# Technology doesn't work that way - SamuelA's Pit Thread **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 3, 2017, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420 "2017-12-03T00:52:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 39
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/761 "2018-01-25T19:56:08Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > What I said was that you’re a fucking racist, and apparently not bright enough to possess the self-awareness to even realize it. We can look at the pertinent quotes from the cited immigration thread: > Post #73: > \*The immigrants who our ancestors let in were not just anyone. > > I won’t try to claim any particular racial or cultural group is better or worse, so I’m not branded a racist, but immigration policy in the past was selective, and America is highly successful. \* > Note the first occurrence of the classic red-flag “I am not a racist”. {…} Not saying something racist so no one can brand you as a racist isn’t classic red-flag “I am not a racist” it’s classic red-flag “I am a racist, but I’m going to try to maintain plausible deniability”. CMC fnord! ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/762 "2018-01-25T20:17:40Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > What I said was that you’re a fucking racist, and apparently not bright enough to possess the self-awareness to even realize it. We can look at the pertinent quotes from the cited immigration thread: > Post #73: > \*The immigrants who our ancestors let in were not just anyone. > > I won’t try to claim any particular racial or cultural group is better or worse, so I’m not branded a racist, but immigration policy in the past was selective, and America is highly successful. \* > Note the first occurrence of the classic red-flag “I am not a racist”. Looking at the substance of this complete bullshit, the first statement is ignorantly flat-out wrong, since there were no meaningful limitations on immigration before the immigration acts of 1921 and 1924. So in fact “our ancestors” literally did let in “just anyone”, although that (fortunately for white supremacists everywhere) turned out to be mostly white northern Europeans. > > This is what our **SamuelA** regards as laudable “selective” immigration policy that made America successful: blatant racial and ethnic discrimination. I’m not “mischaracterizing” what the fucking racist wrote, I’m quoting it directly. > > But it gets even better … > Post #75 > \*… most of the world’s population pre-1920 was too poor to come to America or there weren’t significant amounts of shipping running that way. Hence it was mostly just Europeans. > > I am not going to claim that Europeans are better or worse than anyone else\* … > > **But what would happen if the immigration mix changed, and it was not just white northern Europeans coming to America?** Ah, **SamuelA** has that figured out, too, the way he has everything else figured out, like how our brains work. It comes in the continuation of Post #75: > \*… the rational outcome would be a massive cultural change, with the new cultural being mainly weighted towards the culture of origin of the immigrants. > > And if that culture is a “failure” creating a “shithole” : what do you reasonably think would happen.\* > It’s clear what would happen if we let people in from shithole countries: the whole place would turn into a shithole. > > So what we have here is not just an ignorant racist, but a racist of Trumpian proportions. > > I responded to that last comment, with considerable restraint, [in this post](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20744543&postcount=78). Here, BTW, [are some shitholian residents from a shithole country](http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/trump-travel-ban-iran-harvard-medical-students-toronto-1.3967469) who are probably leaving voluntarily, but no doubt **SamuelA** will make sure they’re kicked out before the place becomes a shithole. First of all, you can claim that “anyone who says they are not a racist is a racist”. But you have to deliver. The rest of your post is utter bullshit. You haven’t proven or even shown I’m a racist or advocating racist policies in any way. What I have \*said \*is : “while pre-1920 policies were not explicitly racist, geography and economics made them highly selective”. Something you agree with. What I have said is “while I will not claim any specific racial group is better or worse, it is complete ignorance to say that “anyone can come in any numbers” is the **same policy today** as it was then.” Because while the law pre-1920 wasn’t restricted, geography and economics meant that it was highly limited. Today’s geography and economics are different. So you’d be an utter moron to say the **same** policy would work with the **same results**. Also in your selective, hateful arguing, you somehow forgot my post in the thread where I pointed out that if we **are** going to be arguing racial superiority, the \*evidence \*slightly favors Asians over everyone else. If I was a closeted KKK member like you claim, better hope the boss doesn’t hear about my opinion there… Finally, you neglected to notice that the actual thing I advocate for…in several posts after you “forgot” to keep reading…is a machine learning model and individual by individual selectiveness, where we pick the best individuals, ranked in order and going to whatever quota we set. So Harvard students, even from a shithole\* like Iran, are going to meet the criteria for any reasonable mathematical model you come up with. \*I mean this is basically official Federal government opinion, like it or not. I am aware that Iran is more western in some ways than official “allies’” of the USA, but officially Iran is an enemy nation. