So, the old "everybody does it" defense. That is baloney. Every big company has some unethical employees, but many companies have a basic culture of ethical responsibility. Uber is far worse than average, and the problem starts at the top. Travis Kalanick makes even Larry Ellison seem like a nice guy.
France, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Portugal
You can not be a waiter in any of those countries if you don't speak the language
You are full of crap. I have been to Spain and was served by a non-Spanish speaking waitress (she spoke English and Catalan). A quick Google search brought up zero legal language requirements to work as a waiter in ANY of the other countries you mention.
At my company, the CEO announced a monthly contest, with an award of $100, for the best idea to cut costs or improve efficiency. The first month, the $100 went a woman whose idea was to reduce the award to $50.
Anyway, how do you specify that your taxi driver must have a good command of English?
When I take a taxi, I want to have private conversations on my cellphone without the driver eavesdropping. So I want a driver that does NOT have a good command of English. In America, this is generally not a problem, but I read the Uber reviews anyway and choose a driver with poor ratings for communication. Unfortunately, it looks like I will no longer have that choice in London, so I will just take the tube instead.
Because if they do the consequences will be... what, exactly? Bad for them? Bad for my nefarious goals?
Bad for people killed by drunk drivers. Bad for taxpayers who pay for your obesity related diabetes. Individual choice is fine if all the consequences are borne by that individual.
A customer has two options: 1. Look at the driver's reviews. 2. Use a service that requires their drivers to speak English well. In London, you can get that with a standard cab, so that is already an option for people that want it and are willing to pay for it.
Actually in most western countries this is the case, facepalm.
Really? MOST western countries have a government mandated language test for waiters? Could you name, say, one?
You don't know the quality of the driver's English until he turns up or even until after the ride starts.
If I care if the driver speaks English well (I don't), then I would use A DIFFERENT SERVICE, such as a standard black taxi. I know that there is no guarantee with Uber when I choose to use it, but it does offer other features that I do care about, such as a lower price.
It is part of a campaign to improve quality and reduce the number of rogue mini-cabs on the road.
Shouldn't the level of quality be up to the customer? If I want to save money, I can choose to go to a low quality restaurant rather than a high quality restaurant. Why shouldn't I be able to do the same when I get a ride? Or do you think there should be a government imposed language test for waiters as well? After all, if the waiter can't speak proper English, they won't be able to ensure the customer has no allergies to the food they are ordering, or able to render proper medical assistance if the diner has a heart attack or epileptic seizure during their meal. What if there are children at the table, and they need to ask directions to the toilet? Think of the children!
Or perhaps this is just politicians using "safety" as an excuse to protect their racket?
Yeah, then do the same with booze. Wow, how come nobody has thought of this before? We'll be so healthy!
Alcohol taxes reduce consumption and reduce incidents of drunk driving. There is no reason to believe that a "sugar tax" wouldn't also reduce consumption. Mexico has a "soda tax" and has seen a decline in soda consumption. A 10% tax resulted in a 6% decrease in consumption.
use breaks (yes, even summer vacation) to come up with more lesson plans.
This is something that has never made sense to me. If there are 100,000 teachers teaching the same subject, why don't they all use the SAME lesson plan rather than reinventing the wheel 100,000 times? Maybe there should be a wiki site for lesson plans.
He said $150k per year. With a 4% mortgage, that would be a $3.75M house, which in the bay area could be a nice three or four bedroom house near good schools.
As opposed to say, leading AI researchers that are attending conferences and writing papers on the state of the art.
The experts in any field tend to be focused on the problems and obstacles, and are often the unduly pessimistic about progress. In hindsight, they often turn out to be the worst predictors. It is hard to see the horizon when you are in the trenches.
And a space elevator, of course, would only cost about a Trillion
Since the material to build it doesn't exist yet, estimates of the cost seem a bit premature.
and there's this little problem of it hitting something
Most designs are for many fibers in parallel. So in an impact you would lose one out of N. Other designs are for a wide ribbon. Nobody is proposing a cylindrical pillar.
there's a problem with the kinetic energy if it falls down.
Since it has a counterweight, why would it "fall down" rather than "float up"?
Sort of like having many atom bombs go off.
Except it is 25,000 miles long, so it wouldn't all go off at once. It would be like a ribbon falling into the atmosphere. It would burn up 60 km up, and unlike a nuke, there would be no radiation or EMP. Chelyabinsk killed zero people, and that happened over land. A space elevator would have its base at sea near the equator.
Sure, but so far the evilness has worked in Uber's favor. The have repeatedly prevailed against rivals that were hobbled by ethical compunctions. Their only clear loss so far was against Didi Chuxing, which is arguably even more evil, and even there Uber came out pretty good with a 20% equity stake.
imho, the only test for the quality of an AI is "what it can do", not how.
