11 June 2025

Musings

* Will we someday reach a point where computer software is routinely bug-free, routine software updates are a thing of the past, and there is a single standard of cables for everything? If not, why not?

* One of the main things that I want AI to do is figure out my habits and patterns and suggest ways to automate them. 

Do I always put emails from a certain sender in a particular folder? Suggest a rule to automate that task. 

Do I go through a certain set of steps to create a citation from an academic journal or preprint webite in a blog post along with its citation? Suggest creating a button in my UI to do that. 

Have I never used a word processing font ever? Suggest putting that font somewhere other than the main dropdown menu in my word processor. 

Do I adhere to certain style standards when drafting legal documents? Suggest making that an MS Word style. 

Do I usually bookmark certain kind of webpages in certain bookmark folders? Make those folders the default choice when I hit the bookmark button. 

Does a webpage or file seem to be in the wrong folder? Confirm that this is where I really want to put it in a pop up question.

* How can we disrupt the systems that create flat Earthers, young Earth creationists, evolution deniers, anti-vaxxers, the sovereign citizen's movement, and similar anti-scientific and conspiracy theory thinking?

* If there a better way to restrain bad actors like Fox News that consistently spread misinformation without doing unnecessary harm to free speech?

* Can courts devise better remedies for administrations like Trump's that consistently ignore or defy the law and court orders?

* Somehow, before today, I managed to run my household without owning an ax or hatchet. A need to get branches I'd trimmed from the tree in front of my house down to under four feet in length and four inches in diameter in order to be eligible to put in my compost bin was the final straw.

* Lawful permanent residency is just second class citizenship. It would be better if that category were abolished and everyone who has or would be eligible for a green card immediately becomes a citizen.

* How much of Japan's reasonable housing prices is due to policy, and how much is due to its shrinking population and unfriendliness to long term immigration?

* People are happier and more productive in countries with higher taxes. Low taxes are a sign of economic underdevelopment. They aren't pro-growth.

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