Schmoo

Why would Americans care about trains when they're gonna be a billionaire any day now and have their own private jet?

/s

There was a spate of news articles recently about AI feeding people's delusions to the point that they start thinking they're the chosen one, emphasising that it was happening to people with no prior history of mental health issues. It was supposedly linked to an update to ChatGPT that made it even more sycophantic than usual.

It's a mix of sensationalist media and moral panic with just a hint of truth IMO. If people can fall for scams, pseudoscience, and conspiracy theories then they can definitely get pushed off the deep end by an AI saying "yes and" to their every thought.

That's a connotation it has gained, but is not the literal definition.

Propaganda is not necessarily deceptive, though it can be. The word has gained a negative connotation over time but it just means systematically disseminating information in support of a doctrine or cause. That can be any doctrine or cause, and the information can be true, false, satire, or pure opinion. Propaganda is a neutral term and the internet has made producing it so simple that almost everyone has done so.

It's because a lot of them haven't taken that first step of getting out and taking action IRL. When you do it becomes obvious very quickly that peaceful protests and legal maneuvering are important parts of a larger resistance movement, and that they aren't mutually exclusive with more direct action like obstruction, sabotage, and civil disobedience.

So this is actually him implying that Tim Walz ordered the assassination because Melissa Hortman voted against healthcare for undocumented migrants. Not the threat that it sounds like without context, but orders of magnitude more stupid. These people live in an entirely different reality.

There isn't a rational argument for that. I'm not defending religion or even private property, I'm simply pointing out that religion is not something you can eradicate because it is an idea that emerges spontaneously from human psychology. Even if you murdered every follower of religion it will eventually re-emerge in a new - but still familiar - form. In addition, the idea of private property is not exclusive to religion. Religion just provides a convenient framework for justifying it.

Like I said, the underlying problem is greed and lust for power. There is no easy solution.

Well my argument is more than just saying "it's not the religion!" I'm saying that it's more than that. Religion is an effect, not a cause. The distinction is important because it helps us know what to do about it, and trying to eradicate religion isn't it. That's just like the "war on drugs" or the "war on terror." It's a fight that you can never win and that only causes more harm.

I agree that religion has no place in government, what I'm getting at is that there isn't anything unique about the Abrahamic religions that makes them more susceptible to being used to justify violence and oppression. In India right now Hindu nationalism forms the basis of their fascist government. In the past there have been countless belief systems of all sorts that were used as justifying dogmas for all manner of atrocities. I would argue that the Abrahamic religions have been shaped by the violence and oppression they've been used to justify and not the other way around, and that's true of all justifying dogmas which causes them to share many similarities.

And I say all this to push back against the idea that repressing the Abrahamic religions - or any religion for that matter - will do anything to stop the violence. In fact, repression of specific religions and of religion in general is quite common throughout history, and as I said before, it tends to form the basis of a new justifying dogma for violence and oppression rather than stopping it.

I don't understand how the speed of communication is relevant here, would you mind elaborating?

Your mistake is presuming that people elsewhere in the world are any different. We all have the capacity for both great good and great evil. Hell, in the US right now we are ramping up the oppression of immigrants and minorities in prelude to what could easily turn into a genocide if we do not change course.

It's also important to recognize that the Abrahamic religions are just what are currently used as post hoc justifications for settler-colonialism and imperialism. In the past other philosophies - religious or otherwise - were used and in the future there will be new ways of justifying atrocities. The underlying driver of war and conquest is greed, and that cannot be erased. Eradicating the Abrahamic religions like you suggest will not stop the killing, but would instead likely form the basis of a new justifying dogma.

Allow me to translate.

I form my worldview on vibes alone and am incapable of thinking for myself. My perception of people is entirely filtered through memes and sensationalist media.