“So, Greg, what do you do for work?”

“Uhhhh…. I’m the control group for AI toilets.”

I teach Philosophy.

I need them to think for themselves, which just isn’t happening if they turn in work that isn’t theirs.

So, I’m pretty harsh on anyone using AI. Even if it’s for a discussion post, I’m reporting it to the Academic Integrity office.

This is why we have accommodations offices at colleges.

No problem giving an alternative for those who need it.

I teach at a community college. I see a lot of AI nonsense in my assignments.

So much so that I’m considering blue book exams for the fall.

Youthful rebellion transcends technology.

Is there much difference between this and, say, using a pen to drill a hole in your desk?

He ain’t leaving unless it’s in a casket.

I’m absolutely convinced that there’s a certain threshold of money/power/privilege that just destroys a person’s humanity.

Either abroad or goose stepping through American city streets.

I’ve been trying to de-billionaire my life lately. The strategy at the moment for spending money is:

Buy nothing, if possible. Then buy used, if I have to spend money. If I can’t buy used, then buy local. If I can’t buy local, then buy Canadian or Mexican.

Individuals can do that, and they should if they feel like keeping MS.

Organizations are, unfortunately, probably going to remain stagnant and keep paying millions to for things that have free alternatives.

It’s actually really infuriating. When I was in grad school I filed an information request with the college to see how much they paid for access to Office 365 each year. This was in 2021 and they were paying 4 million a year. Meanwhile their grad student employees were all living deeply below the poverty line.

Individual users can make use of free alternatives pretty easily, but I’m not sure they’re actually the target for the price increase here.

Schools, governments, businesses, and other institutions pay wild amounts to MS every year.

I’m honestly just deeply interested in this guy every time I hear about him.

Not because I think he’s smart, on to something, or at all worthwhile though.

It’s just…. Kind of morbidly entertaining to watch a man spend so much time and money to deal with an obvious and incredible fear of death.

He’s going to die some day, and probably from one of these things he’s paying for to avoid dying. It’s Qin Shi Huang shit.

And, ya know what? There are some truly wonderful and interesting works of philosophy dealing with his exact problem, but our boy is too much of a tech bro to even consider that someone may have found a way to deal with the fear of death a few thousand years ago.

So, fuck it, burn that cash bud.

I’ve been using Mint and Pop!_OS on two different machines for a few years.

Neither has really required much from me as the user, although I have needed to use the terminal once on each of them.

Personally, I really like the way Pop does window tiling and workspaces.

My head went to the exact same place.

Geez, NYT, how’s the boot taste?

I have no doubt they’d try.

But, other people in his party will try to fill the void too, and none of them or his kids have the horrid charisma that he does.

If he lives that long.

Despite all the shitty AI pictures of him with abs, the guy is still old as fuck and in terrible health.

Plenty of lawyers, at least some of them talented, will offer to defend him for free.

It could make their career.

If you’re curious about the guy, he’s worth reading. His Letters and Papers from Prison and Ethics are the two dealing with all of this. Ethics is unfinished, because he was moved from a standard prison to a concentration camp before they eventually executed him.

Not many, but my hope is that anyone interested enough does a little research.

Bonhoeffer’s pacifism is a complicated matter. He believed in nonviolence, but also participated in a plot to kill Hitler.

To summarize him a little…. Sometimes we need to abandon our principles to care for others. My goodness is less important than the wellbeing of those who are oppressed.