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/763 "2018-01-25T20:18:45Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Not saying something racist so no one can brand you as a racist isn’t classic red-flag “I am not a racist” it’s classic red-flag “I am a racist, but I’m going to try to maintain plausible deniability”. > > CMC fnord! Yeah you’re just lazy. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/764 "2018-01-25T20:43:01Z")
Oh, and anyone who points out that the geography hasn’t changed since 1920 : fuck you. I meant to say the travel restrictions created by geography don’t mean what they did since we have airliners. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/765 "2018-01-25T20:46:51Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > Yeah you’re just lazy. Well . . . you’re glue . . . so there! I’ll take non-sequiturs for 500 Alex?! CMC fnord! ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/766 "2018-01-25T20:49:57Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > Oh, and anyone who points out that the geography hasn’t changed since 1920 : fuck you. I meant to say the travel restrictions created by geography don’t mean what they did since we have airliners. Yeah you’re just lazy. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/767 "2018-01-25T21:02:03Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Well . . . you’re glue . . . so there! > > I’ll take non-sequiturs for 500 Alex?! > > CMC fnord! Now you’re lazy and stupid. Obviously I was saying that simply taking that idiot wolfpup at his word instead of reading my actual fucking posts makes you lazy. Now I’ve concluded you’re stupid. Only a moron would consider it a non-sequitur. ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/768 "2018-01-25T21:14:43Z")
Sammy, I read your posts in the other thread and they are clearly racist. This is not **wolfpup** reading things into them that isn’t there. It’s you showing a complete lack of self-awareness. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/769 "2018-01-25T21:37:31Z")
> [@TroutMan](#): > > Sammy, I read your posts in the other thread and they are clearly racist. This is not **wolfpup** reading things into them that isn’t there. It’s you showing a complete lack of self-awareness. Yeah, my reading had nothing to do with anything wolfpup said, I just used that post to post something I, and I’ll assume you, was already thinking. (Strangely I rarely post things that aren’t, or aren’t at least inspired by, responses to other posts.) But, “I’m not going to say ‘something racist’ so no one can claim I am a, and what I said is, racist” does suggest some self-awareness. Maybe SamuelA is up to taking that Turing test after all! CMC fnord! BTW Am I any closer to getting ignored by you SamuelA? ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/770 "2018-01-25T21:55:18Z")
I have a hypothesis about **SamuelA** that seems to be well supported by the evidence. First of all I’d like the reader to review the remarkable character of some recent quotes: > [@SamuelA](#): > > Once every sentient being is an AI or a human converted to a computer and has sufficient processing power, we will all have … blah blah blah. > [@SamuelA](#): > > As smarter beings begin to replace humans - whether that be AIs, cyborgs, genetically engineered humans, … blah blah blah. > > … Smarter beings will also have vastly more memory capacity and ability to share data with each other digitally. > > … If you encountered another being with a different opinion, you could just plug your serial ports together or whatever and swap memory files. > [@SamuelA](#): > > … Similarly, if you think of preferences as weights between 0 and 1, it’s clearly possible for someone with a different set of preference weights to look at your preference matrix and give you advice that would be verifiably correct as to how to maximize your preferences, even if they do not share them. > [@SamuelA](#): > > That’s because people are imprecise. There’s no output ports. Our neural networks have weights but they are inconsistent and float as different neurons temporarily glitch or run out of ATP or give the wrong output from noise. Now here’s the hypothesis. We have someone – or some **thing** – which: [ul] [li]Throughout this thread and others has consistently presented a weak, low caliber of argument,[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Appears to suffer from a spectacular lack of real-world knowledge or any in-depth subject matter expertise,[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Consistently engages is repetitive, robotic technobabble such as the above, as if driven by a limited, experimental knowledge base created by someone obsessed with AI,[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Is completely lacking in self-awareness,[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Is remarkably tenacious.