Science/Techno Babble Random, Random

[Suliso]

As usual Scott Manley provides an excellent unbiased technical assesment.

[ti-amie]

Jason Koebler
@jasonkoebler@mastodon.social
New: Firefox users have reported an "artificial" 5-second delay when they try to load YouTube videos that is magically fixed if they use Chrome, which has been going viral in a few different places. I asked Google what is going on. They

1) Didn't deny the artificial wait time is happening
2) Said it's part of its war on ad blockers, not targeted at Firefox

Mozilla also told me no indication this is targeted at Firefox

https://www.404media.co/youtube-says-new-5

This explanation, I think, is actually crazier. Google is introducing quality of life problems to adblock users without telling them why their experience is getting worse.

I think this is actually the bigger risk associated with YT's anti adblock campaign. Google is tinkering with things constantly, and rolling out different detection methods and making user experience worse in a haphazard way. People rightly then have no idea what's going on or why this has happened

This throttling story was on top of HackerNews, top of r/technology, top of r/youtube, top of r/firefox. People are very mad, and it's a result of constant tinkering that affects some people but not others ... just ... why would you do this


Dr. Sbaitso
@drsbaitso@infosec.exchange
@jasonkoebler Because YouTube has no functional competition. They do what they want because they can ...

[ti-amie]

OpenAI future in chaos as most workers threaten to leave for Microsoft
Former CEO Sam Altman could still return to OpenAI, despite Microsoft announcing he would join the tech giant
By Nitasha Tiku, Pranshu Verma and Gerrit De Vynck
Updated November 20, 2023 at 7:08 p.m. EST|Published November 20, 2023 at 11:15 a.m. EST

The future of OpenAI was thrown into chaos Monday after nearly all employees at the artificial intelligence company threatened to quit and join ousted chief executive Sam Altman at Microsoft if he isn’t reinstated as CEO, extending the dramatic Silicon Valley boardroom saga.

More than 700 of the company’s roughly 770 employees have signed a letter threatening to quit unless the current board resigns and reappoints Altman, according to a person familiar with the matter. In a bizarre twist, the letter included among the signatories Ilya Sutskever, the company’s chief scientist and a key member of the company’s four-person board, who voted to oust Altman on Friday.

“Your actions have made it obvious that you are incapable of overseeing OpenAI,” the employees wrote in the letter. “We are unable to work for or with people that lack competence, judgment and care for our mission and employees.”

The potential mass exodus at OpenAI puts the future of the lab in doubt, a drastic change of fate for a company that, until just days ago, was considered one of the most promising start-ups in Silicon Valley with a valuation close to $90 billion. Its demise would leave a gaping hole in the center of the AI industry and potentially force thousands of start-ups to find a new provider of AI technology or face the prospect of shutting down. That could allow Big Tech giants to amass more control over powerful new AI technology, which is rapidly making its way into everyday life. Microsoft especially appeared poised to emerge as a winner, potentially gaining significant AI talent. Still, the chaos at OpenAI, which was already giving its technology to Microsoft as part of a partnership, could also affect Microsoft’s future AI products, which have relied heavily on OpenAI tech.

In a media blitz Monday afternoon, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella sought to assure customers and investors that his company was on solid ground no matter the outcome. He left the door open to Altman returning to OpenAI or continuing on as an AI leader at Microsoft, even though he announced late Sunday night that Altman was coming to Microsoft. “I’m open to both options,” Nadella said in an interview on CNBC.

Altman too, has signaled he could still return. “We are all going to work together some way or other,” he said in a post on X Monday morning. He added that the “top priority remains to ensure OpenAI continues to thrive. We are committed to fully providing continuity of operations to our partners and customers.”

That leaves the fate of Altman and OpenAI unclear, three full days after the board fired him.

Regardless of the messaging, OpenAI employees continued to express their frustration and anger. Jan Leike, a senior OpenAI executive and respected researcher in the broader AI community who on Sunday was seen going into and out of the company’s offices, said Monday on X that “the OpenAI board should resign.”

