iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 14/07/2025

The state is to protect us from oppressors. So said Thomas Hobbes long ago. Our state today must measure up. A significant number of GOP reps who see the need must rise against Trump, join all reasonable people and remove him. If no such come forth we must accept our fate. Tell them! Today!

040

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 07/07/2025

"There is bound to be a certain amount of trouble running any country. If you are president, the trouble happens to you. But if you are a tyrant you can arrange things so that most of the trouble happens to other people." Don Marquis. 1878-1937 Says it all?

040

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

Is there a debate to be had on "Academic Freedom " used as it is as a free pass to an authoritative platform for wide ranging views on any topic whatsoever, enjoying however varying degrees of support from any form of rigorous examination? E.g. In sociological pronouncements.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

Tried "Mind Hunter" TV series. Quirky plots rendered almost impossible by appalling "artistic" photography. Half shit in the dark and when outside in daylight everything is a grotesque yellow/grey. How do we tell these people?

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 23/06/2025

I've walked this brazen clanging path In flesh's brittle arrogance To chance the simple hazard, death Regretting only this, my rash Ambitious wish in verse to write A true and valued testament Hamish Henderson.

040

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 12/06/2025

Let us make no mistake. Trump is unique. We have not seen destructive ignorant folly on this scale before. But. He is not unrepresentative. He is the front end of a substantial body of opinion. We need a solution which removes him but manages the issues which divide us. Or we will have a repeat.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 12/06/2025

Edward Gibbon attributed the fall of the Roman Empire in large measure to the pursuit of "luxury and despotism". And here we are. Persecuted in the majority by a tiny minority, the super rich, destroying the good and useful in that very pursuit. We are now victims of despotism. We must act.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 12/06/2025

Charles Taylor is unworthy of our attention. His religious affiliation is incompatible with his philosophical work and indeed nullifies it. We do need to understand religion in order to contain its harms but not from him. Stick with Robert Bellah.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 11/06/2025

Having had Sumter II, today we have the speech that will be "heard around the world" Only the GOP can prevent the inevitably tragedy looming. It gave him the role and bears the responsibility. Unless of course we are seeing here its "true colours shining through". With apologies to Cyndi Lauper

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 10/06/2025

Anthony Kaldellis has written a magnificent book "The New Roman Empire" about the Eastern Empire based on Constantinople. The book is full of observations of huge current relevance. For example "its aristocrats were unable to accumulate so much wealth that they could bully the state" Get that!

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 10/06/2025

We need better guidance on how to live. Try this. Never buy anything that is advertised! Since advertising is concentrated on items with no distinctive features. Like soft drinks. Or political parties. And the product thus costs more. Let us all tell each other if we find something worthwhile.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 09/06/2025

"Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity." W B Yeats 1919 And he thought that was bad! Look at us now.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 08/06/2025

Almost 300 years ago David Hume noted the general acceptance of "the easiness with which the many are governed by the few; and the implicit submission, with which men resign their own sentiments and passions to those of their rulers." And here we are with democracy dying. All gains lost! Unless!

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 02/06/2025

When life gets tough even rational people despair and are tempted by the blandishments of groups offering seemingly easy answers often invoking supernatural dimensions. Reject . And reflect. "Emotional disorientation is not a warrant for metaphysical retreat" Not originally mine. But original.

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 22/05/2025

His humble townsfolk sicken to behold This monstrous changeling whom they schooled in vain, Who brings no increase in their hoard of gold ..... His evil fame is borne on every wind ...... Roy Campbell Remind us of anyone?

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

Face it. Curiosity will not cause us to die - only lack of it will. Never to want to see the other side of the hill or that improbable country where living is an idyll (although a probable hell) would kill us all Only the curious have if they live a tale worth telling at all. Alastair Reid (1988)

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 20/05/2025

Having now attracted 200 followers I feel a burden of responsibility. When I started I was largely talking to myself in part to keep my spirits up. Now I shall be more circumspect with fewer highly dismissive out bursts. Thank you all.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 19/05/2025

From: All Hallows by Louise Glück. Even now this landscape is assembling. The hills darken. The oxen sleep in their blue yoke, the fields having been picked clean, the sheaves bound evenly and piled at the roadside among cinquefoil, as the toothed moon rises: She is much missed.

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 02/05/2025

Healthcare in a humane society needs communal funding. All but plutocrats will fail to pay for some of the more expensive consultations from liquid assets and insurance is just an exploitative organ of profit for the already rich. Taxation is fair and tailored to our needs and means. Let's do it.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 22/04/2025

Doctors are under universal injunction to avoid giving advice on illness in family or friends. For sound practical reasons. Despite knowledge and experience, humane emotional involvement will limit its worth. Yet much more pressing are the hazards of the current pandemic of self diagnosis.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/04/2025

The Pope has just died. "Conclave" is past its release. Cardinals saw film?

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 20/04/2025

Looking for a way To post some stuff on Bluesky Found the perfect form.

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 19/04/2025

Trump made Kennedy Many kids will likely die They must make amends.

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 13/04/2025

You, my poems, were not created like beautiful flowers in expensive vases to charm cultivated men of leisure. You, my poems, were not created to be like blown soap bubbles, coloured glistening lies against life You, my poems , are my weapons. Louis Fūrnberg /Hamish Henderson

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 06/04/2025

The President has created chaos and inflicted untold harm on the American people. Yet markets get most attention. Let us not forget that markets disproportionately reflect the short term estimates of the fortunes of the affluent few. Which do not align well with the common good.