If I hire two men to dig ditches, and I give one a shovel and the other a backhoe, it is silly to say that the second is ten times as intelligent as the first. Intelligence is the ability to formulate an effective course of action, not the ability to execute it. Of course, the physical ability to execute is important, but it is not "intelligence".
I remember when "AI" was defined as, "indistinguishable from human."
AI has never been defined as that, at least not by people working in the field. There is a particular subcategory of AI focused on human-level performance, called "Strong AI" or Artificial General Intelligence, but few AI researchers are working on that, or consider Strong AI a realistic near term objective.
And we have the HFCS to thank for this unfortunate condition
The link between HFCS and diabetes is very, very weak. It is more myth than reality. One study found a correlation at the national level between countries that use a lot of HFCS and also have higher levels of type 2 diabeties, but that is a weak link with very few data points that could have a lot of other explanations rather than direct causality. AFAIK, no study has found a causal link between HFCS and diabetes in humans. If the link was really as strong as many corn critics claim, then it would be very easy to show causality, yet that hasn't happened. I am very interested in this topic, so if someone can cite a study, I would be very interested to see it.
Disclaimer: I try to avoid HFCS (and other sugar as well), but I am not a fanatic about it.
You *chose* to eat a ********CORN-BASED******** diet and then you blame ********EVERYONE ELSE******** when you get diabetes.
Yes you can. For 30 years, we had public institutions telling people that they should eat a diet based on grains and starch. That was finally exposed as bogus nonsense unsupported by evidence. We can't just shove all the blame onto the individuals who followed the advice of the "experts".
Slashdot Mirror
Pretty much every corporation.
So, the old "everybody does it" defense. That is baloney. Every big company has some unethical employees, but many companies have a basic culture of ethical responsibility. Uber is far worse than average, and the problem starts at the top. Travis Kalanick makes even Larry Ellison seem like a nice guy.
Disclaimer: I didn't watch the video.
That does not make them funding campaigns.
That makes them donators to parities, big difference.
That seems more like a very, very small difference.
France, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Portugal
You can not be a waiter in any of those countries if you don't speak the language
You are full of crap. I have been to Spain and was served by a non-Spanish speaking waitress (she spoke English and Catalan). A quick Google search brought up zero legal language requirements to work as a waiter in ANY of the other countries you mention.
...because nobody on the tube can eavesdrop?
No, because cellphones don't work on the tube, so that solves the eavesdropping problem.
Disclaimer: The last time I was in London was five years ago, so maybe things have changed.
At my company, the CEO announced a monthly contest, with an award of $100, for the best idea to cut costs or improve efficiency. The first month, the $100 went a woman whose idea was to reduce the award to $50.
Anyway, how do you specify that your taxi driver must have a good command of English?
When I take a taxi, I want to have private conversations on my cellphone without the driver eavesdropping. So I want a driver that does NOT have a good command of English. In America, this is generally not a problem, but I read the Uber reviews anyway and choose a driver with poor ratings for communication. Unfortunately, it looks like I will no longer have that choice in London, so I will just take the tube instead.
Unions don't fund "campaigns", neither can they by law nor would the public accept this.
Baloney. Unions are, by far, the biggest donors to the UK Labor Party.
Because if they do the consequences will be ... what, exactly? Bad for them? Bad for my nefarious goals?
Bad for people killed by drunk drivers. Bad for taxpayers who pay for your obesity related diabetes. Individual choice is fine if all the consequences are borne by that individual.
And how should the customer decide?
A customer has two options:
1. Look at the driver's reviews.
2. Use a service that requires their drivers to speak English well. In London, you can get that with a standard cab, so that is already an option for people that want it and are willing to pay for it.
Actually in most western countries this is the case, facepalm.
Really? MOST western countries have a government mandated language test for waiters? Could you name, say, one?
You don't know the quality of the driver's English until he turns up or even until after the ride starts.
If I care if the driver speaks English well (I don't), then I would use A DIFFERENT SERVICE, such as a standard black taxi. I know that there is no guarantee with Uber when I choose to use it, but it does offer other features that I do care about, such as a lower price.
It is part of a campaign to improve quality and reduce the number of rogue mini-cabs on the road.
Shouldn't the level of quality be up to the customer? If I want to save money, I can choose to go to a low quality restaurant rather than a high quality restaurant. Why shouldn't I be able to do the same when I get a ride? Or do you think there should be a government imposed language test for waiters as well? After all, if the waiter can't speak proper English, they won't be able to ensure the customer has no allergies to the food they are ordering, or able to render proper medical assistance if the diner has a heart attack or epileptic seizure during their meal. What if there are children at the table, and they need to ask directions to the toilet? Think of the children!
