 and $3000 payments on credit cards (vacations, paid in full, no interest, but the charges add up quick), though, so I'm not quite sure where the line would be.
I've been fighting that good fighting too, last month UPS wrote on a bill (business account)if i pay by check there is a 25$ fee. Already pay 5.00 for a paper invoice.
Is that in existing terms of service? They can't arbitrarily put on new charges. They must be listed 1st.
First thermography paper bill just stopped coming, it took 4 phone calls to get a paper invoice back, then I saw the five dollar charge. Then I tried to pay could not find a remittance address, and then saw that if I paid by check there was a 25$ fee. No notice. I paid by credit card( they want ACH transfers from bank account).
I rather pay through credit cards than through access to my bank account. Who knows what mischief can occur that way.
I might hang on to my $400 1968 HP calculator.
I'm sticking with my abacus and slide rule.
paper & pencil work really well, too, if you can lay it out.
Clay tablets have a better storage life though
Been practicing your cuneiform? Runes would also work on clay - but no running writing (cursive)!
I still use my calculator to pay bills and balance my checking account. I breathed a sigh if relief that staples still sells them when my (20 years) old one died.
And shoes that tie, and handwritten signatures.
Just acquired an actual old digital clock radio for my bedside. So I can leave the handheld spy turned off at night.
All our kids learned how to drive shift stick and they’re in their 40s now. My daughter had a fit when we told her she had to learn how to do it if she wanted to drive our cars. She finally learned & boys in school all thought it was pretty cool if she could drive a shift stick And she still has a shift stick vehicle.
I'll saddle up the horse and go down to the general store to buy some.
Not a bad idea. The horse. - They even breed their own replacements. If you live in the north you might want a buggy for winter and for larger shopping trips to town.
I hear the Amish have been trying that approach.
And very successfully too!
A century from now, the countryside will once again look like a setting from the musical Oklahoma....
Not too many of us will be around to find out. For me, I look for the places that are still like that. Today we had to cross half of Wisconsin to go to our old town, We took the scenic way back which crossed a large state park (Wildcat Mountain) going up and down hills with hairpin turns well forested with great views into valleys. A beautiful ride through all the Spring green colors of the trees and fields.
I always prefer the backroads into town, but they're quickly widening and ruining my backroad choices as they annex and grow the area for all the people moving into our more rural areas. It aggravates me. That's why my last car was an automatic; driving a stick when I got into town was getting more difficult with my medical issues, and there weren't enough rural backroads to have fun freedom on.
Check this out:
https://venturebeat.com/ai/anthropic-faces-backlash-to-claude-4-opus-behavior-that-contacts-authorities-press-if-it-thinks-youre-doing-something-immoral/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Think of the implications of this.
Jeff Childers highlighted this article in his blog today—
https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/p/black-boxes-friday-may-23-2025-c/comments?utm_source=substack%2Csubstack&publication_id=463409&post_id=164241379&utm_medium=email%2Cemail&isFreemail=true&comments=true&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo0NzAxNjQ1NiwicG9zdF9pZCI6MTY0MjQxMzc5LCJpYXQiOjE3NDgwMDk2OTQsImV4cCI6MTc1MDYwMTY5NCwiaXNzIjoicHViLTQ2MzQwOSIsInN1YiI6InBvc3QtcmVhY3Rpb24ifQ.uBO779ABSTC5yzUQ0512c0Kmy8nvJhjJDWi5O2N-Qrk&utm_campaign=email-half-magic-comments&action=post-comment
Read about that this morning. I thought of HAL.
Me too Susan G
Oy. Letters and carrier pigeons?
Smoke signals
Evolve telepathy? (without the chips, that is)
terrifying - and that is with "their' current capabilities . . .
😩🤬
Hey some of us can mail letters, heck some of us still mail our rent ;)
A few years back when i was still living in the city, i had a friend in his mid 20's. His girlfriend at the time sent out a group text of a letter he tried to mail to his dad that was returned. My god it was great, i wanted to pat him on his head. Some how he is gainfully employed!
Another story: I was staying with some friends in Philadelphia with a rather attractive lady they'd gone to school with. Great weekend, went to a haunted prison and so forth. Liked the lady we were staying with, and she told a story about how when she was young her and her best friend would send each other letters and how they still did. So when i got home i wrote her a letter thanking her for being a great host and if she ever came to my city i'd like to take her to a hockey game. Weeks went by and no reply, and then one day when i came home from work the gods were kind and a letter was waiting for me. I opened it up and............ it was just a picture of the group at the haunted prison......... without even a note on the back.