Employees who signed the letter include other senior executives such as chief technology officer Mira Murati, who had been named interim CEO by the board on Friday but was replaced by Emmett Shear on Sunday; chief operating officer Brad Lightcap; chief strategy officer Jason Kwon; and head of safety Lillian Weng. Many of the company’s top researchers, AI luminaries who can command salaries in the tens of millions of dollars, also signed, including Wojciech Zaremba, Alec Radford and Bob McCrew. Without them, OpenAI would struggle to keep up with other research labs run by Google, Facebook and Anthropic AI.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technolo ... man-fired/

[ti-amie]

A comment from a reader at WaPo re the above

What is happening is almost like Microsoft is taking over Open AI without having to buy up stock.

Open Ai’s board of directors is almost making Musk’s buy-out and take over of Twitter look competent.

At any rate, something to study in Business 101: How (not) to destroy a company.

Maybe, AI can devise a solution.

Almost like?

[ti-amie]

Ars Technica
@arstechnica
Amazon’s $195 thin clients are repurposed Fire TV Cubes

Amazon Workspaces Thin Client is a Fire TV Cube with different software.

https://arstechnica.com/information-te

[ti-amie]

Elon Musk tells boycotting X advertisers “Go f*** yourself”
Musk says X advertiser backlash is "going to kill the company."
JON BRODKIN - 11/29/2023, 7:53 PM

Elon Musk addressed an antisemitism controversy in characteristically unwise fashion during a public interview today, telling businesses to "go (expletive) yourself" and to stop advertising on the social network formerly named Twitter.

Musk spoke on stage at The New York Times' DealBook Summit in an interview conducted by journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin. Sorkin asked Musk about trying to gain back advertising from businesses that pulled ads from X after Musk posted a favorable response to an antisemitic tweet.

"I hope they stop. Don't advertise," Musk said in response to Sorkin's question (see video).

Perplexed, Sorkin asked, "you don't want them to advertise?"

"No," Musk responded. "What do you mean?" Sorkin asked.

"If somebody is going to try to blackmail me with advertising, blackmail me with money? Go (expletive) yourself," Musk said.

Sorkin replied, "but," and trailed off. Musk wasn't done. "Go (expletive) yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is. Hey, Bob!" Musk said. Musk was apparently addressing Disney CEO Bob Iger, who previously said at the conference that advertising on X "was not necessarily a positive" association and so Disney "decided we would pull our advertising."

Musk: “It’s going to kill the company”
Sorkin pressed Musk on the economics of pushing away advertisers, pointing out that X CEO "Linda Yaccarino is right here and she's got to sell advertising." Musk responded that the advertising boycott is likely to kill the company. "What this advertising boycott is going to do is it's going to kill the company, and the whole world will know that those advertisers killed the company and we will document it in great detail," Musk said.

Even before the latest controversy, Musk's X platform was struggling financially. When Sorkin pointed out that advertisers see things differently, Musk replied, "oh yeah? tell it to Earth."

Sorkin continued: "They're going to say, Elon, that you killed the company because you said these things and they were inappropriate things and they didn't feel comfortable on the platform. That's what they're going to say."

"And let's see how Earth responds to that," Musk replied.

Despite that exchange, Musk said he regretted making the post that kicked off the advertiser boycott. "I should in retrospect not have replied to that one person and should have written in greater length what I meant," Musk reportedly said. "But those clarifications were ignored by the media and essentially I handed a loaded gun to those who hate me and arguably to those who are antisemitic. And for that I'm quite sorry, that was not my intention."

Musk also called it, "one of the most foolish—if not the most foolish—thing I've done on the platform."

On November 15, Musk replied, "You have said the actual truth" to an X post that said Jewish communities are "pushing hatred against whites." A White House spokesperson condemned Musk's post as "abhorrent promotion of antisemitic and racist hate."

