Jarich - Jarich

So this happened on November 14.

The bill that opposition party MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke tore up before the haka suggests moving interpretation of the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi from the courts to Parliament.

It is essential to understand that the courts have often been used to rein in Parliament's misinterpretation with respect to provisions in the Treaty.

The Waitangi Tribunal, set up in 1975 to investigate alleged breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi, notes the bill "purposefully excluded any consultation with Māori, breaching the principle of partnership, the Crown’s good-faith obligations, and the Crown’s duty to actively protect Māori rights and interests". It also said that the principles of the bill misinterpreted the Treaty of Waitangi and that this "caused significant prejudice to Māori".

Act - a minor party in the ruling centre-right coalition, and the party that introduced this bill - claim that the Treaty has resulted in the country being divided by race. However, there's no suggestion that this measure will improve the fortunes of the 18% of New Zealand's population who are Māori. Many Māori remain disadvantaged compared with the general population on metrics such as health outcomes, household income, education levels and incarceration and mortality rates. There remains a seven-year gap in life expectancy.

The tabling of the Treaty Principles Bill comes following a series of measures introduced by the government that have affected Māori. They include the closure of the Māori Health Authority, which was set up to help create health equity, and reprioritising English over Māori when it comes to the official naming of government organisations, for example.

much better footage of the haka that shut down parliament today

Former Minnesota Vikings punter, Chris Kluwe, who was blacklisted from the league for standing up for marriage equality, speaks at a city council meeting where he calls Trump a Nazi. He is subsequently arrested and carried out by police.

Or perhaps "how far off are we [the Brits]?"

Executive chef at a top Thai restaurant tells Gordon Ramsay that his Pad Thai is trash [x]

I'm in tech and I agree that there are some things that LLMs can do better (and certainly faster) than I can.

1. Provide workable solutions to well-described (but fairly straightforward) problems. For example "using jq (a json query language tool) take two json files and combine them in this manner...."

2. Identify and fix format issues: "what changes are required to make this string valid json?"

3. Doing boring chores. "Using this sample data, suggest a well normalised database structure. Write a script that creates a Postgres database, and creates the tables decided above. Write a second script that accepts json objects that look like EXAMPLE and adds them into the database."

However, while there is a risk my employer will decide that LLMs can reduce the workforce significantly, 99% of what I do can't be done by LLMs yet and I can't see how that would change.

LLMs have the ability to draw on the expertise and documentation created by millions of people. They can synthesise that knowledge to provide answers to fairly casually askef questions. But they have no *understanding* of the content they're synthesising, which is why they can't give correct answers to questions like "what is 2+2?" or "how many times does the letter r appear in strawberry?" Those questions require *understanding* of the premise of the question. "Infer, based on hundreds of millions of pages of documentation and examples, how to use this tool to do that thing" is a much easier ask.

The other thing about having no understanding is that they can't create anything truly new. They can create new art in the style of the grand masters, compose music, write stories... But only in a derivative sense. LLMs possess no mind, so they can't *imagine* anything. Users who use LLMs to realise their own art are missing out on the value of learning how to create their art themselves. Just as I am missing out on the value of learning how to use the tool jq to manipulate json files which would enable me to answer my own question.

LLMs have such a large environmental footprint, that they're morally dubious at best. It should be alarming that LLM proponents are telling us to just use these tools without worrying about the environment, because we aren't doing enough to fix climate change anyway. "Leave solving the future to LLMs?!" LLMs aren't going to solve climate change, they're incapable of *understanding* and *innovating*. We already know how to save ourselves from climate change, but the wealthy and powerful don't want to because it would require them to be less rich and powerful.

The trillion dollar problem is literally "how do we change our current society such that leadership requires the ability to lead, a commitment to listen to experts and does not result in the leader getting buckets of money from bribes and lobbying?" preferably without destroying the supply chain and killing hundreds of thousands.

so like I said, I work in the tech industry, and it's been kind of fascinating watching whole new taboos develop at work around this genAI stuff. All we do is talk about genAI, everything is genAI now, "we have to win the AI race," blah blah blah, but nobody asks - you can't ask -

What's it for?

What's it for?

Why would anyone want this?

I sit in so many meetings and listen to genuinely very intelligent people talk until steam is rising off their skulls about genAI, and wonder how fast I'd get fired if I asked: do real people actually want this product, or are the only people excited about this technology the shareholders who want to see lines go up?

like you realize this is a bubble, right, guys? because nobody actually needs this? because it's not actually very good? normal people are excited by the novelty of it, and finance bro capitalists are wetting their shorts about it because they want to get rich quick off of the Next Big Thing In Tech, but the novelty will wear off and the bros will move on to something else and we'll just be left with billions and billions of dollars invested in technology that nobody wants.

and I don't say it, because I need my job. And I wonder how many other people sitting at the same table, in the same meeting, are also not saying it, because they need their jobs.

idk man it's just become a really weird environment.

Genius.

:-)

I can imagine that the Mintari might come to regret that treaty.

Humans are weird: The Monster Inside

( Please come see me on my new patreon and support me for early access to stories and personal story requests :D https://www.patreon.com/NiqhtLord Every bit helps)

I was an observer at the time sent by the Mintari command to coordinate the war effort alongside humanity against the Tempari Regime. A temperate people, the Tempari were roused into conflict with my people over the destruction of a religious comet that was projected to impact one of our colony worlds. Diplomatic talks were waylaid by feverous religious zealotry and so war was declared not long after.

Humanity interestingly enough had not been drawn into the conflict at first as they were not labeled as a belligerent by the Tempari. They would have remained out of the war entirely were it not for a defensive treaty they had signed some six of their months earlier. A notion they no doubt regretted but they still came and now found themselves facing down a Tempari fleet three times their number.