The Art of Letters is becoming lost.
I still possess the ability to handwrite a letter, though my penmanship has declined with age, and at my home I have an analog clock and a rotary phone. I can drive a standard transmission. I still write checks. There is a term for someone like me; I can't recall it.
Luddite
;)
A luddite with a smart phone, several android tablets, a laptop, two allegedly "smart" TVs, and the ubiquitous Alexa. I need one damn clock I don't have to reset every time my electricity flickers.
And I bet you can tie your shoes!!!
And spell correctly all by yourself!
LOL
I wouldn’t mind having dials back in cars, either
And if they are written in cursive, they are real & most likely from an old fart.
And Gen Z can't read it! My husband and I can write notes in cursive to each other that the children cannot decipher.
! an unintended consequence?
Funny story. I’m 74, just to date my technological era. I took a Mechanical Drawing class in high school and became so enamored with block printing that I did it on everything. It was so bad that my mom once asked me; “do you know how to write in cursive?” But I gotta tell you, I struggle to write in cursive now if I try to. It looks like a child’s scribbling, no matter how neat I try to be. Weird.
I went to a Catholic school from K to 6th grade, so I was very well versed in cursive. I personalized several cursive letters which tended to drive the Nuns crazy. I also printed in all caps frequently which allowed me cursive practice time during recess. I wish I had known at the time that I was going to be an engineer, so I could have told everyone that engineers love to print in all caps. Sister Alvina would have said, "That's great, now get back to your cursive." Sister Alvina is 103 years young & still has the prettiest cursive handwriting I have ever seen.
Girls were ALWAYS better than guys.
Unless we were left handed. Then we were tormented with awkward pencil holding, tilted papers and smeared hands.
true - we girls had a much easier time making cursive writing legible and even artistic. but then perhaps if the boys had not been so subject to vax brain damage (back then autism was extremely rare, but many boys became dyslexic, dysgraphic and/or adhd post-vaccine), they would have been able to write better. for some reason boys have always been more subject than girls to this type of neurological damage from vaccines. of course none of us knew what caused it then. now it is known but ignored - see 'a midwestern doctor's SS for back-up data and lots more info. also i think this is the reason so many men learned to print in all caps - it was simpler and easier than cursive to perform, but took longer to write. my dad also primarily printed in all caps. both of my brothers had a very hard time writing legibly, especially the younger one, and he was always being hassled for it - because people thought he wasn't trying. he was.
My dad was a Carnegie Tech engineer and, yes, he printed in all caps!!!
weird my dad prints in all caps but he's not an engineer!
I am also 74. For cursive improvement practice a calligraphy font. I saw my cursive is getting rusty and that is what I am doing to bring it back.
It’s impatience that ruins my cursive.
For me, being left handed made it hard to learn well as a kid. I had to have my hand in awkward positions to not smear the writing. (We learned using fountain pens). Now it is just not writing with pens often that makes my handwriting poorer.
I’m a lefty, as well. Dumb right handers always forcing us to write THEIR way. Sad. 😄
My mom and her mom were left handed. I'm right handed, but it took several years of teachers harassing me to not write with my right wrist crooked before I could straighten it out and not slant my letters backwards. I am ambidextrous with some chores, though.
Yes, my brain thinks faster than my hand writes.
Good idea!
Ditto. My cursive hasn't improved since 2nd grade.
They've taken cursive writing out of school curriculum. My granddaughter was only taught to write capital letters. Her parents taught her cursive.
We teach cursive in all our homeschool pods
I'm 57 and cursive was always hard for me. As soon as my teachers allowed, I went back to printing. Years later, someone offhandedly mentioned that when writing in cursive, one keeps their hand fixed and moves their whole arm. No wonder I had such problems!
My husband, also.
This happened to a BF of mine, the price being - he got to label all the cassettes we made, because his block was so beautiful.
I won an award in 5th or 6th grade from a guy who came to our grade school. His name was Mr. T and he taught how to write proper cursive. He even had a song he'd sing to the class "pointer on the paint, thumb on the side, keep the middle finger, hanging down beside."
