igogq425

They promote those they believe have the highest potential to bring value.

Thank you for writing that! That would have been my first comment as well. Due to the organizational hierarchy, there is a standard assumption that the company or the decision-makers within the company are magically capable of making objective assessments and decisions. Of course, this is not the case. But in the style of corporate language, there is often a strategic concealment of the fact that in every functional role, even at the very top, individuals work and make subjective decisions (hopefully competently, hopefully to the best of their knowledge and belief, but nonetheless always subjectively).

To supplement the thermodynamic reference with a more benevolent interpretation:

What can certainly be done, and what has already been done quite productively, is to transfer the thermodynamic concept of entropy to other areas. The first thing that comes to mind is Shannon's information entropy. But there is also Georgescu-Roegen's bioeconomic entropy, social entropy in the social sciences, and some (rather speculative and perhaps primarily metaphorical) concepts of psychological and psychodynamic entropy.

However, I do not think that if one were to zoom in further in these areas, one would find hard evidence for the worldview that is seeking justification here.

That of course depends on what you mean by "society".

Yes, that is the old discrepancy between society in the true sense and society as imagined by libertarians. A few strangers waiting together for the bus do not constitute a community. If the bus is canceled and they organize a carpool, then a community has formed. If you scale this up and replace personal relationships with institutions, you have a useful concept of society.

For libertarians, society is any large gathering of people who interact with each other in some way (or not), even if they rape and devour each other. If you understand society in this way, it cannot collapse (or is constantly collapsing).

Ultimately, an economy is all about the side effects you describe (goods and services for the population). The fact that, while producing these side effects, the machine also leads to massive wealth accumulation among a small number of people is another side effect that basically has nothing to do with the core tasks of the economy. The question now is how to evaluate this additional side effect. If it does not have any negative consequences, it can be ignored. If it does, it should be counteracted.

It's like in a combustion engine. Oil has to be added for the engine to work. But over time, dirt particles, metal abrasion, soot, and combustion residues accumulate in the oil, overwhelming the oil filter and reducing its lubricating ability. If you don't reset it to a “healthy” basic state at regular intervals, it gets so bad that it prevents the engine from operating and ultimately even destroys it.

Does the massive wealth inequality we see today cause problems that lead to the erosion of society itself? I would say yes, definitely. Of course, it is frustrating for these people when the money they have generated is taken away from them. But let's look at it realistically: if someone has $100 billion and $99 billion is taken away from them, they are still in a situation where they lack nothing financially.

At some point, you've played capitalism through to the final level. And then you should put down the controller and go outside to listen to the birds chirping instead of frantically chasing after the growth of a number that, due to its sheer size, no longer has any concrete meaning, apart from the fact that there may be two other people whose numbers are bigger or who are hot on your heels.

I have to smile a little at the graphic with the headline “LOW-CODE VALUE PROP.” Judging by the few low-code applications I've seen so far, the images should be arranged in exactly the opposite order.

I read appeals here asking developers to please pay for their tools. I would like to point out that collective behavior cannot be changed by appealing to individuals.

Furthermore, it is the employer's responsibility to provide tools for employees. I'm not going to get into a tug-of-war with my employer over this. I simply work with the tools I am provided.

For self-employed individuals and companies, this should be regulated by the market. If competitiveness correlates with the use of the right tools, the problem should resolve itself. If this correlation does not exist, then it is questionable whether these tools have any added value at all.

If this market mechanism does not work properly because Big Tech systematically undermines it, then it might be appropriate to consider whether this could (or could not) represent a more far-reaching social problem and what solutions there might be. If you go down that route (which I would advocate), it very quickly becomes very political. In any case, it should be clear that this problem cannot be solved by simply shouting at developers: “Pay for your tools!”

What complicates matters further is that our work requires more than just tools in the narrow sense. The entire stack, down to the compiler, web server, and ultimately the operating system and operating system kernel, is based on countless hours of unpaid human labor. On the one hand, it would render us incapable of acting if we were to economically quantify this entire value chain like Diocletian and then insist on slapping an appropriate price tag on it. On the other hand, there is no justification for why we should only do this with the tip of the iceberg that we call tools.

For example trump voters having their partners deported.

I think there were similar surprises for some people back then. Social reality is complex, as can be seen, for example, in the case of J.D. Vance's wife. Every ICE officer would surely like to drag her out of her Porsche Cayenne by her hair and press their knee into her neck. Here in Germany, the shift to the right is being driven by Alice Weidel, among others, who is in a same-sex partnership with a dark-skinned woman who was born in Sri Lanka.

