Free Republic

In the 1960s, Milton Friedman reportedly visited a construction site in a foreign country. To his surprise, the canal builders used no heavy machinery and instead armed thousands of men with shovels. He questioned the bureaucrat about this odd choice and the bureaucrat responded that it was a jobs program. “Oh, I thought you were trying to build a canal,” Friedman said. “If it’s jobs you want, then you should give these workers spoons, not shovels.” Friedman’s absurd proposal illustrates the absurdity of make-work bias—the belief that conserving labor makes us poorer. Make-work bias was particularly popular during the Industrial...

Elections are the cornerstone of our republic. The accuracy of the tabulation of votes is critical to the maintenance of a government, “by the people and for the people.” Two recent events – the Iowa Caucus and the accidental exposure Israel's entire voter registry, including personal details such as addresses, ID numbers another other information that could be used for identity theft, spying and even voter intimidation – have forced a rethinking of the pace at which technology is implemented into one of the most basic societal institutions. A big story in the early portion of the Democratic Presidential Primary were the...

Bad weather can render the cameras and lidar on self-driving cars useless. Researchers at MIT suggest ground-penetrating radar as the fix.

PARIS -- If the UK allows Chinese multinational Huawei to participate in building a new-generation cellular communications network, the CIA is going to take its ball and go home. That's the message Mick Mulvaney, U.S. President Donald Trump's acting chief of staff, delivered in a speech at the Oxford Union last week just before his meeting with British officials. Mulvaney and Trump are concerned that your selfies and your mom's Facebook rants about the neighbor could be laughed at by some military intelligence officer in Beijing via secret backdoors installed in Huawei equipment. Those who don't know any better say...

The U.S. Department of Defense officially adopted a series of ethical principles for the use of Artificial Intelligence today following recommendations provided to Secretary of Defense Dr. Mark T. Esper by the Defense Innovation Board last October.

Not many people would complain about a 60-degree day in February. But this winter’s temperature spikes could mean even earlier exposure to one of spring’s downsides: potholes. Tech gurus can’t stop the weather conditions that cause asphalt to weaken and crack — eventually opening up gaping holes large enough to swallow a Goodyear tire or mess up a Jeep’s alignment. But armed with smartphones, algorithms and self-healing asphalt, they’re trying to make road maintenance a little more manageable. While some are experimenting with high-tech ways to fill the pothole once it pops up — like using a 3D printer and...

Despite China’s incredible economic success as of late, it’s important to remember that it is still fundamentally a communist country. Recent events have been a stern reminder. Freedom can be messy, but it’s nothing like the mess an authoritarian regime creates when it fears losing power. The disturbing outbreak of the coronavirus (2019-nCoV) in China and the communist government’s response to it should be a reminder of the consequence of a system based on state control, without rule by the people and a vibrant civil society. Many are impressed by the fact that China built a 1,000-bed hospital in 10...

Moscow (AFP) - Gripping a scalpel, Vladislav Zaitsev makes an incision in the fold of skin between his client's thumb and index finger and pushes in a small glass cylinder. Alexei Rautkin, a 24-year-old programmer in a hoodie, is having a chip inserted in his hand so he can open the door to his office without swiping a card. "It's something I decided a long time ago," he says. "Mainly because it's convenient but there's also a kind of exclusivity, because practically no one else has this." Rautkin and Zaitsev are among a growing number of Russians interested in biohacking,...

Margaret Cudia thought her Ring doorbell camera was "the best thing since sliced bread." She loved watching the world pass by through her suburban New Jersey neighborhood, guarding vigilantly for suspicious strangers and porch pirates from the comfort of her phone. She hadn't expected the camera also might capture awkward moments closer to home, like the time it caught her daughter grabbing a beer and talking about how controlling her mother was. "I never told her about that one," she said with a laugh. Amazon's Ring, Google's Nest and other Internet-connected cameras - some selling for as little as $59...

It’s no wonder he chose to skip the Iowa caucus, given that former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg apparently thinks farmers and manufacturers all across America lack “gray matter." In a clip just now circulating online, Bloomberg, while speaking at Oxford’s Said Business School back in 2016, explained that "anybody [can] be a farmer," but that it takes "a lot more gray matter" to "think and analyze" enough to work in the tech field. “I could teach anybody – even people in this room, no offense intended – to be a farmer,” Bloomberg explained. “It's a process. You dig a hole,...