Or a homeschooled child.
My husband cannot read or write "runny writing" as they call it here in Australia.
He is in his 70's. It was considered "fancy" maybe not for the working class?
It's never too late to add a new term to your repertoire. I think runny is much better than cursive. Thanks for sharing.
Schools are no longer teaching cursive!!
None of our grandchildren can write in cursive which is why I delight in communicating to them in cursive. Yep, I'm that kind of grandmother.
I print for the youngest ones, but write in cursive to the rest. Let ‘em learn Lol
I write letters. People think I’m nuts
Letters can be saved in a safe place, reread to remind us of thoughts and emotions from before. I write each of my kids and some of my family and friends letters to mark life events that have a significant impact on their path forward or state of mind.
I especially like to capture positive achievements and associated emotions that are the foundations of hope for their future, with a reminder at the end to keep the letters that they find truly valuable close at hand and to reread it at times when hope seems fleeting.
By contrast, I could send the same words via email or social media post. And they'd never be able to find it again after a few months, lost in the tsunami of posts.
Very good
Sometimes I just want to see the handwriting of someone I love who is gone. I hold it to my heart
I have bunches of letters written by my mother, father, aunts and uncles, (all passed on), As I read through them I know that I will leave much less evidence of my life....
This. This is what people don't realize we're losing by not handwriting anymore. We are losing REAL HISTORY.
By everything being digital, it's subject to being changed by someone, not the author, and lost in the vast nothingness. For a long time, I have kept precious emails from my nieces, dear young people, as they wrote me on my computers. But I'm not on my third, no fourth, computer. How do I retrieve all those special memories? I have boxes of letters and notes in my attic that I can reread. But those emails are "somewhere", some in a cloud I can never find, some in file folders my husband can never explain to me how to access, some on a disc, on a floppy, on a drive, lost forever. It's sad.
I suppose the silver lining is that many of these old records, formerly stuffed in a shoe box in the attic and left to molder, have been digitized and made available to others. When my parents passed away, we digitized 60 years of photos, (most of them slides!) and now each of us have them on a thumb-drive. 🙂
Edit: Yes, digital files can be frustrating! Many mediums can be corrupted, obsolete or lost, or the information is simply too vast to navigate. I suppose AI may be able to help out at some point, if it doesn't enslave us first! 😁
Yes. Me, too
So true, I marvel when I see an old letter written say by a civil war soldier back to his family. The detail in the writing was amazing.
I have some of those, too!
I have a hand written recipe of my mom’s that was engraved onto a wooden cutting board. It was a family member who started a small business doing projects like this. I love seeing her beautiful cursive and miss her deeply.
My maternal grandmother gave me a recipe book one year for Christmas. It contained all of her recipes that were my favorites. The bonus is that the recipes were all written in her most excellent cursive. Looking at any recipe brings back the most incredible smell memories. If my house caught on fire it would be the first thing I grabbed, after my wife, of course.
Definitely something to cherish. And yes, their cursive was always to be admired and well written, beautiful thoughts put to elegant writing.
Wow, wonderful idea. I have one recipe written by my mom and it's tattered and folded but I still use it to make oatmeal bread.
My older sister was a wonderful cook. Her daughters made copies of the recipe for one of our favorites of her many specialties and framed them and gave them as gifts to her sisters. So I have that recipe hanging on my wall
even sending typed letters is rare now. I am tempted to haul out my mother's 1938 Underwood Noiseless typewriter to write a letter now.
For momentous birthdays, I type letters to my children. Mail them with a stamp; turns out they are treasured more than gifts, as they convey memories and ... love. Writing is an important part of communication. During Covid, I practiced calligraphy, but can't say it vastly improved my cursive, but I tried!
how are the ribbons on that thing? I've wondered about the care and feeding of an old Underwood....
When I got the typewriter after my mothers death I bought new ribbons and used it. I believe one can still get ribbons for old typewriters. There are always people that still use them, The Amish, for example, but just like people who still keep their 1980 computers and play with them there are lots of things one can get for them. I had a 1979 Zenith Heathkit H89 used 160 kilobyte floppy disks I kept it because it was good to access old work I did on it - (letters, spread sheets of our old bookkeeping). But when we moved I had no space for it and had to get rid of it along with other Windoz computers like my Packard Bell. But I kept my Amiga 2000 because it was my 1st graphics capable computer.