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/202 ... rstechnica

Embedded links in the article

[Oploskoffie]

When X collapses, and I truly hope it does, I'll feel even more sorry for the thousands of employees, current and past, who poured their heart and soul into making Twitter a success and got Musk instead. Was this downward spiral and possible end ever anything other than a matter of when, not if? The fact alone that he thinks the Earth needs his version of free speech, that hardly anything is ever his fault, that (in my opinion anyway) he bought Twitter as a means to give himself the biggest possible medium to further build the Cult Of Elon... I'm surprised it took advertisers this long to exit.

[ti-amie]

The video is simply amazing. The man doing the interview was almost stunned into silence before his reporters training kicked in. Elmo's response was that of a person who had just delivered a great speech, looking around like "wasn't that great?"

I hope his fanboys really look at the video.

[ti-amie]

All you need to know about Xitter as of today.

[ti-amie]

[ti-amie]

I was reading comments of people trying to explain MAGAt behavior and someone mentioned that maybe they don't have an internal dialogue as part of their psychological makeup.

I am absolutely shocked that people live like that.

Do You Have an Internal Dialogue? Not Everyone Does
By: Nathan Chandler & Desiree Bowie | Updated: Oct 10, 2023

Have you ever thought about how you think? Ever tell yourself, "Don't forget the milk," before you leave home? And at the end of the day, when you get home without it, you say to yourself, "How could I have forgotten that?" Then you likely have an internal dialogue going on in your head throughout the day.

Turns out, it's not uncommon to use language-based chatter to organize and focus your thoughts. However, some people don't have this kind of inner convo at all. Instead, they may rely more on visualization (for instance, "seeing themselves" buying the milk at the store). Others employ a combination of these techniques.

Let's take a closer look at the science behind inner speech and some of its potential causes.

Contents

What Is the Inner Voice?
Studying Inner Speech
What Causes an Internal Monologue?
Managing Your Internal Dialogue

What Is the Inner Voice?

Inner voice — also known as an internal dialogue, internal monologue or inner speech — refers to the ongoing, often subconscious, stream of thoughts, feelings and inner conversations that occur within a person's mind. Unlike external speech where you use your voice to communicate with yourself or others, the inner voice is how people think and communicate with themselves internally — in other words, the little voice in your head.

The inner voice can encompass a wide range of thoughts and emotions, including self-reflection, problem-solving, self-criticism, planning, decision-making and even daydreaming.
The Role of the Inner Voice

The inner voice is a fundamental aspect of human cognition and consciousness. It plays a significant role in shaping our perceptions, attitudes and behavior. It can influence how we interpret events, make choices and respond to various situations.

It is also a key component of self-awareness and introspection, allowing individuals to reflect on their experiences, beliefs and emotions.

For example, when faced with a challenging decision, a person may engage in internal dialogue by weighing the pros and cons, considering their values and priorities and ultimately arriving at a choice. Alternatively, when experiencing stress or anxiety, internal dialogue may involve self-calming techniques or negative self-talk that can either exacerbate or alleviate the emotional state.

Understanding and managing one's internal speech is a common goal in various psychological and therapeutic approaches, as it can have a huge impact on mental well-being and behavior.

In fact, techniques, such as cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), often involve identifying and modifying unhelpful or distorted thought patterns within one's internal dialogue to promote healthier thinking and coping strategies.
Studying Inner Speech

People on both sides of this "inner monologue" divide have a hard time imagining another way of being — to the point that it sort of freaked everyone out during an online debate that went viral in February 2020.

Russell Hurlburt is a psychology professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. For decades, he's been doing experiments on people's inner experiences, their thoughts, feelings and sensations. Regarding the viral kerfuffle over the inner speech haves and have nots, he chuckles a bit and says he frequently hears people claim that they have an ever-present inner monologue — but his experiments show that this is not always true.

But rather than argue with them, he says, "Well, let's find out."

