Thanks for the helpful advice. What would you recommend to someone who is interested in learning about diffusion models? I have a CS degree but I have 0 knowledge about AI. Things like Stable Diffusion have blown my mind and I’m really interested in learning about this field. Lots of courses out there but I lack the expertise to discern which one is good.
Tried your app, I liked the product idea but think the execution could use much more work. Personally, I am obsessed with FaceApp’s filters. If you could make an app with even more interesting filters but with the same (or better) realistic quality, I’d definitely use it :)
They risked their money and reaped the awards of there investment. The success of a company is not determined by a dice roll, it is determined by the founder’s execution and product market fit. Given this, I’m not sure how you would consider this to be an inequitable “lottery”. Do founders who do not execute properly and make a low quality product deserve the spoils of success?
However, I do agree that we should keep the rest of humanity in mind.
"Addicts" do not consume drugs out of their own free will. They are addicts, their condition is out of their control. The dealers have free will and willingly choose to ruin society.
> Someone switches bags with you at the airport, in a part of the airport where no cameras are...you have no proof, and you are sentenced to death for being "such a menace"?
You raise a good point - and believe it or not, that is actually a fear I have of travelling to Singapore. Even though it's obviously unlikely, there is always that fear of "but what if it happens?"
This is why the defendant deserves the best defense possible, and that doesn't seem to have happened in this case. It's also why the government should absolutely prioritize a high level of certainty when assessing if someone is guilty of such a serious crime or not. Personally, I wish they opted for life sentences as opposed to execution. You can free someone from prison. You can't un-execute them.
> "Finally, does the prosecution and sentencing of many mainly black men in USA for small drug crimes"
America has for-profit prisons, corrupt police, and a long history of racism. These factors play a major role in why minorities are targeted.
You raise a good point - victimless crimes should not be punished. However, when someone is distributing drugs, I'd argue that is a crime with victims. The person buying it is not doing it out of their own free will, but out of addiction.
> "because when someone stole it you were on a date with a colleague from work, and didn't want your husband to know"
I don't understand the logic here. Why not report it after the date? A rather strange number of coincidences... having a "prior arrest record in another drug use case" and not reporting his phone being stolen, only to be arrested for a drug event again.
Nevertheless, I would never cheat on my spouse, so I would not be in such a situation to begin with.
Regardless, it is possible that we are not really hearing his side of the story properly. He doesn't even have a lawyer, which is extremely concerning. Regardless of whether or not he is guilty, he deserves the best defense possible.
So how did Singapore go from a staggering rate of opium addiction to one of the lowest in the world? Would they have gotten here with laws lenient on substance abuse? I'm curious about the evidence you speak of.
> "Given that Singapore ranks very low on human rights and press freedom"
And yet Singapore is in the top 5 nations for highest GDP per capita (nominal). They also have one of the lowest rates of drug addiction. Surely they are doing something right. Which one would most people rather have - a prosperous life, or freedom to smoke weed? I choose the former.
> "anyone with a moderate amount of drugs"
But why do they have drugs to begin with? Nobody forced them to smoke weed. How does society benefit from the legalization of recreational drugs, which have negative effects on health? I highly recommend reading the history of Singapore's drug addiction crisis.
> "As another poster pointed out, it’s extremely suspicious that the penalized under drug policies seems to have a racial used tinge to it."
A cause for concern indeed. This should be investigated.
> "Did America’s strict drug laws create a better society than countries that tried more empathetic approaches with legalization and trying to help drug addicts get back on their feet?"
Unlike Singapore, America has for-profit prisons, so it's unlikely helping addicts get back on their feet is even a priority for this nation to begin with.
Just searched for her name, and the first result was a NBC news article titled "Covid vaccines for children are coming. So is misinformation". Nowhere in the article is her name even mentioned. I'm curious as to how this is my first search result on Google.
Now back to her case, the law firm's page about this case says that doctors initially said "Maddie’s Anxiety Is Causing Her Symptoms". Then, "the hospital referred Maddie to psychologists as they believed that Maddie’s symptoms arose from her anxiety."
This directly matches the dictionary definition of "gaslighting".
I've lost count of how many times I've heard doctors attributing something they don't know/understand to "anxiety". A genuine question - how is the notion of a serious side effect dismissed and considered "correlation", yet anxiety is absolutely ruled as "causation"?
> "I have a rock that keeps away tigers in my town. No one in the town I’ve lived in work my rock has ever been attacked by tigers. Would you like to buy my magical rock?"
I'm not sure if the "correlation != causation" argument works here. They have serious laws to prevent drug smuggling, and all the data shows that it is working. Logic suggests deterrent against serious crime => less serious crime
> "Moreover, I suspect like all places, Singaporians don’t have that much difficulty accessing illicit drugs."
"I suspect" is not a valid source.
"Singapore has one of the lowest rates of drug abuse in the world: 30 opiates abusers per 100,000 people" (source: The Washington Post)
Perhaps the law serving as a deterrent against heinous crimes works?
He claims to have lost his phone, but at the same time, he never reported it as stolen.
Also, "The Independent reported that Tangaraju had a prior arrest record in another drug use case, and that he was required to submit himself to regular urine tests. He had missed a test and was on his way to report to the police when he arrested."
Seems rather suspicious.
Nonetheless, the fact that he doesn't have a lawyer is extremely concerning from a human rights perspective.
> “He was also questioned by the police without legal counsel, and said that he was denied a Tamil interpreter.”
That is concerning. Regardless of whether or not you think someone is guilty, they still deserve the best possible defense.
However, one thing I am genuinely curious about is why people condemn Singapore's solution in regards to substance smugglers. The state of their nation suggests that their solution works well.
Why should society condone the distribution of substances that ruin lives? I've seen people argue that capital punishment is unethical in this case. From the perspective of potential false-positive convictions, that is definitely a valid point. However, when people argue that the current punishment for such crime is too much, I must ask: what about the countless addicted people who lose their lives to drugs every year? Don't they deserve to live? Why does a smuggler who knowingly distributes a substance that destroys lives deserve sympathy? How can one expect such a menace to be "rehabilitated" in prison?
> Daszak effectively silenced debate over the possibility of a lab leak with a February 2020 statement in the Lancet. “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that covid-19 does not have a natural origin,”
Regardless of what you think about the lab leak hypothesis, this statement is deeply concerning. Resorting to name-calling ("conspiracy theorist!") as opposed to logically assessing the merits of a statement does not sound like a scientific approach. (Not pointing at any particular wing of the political spectrum - I have seen this from all sides unfortunately.)
> Filippa Lentzos, codirector of the Centre for Science and Security Studies at King’s College, London, told the Wall Street Journal, “Some of the scientists in this area very quickly closed ranks.”3 She added, “There were people that did not talk about this, because they feared for their careers. They feared for their grants.”
This is also concerning. I wonder how many different scientific fields are experiencing something similar - people staying silent to receive grant money?
> "“We’re not crackpots or conspiracy theorists, we’re husbands and wives and family members who have lost somebody – that’s all it is."
The fact that they have to say this to begin with is upsetting. I have come across posts of some unfortunate people who have experienced adverse effects from these vaccines, only to see replies accusing them of being "liars" and "far-righters" (even though their post isn't even political). I even recall a meme where they took a video of someone's vaccination side effects and put comedic music over it.
This isn't just exclusive to vaccines. As a person who knows several people who have suffered serious side effects from medical treatments, I have seen way too many incidents of "it's all in your head." and "we can't quantify it, so it's not there". The result? These people lose trust in the health care system.
Sometimes giving someone the benefit of the doubt can go a long way.