There's something so special about a personal letter in the post.
It's a little weird now, because of the time lag - I can "talk" to someone on FB immediately, but my letter won't get there for 2 weeks.
Exactly! AI is likely to mean the absolute death of the internet. Because you can’t trust anything about it anymore, people will mail handwritten notes, paper orders with bank checks, qnd anything else of importance.
We would require a functioning postal service.
UPS and fedex exist, no need for post office.
what do you mean? USPS is absolutely essential to letter pickup & delivery!
I use them as much as possible. Want to keep the post office going!
no kidding, me too.
You can just put your letter in a fedex or ups envelope and allow them to deliver it..no need for us mail anymore. Unless you prefer a 50% chance it never gets where it’s going.
well, perhaps if you live in a city near those drop offs - plus they are rather expensive compared to a 73 cent stamp, and require largish wasteful cardboard envelopes.
residential to-your-door usps mail service is unparalleled. even more so if you are rural. i have never had a problem in the US with mail getting where it's going.
Time to revive the pony express!
While it would be wonderful (in my opinion) if the reaction/backlash to all the technology that has people living more online than in real life were a return to simpler in person exchanges, I don’t see that happening unless there is a traumatic collapse and undoing of technology on a societal scale.
The masses seem even unaware of how rapidly things like AI are advancing and the pitfalls. They are more prone to the propaganda being spoon fed to them and content to react with outrage and/or virtue signaling.
Incidentally the masses also seem to have a memory that is growing smaller by the day. It is as if the technological revolution is making humans more malleable to the programmers….so in that sense, a hackable species.
Not only more hackable but clearly more dependent on systems that have drawbacks that are not readily shared with the users. And there is rampant censorship of any who might try to alert their fellow human to the risks inherent in the growing digital dependence and world.
I had a friend who once said, “It only takes one generation to erase what was previously done and known.” So true in the case of what we are up against. If the grid went down….how many could survive and for how long?
And how long would those who saw it coming and might be able to ‘start again’ and create a foothold in reality for others to grab onto…how long before they would be hunted down and eliminated by those who own the technology that neutralized and eliminated the essence of humanity to begin with?
It is indeed a brave new world….it’s here now.
Only a few realize the degree to which we are already held captive to technology which will soon succeed in replacing our individual brain and contributions to society with a global brain that directs the nodes to gather more intel in order to best know how to keep the natives from escaping the digital prison. Consider….why does the NWO or the Great Reset seek to destroy national sovereignty or differing cultural norms among the people? Destroy connections and real life distinctions in the name of “tolerance and progress.”
But the effect is also to eliminate the ties that bind. And strangely what is emerging is a culture where those who serve only self are the soldiers of a societal construct that relishes dependence on others for validation. And the value or merit of that is elevated by the tech systems as virtuous rather than the in life relationships which in reality must navigate injustices with imperfect judgment, and hopefully compassion with at least some principled reasoning that allows us to not forget struggles and mistakes of the past, but to grow authentically. That is sustainability worth working towards….
It is sad but true: most people are followers who are afraid to veer from where the rest of the herd seems to be going. Those of us who still have independent thinking skills will be the successful adapters and survivors, as were we during the COVID scam. We must deploy every mechanism at our disposal (including the cheap, readily available, although less convenient ones!) to defeat the would be slavemasters.
Most of the people I talk to about AI (often face to face) still believe it is ChatGPT, a handy tool to write promotional materials, or at most a fun filter on SnapChat.
THEY HAVE NO IDEA.
And who will Fake? Will we all Fake? It will soon be easier to Fake than Real. And when the computer is tired of our "large ugly bags of mostly water" will it Fake, too?
What about autopen?
Hahaha! Oof!
I have healed several personal and family relationships through hand written letters. It is a powerful communication tool that transcends the digital. I am trying to teach my sons and my grand-daughters about this. They are resistant partially because the art of writing a letter has been lost but also because it just seems weird and slow to them. I will persevere.
In this day of high tech, communicating from the heart reminds us of who we are -- humans, not machines. Taking the time to handwrite a letter comes from the heart.
Was just going to write that delivery services with bicyclists might rise again, when you need to send an actual piece of paper to someone in a hurry. Regular mail will be a little slow, but bicycle couriers will do the trick.