The Beeper Study

His quest to understand internal experiences kicked off decades ago. As a graduate student in the early '70s, he began wondering how scientists could investigate subjects' pristine inner experiences — or experiences that are in your present consciousness, before your brain has tried to make sense of them or assigned them some sort of interpretation.

"The object of my research is not to explore inner speech or inner monologue or whatever you want to call it, but to explore your experience as it actually is," says Hurlburt.

For the test, Hurlburt, who has an engineering background, designed and patented a device that beeped at irregular intervals. Each time the beeper went off, he asked subjects (students, in this case) to make notes about their experiences in that moment.

The students were instructed to try and clarify what was happening in their minds whenever the device emitted a beep — but the beeper only went off a few times. This cadence was intentional so that the research subjects would forget that they had them (and thus, not contaminate their thinking processes with thoughts about the experiment).

Descriptive Experience Sampling

Later, researchers asked the students questions to better understand how they were thinking when the beepers sounded. Were they visualizing something? Experiencing a tactile sensation? Feeling an emotion? This line of inquiry is called Descriptive Experience Sampling (DES).

He says one key takeaway was that, "You can't expect a good answer on the first day." Essentially, it takes a day or two of DES training before people find ways to focus on and express what they're experiencing in a given moment.

In his research, he found that most subjects struggled to articulate the way they were talking to themselves. When he asked them for the specific words or sentences, many came up blank. "And in the course of doing that, you and I together, I guess you would say, we decide, 'Well, I thought I had inner speech, but I really don't.'"

Hurlburt's study found that subjects talked to themselves inwardly about 26 percent of the time they were sampled. Many never experienced inner speech while others had it 75 percent of the time (the median percentage was 20 percent.)

Hurlburt has worked with other researchers, like Charles Fernyhough, to use DES questioning while subjects were inside MRI scanners. In a 2018 study of just five subjects, the scanner showed that the area of the brain associated with certain topics lit up when subjects said they were thinking about those things, providing a physical link to the abstractions of thoughts themselves.

Still, scientists are grappling with a lot of uncertainty.

What Causes an Internal Monologue?

Some research shows that people often use more inner verbalization when they're under pressure or for self-motivation. Perhaps, they're using their inner voices to rehearse answers to job interview questions, or they're athletes trying to focus and execute.

Among people who do report having inner monologues, they tend to perceive those voices as their own. That self-talk generally has a familiar pace and tone, although the exact voice might change depending on whether the current scenario is happy, scary or relaxed. They may use whole sentences or rely on condensed wordplay that would be meaningless to anyone else.

But what causes inner speech? A researcher at the University of British Columbia, Mark Scott, found that there is a brain signal called "corollary discharge" that helps us distinguish between sensory experiences we create internally versus those from outside stimuli — and this signal plays a big role in internal speech.

Corollary discharge also plays a role in how our auditory systems process speech. When we speak, there is an internal copy of the sound of our voice generated at the same time as our speaking voice. In other terms, we hear our own voice one way while we speak words out loud.
Managing Your Internal Dialogue

Learning how to manage your internal dialogue effectively can have a profound impact on your mental well-being, self-esteem, decision-making and overall life satisfaction. Here are some strategies that may help:

Mindfulness meditation: Practicing mindfulness meditation can help you become more aware of your inner thoughts without judgment. This awareness can help you identify unhelpful or negative thought patterns and replace them with more positive and constructive ones.
Challenge negative thoughts: When you notice negative or self-critical thoughts, challenge them by asking yourself if they are based on evidence, whether they are rational and if there are alternative, more balanced perspectives. Cognitive-behavioral techniques are often used for this purpose.
Positive affirmations: Incorporate positive affirmations into your inner speech that can counteract negative self-talk. For example, if you're feeling anxious about a presentation, you can say to yourself, "I am capable, and I can handle this."
Practice self-compassion: Treat yourself with the same kindness and understanding that you would offer to a friend. Be aware of your inner critic and counter it with self-compassion and self-encouragement.
Visualization: Use visualization techniques to imagine successful outcomes and positive scenarios. This can help shift your internal dialogue from focusing on potential failures to visualizing your desired achievements.
Journaling: Write down your thoughts and feelings, especially when you're facing challenges or making important decisions to externalize your internal dialogue. This can provide clarity and allow you to analyze your thought patterns.
Seek support: Talk to a trusted friend, family member or therapist about your internal dialogue. Sometimes, discussing your thoughts and feelings with others can provide valuable insights and emotional support.
Practice gratitude: Regularly reflect on the things you're grateful for in your life. This can help shift your inner voice toward a more positive place.
Limit exposure to negative influences: Be mindful of the media you consume, the people you surround yourself with and the environments you expose yourself to. Limit exposure to negative influences that can fuel pessimistic internal dialogue.
Set realistic expectations: Sometimes, unrealistic expectations can lead to negative self-talk, so try to set achievable goals — and remember that no one is perfect. Embrace your imperfections and learn from your mistakes.
Focus on the present: Instead of dwelling on past mistakes or worrying excessively about the future, try to stay focused on the present moment. Mindfulness practices can help with this, as they encourage you to be fully present.

This article was updated in conjunction with AI technology, then fact-checked and edited by a HowStuffWorks editor.

https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/ ... -voice.htm

[ti-amie]

What it's like living without an inner monologue
A look at the inner experience and the science behind it
Alex Soloducha · CBC News · Posted: Mar 06, 2020 4:00 AM EST | Last Updated: March 6, 2020

This story originally published on March 6, 2020.

Hi there! Are you hearing this sentence in your head right now? Is your inner critic voicing its thoughts on the sentence structure? Is it saying this is an odd start to a news story?

The concept of an inner monologue — the term now commonly used to describe the voice in your head — recently sparked a flurry of discussion on social media.

A tweet by @KylePlantEmoji and subsequent blog post by Ryan Langdon brought the topic into the forefront, informing the internet that not everyone has an inner monologue.

Some people freaked out, not believing that some don't think in a verbal, linear way.

Others who live without that inner voice realized they think differently than many of their friends and family members.

Olivia Rivera, 22, said she figured out she doesn't have an internal monologue when her co-workers at a Regina salon started talking about the viral debate.

She said that until then, she didn't know that some people actually have a voice in their head that sounds like their own voice.

"When I hear that other people have like a constant kind of dialogue and stream in their head and that when they're doing a task they'll just be thinking about things the entire time they're doing a task, it actually kind of feels a little overwhelming," she said. "How do you deal with that and what does that feel like?"

Inner monologues and pop culture

You may have seen inner monologue portrayed in TV shows where a detective debriefs the situation via narration. Or maybe you've seen the movie What Women Want, where Mel Gibson's character can read the minds of his female coworkers and romantic interests.

Rivera said she was first confronted with the concept of inner voice as a child, watching the show Lizzie McGuire in which a small animated version of the main character shared her thoughts and commentary on what was happening.

Rivera said she never understood the explanatory device was supposed to mimic the voice inside the character's head.

"I always thought it was something that people just manifested and made up for movies and books and characters just to kind of like explain your inner thought process," Rivera said. "I didn't realize that it was actually that constant for people, that people did actually have a little kind of voice in their head telling them different things and what to do and what to think.

"I don't have that so that's always been weird to me."

So what does Rivera's mind look like? She described her inner thoughts as jot notes.

She said that if she was running late for work, she would know she was late but wouldn't be thinking, "I'm late. I need to stop sleeping in. I need to go to bed earlier, etc."

If she is having a panic attack, her anxiety manifests in more of a physical way, rather than with compulsive, repetitive thoughts.

"I'm not telling myself to panic and I'm not like, 'Oh my gosh Olivia!'" she said. "I never think like that, that feels weird to say. I would never address myself."

Other times, Rivera said, she thinks in a more visual way.