Admiral Horner was unusually calm about the entire situation; or at least that is how he presented himself. Humans are notoriously difficult to read when they wish to be and the Admiral was showing nothing beyond a calm calculating nature as his ships spread out.

I was wondering what rash move he would take to engage the Tempari. It was another well-known habitual that when humans came up against impossible odds they would always do the unexpected and somehow emerge victorious.

The Admiral opened a direct line of communication to the Tempari flagship. For the first time in recorded history a human admiral spoke directly to a Tempari fleet commander. Their name was Gilyan and they opened dialogue by asking the humans to abandon my people; that this war was not theirs to fight and if the humans departed now they would not be harmed.

It was a tempting offer and I must admit that I felt my hearts beat faster as Horner failed to rebuff the offer. I worried that they would indeed leave us to our fate and when the Admiral finally stood up and straighten their uniform I had all but stopped breathing.

“Did you say goodbye to your son?”

Whatever I had been expecting this certainly was not it, and the Tempari appeared just as caught off-guard as I.

“Excuse me?” Gilyan asked.

“Your son,” Admiral Horner continued as he took out a small wooden pipe and lit the end of it, “did you say goodbye to them before you deployed here?”

“I did not.” Gilyan replied cautiously.

“A pity.” Horner remarked as he took several puffs from his pipe and then looked at the Tempari commander. I watched as quietly a series of targeting vectors began appearing over on ship amongst the Tempari lines. It wasn’t the flagship and as far as I could see it was just another Tempari light cruiser, but every gun in the human fleet was now locked on to it as the Admiral gave his final words before the storm.

“No parent should outlive their child.”

The communication went dead as the entire fleet opened fire as one on the light cruiser. Shields of bright purple flared for a moment, straining to hold off the torrent of firepower before bursting like a popped bubble.

Countless warheads, rail gun rounds, plasma lances, and all other manner of ordinance peppered the hull of the cruiser causing it to buckle and break like a twig in a raging stream before finally the inevitable happened.

What had been a light cruiser just moments before was now a cluster of debris slowly floating amongst the Tempari fleet.

Before I had any time to ponder what had just happened the Admiral began issuing fleet wide orders for a withdrawal. Under a storm of Tempari return fire the allied fleet began turning around and engaging their jump drives to flee out of system. At the head of the fleet was the Tempari flagship recklessly charging ahead of their fleet leaving it dangerously exposed; yet the Admiral refused to turn and engage them. Their cannons claimed three human ships before our own flagship made the jump and left the system. 

“You know they can track our trajectory.” I offhandedly remarked to the Admiral as he reclined into his command throne.

“I am aware.” The Admiral replied dryly. “They will follow us; of that I am sure.”

“And why are you so sure?” I asked.

The human looked at me and with a grin that could make their devil pale they said, “Because we just killed their commander’s son.”

--------------------------- What followed was what came to be known as the “Bloody Quadrant”.

The human fleet led the Tempari fleet on a wild chase throughout the entire Quadrant. Always near but just out of reach of their grasp. A place the humans had carefully crafted them to be in.

Every time the Tempari fleet would exit a jump they would find themselves in a deadly trap.

In the Gameri system the Tempari fleet exited a jump directly into a massive nuclear minefield that took out thirteen of their capital ships.

In the Hulv Nebula they were ambushed by small squadrons of frigates that picked off their supply and repair ships before retreating.

Worse yet was when the human fleet actually appeared to turn and fight above the moon of Y’op only to detonated previously hidden explosives within the orbital body and shatter the moon. They jumped out of system just as the debris field of the former moon showered the Tempari fleet decimating a third of their remaining forces.

I could not help but ponder why the Tempari were so intent for battle even after suffering such terrible losses, but at the same time I had known the answer.

By killing the Tempari commander’s son in the opening battle the humans had driven them into a blind rage. Their thirst for revenge would not allow them the luxury of letting the humans escape, and by remaining so close to them they ensured the blood lust would continue to build and cloud their judgment.

At the end only the Tempari flagship and fifteen escort vessels remained when Admiral Horner had decided the chase had reached its end. They were battered and scoured with the battle damage from a dozen battles and now they faced off against the entire allied navy.

“Will you offer them terms of surrender?” I asked as the Tempari formed up for the final time. The human shook his head.

“I will not insult them anymore than I already have.” He spoke in a stoic voice. “We will let them die well.”

To my surprise I could detect hints of remorse in their voice as the Tempari charged at our ship.

One by one the escorts were picked off until only their flagship remained making a suicidal charge at our ship. I watched as it shrugged off round after round of concentrated rail gun fire as it pressed forward and it looked that it would collide with us and carry out its final revenge.

A thermal warhead struck its rear thrusters at the last moment. The two ships scraped and grinded against each other’s hulls and the entire ship shook with a force I would equate to an earthquake. Countless human crewmen were thrown from their seats and some of the less lucky ones were dashed against the metal terminals of their posts and fell limply to the ground, blood pooling around them from their wounds. The Admiral watched unmoving from his throne as his ship sparked and screamed in pain until finally the nightmare ended.

The Tempari ship drifted behind our ship, now dotting countless holes and trails of smoke from plasma fires raging across multiple decks. Admiral Horner didn’t even bother to watch as his rival finally met their end, and instead relinquished the bridge to his second so he could go to his quarters to rest.

“They’ll call you a monster for this.” I couldn’t help myself from saying as the enemy flagship finally detonated.

With a look of disappointment in their eye the Admiral turned to me. “I should hope so; war makes monsters of us all.”

hey don’t cry. spiro the bald eagle failing at catching a crab, okay?