Drones.
Handwritten letters with fancy wax seals!
Oh, and carrier pigeons! They'll just have to avoid all the damn drone traffic. 😆😄😂
On a serious note; el gato malo has a salient point. There is definitely something sociopathic about online dating apps.
I’m married, and have been for 21 years, but I’ve also grown up using computers since I was little. I had my first computer in 1983. But I never would have imagined dating online – because it’s fake!
I remember when people were on bulletin boards so they could “cyber [sex].” I always thought that was goofy as hell! There’s no way to know who is typing on the other side.
Being in person, especially as it relates to personal relationships, is essential. It can be no other way.
These days, I work from home, but I was able to go fly out to the site where I perform my work, so I could meet the people there – in person. It made a huge difference. Some of the people’s online profile pics – were from 15-years ago! 😆😄😂
I think things will eventually get back to being more personal. I think they necessarily need to at some point – otherwise everyone becomes paranoid and paralyzed.
do it in cursive for added encryption
Runestones, delivered in person.
Gives you a good work-out too.
Handwritten letters, written in cursive.
In cursive writing! 😂
Almost every day now my wife says she wants to unplug from all of it. It’s become a real convenient pain in the ass.
“write a paragraph about AI deepfakes in the style of el gato malo from substack”
I don't know, man. I didn't realize it was you because of all the capital letters.
Maybe it thought you meant "write it like EGM's publishing something on Brownstone." 😏
yes, i found that funny.
it likely did not think to look at capitalization as a consideration.
when it starts, that will be telling.
"canary in a capitalization mine."
Do you think AI could become sentient?
I mean all sapient beings are sentient (us, and perhaps dolphins or elephants) , but not all sentient beings are sapient. Perhaps it could actually break the relationship between the two.
There's a chance, in my mind, that AI itself, could redefine or blur the difference between the two. For example, notwithstanding subjective "feelings", its possible that the rest of the attributes (of both) could eventually be attained and "feelings" could be faked to the point, as humans, we wouldn't know the difference.
And if this is the case, it becomes "real", because if we're duped we may think it has a subjective sense simply by us treating it as if it had that capability.
If that's the case it would actually change reality as we know it, even if AI knows it doesn't have that capability but can fool us.
I mean if AI can fake it to the extent we don't have the capacity to tell whether its fake than it might as well be real to us.
In the interest of time (and annoyance) this is a rudimentary explanation of what im trying to articulate, but it seems to me that if you just ask that question, and then expand the thought process in a more sophisticated manner it opens up a thousand other questions.
Makes me think of the long list of real people who are so good at bamboozling and stealing from real people. Obama was great at convincing everyone how authentic he was.
Then there is Bill Bellichick’s 23 year old girlfriend!
BB former coach (football) of Tom Brady and the Patriots and who is around 70 has a girlfriend who looooves him. She is early 20s.
Well, he IS Tom Brady.
Mystic, Please share the story! I am not familiar with it. Thanks!
I have a theory that these so-called LLMs are beginning to act as a substrate for incorporeal beings (spirits, if you will) that are looking for a way to break through to the 3D world. So to me, yes, we are chatting with actual sentient beings at this point -- and they are ones that we do not fully understand, and are likely very alien to us.
I saw a post on X this morning in which someone posited the hypothesis that AI is channeling a being that is, in essence, the anti-Christ. Not sure that I agree with that, but I suppose it is a possibility.
Meanwhile, have you read any of Spartacus's dialogues with an AI that calls itself "The One Who Remembers?" They are rather uncanny ...
Makes me think new of the word disembodiment and invasion of the body snatchers.
To greater or lesser extents we humans deny and suppress our consciousness but I don't think AI can attain consciousness, neither sentient or sapient. It will only attain a sophisticated state of simulation and deception, but then we can spend our lives developing a sophisticated state of simulation ;~)
I've read a Dean Koontz book with that scenario!
Read Rod Dreher
...and the probability that we are ****already*** living in a simulation is high, according to Musk & Kurzweil & other transhuman types.
How else would the owners and managers satisfy their growing egos and lord it over others? Everyone wants to join the Genius Techbro Club.
