Douglas Orr @daorr

Five dimensional chess doesn’t exist. Everyone is furiously improvising all the time. The future is utterly uncertain.

Dans le manifeste "techno-optimiste" de Marc Andreessen, il y a une phrase qui m'a marqué : "Our enemies are not bad people – but rather bad ideas." Nos ennemis ne sont pas des mauvaises personnes. Ce sont des mauvaises idées. Prenons Jancovici. L'homme est brillant, sincère, travailleur. Il ne se lève pas le matin en se disant qu'il va nuire à l'humanité. Mais l'idée qu'il porte la décroissance, le rationnement, la frugalité érigée en horizon civilisationnel est une idée profondément destructrice. Elle prend des esprits brillants et les transforme en commissaires politiques d'un futur appauvri. Et le plus fascinant, c'est ce que cette idée fait aux gens qui l'adoptent. Dans mon entourage, une grosse partie de mes amis est sur cette ligne décroissantiste, avec tout le package qui va avec. L'argent c'est mal mais ils en veulent. Il faut moins prendre l'avion mais ils rêvent de voyager partout. Il faut consommer moins mais ils ne renoncent à rien de ce qu'ils aiment vraiment. Et tous ont un point commun : ils sont déprimés. L'un d'eux m'a même confié qu'il était sous antidépresseurs. Ce n'est pas un hasard. C'est mécanique. Quand tu crois que ton désir de vivre, de créer, de t'élever est moralement suspect tu te détruis de l'intérieur. Tu passes ta vie à t'excuser d'exister. Tu vis dans la dissonance permanente entre ce que ton corps veut (plus, mieux, plus loin) et ce que ton idéologie t'ordonne (moins, sobre, immobile). D'où ma théorie : Quand on pense quelque chose de fondamentalement faux décroissance, communisme, extrémisme religieux (de tout ordre) ce n'est qu'une question de temps avant que ça devienne vraiment destructeur. D'abord pour soi. Puis pour les autres. Les mauvaises idées tuent. Lentement chez ceux qui y croient, brutalement chez ceux qui les subissent. C'est pour ça que la bataille des idées n'est pas un luxe d'intellectuel. C'est la bataille la plus importante de notre époque.

@pierreeliottlal CLAUDE

@itsalexvacca EMAIL

@thisisgrantlee @sarahdingwang @a16z You took on the 'impossible' task of displacing PowerPoint. Since first using it 12 months I have not willingly used anything else but @GammaApp. Congratulation @thisisgrantlee and team!

7 reasons having a good attitude every morning will improve your day.

Who noticed the small announcement that Australia Blue, the first wind farm, is shutting down after 20 years? Situated in Western Victoria the closure is for financial reasons, the turbines have to be replaced and it is unaffordable to do so. The alternative is also unappealing as it requires the farm to be demolished. The cheaper of the options is to demolish and restore the land. There is no way of recycling the blades, so they will go to landfill, the metal work to scrap and the 20,000 tonne foundation will have to remain in the ruined farmland. It is interesting to note that the returns from this installation after 20 years is less than the expenditure which goes to illustrate the massive con job this “green and free” energy hype has been. Enough to make even that fool, Bowen, to weep.

Massacre of the oak, maple, pine, cypress and hickory trees - all in the name of Ed Miliband's great net zero energy hoax - the inconvenient truth of where Drax's energy pellets come from. dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1…

I'm German. 16 years ago, the EU and US economies were neck and neck. Today, the US economy is 50% larger than the entire EU combined. Here's the devastating truth behind Europe's ongoing economic suicide 🧵:

keyboard_arrow_left Previous keyboard_arrow_right Next

1/10 Europe just got a brutal wake-up call about green energy math. When wind & sun disappeared in December, electricity prices shot up 20X. Our current plans for batteries and storage won't solve this for decades. Here's the real numbers 🧵

‘Puberty blockers were developed for end-stage prostate cancer and are used to chemically castrate sex offenders. Side effects include bone density loss, impacted fertility and lowered IQ. Despite this, they were widely prescribed to children off-label.’ telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/12/1…

Remember this graph, because in 10 yrs when the US controls every aspect of your life by owning the AI models which are integrated with EVERYTHING…. This graph will be why. What is wrong with our institutional capital, why does it hate European/UK VC and technology so much?

