Links

Should We Teach Our Children To Lie Better?

The truth is everybody lies.

I remember my grandfather saying “Politicians always lie. That’s why they get elected. It’s a dirty business. Stay away from it.” Keep in mind, he was a good acquaintance if not a good friend with all the local elected politicians. It was always weird seeing him be friendly with them at church or other social gatherings. So, from my perspective there was always a disconnect that’s been a part of my view of politics and politicians for most of my life. I doubt I’m alone.

Jametlene reskp Q79XFGuTFfM unsplash.

Of course politicians aren’t the only ones who lie. Corporations do. Ordinary humans lie to other humans. Hell, these days, even AI chatbots lie. It’s all an expected part of the game of life, regardless of what the ninth of the Ten Commandments say.

Most legal systems are built on the premise that one side of the other is going to lie in some form or the other and it’s up to a judge or jury to determine where the truth my lie. But rarely does the losing side get punished for using lies as a defense.

What I do wonder though is why we waste so much time teaching our children not to lie. Given that we know full well they are going to grow up in a world where lying is not just the coin of the realm, but the realm itself, why bother? We do spend time teaching them to beware of the lies being told by salespeople, politicians, friends, etc… But I don’t think many parents spend time providing their progeny with better deceptive skills to be successful.

It’s a weird disconnect. Of course we want our kids to own up when they do something wrong. But eventually they figure it out anyway and everyone goes around living the lie about not lying. Rinse. Repeat.

Bad liars are easy to spot. So I guess arming youngsters with better skills wouldn’t’ necessarily be a bad thing. These days, even the bad liars seem to be rewarded for getting away with it, so a better skill set might unlock better achievements. But then again, choosing sides between Kant and Aristotle on the virtues of truth telling and situational ethics isn’t really good fodder for a dinner time conversation with the kids.

There are many old sayings that end with “_________makes liars of us all.” You can fill in the blank with “the world,” “fear,” “marriage,” “The Internet,” etc…. You can pick your target for blame. Just don’t pick yourself.

Perhaps hallucinating AI chatbots will one day level the playing field of liars by “reasoning” this down to the lowest common denominator. Regardless of what their makers say, they can only learn and spit back what humans have already learned and regurgitated back into the world. We’re all lousy liars, some lousier than others. We lie to the tune of our own rhyme or reason in the moment. And we certainly haven’t learned to pretend other as we endlessly recycle our inability to do different.

Image from Jametlene Reskp on Unsplash.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

We Just Keep Watching As We Roll Faster Into Disaster

If an AI commits a murder can it argue self-defense?

It’s all feels like a bad movie. One that is both made poorly and has a “you can see it a mile off” bad ending. It doesn’t matter if it’s politics, social decay, or the seemingly inevitable march of Artificial Intelligence, we all know how badly most of these things are going to play out, yet we sit spellbound watching the story unfold.

Axios has been on an anti-AI roll lately (a good thing) and they published this piece titled Top AI Models Will Lie, Cheat and Steal To Reach Goals, Anthropic Finds. For some reason Axios decided not to include “take deliberate actions that lead to death” in the headline.

Given our seeming acquiesce to lying, cheating, and stealing in most realms of life these days, I guess that’s one way of toning down the bad news. Go read the article. Or should I say, the summary.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Summer’s Coming

Summer’s almost here and at least in my neck of the woods we got a brief breather this morning before temperatures in the 90’s hit Chicago this weekend and into next week.

 I say a brief breather because in the early morning hours the sky was crystal blue and the air was clean and fresh thanks to a wave of storms that finally blew all of the wildfire smoke out of our atmosphere. Of course that changed once the Sun got a little higher and you can feel the temps rising, high clouds and humidity beginning to creep in. 

Those storms knocked many of the blossoms off of the surrounding Catalpa trees, making it almost appear like a Summer snowfall. 

Screenshot

These days, you take your moments when you can.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Federicio Viticci and Craig Federighi Go One on One about the iPad

A great article and interview for iPad users.

If you’re an iPad user (or even if you’re not) this post is just a quick link to recommend that you check out an excellent article containing an interview by MacStories’ Federico Viticci of Craig Federighi.

New Screenshot.

There has been much consternation and tension among iPad fans over the last few years. Viticci has long been an iPad advocate and had, like many seen his ardor cool while Apple seemingly was cooling its jets on the platform. Federighi sitting down with Viticci is quite a PR move on Apple’s part.In and of itself is a signal by choosing the iPad’s most ardent supporter and vociferous critic.