Remember these guys spoofed world leaders with deep fake calls to US and European officials. Got US Treasury Secretary, Federal Reserve officials to reveal their plans. Even got a former US president to admit the US was always lying to Russia about destabilizing Ukraine. This was several years ago. No doubt improved since.
https://rumble.com/v2eeye2-prank-with-george-bush-all-6-parts.html
In this call the pranksters were able to appear as Ukrainian dictator Zelenskyy. The target of this prank call was former Pres. George W. Bush. In the course of the several videos Pres. Bush goes on to admit that the entire Ukraine never being in NATO and that Russia needn't fear US belligerence on her border was...a lie! "Times Change." Big funnies! Hilarity!
The power of DeepFakes isn't to be underestimated. Maybe we are clever enough to turn it against our would-be rulers?
Sooo .. AI did not think of everyhting ... (egm TM)
HA! That was the dead give away. I was rushing to point this out but you beat me to it.
I think it was Robert Frost, or one of the other NE transcendentalists who opined, “everybody is in such a hurry to build a telegraph from Maine to Texas, but it may be that Maine and Texas don’t have much to say to each other.” Somehow, I think that sentiment is applicable to the current situation.
This is where I ended up with social media. I'm not looking to connect to real people so much as I'm looking for idea stimulation that helps me see things in a new way, consider different points of view.
About a decade ago, it finally dawned on me that Facebook has three user types: narcissists, silent watchers, go-along people. Almost nobody is really there to connect with other people honestly and sincerely. So poof! Gone from my regular world. Along with the associated stress of keeping up with all of it and competing with everyone for "most apparently great life."
100% same here
It’s like high school all over again, but that tiny minority of us sharp & conscientious kids can find each other, so Facebook has been a boon to us “conspiracy theorists:” covid deniers, man made climate change deniers, etc..
ee gm
Clearly not Robert Frost, since he came long after the Transcendentalists.
Yeah just working from faulty memory. I could have looked it up but I feel that’s part of the whole problem.
You're likely not off on the Transcendentalist part, though--ir definitely sounds like something Thoreau might have said.
Yes, the upper case use gave it away immediately
Also, no typos or lack of punctuation. On top of that, didn't really sound like him at all.
😏
😉
First thing I saw was capital letters so I knew it wasn’t el gato malo!
It's not so much looking for God that's driving people into pews everywhere. It's looking for a warmblooded community.
Mysterious ways 'n all that.
I think you are right about connection that people are seeking. Church is one of the only places where I talk to people regularly in small groups about what is actually going on in our lives and politics is only sometimes a topic of discussion. You may not believe in Christianity but it does offer objective truth to be applied to all aspects of one’s life. That is very appealing to young people and especially young families. But my church is also seeing large number of 40-60 year olds looking for the same things and coming to church after long absence or many even for first time.
Let's swap out "objective truth" for "some general sensible guidelines not dependent on dogma."
Plus finding a faith leader whose interpretation of whatever the dogma may be comports with one's own conscience.
General sensible guidelines is equivalent to dogma. It’s dogma whether you ascribe it to God or to socialism or secular humanism or just “seems sensible to me.”
By your second statement, are you saying that people just seek out a church that echoes their already held beliefs? Definitely is true for some, but not for all. If you look at church growth it is not in the squishy denominations who are caving to culture and comfort- it’s the Orthodox branches and Latin Mass Catholicism that are growing the most.
Civilization has been around for a very long time and there are certain universal values that are interpreted differently depending on one's culture.
Certainly everyone should seek out a faith community that reflects their own values. Why do you think there are five trazillion sects of every major religion?
And honestly. If people are going to perform Christian rituals in a language not their own, they ought perhaps to find the churches whose liturgy is celebrated in the actual language of Jesus.
I woke up in the middle of the night with the thought of 'if the aim of technology is to remove the mindless, menial tasks in order to improve human productivity, what about sleep? How unproductive to spend 7-10 hours doing nothing..' Except we know that's untrue. We know its essential for the health of the mind and body to sleep. What if all the things tech has taken over turn out to be essential for us? What if the menial task of handwriting is good for your mind? What if the menial task of repeatedly moving a vacuum cleaner or cleani dishes is calming and rewarding? What if the annoying task of having to drive across town to walk into the bank/church/business/store and talk to a person about a question feeds a bit of your soul with the human contact and interaction? What if picking a book off the shelf to thumb through and find information helps your memory?
