curious_straight_ca
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User ID: 1845
curious_straight_ca
25d ago
I think we have some reason to believe we did strike a school and plausibly hit children (who, on priors, spend much of their waking time in schools): https://archive.is/9bWjL
An ongoing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a deadly Tomahawk missile strike on an Iranian elementary school, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings.
Officers at U.S. Central Command created the target coordinates for the strike using outdated data provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, people briefed on the investigation said.
A visual investigation by The Times showed the building housing the school had been fenced off from the military base between 2013 and 2016.
Satellite imagery reviewed by The Times showed that watchtowers that once stood near the building had been removed, three public entrances were opened to the school, ground was cleared and play areas including a sports field were painted on asphalt, and walls were painted blue and pink.
I think this incident is of little overall significance, it's the sort of thing that happens in every war. At the same time, it probably did happen.
curious_straight_ca
25d ago
Fault isn't zero sum. If a parent negligently ignores their small child and lets them wander out of the house into the middle of the road, and you strike the child with a car and kill them, that parent is is definitely very fault, and yet both in the eyes of the law and common sense you are not particularly much less at fault. I don't really think killing those children is one of the more notable facts about the conflict, it happens in any big enough conflict. But it was not a necessary strike and one that (as far as I know) wouldn't have happened if the US military had lived up to its own values and followed its own policies, so I really don't see the need to defend it.
Does everyone just like it too much to find the change worth commenting on?
I dislike it too much to comment on it! Listening to Trump or Hegseth discuss the war (and not on clips, many hours of uncut video) should make anyone who listens despair that this is the chain of the command of the US military, the people who controls what some say is the biggest and most beautiful nuclear button anywhere. But Trump Bad is a decade old at this point, and talking about the continuous decline just isn't that interesting, idk. It makes you sound like you have TDS. Like, it really does look to me like he's making all these important geopolitical decisions in the manner of a professional wrestler, if not a teenager who's acting out. But ten million #RESIST liberals have already posted exactly that on facebook or tiktok etc. And what even is there to discuss about it?
curious_straight_ca
25d ago
Strongly agree. Although, is there anywhere left with good discussion culture, other than literal rationalists / LessWrong
curious_straight_ca
25d ago
I don't have much to add beyond that I like posts like this as much if not more than 'actual' culture war posts. And that when somewhere I lived had a ~90% stairway slope, I thought it was a bit steeper than I'd prefer in terms of safety, but not so steep I think it shouldn't be allowed. Hm, now I want to read a good blog post about the history of building codes.
Part of the answer is that the division over the last decade is a little more even than it often was historically. Looking at the margin of victory in presidential elections, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statistics/data/presidential-election-mandates, the most recent popular vote margins are all less than five in absolute value. But scroll up and you'll see many in the 15-25 range (a 20% margin is like 60-40). I think it's correct to notice that the gas station thing isn't quite enough to explain a consistent <5% margins
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