For anti-Semitism in Germany before the Holocaust, I can recommend Robert Musil's novel “The Man Without Qualities.” For me, it was the most insightful look into the social background and conditions that led to the mindset of the time, which later erupted into genocide.

Incidentally, I realize that we are not yet seeing full-scale genocide in the US. But it already has the character of ethnic cleansing, doesn't it? The beginnings were similar here in Germany back then: armed troops harassing people on the streets or taking them away and imprisoning them. Desensitizing and intimidating the general public in this way creates the basis for further escalation.

It is very stable. I have been using it for several years for exactly this purpose without any problems. It simply runs in the background and does its job so reliably that I simply forget about it for long periods of time.

As a German, I am generally cautious about drawing hasty parallels with the Holocaust, but I must admit: now that you mention it, the Sturmabteilung and the Schutzstaffel probably began their work in the streets of the country in a similar way to ICE today.

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Sturmabteilung (SA)

The SA was formed in 1921 as the paramilitary fighting organization of the NSDAP and protected party events. After 1933, under Ernst Röhm, it carried out street violence against Jews, communists, and trade unions, grew to millions of members, but was crushed in 1934 in the Röhm Putsch.

Schutzstaffel (SS)

The SS started in 1925 as Hitler's elite bodyguard under Heinrich Himmler and emancipated itself from the SA. From 1934, it took over police duties, concentration camp guarding, and from 1936, the Gestapo, directing deportations and the Holocaust.

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It sends a chill down my spine when I think about this comparison. I recently heard about an ICE agent who tried to drag an indigenous woman out of her car and said to her, “You're next!”

Due to the sanctions, Russia has shifted its economic focus away from the West. This has given BRICS a massive boost. BRICS+ now controls over 40% of global GDP and over half of global oil exports. I don't know how much the sanctions are affecting people's everyday lives in Russia itself. In 2023, there were newspaper articles here in Germany about how we are still importing Russian oil, just not directly from Russia, but indirectly via India.

You deny the obvious and argue with superficial platitudes. Show me a country anywhere in the world that is thriving despite being defenseless against the encroachments of a nearby superpower. I can't think of one. If you need more examples, the former Soviet countries near Russia have a similar problem.

Without the Marshall Plan, Germany would probably be an agricultural country with a below-average GDP, just like Ukraine. You would have to be completely clueless to believe that weaker countries can develop freely and independently of the influence of the major powers in whose sphere of influence they find themselves.

If you believe that the differences in economic performance and political stability in different countries have other causes, then say so openly instead of beating around the bush.

Of course it's not scientific. I don't wear a lab coat, and neither do you. You should take a look at yourself in that regard. You can't accuse me of lacking standards that you yourself don't live up to.

Ecuador 2010, Honduras 2009, Venezuela 2002, Haiti 1994, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and El Salvador until 1990, Panama 1989, Grenada 1983, Bolivia 1980, Chile 1973, Dominican Republic 1965, Cuba 1961, Guatemala 1954, and so on until the territorial destruction of Mexico in 1848: all of them wars, coup attempts, occupations, protection of U.S. corporate interests, installation of military dictatorships, attempted assassinations of heads of government, etc.

These are recent events that naturally have a massive impact on the political and economic development of the nations concerned. And you want to equate that with the fact that the Turks were in Vienna at some point or that a nation of 1.41 billion Chinese has now recovered somewhat from European colonialism. Sorry, but that's ridiculous. The US bears significant responsibility for the poor political and economic situation in many Latin American countries. You don't have to agree with this assessment. But to pretend that there aren't a multitude of valid arguments for it is either ignorant or disingenuous.

I mentioned ICE because you mentioned something about child labor camps in Cuba. You have to keep things in context when you make non sequitur insinuations. I don't share the view that ICE is the first problematic development and that everything was fine in the US before that. We can end the exchange here. Nothing positive will come of it.

I will read the article and incorporate it into my view of things. I don't get the impression that you are prepared to evaluate information in a similarly open-minded way. You remain silent on all the points I have raised. This makes it clear to me that you are an ideologue.

I can find nothing to support the claim that Cuba allegedly has labor camps for children. As far as I can see, this is an unsubstantiated propaganda claim. It is well known that the US is currently having ICE round up people off the streets and imprison them throughout the country. There is evidence that five-year-old children are being detained separately from their parents. The ability of people to apply double standards is always astonishing.

https://www.amnesty.de/sites/default/files/2025-03/030_2025_...

And it is simply irrational not to link Cuba's problems with the US embargo.