000

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 29/03/2025

The future of work in the era of AI It has been clear for some time that AI will replace humans , particularly those whose qualities lie in decision making rather than physical performance. Physicians are prime examples. Here is Bill Gates' view balleralert.com/profiles/blo...

balleralert.com

Bill Gates Predicts AI Will Replace Doctors, Teachers, and More Within the Next Decade

In a recent Tonight Show interview, Bill Gates shared his vision for the future, revealing how AI will revolutionize industries, replace professionals, and reshape the workforce in the coming decade.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 28/03/2025

To S R Crockett Blows the wind to-day, and the sun and the rain are flying, Blows the wind on the moors to-day and now, Where about the graves of the martyrs the whaups are crying, My heart remembers how! Robert Louis Stevenson.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

Can we create a Trump and Musk proof AI platform. The current cohort seem vulnerable and in some instances corrupted already. We need action.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 26/03/2025

Can we any longer use AI? Trump/Musk have infiltrated so much of public life that we can no longer have confidence in the responses we get from AI agents.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 09/03/2025

There is mention of ads in Bluesky. That would be the end . Let us remind ourselves that expensive advertising is overwhelmingly in support of propositions and products indistinguishable from their rivals. They are no value to the consumer and invariably adversely affect the quality of the content.

330

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 01/03/2025

When in dead lands where men like brutish herds Rush to and fro by aimless frenzies borne, Firing a golden fusillade of words, Lashing his laughter like a knotted scourge, A poet of his own disdain is born And dares among the rabble to emerge Roy Campbell Thought for today and the immediate future.

030

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 27/02/2025

What if every day we each consider yesterday and resolve to make tomorrow better? Insofar as we can. And without relying on harm to others. Is that possible? Or is personal comfort and increased longevity a zero sum objective? My benefit must be to your detriment? Someone claims to know the answer.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 24/02/2025

Psychiatry is a problem. A zillion or more often contested diagnoses per DSM-5. Lots of distressed people and pretty poor treatments. Progress however from AI. It seems to do well both in diagnosis and therapy. Maybe we can have direct access and ditch the psychiatrists? doi.org/10.1017/S003...

doi.org

Artificial intelligence in mental health care: a systematic review of diagnosis, monitoring, and intervention applications | Psychological Medicine | Cambridge Core

Artificial intelligence in mental health care: a systematic review of diagnosis, monitoring, and intervention applications - Volume 55

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

The Ancient Greek Heraclitus is said to have said "You can't stand in the same river twice" Everything always changes. Tomorrow won't be like today. Move on. (Which gives little comfort to the ultra poor trapped in drudgery and hardship.) But we must start somewhere and this looks as good as any.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

"It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong" Jeremy Bentham 1648-1832 Another who spoke to normal people. How are we doing these last few days?

240

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

A quote "Philosophy is not an empirical enterprise. Its traditional claim is to be a form of knowledge about reality, even though it does not rely on observation about that reality. " A confession?

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Three quotes above. Two from when philosophers spoke to normal people. One from recently when they don't.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Philosophy Alain Badiou Art is not ideology. It is completely impossible to explain art on the basis of the homological relation that it is supposed to maintain with the real of history. The aesthetic process decentres the specular relation with which ideology perpetuates its closed infinity. Huh?

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Philosophy A quote from David Hume A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Philosophy A quote from John Locke All men by nature are equal in that equal right that every man hath to his natural freedom, without being subjected to the will or authority of any other man; being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 20/02/2025

"Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light. Though wise men at their end know dark is right, Because their words had forked no lightning they Do not go gentle into that good night." DT For us in this time?

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 20/02/2025

"Philosophy" is a widely used term applied to many subjects in daily speech. We sort of know what it means and go about our lives. It has unhappily a more serious use. "Proper" philosophy is an academic pursuit of interminable complex dispute. It is closed to normal people. This has to change.

020

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

How many demonstrations have there been in protest at the Musk/Trump horror show? In most countries the streets would be filled with outraged people confronting their fate and thise supporting the destruction. The lack of protest is a terrifying indictment.

110

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 12/02/2025

On Darwin's Birthday we should celebrate his contribution but take time to deprecate the efforts of those who will not accept the obvious but seek to inject pseudoscience. Of such are the clearly religiously inspired niche constructionists making a route for god to determine our genetic future.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 10/02/2025

US has suffered a coup d'état. With no response from the people. Today it has an unelected functionary acting as a dictator. Even Trump is now in danger. When will its people or their elected representatives rise? The world waits. Today would be good.

010

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 06/02/2025

"Let my words knit what now we lack The demon and the heritage And fancy strapped to logic's rock. A chastened wantonness, a bit That sets on song a discipline, A sensuous austerity." by Hamish Henderson Somehow that fits our current predicament though written of a time of war.

030

billga2603.bsky.social @billga2603.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

This singer as a young girl suffered starvation by the Nazis occupying Holland. The pain is still clearly to be heard in her voice. ( Let us note in passing that Musk was a white South African, a group who had a record of similar cruelty) open.spotify.com/album/5M4FRT...

open.spotify.com

Aafje Heynis - Complete Philips Recordings

Aafje Heynis · Album · 2014 · 142 songs

020