[/li][/ul] Are you thinking what I’m thinking? I think **SamuelA** might be a low-grade AI created by a high school student as a science project, and unleashed on the Internet for shits and giggles. I’m kind of suspicious that it could easily be an acronym for Simple Algorithm for Machine Understanding of English Language Arguments. If so, the joke is on us. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/771 "2018-01-25T22:07:32Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Are you thinking what I’m thinking? I think **SamuelA** might be a low-grade AI created by a high school student as a science project, and unleashed on the Internet for shits and giggles. I’m kind of suspicious that it could easily be an acronym for Simple Algorithm for Machine Understanding of English Language Arguments. If so, the joke is on us. That’s kind of long. Can we just call him “Simple” for short? ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/772 "2018-01-25T22:18:24Z")
I’m going with a low-grade AI accidentally infected with a zombie virus that’s planning for “Judgement Day”, hence the desire for a stockpile of frozen brains! CMC fnord! ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2018, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/773 "2018-01-25T22:26:33Z")
Works for me. **Simple Sam** as the long version. While we’re poking holes in his understanding of immigration history, I’ll take this one: > [@](#): > > Post #73: > The immigrants who our ancestors let in were not just anyone. > > I won’t try to claim any particular racial or cultural group is better or worse, so I’m not branded a racist, but immigration policy in the past was selective, and America is highly successful. The US _did_ let in pretty much anyone who could get on a boat and get here. People came for all kinds of reasons, and many, many of them were undocumented. The first federal immigration law wasn’t until 1882. Prior to the opening of Ellis Island in 1892, individual states managed immigration as they saw fit. Untold thousands of people arrived at port, got off, and start walking. Some recorded, many not. (We could also talk about indentured servitude, and slavery, but I’ll save that for another lecture.) The point is, not that you’re paying attention **Sammy** , that our country, and others throughout history, has prospered because we welcomed others without the level of selection that you seem to think we applied, and have done so throughout most of our history. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/774 "2018-01-26T18:15:46Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > Works for me. **Simple Sam** as the long version. > > While we’re poking holes in his understanding of immigration history, I’ll take this one: > > The US _did_ let in pretty much anyone who could get on a boat and get here. People came for all kinds of reasons, and many, many of them were undocumented. The first federal immigration law wasn’t until 1882. Prior to the opening of Ellis Island in 1892, individual states managed immigration as they saw fit. Untold thousands of people arrived at port, got off, and start walking. Some recorded, many not. (We could also talk about indentured servitude, and slavery, but I’ll save that for another lecture.) The point is, not that you’re paying attention **Sammy** , that our country, and others throughout history, has prospered because we welcomed others without the level of selection that you seem to think we applied, and have done so throughout most of our history. The [actual data](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_racial_and_ethnic_demographics_of_the_United_States) says you are completely full of it. Read it. Your theory is wrong. Obviously the selectiveness was not from outright laws, but other factors, this does not change the fact that immigration was highly selective. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/775 "2018-01-26T18:27:03Z")
His “actual data” is what others call “Wikipedia”. Look out, it’s a trap! ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/776 "2018-01-26T18:33:10Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > The [actual data](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_racial_and_ethnic_demographics_of_the_United_States) says you are completely full of it. > > Read it. Your theory is wrong. Obviously the selectiveness was not from outright laws, but other factors, this does not change the fact that immigration was highly selective. Please enlighten us as to what we are supposed to derive from the data you linked, that proves immigration was highly selective. I assume you are trying to highlight that it was predominantly white people, to further the racist arguments you made in the other thread. But I’ll let you explain it. Come on, _make your argument_. Don’t link to tables of demographics as if it proves some point. State your hypothesis clearly, and explain why those demographics prove it. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/777 "2018-01-26T19:52:57Z")