There’s a chance Apple has jumpstarted those jets a bit based on the iPadOS 26 announcements at WWDC, and from some of the early reactions we’ve seen from some developers and users. While those reactions seem genuinely positive, we’ll need to see how things shape up as the summer beta season rolls along.

The one thing is certain, there will be new life in the iPad discussion after iPadOS 26. Viticci’s article has laid great groundwork on which that discussion can take place.

Load it up on your iPad and give it a read.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

What’s Next After No Kings Protests?

We’re all asking the same question. There are no easy answers.

The No Kings protests this weekend were quite a recipe for hope. I won’t post any crowd number estimates because despite what you may hear or read there’s no real way to know numbers. What is knowable though is the large number of locations across the country that participated, indicating a depth and breadth of support against this horrible fascist regime we allowed to take over.

No kings protest la.

I’m including this link to Scott Dworkin’s post that contains a collection of No Kings protest photos from all 50 states. It’s a great look at that breadth and depth. But those are snapshots of moments in time. The energy that compelled so many to join protests this weekend needs to somehow be harnessed so that any momentum is not lost.

Certainly since the head of the regime we’re all protesting against has done the only thing he can do, which is double down with his threats, now more specifically calling out Blue State cities and populations.  We need to turn that recipe for hope into a full blown meal.

So, how do we keep it going?

That’s going to be tough, but this is a tough fight. I’m one who believes that we should extend weekend protests into the work week. Disrupt the work week and it will have a larger impact than just a weekend event. Especially given how the media seems too afraid to provide anything approaching real coverage, and the Trump adjacent media is just going to ignore it or make shit up. Unless there’s violence they want to exploit.

As an example of that, I sent out the above link from Scott Dworkin to some sadly still MAGAt worshipping relatives. From most I got the usual brush off. But two responded that they had no idea the protests were so large across the country. Guess where they get their news?

Perhaps that’s a simple cue we can use for our own good intentions. Accept the media won’t cover what needs covering. Assume those you know won’t see it if they do. Become your own source for providing information. Keep in mind, It won’t do any good to send inaccurate info or just be argumentative. Just send out the info with a message that says “in case you didn’t see this.”

I know that’s tricky ground for many with family tensions about this moment. But, in my humble opinion, it’s a step in the right direction and a necessary one. Big steps were taken this weekend. We need to keep moving forward. The other side is and will. Let’s make it tougher, not easier for them to do so.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Thinking of This Guy and All of Us Today

Maybe it will rain.

Thinking of this guy today. Known as Tank Man for standing in front of a line of tanks during the Tiananmen Square protests in China in 1989. Don’t know why. Perhaps it’s because we’re rolling tanks out to celebrate a dictator wanna- be’s birthday.

Remember. This image can’t be openly viewed in China currently.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Hinge Moment?

It’s going to be a weekend.

There’s really no way to know if you’re living through a hinge moment of history or not. But these next few days certainly have the makings of one.

Shutterstock 2433622859.

Between the events in Los Angeles, (including what happened to Senator Padilla,) already planned but now growing No Kings protests, Trump’s ego-fluffing birthday parade, and events in the Middle East, the atmosphere is charged. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t feel a sense of foreboding.

There’s no way to know what is going to happen and yet we all know we have to live through whatever comes. It’s almost like preparing for surgery knowing you have a negative reaction to anesthesia.

To be perfectly honest, I think my biggest fear is that we have such fools and imbeciles in charge. There may be plans, there may be desired outcomes. There may be plans to disrupt either. The events I cited above, while all potentially fraught with the potential for danger, all depend on those imbeciles and whatever decisions they are going to make, and the reactions to them.

Sadly, we don’t have to look hard to find them or see their imbecilic behavior.  Apparently, according to the Secretary of Army, there is an American soldier on the moon. The Pentagon is a mess. And the White House, well.. let’s just say I think the faithful is starting to lose a bit of faith in what comes out of there anymore.

Speaking of faith, I don’t have much of it in those elected to be leading voices in opposition.

If so much didn’t hang in the balance, all of this would be laughable. But so much does indeed hang in the balance. Beyond my fears of the imbeciles is how much they relish being cruel. They’ve baked cruelty into the cake they want to stuff down our throats to a point that just being cruel for the sake of it seems to be the entire point, not just a means to an end.