She does have songs just pop into her head. In those cases she will hear it in the singer's voice.
The science of 'inner experience'

Russell Hurlburt, a psychology professor at the University of Nevada, has been studying what he calls inner experience for more than 40 years.

"It's the most interesting topic on the planet," he said.

He has written six books on it and worked with hundreds of participants. He gives them each a beeper and when it goes off at random times throughout the day, they have to note what's going on in their minds. He said people generally think in five ways. Some people experience them all.
The 5 main ways of thinking:

Inner speaking/ inner monologue - Ex. talking to yourself, hearing your voice or someone else or audibly recalling a phone number.
Inner seeing/ visual imagery - Thoughts with a visual symbol. Ex. picturing a memory or a place you wish you lived.
Feelings - A conscious experience of emotional process. Ex. feeling sad after the death of a loved one.
Unsymbolized thinking - No word or image associated with thoughts. Ex. pouring your morning coffee without telling yourself to.
Sensory awareness- Paying attention to a sensory aspect of the environment for an unimportant reason. Ex. hearing someone talk but seeing the light reflecting off their glasses.

According to Hulburt, not many people have an inner monologue 100 per cent of the time, but most do sometimes. He estimates that inner monologue is a frequent thing for 30 to 50 per cent of people.

"There are very big individual differences," he said, "Some people have absolutely none and some people have pretty close to 100 per cent."
The pros and cons of inner monologues

People who don't have an active inner monologue can teach themselves to, Hulburt said. But he doesn't think it's necessarily a good or bad thing.

Hulburt said having an inner monologue can make it easier for people to create a sequential plan and solve logical problems, but other ways of thinking have benefits too.

"People who see visual imagery very often see imagery that doesn't exist in the real world," Hulburt said. "People who are given credit for being imaginative probably don't have much of an inner monologue."

Rivera said not having an inner monologue has been good for her in some ways, because she can block out negative memories or thoughts relatively easily.

It also brought some challenges. She said that when she was growing up, her mother often told her to think before she spoke, but she couldn't.

"I can be blunt and I can have no filter. Sometimes I say things I shouldn't say," she said. "People often know what I'm thinking because I will say exactly what I'm thinking."
Do you really have an inner monologue all the time?

Hurlburt said the recent buzz around inner experience is a good thing if it leads people to explore what's really going on in their minds rather than believing it is one way and not questioning it.

"I think most people are mistaken about it," said Hurlburt. "People are hyper-confident. 'Yes I have inner monologue.' And other people say, 'No I don't have a monologue.' And the chances are pretty good that both sides of the debate are mistaken."

Hurlburt said what he calls "armchair introspection" likely won't teach you much about your own mind because the act of paying attention "screws up your everyday inner life."

Rivera said the online discussion prompted a real life one between her and her partner about how they both think. He has an inner monologue and was surprised to find out she doesn't, she said.

"I think it is something that we should know more about because I think that helps knowing how other people think," she said. "You can kind of react better and maybe expect less or more for a situation because you can understand how they might be actually thinking."


https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatch ... -1.5486969

[ponchi101]

My internal dialogue is so constant I have to make efforts to STFU myself.
Indeed, incredible (to me) to find out some people don't have it.

[Suliso]

SpaceX narrowly missed the self advertised 100 launches this year ending with 98 (91 Falcon 9, 5 Falcon Heavy and 2 Starship test flights). All perfectly succesful except of course those two test flights. The previous record by a single rocket family was 63. They're now promising up to 144 flights next year.

The next best in the Western world are Rocket lab and United Launch Alliance with 10 and 3 launches respectively. France based Arianspace launched twice. Also two successfull launches out of Japan, one from South Korea and 3-4 from India.

I couldn't find the latest data, but a month ago China stood at 54 (1 failure) and Russia at 15.

This has been the busiest year for rocket launches ever.

[skatingfan]

SpaceX has benefited from having Musk's attention on Twitter.