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  1. Charles Pigden's avatar

    Surely there is an answer to the problem of AI cheating which averts the existential threat. . It’s not great,…

  2. Mark's avatar

    I’d like to pose a question. Let’s be pessimistic for the moment, and assume AI *does* destroy the university, at…

  3. A in the UK's avatar
  4. Jonathan Turner's avatar

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  5. Craig Duncan's avatar
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  7. A in the UK's avatar

    I’m also at a British university (in a law school) and my sentiments largely align with the author’s. I see…

Threatened by a potential (Hellie)

London Times (3 September 2006):

THREATENED by a potentially nuclear-armed Tehran, Israel is preparing
for a possible war with both Iran and Syria, according to Israeli
political and military sources.

Ed Wood, ‘Plan 9 from Outer Space‘:

EROS
I? A fiend? I am a soldier of our planet! I? A fiend? We did not come here as enemies. We came only with friendly intentions. To talk. To ask your aid.

COL. EDWARDS
Our aid?

EROS
Yes. Your aid for the whole universe.  But your governments of Earth refused even to accept our existence.  Even though you’ve seen us, heard our messages, you still refused to accept us.

COL. EDWARDS
Why is it so important that you want to contact the governments of our Earth?

EROS
Because of death. Because all you of Earth are idiots!

JEFF
Now you just hold on, Buster.

EROS
No you hold on. First was your firecracker, a harmless explosive. Then your handgrenade. They began to kill your own people a few at a time. Then the bomb, then a larger bomb. Many people are killed at one time. Then your scientists stumbled upon the atom bomb. Split the atom. Then the hydrogen bomb, where you actually explode the air itself. Now you will make a bomb that brings the destruction of the entire universe, served by our sun. The only explosion left is the solaronite.

COL. EDWARDS
Why there’s no such thing.

EROS
Perhaps to you.  But we’ve known it for centuries. Your scientists will stumble upon it as they have all the others. But the juvenile minds you possess will not comprehend its strength, until it’s too late.

COL. EDWARDS
You’re way above our heads.

EROS
The solaronite is a way to explode the actual particles of sunlight.

COL. EDWARDS
Why that’s impossible.

EROS
Even now, your scientists are working on a way to harness the sun’s rays. The rays of sunlight are minute particles. Is it so far from your imagination they cannot do as I have suggested?

COL. EDWARDS
Why a particle of sunlight can’t even be seen or measured.

EROS
Can you see or measure an atom? Yet you can explode one. A ray of sunlight is made up of many atoms.

JEFF
So what if we do develop this solaronite bomb? We’d be even a stronger nation than now.

EROS
Stronger. You see? You see? Your stupid minds…stupid! Stupid!!

JEFF
That’s all I’m taking from you!

[JEFF LEAPS AT EROS]

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