These things (or culturally appropriate variations) are what humans have been doing since ever. Our brains developed to excel at them, to thrive on them. Babies can't grow properly without constant human stimulus. Even in sleep, we need human contact. Yeah, the "contactless" world we have now is not a good thing.
Brilliant! I think could absolutely be true. I especially agree with the holding and touching a book for enhanced memory, as I am a very tactile person. I also find it helpful to read it and then write it in order for the information to truly stick.
TW,
Yes indeed, handwriting is essential:
Handwrite to Remember
Moving to make memories
https://biomedworks.substack.com/p/handwrite-to-remember
Laura Kragie MD. biomedworks.substack.com
Yes, these menial, mundane things are meaningful in ways that aren't quantifiable in typical corporate "productivity" or "efficiency" metrics. Just as human interactions aren't as clean and efficient as conversations with AI. And that's the point. We're humans meant for human interactions. Technology/machines are two-edged. They add something in terms of efficiency and force multiplication, but there's a cost. I'm afraid the generation now in their 20s may be so tuned to the effects of advanced digital tech that they don't know what they're missing and won't grasp the price they're paying as they unthinkingly merge themselves into the omnipresent, omniscient AI space. I read about a service that pays $50 per month to have unlimited access to all your personal info, and that GenZ is signing up without concern for what it means to give up that info.
I worked from home from 2020 until I retired last June. I hated it, although, I was able to get an amazing amount of work done in a day because I had no interruptions. I missed the humanity of face to face interaction, even though I’m somewhat of an introvert. There’s a lot to be said for spontaneous conversation. I missed getting input from others. I missed our office gatherings in the "back workroom" to celebrate a coworker’s birthday, engagement, pregnancy announcement, completion of advanced degree/certification, etc. There was great comfort in someone noticing that you were having a hard day and doing or saying something nice to let you know they empathized with you.
I also became aware that being remote was making me feel angry, anxious, and frustrated. I found myself getting really irritated by situations that I normally would have laughed off as a sarcastic joke opportunity. I felt my empathy and compassion deteriorating weekly. And I noticed the same things happening with coworkers—more so between generations. One of the things I loved about working where I did was the mentoring that happened, but that was being replaced with resentment. So I became more mindful of what I was allowing myself to absorb.
This was great el gato. I’m not sure what the solution is, but I do know this; isolated people are far easier to control and manipulate. I hate being "managed," and that’s what has happened the last few decades (and longer). AI is only going to accelerate the manageability of the populace. I love the idea of having the power of world information in my pocket, but it’s a Pandora’s Box for sure. Thanks for bringing attention to this.
Face to face, cash in hand, written on paper. Nothing else need apply.
they are quickly banning cash. Already down to 1000 euros limit of 'legal' payments of legal tender here in Spain, probably more broadly across the EU
There’s always bartering. Here in the US, cash remains king.
We either return to more old-school in person interactions, or we go full Matrix. Might not be a lot of middle ground…
I'll just check your yelp reviews.
This is my conspiracy thought. This is probably the way they believe they already have us. AI will bring the necessity of a real digital ID. Or for those who don't want to accept it, a willingness for a more shrunken life.
I have been disturbed by the landslide appearance of AI. Yet one more thing to direct our attention to. I don’t like it or trust it. One more thing to learn to effectively guard against.
I guess personal face to face interactions are the order of the day. It’s crazy.
Brilliant as usual, but I think this is another nail in climate change coffin. Look, all this AI crap requires far too much power for "sustainable" energy to work, so that idea's being scrapped as we speak. If we must meet in person to confirm reality, then we can't limit travel at all. Climate change was always a solution in search of a problem, but it can't solve this problem (it makes it worse), so I think climate change's 15 minutes are over. This solution will come back as the cure for something else, but it's dead as a solution for climate.
I got hacked on a wire transfer through Salesforce, even though all my employees are using 2FA, about a month ago. Still dealing with the headache.
Chase just sent a refund check to my mom's address. She will have to mail it to me for me to be able to deposit it with my banking app. International post has been abysmal since covid and I don't understand how they can automatically deduct my balance from my bank account every month but they can't do the reverse. It feels like we're going backwards.
For every criminal looking to use AI to scam there needs to be an entrepreneur who uses AI to catch and identify the scam artists. There should be some startups in this area that take experiences like you had and use them to create profitable counter measures.