The U.S. Justice Department has accused Huawei Technologies of helping Iran track protesters in its latest indictment against the Chinese tech giant as Washington steps up pressure on the world's largest telecommunications equipment maker. In a new indictment unsealed on February 13, Huawei was also charged with conspiring to steal trade secrets from six U.S. technology companies and to violate a racketeering law typically used in the fight against organized crime. The indictment supersedes one unsealed last year in federal court in Brooklyn, New York. According to prosecutors, Huawei provided surveillance equipment to Iran that enabled the monitoring of protesters...

Can the creation of a U.S. military space force boost the economy, maintain American sovereignty, and preserve world peace? General Steve Kwast joins Candace Owens this week for a discussion on how a national space force will impact global relations. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLiwKqL5nko   

The Chinese company Huawei can secretly tap into communications through the networking equipment it sells globally, a U.S. official charged as the White House stepped up efforts to persuade allies to ban the gear from next-generation cellular networks. The U.S. national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, made the statement at an Atlantic Council forum on Tuesday evening after The Wall Street Journal quoted him as saying Huawei can “access sensitive and personal information” in systems it sells and maintains globally. O’Brien did not provide any evidence to support the claim. U.S. officials have long argued that Huawei is duty-bound by Chinese...

Posts Posted on February 11, 2020February 11, 2020 Consider Moderating Your Smartphone Usage for Lent  As Lent approaches consider that it is often easier to abstain from something entirely than to moderate its use. It’s also easier to measure the success or failure of abstinence. When I “give up something for Lent,” my approach is to stay away from it entirely during Lent. I don’t exempt Sundays or solemnities that occur in Lent. The “on again, off again” approach just doesn’t work for me.However, there is something to be said about using Lent to moderate behavior as well. There...

In June 2018, President Trump directed the Department of Defense to “begin the process necessary to establish a space force as the sixth branch of the armed forces.” The reason for a space force is simple: space is the strategic high ground from which all future wars will be fought. If we do not master space, our nation will become indefensible. Since that time, entrenched bureaucrats and military leaders across the Department of Defense, especially in the Air Force, have been resisting the President’s directive in every way they can. And this December, although Congress voted to approve a Space...

China is using talking drones for law enforcement and coronavirus hygeine. This is a wet dream for any social justice warrior needing to implement behavior and thought control under a commie one world govt. police state. Leftist technophobes got no problem with this bit of technology. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9bbAmfLLWQ

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has temporarily shelved a proposed rule change that would further restrict American sales to Huawei, the Chinese telecom giant, after some officials in the Defense Department and other agencies argued that the measure, which was intended to protect national security, could actually undermine it, according to people familiar with the matter. The rule change, which multiple government agencies were reviewing, would close a loophole that allowed technology companies like Intel and Micron to continue shipping chips, software and other products to Huawei despite a ban that prevented the Chinese company from buying some American products....

A coalition of states is suing the Trump administration over new regulations that they say could allow for the online release of blueprints for 3D-printed firearms, which make it easier for anyone to access the files at home and make a functional plastic gun with a 3D printer. Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson, who is leading the effort to block the administration’s rule, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington on Jan. 23, seeking an injunction to block the administration from implementing the new rules. Joining him in the federal lawsuit are...

I received a speeding ticket tonight coming up hwy 7 from Ole Miss to Memphis. Since I haven’t had one in ten years or so, I found a few tings interesting: 1. The police were in the opposite lane and must have locked on without sitting on the side of the road with a radar gun. I imagine they have some new stuff that uses their speed against an oncoming car’s speed. Not hard to solve, but I’ve never run into it before. 2. Since it was at night, after I pulled over, I put on the overhead lights, rolled...

A startup focused on “invisible computing” Thursday unveiled a smart contact lens which delivers an augmented reality display in a user’s field of vision. The Mojo Vision contact lens offers a display with information and notifications, and allows the user to interact by focusing on certain points.