> [@TroutMan](#): > > Please enlighten us as to what we are supposed to derive from the data you linked, that proves immigration was highly selective. I assume you are trying to highlight that it was predominantly white people, to further the racist arguments you made in the other thread. > > But I’ll let you explain it. Come on, _make your argument_. Don’t link to tables of demographics as if it proves some point. State your hypothesis clearly, and explain why those demographics prove it. It’s 84% white people and the second group is black people, who were not voluntary immigrants. That makes it highly selective. Essentially if you remove blacks from consideration, since they didn’t have a choice, it means that voluntary immigration was more than 98% white people. You tell me : what percentage of world population were they in these eras? Being able to recognize reality doesn’t make someone racist. My point was that whether or not you think immigration was limited, it obviously was in reality. Why didn’t the residents of Japan, India, China, Spain, Mexico, South America, and Africa come to America voluntarily when the borders were open? I don’t know the answer. I can only guess, or someone here can go look up the facts instead of calling me a racist. It could well have just been open racism, but not written into Federal law. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/778 "2018-01-26T19:58:05Z")
And my point was that even if you start with the hypothesis that “no race or culture is better or worse than any other”, which is obvious bullshit (clearly cultures that value knowledge and technology are better for modern purposes than ones who don’t), you can see that America was not founded from a melting pot of all races and cultures. It was all white people from Europe except for the people they brought in chains. That is actual physical reality backed by overwhelming evidence. Anyone who denies this is worse than a racist. I’d say it makes them a denier of objective reality and they should be put into a straitjacket for their own protection. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/779 "2018-01-26T20:13:45Z")
Nice. So now you’re an admitted racist. Real nice. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2018, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420/780 "2018-01-26T20:46:31Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > And my point was that even if you start with the hypothesis that “no race or culture is better or worse than any other”, which is obvious bullshit (clearly cultures that value knowledge and technology are better for modern purposes than ones who don’t), … Rascists just gotta be racists, they can’t help it, and they’re oblivious to it. At this point he’s not even bothering with the “I’m not a racist” preamble, he just launches right into it. 😃 Notice how (a) one can dismiss a thousand years of social, historical, and cultural values of a people, and simply place objective valuations on the merits of “culture” as arbitrarily defined by the racist bigot (technology! self-replicating nanobots!), and (b) notice how one can judge _ **individuals** _ from those societies (some of which are shitholes, to use our resident racist bigot’s favorite term) _ **on the basis of the alleged characteristics of the larger group** _, which is the dictionary definition of “bigot”. Thus, it’s a given with **SamuelA** that the immigrant from a shithole country will bring ignorance and shitholism with him, just as surely as the Negro will rob you in the back alley. This is not racism, you understand, it’s a fact. **SamuelA** deals only with facts, because of the inscrutable brilliance of his giant throbbing brain. > [@SamuelA](#): > > … you can see that America was not founded from a melting pot of all races and cultures. It was all white people from Europe except for the people they brought in chains. Notice how this fits with our resident racist bigot’s previous statements, as I already described [in post #759](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20747345&postcount=759)! He claimed that America historically admitted “not just anyone”, oh no, “immigration policy in the past was selective”. And as I described, the circumstances of trade and travel were such that, except for slaves, this immigration was almost 100% white. This does not constitute a “policy”, so our resident bigot is also ignorant, and when indeed policies were implemented in the years after 1920, they were overwhelming and overtly racist in favor of white northern Europeans. Our resident bigot highly approves of these policies, because it was the direct result of all this whiteness from the right countries that “America is highly successful.” Those are all direct quotes and exactly convey the sentiments of the fucking racist bigot **SamuelA** , which can all be found for posterity in the original thread. > [@zoid](#): > > Nice. So now you’re an admitted racist. Real nice. As I said, he’s not even bothering to deny it any more. The thing about racists is that they’re not very smart, so it’s fun watching them dig themselves in ever deeper, covered in their own ignorance and myopia like pigs in shit. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420.md?page=38) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/technology-doesnt-work-that-way-samuelas-pit-thread/803420.md?page=40)