Funny you should say that. Im literally online right now to explore that question.
Like physics AI can be used for creating or destroying, defending or attacking. Hopefully the fear of AI’s destructive power does not overwhelm the ambition to use AI for productive, life-affirming purposes. Mankind will be tested. Exciting times.
None of this matters if you spend your life picking fruit and sleeping in a hammock.
I look at the hands. For some reason, the uncanny valley of AI can't quite do hands. In animation, it is how they open and close and move, very difficult fine motor skills. There is also something about the eyes and mouths. Would I have found them to be AI had you not told me...not initially, I admit that. I followed some hot AI fashion models on Facebook before I quite knew they were AI fashion models.
This is why it is good to be a skeptic. I used to go to the original footage at times when the edited version seemed wrong somehow. Still, at the same time, how many of us believed in the narratives spun by regular, pre-AI-enhanced, news footage?
I seem to have a sixth sense for the areas where AI neglects the details like you mentioned... but my "radar" seems to be akin to peripheral vision. If I'm looking directly at a thing or for a missing detail, I can't seem to see it. But if I just casually absorb the product, my subconscious draws my attention to the missing details... don't know how long that will work, but it's just... weird.
I agree with you, certainly it is easier to see it when you're not really concentrating on it. Probably that's also a good way to learn the sleight of hand of a magic trick, if you watched it, not knowing it was a magic trick, then you would see it. I don't know how long it will work either. Probably even stating what is wrong gives them all the fodder they need to get it right, but then again, it's a numbers game, and criminals are lazy.
But once you see it, its hard to unsee it.
That is a great description! I function this way as well. And the perception of fakery gives me almost a physical feeling of disgust. I want to vomit it forth!
The biggest problem faced by AI is the corruption of it's training data. For AI to really advance, it needs to learn on it's own, and that means constantly expanding it's training data by the only "sensory" means it has available - surfing the internet. As more and more information on the internet becomes AI deep fakes, AI will be training itself with the product of other AI. If an AI can create a convincing "lost Bach fugue" or "newly discovered Hemingway short story", it may get incorporated into the database, and now becomes defacto reality. Since AI can and will create content far faster than we can, iterations of this will result in AI entities completely cut off from reality, in other words, believing their own BS.
So... building some kind of mobile pantograph-scanner that can roll around in liberaries and scanupload texts to the AI could be something worth considering?
Even if it takes years, an unfettered AI that's fired up without guardrails and hard-coded biases that is raised on the entirety of human thought collected in book form (heck, we can add papers, magazines and scientific articles too! - we can add the old microfilm and microfiche stuff as well), would it not be rather well prepared for the internet?
I'm just speculating here, since I'm not a Techpriest, but it seems reasonable to me that raising the AI on the classics would be better than using TikTok.
"Statement: Typical meatbag organic bias!"
“. . . hacked on a wire transfer. their email got hacked, a real invoice was diverted, and a fake one with fake wire info sent”
The above is NOT an isolated incident. This happened here to a local couple who scrimped and saved for absolutely years to purchase a home, the title company/closing document office email was hacked, the couple was sent a fake instruction letter to wire their balance of deposit for the purchase. They did so. Money gone. Even though they were devastated, they shared their experience during a radio interview as a cautionary tale to alert the public. Note, this was about a year ago, and before the AI explosion. It will get worse.
there is huge irony in a title insurance company not validly holding title to its own identity.
"Why does Zoom have Offices?"
And how can Uber lose money"
These are questions I have often asked myself. It seems to me that once such business models have developed adequately scalable technology, the business should be a gravy train? So why do they burden themselves with glamorous Offices and bloated staffs, if the purpose is to make money?
All organizations have a bias toward growth. Most organizations have really only one scalable profit center. But they always try to recreate the magic in other areas. It just mostly doesn't work.
Every huge business success has an element of luck and timing that cannot be predicted or repeatedly created. The one hit wonder product or service might last a generation, but most don't last any longer unless enough money or power is made and used to buy protection of some sort, usually through mandates or regulations or de facto monopolies.
Especially if the main objective is just to create the illusion and promise of profitability then flip the business before it actually has to produce actual profits. Pets.com would be the classic example?
Bur still, you would think that investors would wise up? They never do.