To be honest, while it feels like things are stacked against those, like me, who stand against this imbecilic sadistic regime, I sense that there are still possibilities to erode the ground underneath their plans. I may not be encouraged by the s0-called leaders of the opposition, but I am heartened by what seems to be a growing groundswell of anger among those they think they’re leading.

Things might need to get uglier first, sadly. The saga of human history bears that out. Perhaps these next few days will tell us which way the hinge of history is going to swing. Perhaps not.

See you on the other side.

Photo by Vasylchenko on Shutterstock.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Mel Brooks’ Spaceballs Sequel Trailer Is Brilliant

Just posting this here because in the midst of all of the shit going down around us, it surfaced and made me laugh. And I needed that for just a minute. 

Mel Brooks announced a sequel to his wacky sci-fi comedy, Spaceballs. It’s been awhile and he takes full advantage of that in this brilliant trailer. 

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above. 

Apple Beta Season Is Upon Us and iPad Debates Are Around the Corner

Changes look promising. Wait and See is the operative condition.

Apple announced what it has in store for the next versions of all of its operating systems during it’s annual World Wide Developers Conference this week. Or rather Apple put out a pretty nice commercial for some of what it has in store. But that’s the way of these things whether pre-taped or live. The beta testers and pundits are off and running looking into every nook and cranny of the code, celebrating, criticizing, and screenshotting. That will go on deep into the summer.

Apple WWDC25 iPadOS 26 hero 250609_big.jpg.large_2x.

The biggest, most observable change is the new design language, Liquid Glass, that is intended to bring all of Apple’s operating systems into a more unified look and feel, sorta, kinda based on the Vision Pro. Who knew that headset would provide new Vistas ahead?

They also unified the current OS numbering system, ditching the previous version numbers. Now each operating system will increase by the last two digits of each year ahead, as in iOS 26, watchOS 26, etc… We’re going to get to iOS 50 sooner than we thought.

I no longer play the beta game with my devices so I haven’t seen anything first hand, beyond the reactions of others that range from it’s terrible to the best thing since sliced bread. Keep in mind that any reactions you see following the release of the first developer beta should always include the caveat that what you see now will probably evolve over the course of the summer. Wait and see is the operative condition that needs to be set.

As far as I’m concerned the big news was about the iPad and what iPadOS 26 is promised to offer. There has been lots of back and forth about trying to define the iPad ever since there have been iPads. But certainly since Apple, in the pre-M1 chip era, put out the What’s a Computer campaign in 2018. There were quite a few loud voices always wanting more than Apple delivered in terms of making the iPad more like a Mac. And in recent conversations many of those loud voices were putting down their megaphones and were moving on from those iPad as their main computer dreams.

But this year Apple seems to be promising most of the changes those users have been clamoring for. They include a multiple windowing UI, much more similar to MacOS than any of the previous multi-tasking attempts. There’s even a menu bar, the inclusion of a new Preview app and more Finder-like functionality in the Files app. Better background processing and enhancements to the audio system are sure to make podcasters happy. There are a host of other new tidbits as well. There are also casualties. Many are already mourning the loss of Slide Over.

To give you an idea of how big a deal this change is, noted Windows advocate, Paul Thurrott ended his first look piece with “I may need to get a Smart Cover. Or whatever it’s called. This changes everything.”

The cynic in me has to say that the depth and breadth of these new iPad features makes me suspicious as to why Apple didn’t take this path earlier. It seems obvious that it had been thought through. The hardware has certainly been capable. Regardless of those suspicions, Apple has set up another new iPad story to keep us chattering.

So, iPads are being dusted off again. Soon, and more importantly deeper into the summer, we’ll hear how successful these features may be in fulfilling the desires of those who want the iPad to be more like a Mac. What we won’t have to wait for is the debates around the iPad to heat up.

I’ve never been one that felt disappointed by the iPad’s less than Mac-like features. For my work it has always served me well and gotten better in doing so over its evolution. Stage Manager was never my thing, but Slide Over worked well for my usage as my primary multi-tasking metaphor. Will I miss it? I’m sure I will. But I’ll wait and see what this new multi-tasking UI offers before rendering judgment.

But that’s me and I’m not everybody. So, as I look forward to living vicariously through the summer as others poke around these new changes, let me close with this. Regardless of whatever differences exist between the iPad and the Mac they always had one great similar strength that these new changes appear poised to make stronger still. Different users with different needs can use an iPad or a Mac for just about anything they want and need to do.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.