Ray20

> when we model superpowers as rational actors within their ideological system

But they are not. We can thus look at the people who make decisions, but not at the countries themselves. So, it’s most likely not about joining NATO, but about European integration and economic growth.

> The best move is to cozy up to whomever is in power next.

Why care whomever is in power next? You could just do your job.

So, the solution is to press the nuclear button, get a couple hundred million dollars from an offshore account in Cyprus, and live in any country of your choice. Why care about polls in this hole, and what the US will do with this hole in response to the use of nuclear weapons?

I think they would have lost long ago and would have had many times fewer losses in dead and wounded.

> Without western support, Ukraine would be in a much worse state than it is now.

No, that doesn't seem to be true.

I think nuclear deterrence works even in such situations. The retaliatory system is structured in such a way that after decapitation, the decision to use or not use a nuclear weapon is made not by the "number two" or the "successor" but by a person specifically authorized to do so, about whom the successors and number two may know nothing.

> As for international law, it is extremely clear, prohibiting the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.

Decided by whom?

Do you understand that the difference in the Ukrainian case is literally caused by the actions of Western countries?

Venezuelans are going to work tomorrow because no one has provided their corrupt dictatorial government with hundreds of billions of dollars in military and financial aid?

> people who continue to work when all of their basic needs are met

There are no such things as "basic needs". If people can easily satisfy their basic needs, they simply expands this concept until it ceases to be easily satisfied

In other words, abundance is a myth promoted by mentally ill cultists, and meeting the basic needs of all people is unattainable.

So we come to the conclusion that this is not just a violation of freedom of speech, but also persecution of political opponents? The situation didn't look any better.

> of the CCP bankrolling the Chinese electronics industry to the point where roughly 70% of all electronics goods are produced in China.

But we don't see this bankrolling in absolute values. Rather, it's due to regressive taxation, low (cheap) social security for workers, and very weak intellectual property protection.

No, they are not. I think, on average, those who execute are much less aggressive than those who are executed.

Or not. Unlike all of the above, AI directly conflicts with the concept of intellectual property, which is backed by a much larger and more influential field.

> what you're arguing for is a system that you understand and can verify, but not other people.

I don't think people really need it. We're used to using and trusting systems we don't understand. So, I think if the system is open, people will readily accept it. They'll be content with knowing that all the experts say the system is reliable, and they themselves, theoretically, can, if they want, understand its structure and confirm its reliability.

And the real reason for its non-use is somewhat different: The elites believe that the introduction of such a system would almost immediately lead to demands for real direct democracy, and the stupid masses, using this democracy, would make decisions that would destroy society and civilization.

> Might the genuinely good system you put in place have been abused?

The system's resistance to abuse is one of its important characteristics. So if the system have been abused on that scale, the system probably wasn't good in the first place.

> I don't think a person with integrity is likely to vote for such an openly corrupt conman.

As far as I understand, it was precisely because of situations like the one described in the article that people voted for him.

In practice, you don't need to be honest and incorruptible to win an election. You just need to be more honest and incorruptible than your opponent.

He is literally a communist, and was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union until the very end of that party's existence.

An ally's reliability is relative. And relatively speaking, the United States is a very reliable ally.

I mean to what are we comparing America's reliability? To the reliability of the European Union? Which calls Ukraine not just an ally but also its shield, and then pays Putin more money than it provides aid to Ukraine. And this after we've been paying 50 cents per kwh for decades, while talking about how we're moving away from oil dependence and toward green energy.

> They are advancing, sure, put look what they paid for to achieve this: 300k dead, 700k wounded, depletion of their souvereign wealth fund, 20%+ inflation, lower oil production and so on.

Russia is a totalitarian dictatorship led by the communist Putin. As if communist dictators care. Look at North Korea, it's just the results of an unremarkable year.

> Ukraine is going to have some painful demographic issues

The scariest thing is that even in the best-case scenario, this may no longer be possible. Even before the war, Ukraine's demographics were dire, then young people left, and no matter how the war ends, there's no objective reason for them to return.

> As you said Ukraine’s demographic situation was quite horrible before the war. Very few people in their 20s

This is a perfect situation for waging war. Young people are prone to rebellion and overthrow the authorities that send them to war.

> Hence the conscription age being 27 earlier in the war. > seemed to be very politically unwilling to send actual conscripts there

It is exactly because of that reason. The younger the people, the more dangerous they are for the government.

Until someone implements Jim Bell's ideas using encryption algorithms, distributed networks, and the cryptocurrencies, then there will be no government. Perhaps there won't be one anywhere. Perhaps we'll really miss the good old days.

Why change what works?

> it will get even cheaper and faster later

Yeah, and will be done by somebody else. I think this is the main problem, and if you get rid of it, you'll have a completely sensible strategy. I mean there are many government contractors who, through corrupt connections, can guarantee that work will be awarded to them, and very often doing just that.

> But you don't put off buying a computer because it will be cheaper next year.

Why not? Sounds like a pretty reasonable strategy.

> Nobody seems to be putting off buying GPUs

Many people doing exactly that.

But we want the web into the desktop, not the desktop into the web.

> The cloak of words has always been needed, for some reason

Needed? Probably not. There is just no reason not to use that cloak of words.

> largest concentration of power an elected body auditable by the commons

So, billionaires are bad because they can use their money to enter into voluntary deals with other people, which can lead to them achieving goals we don't like. Therefore, we create a single point of concentration of power with totalitarian control and dictatorial powers, that can take resources from people they don't like and give those resources to others they do like.

And these people with totalitarian control over the commons and dictatorial powers over the commons and the most powerful lever on everyone whatsoever and especially on everyone with huge amount of money, will continue to be electable and auditable by the commons because... I don't know, probably because they feel like it, there is literally no other reasons or incentives for them to do so.

"Big money give a human to much power, so let's take all that power from EVERYONE, concentrate it in ONE PLAСE, and add to this power dictatorial powers and totalitarian control over society. Some might argue that this is the exact opposite of the stated goals of the whole undertaking, but they do not take into account the insurmountable protection in the form of MAGICAL RULES with the help of which society will be able to control all of this"

> But the power concentration is a strong reason.

A centralized authority capable of so severely restricting the economic freedom of the most powerful people implies a far greater concentration of power than the one you're fighting against. You're proposing to cure the common cold with AIDS.

And yet, startups exist.

> in the case of Russia of course, wider privatization in the 1990s was disastrous in many ways

When you effectively hand over state property to high-ranking communists for less than five percent of its real value, that is not a privatization.