The UK has the second-largest HR sector in the world. But its proliferation over the last decades has not translated to productivity growth, rather just created the need for more HR. Great diagnosis of "HR Britain" by Pamela Dow: newstatesman.com/business/2024/…

"We can't give you a stairlift, but we can kill you" The story of Christine Gauthier and euthanasia in Canada 🇨🇦

This is a choice. In the 80s and 90s we generally had the third most competitive industrial electricity costs of the G7. In the five years before Blair became PM, our costs were around 9% higher than average advanced economies… 1/2 x.com/alecstapp/stat…

Alec Stapp @AlecStapp

2 years ago

However bad you think things are in the UK, it’s worse

2K 6K 21K 64.3M 3K

The Taliban has decreed that Afghan women are forbidden to: Go to high school or university Work in the civil service Attend a protest Go abroad Drive a car Travel alone Ride in a taxi Speak in public Speak loudly inside your house Sing Read the Quran aloud in public Speak to a male doctor Play sport Go to the gym Go to the park Wear bright clothes Wear high heels Look at men they don’t know Show their faces in public Own a smartphone

There are no low-energy, rich countries Only low-energy poor and high-energy rich ones energyforgrowth.org/article/how-do… Refs&threads: x.com/i/web/status/1…

There is at least ONE area where the UK is world-beating: the cost of our power. Acc to new figs, UK has highest industrial power prices in the developed world👇 A key part of the explanation for why we deindustrialised faster than anyone (another thing we're world-beating at)

Todd: Hello. Operator. Listen to me -- I can’t speak very loud. This is an emergency. I’m a passenger on a United flight to San Francisco. We have a situation here. Our plane has been hijacked. Can you understand me? Lisa: (exhaling a deep breath to herself) I understand. Can the hijackers see you talking on the phone? Todd: No. Lisa: Can you tell me how many hijackers are on the plane? Todd: There are three that we know of. Lisa: Can you see any weapons? What kind of weapons do they have? Todd: Yes. They don’t have guns. They have knives – they took over the plane with knives. Lisa: Do you mean -- like steak knives? Todd: No, these are razor knives -- like box cutters. Lisa: Can you tell what country these people are from? Todd: No -- I don’t know. They sound like they’re from the mid-east. Lisa: Have they said what they want? Todd: Someone announced from the cockpit that there was a bomb on board. He said he was the captain and to stay in our seats and stay quiet. He said that they were meeting these men’s demands and returning to the airport. It was very broken English, and...I’m telling you...it sounded fake! Lisa: Ok sir, please give me your name. Todd: My name is Todd Beamer. Lisa: Ok Todd, my name is Lisa. Do you know your flight number? If you can’t remember, it’s on your ticket. Todd: It’s United Flight 93. Lisa: Now Todd, can you try to tell me exactly what happened? Todd: Two of the hijackers were sitting in first class near the cockpit. A third one was sitting near the back of the coach section. The two up front got into the cockpit somehow; there was shouting. The third hijacker said he had a bomb. It looks like a bomb. He’s got it tied to his waist with a red belt of some kind. Lisa: So is the door to the cockpit open? Todd: No, the hijackers shut it behind them. Lisa: Has anyone been injured? Todd: Yes, they…they killed one passenger sitting in first class. There’s been lots of shouting. We don’t know if the pilots are dead or alive. A flight attendant told me that the pilot and copilot had been forced from the cockpit and may have been wounded. Lisa: Where is the 3rd hijacker now Todd? Todd: He’s near the back of the plane. They forced most of the passengers into first class. There are fourteen of us here in the back. Five are flight attendants. He hasn’t noticed that I slipped into this pantry to get the phone. The guy with the bomb ordered us to sit on the floor in the rear of the plane...oh Jesus...HELP! Lisa: Todd, are you ok? Tell me what’s happening! Todd: Hello. We’re going down. I think we’re going to crash. Wait – wait a minute. No, we’re leveling off...we’re ok. I think we may be turning around. That’s it – we changed directions. Do you hear me? We’re flying east again. Lisa: Ok Todd, what’s going on with the other passengers? Todd: Everyone is really scared. A few passengers with cell phones have made calls to relatives. A guy, Jeremy, was talking to his wife just before the hijacking started. She told him that hijackers had crashed two planes into the World Trade Center. Lisa is that true?? Lisa: Todd, I have to tell you the truth. It’s very bad. The World Trade Center is gone. Both of the towers have been destroyed. Todd: Oh God -- help us! Lisa: A third plane was taken over by terrorists. It crashed into the Pentagon in Washington DC. Our country is under attack, and I’m afraid that your plane may be part of their plan. Todd: Oh dear God. Dear God... Lisa, will you do something for me? Lisa: I’ll try if I can. Yes. Todd: I want you to call my wife and my kids for me and tell them what’s happened. Promise me you’ll call.. Lisa: I promise – I’ll call.

@iGamingBusiness It's been an honour to have the opportunity with my colleagues @Message_Matrix to create a new visitor experience with @iGamingBusiness . No downloads, no passwords, one click and you have a personal guide to what is best at iGB LiVE.