If you tried to back up your assumption with figures or with specific historical facts, you would see that it is wrong. It's not just about the fact that there was instability somewhere at some point, but about how it is being perpetuated. The countries you list above are very diverse. But what they all have in common, and what distinguishes them from countries in Latin America, is that there is a lot of ocean between them and the US. Admittedly, this also applies to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. But if we examine the question of what distinguishes these countries from the ones you list, it brings us back to the connection that was already pointed out above. I live in Germany and have had access to toothpaste my whole life. People my age in Cuba can still remember very well what it was like to have to do without toothpaste. Now ask your favorite LLM who temporarily prevented toothpaste from being imported into Cuba.

This is the first time I've read anything in English about Kärnten and Steiermark. Styria and Carinthia are impressive names. It's as if the Roman Empire were still there.

You have articulated the same freedom twice here.

I live in a city where I can be fairly certain that I will not be the victim of a robbery. I don't need to carry a weapon or otherwise appear defensible. This type of crime simply does not exist here (or only to a very limited extent). That is “freedom from.” If I had the right to carry a firearm to defend myself in the event of a robbery, that would be “freedom to.” These two forms of freedom can be distinguished in a very clear-cut way. One allows you to do certain things. The other ensures that negative events do not occur. In North America, the cultural focus seems to be primarily on “freedom to.” But I would consider it a massive restriction of my freedom if I could not walk through my neighborhood at night without worry, even if I had the right to carry a firearm for protection.

Your semantic sleight of hand cannot reflect the difference between someone who feels safe because they believe they can and are allowed to defend themselves against danger (freedom to defend oneself) and someone who feels safe because they believe there is no danger (freedom from danger). However, there is a clearly discernible qualitative difference between these two freedoms. Otherwise, there would be no difference in terms of freedom between walking through Caracas, Tijuana, Port-au-Prince, or Pietermaritzburg with a firearm in your pocket and walking completely unarmed through Abu Dhabi, The Hague, or Trondheim.

I am in Germany. I will keep my 14-year-old Renault gasoline car roadworthy and use it for as long as possible. When it is no longer economically viable to drive a gasoline-powered car, I expect there to be electric cars that cost a four-figure sum in euros when new, are virtually maintenance-free, and come with a guarantee that a replacement battery will be available at a reasonable price (preferably from third-party suppliers) that I can replace myself without having to go to a specialist workshop. I hope that there will be manufacturers who recognize the need for such vehicles and will meet that demand. I will definitely not pay 20,000 or 50,000 euros or whatever for a skateboard with a battery and car bodywork.

Articles like this confirm my opinion on the subject. What annoys me most is that we argued in favor of electric cars because of climate protection. I am in favor of climate protection, but when I read this article, I just feel like I'm being taken for a ride. Politicians should not have simply decided to phase out combustion engines. They should have imposed further constraints on the automotive industry with regard to low purchase costs, durability, reusability, and affordable maintenance.

This is a balancing act between conflicting requirements. It is understandable that you don't want to jump back and forth between countless small subfunctions in order to meticulously trace a computation. But conceptually, the overall process still breaks down into subprocesses. Wouldn't it make sense to move these sub-processes into separate functions and name them accordingly? I have a colleague who has produced code blocks that are 6000 lines long. It is then almost impossible to get a quick overview of what the code actually does. So why not increase high-level readability by making the conceptual structure visible in this way?

A ReverseList function, for example, is useful not only because it can be used in many different places, but also because the same code would be more disruptive than helpful for understanding the overall process if it were inline. Of course, I understand that code does not always break down into such neat semantic building blocks.

Focus on separating pure code from stateful code, that's the key to large maintainable software! And choose composability over inheritance.

100%!

I think they have made clear what they are criticizing. And a video game is exactly that: a video game. You can play it or leave it. You don't seem to be making a good faith effort to understand the other points of view being articulated here. So this is a good point to end the exchange.

That's an extremely weak argument. Ultimately, it's about the numerical values. Where you set the reference point is secondary as long as you can convert. We could also set your birthday as the zero point. I'm not a Christian and I have to live with BC/CE too. I'm not saying that there is no Eurocentric perspective or that European understanding of history is not shaped by it. But we can reflect on this and correct it. Postcolonial criticism should not go so far as to see the BC/CE system as a structural mechanism of oppression. That's just ridiculous. You'd be better off dealing with concrete economic oppression instead of peddling this Foucault/Spivak/Said nonsense! Sorry for being so blunt, but it upsets me every time. I mean, what's the alternative here? Should we switch to the Mayan calendar now so that it's not so Eurocentric? That's ridiculous. A little Hegelianism (or Laoziism, for that matter) wouldn't hurt you!