Or perhaps this is just politicians using "safety" as an excuse to protect their racket?
Yeah, then do the same with booze. Wow, how come nobody has thought of this before? We'll be so healthy!
Alcohol taxes reduce consumption and reduce incidents of drunk driving. There is no reason to believe that a "sugar tax" wouldn't also reduce consumption. Mexico has a "soda tax" and has seen a decline in soda consumption. A 10% tax resulted in a 6% decrease in consumption.
use breaks (yes, even summer vacation) to come up with more lesson plans.
This is something that has never made sense to me. If there are 100,000 teachers teaching the same subject, why don't they all use the SAME lesson plan rather than reinventing the wheel 100,000 times? Maybe there should be a wiki site for lesson plans.
For $150k, in the bay area? Not going to happen.
He said $150k per year. With a 4% mortgage, that would be a $3.75M house, which in the bay area could be a nice three or four bedroom house near good schools.
Students, educators, researchers, public sector make crap pay.
$38k per year is about $19 per hour. My company pays interns more than that.
As opposed to say, leading AI researchers that are attending conferences and writing papers on the state of the art.
The experts in any field tend to be focused on the problems and obstacles, and are often the unduly pessimistic about progress. In hindsight, they often turn out to be the worst predictors. It is hard to see the horizon when you are in the trenches.
they just have to look at MENSA members ...
It sounds like you have some serious insecurity issues.
And a space elevator, of course, would only cost about a Trillion
Since the material to build it doesn't exist yet, estimates of the cost seem a bit premature.
and there's this little problem of it hitting something
Most designs are for many fibers in parallel. So in an impact you would lose one out of N. Other designs are for a wide ribbon. Nobody is proposing a cylindrical pillar.
there's a problem with the kinetic energy if it falls down.
Since it has a counterweight, why would it "fall down" rather than "float up"?
Sort of like having many atom bombs go off.
Except it is 25,000 miles long, so it wouldn't all go off at once. It would be like a ribbon falling into the atmosphere. It would burn up 60 km up, and unlike a nuke, there would be no radiation or EMP. Chelyabinsk killed zero people, and that happened over land. A space elevator would have its base at sea near the equator.
it's clearly not illegal
It is illegal for public companies to misstate their earnings.
But Uber is not a public company.
It's hard to imagine a more evil corporation
Sure, but so far the evilness has worked in Uber's favor. The have repeatedly prevailed against rivals that were hobbled by ethical compunctions. Their only clear loss so far was against Didi Chuxing, which is arguably even more evil, and even there Uber came out pretty good with a 20% equity stake.
Disclaimer: I use Lyft.
imho, the only test for the quality of an AI is "what it can do", not how.
If I hire two men to dig ditches, and I give one a shovel and the other a backhoe, it is silly to say that the second is ten times as intelligent as the first. Intelligence is the ability to formulate an effective course of action, not the ability to execute it. Of course, the physical ability to execute is important, but it is not "intelligence".
I remember when "AI" was defined as, "indistinguishable from human."
AI has never been defined as that, at least not by people working in the field. There is a particular subcategory of AI focused on human-level performance, called "Strong AI" or Artificial General Intelligence, but few AI researchers are working on that, or consider Strong AI a realistic near term objective.
He wrote a a small portion of a now popular kernel
He also wrote Git, which is topic being discussed.
You are a fool to take his word on little more than faith on anything resembling a security issue.
1. This is not a security issue.
2. Linus explained his reasoning very clearly, so nothing is being taken on "faith".
And we have the HFCS to thank for this unfortunate condition
The link between HFCS and diabetes is very, very weak. It is more myth than reality. One study found a correlation at the national level between countries that use a lot of HFCS and also have higher levels of type 2 diabeties, but that is a weak link with very few data points that could have a lot of other explanations rather than direct causality. AFAIK, no study has found a causal link between HFCS and diabetes in humans. If the link was really as strong as many corn critics claim, then it would be very easy to show causality, yet that hasn't happened. I am very interested in this topic, so if someone can cite a study, I would be very interested to see it.
Disclaimer: I try to avoid HFCS (and other sugar as well), but I am not a fanatic about it.
You *chose* to eat a ********CORN-BASED******** diet and then you blame ********EVERYONE ELSE******** when you get diabetes.
Yes you can. For 30 years, we had public institutions telling people that they should eat a diet based on grains and starch. That was finally exposed as bogus nonsense unsupported by evidence. We can't just shove all the blame onto the individuals who followed the advice of the "experts".