Free Form Friday
...for 8/8/2025
Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence. — John Adams
In 1989 Francis Fukuyama posited humanity was at “the end of history;” that Western liberal democracy would be the final form of government for the world. Hasn’t exactly worked out that way, has it? Instead we appear to have arrived at what I call “the end of facts.” Driven at first by ideological “narratives” which deny the existence of objective reality, then amplified by a social media landscape which rewards clicks over truth, and now turbocharged by AI engines which value “training” over facts and good, solid facts are on the run. Take what one X Twit user cooked with this ChatGTP prompt:
Simple, straight forward ask; small, finite set of facts to master. And what did we get as output?
First, I am never not calling Maryland Marylaid from now on. Second, I’ve had similar snafus from Grok when asking it to generate a list of a conference’s football stadiums by seating capacity. It got members wrong and we are talking a set of only 10-12 facts to nail down. I do not grok how “intelligences” which get small, basic fact sets hilariously wrong can ever generate any novel, effective solution to anything. More importantly how would we know the AI got it wrong if it is novel construct to create something new? When the bridge collapses? There is currently a serious Underpants Gnome vibe around all the AI hype. Maybe I’ve read too many philosophy of science books, but it seems to me that AI does not solve any knowledge problems, instead it creates them. And you say all the faults will just be “trained” out and everything will work out just fine, I have some prime swamp land to sell you in Elorida.
Facts, facts, stubborn facts. I distinctly recall reading The New York Post after the OKC Bombing and scoffing at the official account of how Timothy McVeigh was arrested. At about 10:15 in the morning McVeigh and Trooper Charlie Hanger were driving in opposite directions on Interstate 35; Hanger, traveling southbound toward OKC, spotted McVeigh’s northbound 1977 Mercury Marquis without a license plate, made a U-turn and pulled McVeigh over. The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building had exploded about an hour earlier. No mention of an APB for the car then or since. Just the most remarkable bit of dumb luck policing possibly ever; Hanger himself has called it “divine intervention.” Well, I do not believe in that but it is a minor miracle that interest in all oddities of the OKC event is once again sparking interest on many fronts. One of them is the legend of ATF agents being told not to come to work that day. Why would multiple people just make that up?
Latest on the lies from the IC on the Russiagate hoax. Legacy media continues to have a really bad time telling the truth. And a reminder that independent researchers had sniffed this all out years ago.
Just absolutely brutal and relentless. So many institutions have absolutely torched their credibility in their steadfast devotion to Trump Derangement Syndrome. It should be studied.
How the feds use unlimited resources to frame people and control their reality.
Breaking! Guy who used to work for Michael Whatley says Michael Whatley is going to win a Senate seat. Absurd and incestuous even for the NC GOP. And Whatley will get crushed.
Yet more Epstein debunking. I think the lies are intentional at this point and for clicks. Nothing more.
Some us knew about debanking decades ago.
