Suggested Answers to the Short Quiz

[johnkarls]

.

***************
Section A -- General

Question 1

Did the “Original Proposal” of Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson posit that it "should frame nicely such public-policy issues as electric vehicles and artificial intelligence”?

Answer 1

Yes.

Question 2

Did Yours Truly “get more than he bargained for” by proposing a biography containing, as it turned out, 95 chapters?

Answer 2

Yes!!!

Question 3

Extra-credit Q – How many of our 57 public-policy recommendations to decision makers (summarized in viewforum.php?f=23&sid=ff4d714c1f1c27e70786869a9f2982d0) are touched upon in Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson?

Answer 3

[If you believe there are any of the 57 in addition to the two below, please post your opinion(s) in this section of the website.]

**********
3/17/2022 – Ukraine – Letters to the President of the European Union and the Secretary General of NATO

Our letters a mere 21 days after the Russian invasion were motivated, even though they did NOT say so, by (please see our 3/16/2022 meeting materials at viewforum.php?f=679&sid=bfe28ab6573d271 ... b4b90342ab, viewforum.php?f=680&sid=bfe28ab6573d271 ... b4b90342ab, viewforum.php?f=682&sid=bfe28ab6573d271 ... b4b90342ab, viewforum.php?f=681&sid=bfe28ab6573d271 ... b4b90342ab, and viewforum.php?f=683&sid=bfe28ab6573d271 ... b4b90342ab) --

President Clinton and UK Prime Minister John Major and Russian Federation President Boris Yeltsin on 12/5/1994 GUARANTEEING THE INDEPENDENCE AND INTEGRITY OF UKRAINE – if they gave up their 1900 nuclear missiles.

At the time, Ukraine was the THIRD-LARGEST nuclear power in the world behind the U.S. and the Russian Federation – BUT AHEAD OF CHINA, THE U.K., FRANCE AND ISRAEL.

BTW, Ukraine had its share of Soviet nuclear scientists and its share of Soviet military personnel specializing in handling nukes.

Also BTW, when Russia attacked Ukraine in 2014, President Obama’s attitude was essentially – “any country stupid enough to give up its nukes doesn’t deserve to be a country”!!! [Please see, in particular, the Suggested Discussion Outline for our 3/16/2022 meeting, especially its Sec. B entitled “A Tale of Four Nations – Message to the World: Any Country Would Be INSANE To Give Up Its Nukes" – available at viewtopic.php?f=683&t=2173&sid=510abfd0 ... 9bd5a84fac.]

So our letters to the EU and NATO???

They are available for download at viewtopic.php?f=23&t=2176&sid=16e252960 ... 7ac0f2a3e7.

Recalling that U.S. Senator John McCain loved to call Russia “a gas station masquerading as a country” we recommended –

(1) Re-activating per Elon Musk’s “call to action’ all “moth balled” European nuclear-power plants in order to curtail dependence on Russian oil & gas – which (re-activating) could, except for “red tape,” be done with little more than a “flip of the switch” and

(2) Organizing a “secondary boycott” of Russian oil & gas that would prevent Russia from selling to other countries its oil & gas that Europe would be boycotting.

[BTW, Russia has succeeded in selling its oil & gas to China and India which, because of the increase in world market prices for oil & gas since the Ukraine invasion, means that Putin & Russia are making a “healthy profit” from the Ukraine War.]

And Elon Musk’s action???

Chapter 70 of Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson (pp. 428-434) details how he SAVED UKRAINE.

The invasion was accompanied by Russia knocking out Ukraine’s satellite communications (both military and civilian) – which meant imminent defeat for Ukraine.

And Elon Musk restored Ukraine’s satellite communications immediately at his own expense with his Starlink satellites.

**********
11/9/2011 – Benefitting American Taxpayers for the Scientific Discoveries of Basic Research They Have Financed

There is no explicit mention in Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson that his Space X rocket program has made scientific discoveries that Elon is putting to good use in other endeavors.

However, there follows below our ”Six Degrees of Separation E-mail Campaign” to President Obama in 2011 (NB: President Obama, unlike other national and international decision makers over the years, always studiously ignored our recommendations) –

To: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact

Subject: Benefiting American Taxpayers For The Scientific Discoveries Of Basic Research They Have Financed

President Barack Obama

Dear Mr. President:

As you are probably aware, the U.S. Government funds an incredible amount of basic research through the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Health, the Defense Department, etc.

As you are probably also aware, the U.S. Government does not patent many of the discoveries that result from this research. Instead, companies both U.S.- and foreign-based are free to capitalize on these discoveries and, more importantly, they are free to conduct manufacturing based on these discoveries in low-wage countries such as China.

Accordingly, it is recommended that you announce a new policy accompanied by legislation, if necessary - (A) that the U.S. Government will patent all discoveries resulting from basic research that it funds, and (B) that the U.S. Government will require licensees, whether U.S.- or foreign-based, to conduct in the United States any manufacturing operations utilizing the technology.

It is recognized that many of the discoveries resulting from research conducted by the Defense Department are kept secret, much like the famous Coca Cola formula is a "trade secret." However, it should be a small matter to provide that when defense secrets finally enter the public domain, they will automatically be subject at that time to a new patent owned by the U.S. government that will become part of the program described above.

Most importantly, in addition to vigorous enforcement of the U.S. Government's patents and trade secrets under the existing provisions of the TRIPS Agreement of the 153-member World Trade Organization (WTO) which includes China, the U.S. should insist that (A) every WTO country will ban imports of goods made with the U.S. government's technology without a license, and (B) imports of other goods by WTO countries from countries that use the U.S. government's technology without a license to produce goods for internal use or export to non-WTO countries, will be subject to seizure to pay both for the royalties that should have been paid on the goods used internally or exported to non-WTO countries and also for the lost wages of American workers.

Thank you for your consideration.

Question 4

Second extra-credit Q – in addition to electronic vehicles and artificial intelligence and public-policy issues you identified in answering Q-3, are there any other public-policy issues in Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson that deserve our attention?

Answer 4

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

[If you believe there are, please post your opinion(s) in this section of our website.]


***************
Section B -- Electric Vehicles – Global Warming (aka Climate Change)

Question 1

Whenever we have focused on Global Warming (aka Climate Change), have we always asked for a show of hands by anyone favoring invading the world’s largest carbon polluter (China) to force it to adopt uneconomic fuel sources such as wind & solar which have always been much more expensive than oil/gas/coal?

Answer 1

Yes.

Question 2

Is it true than nobody has ever raised her/his hand?

Answer 2

Yes!!!

Question 3

Is it true that the 2015 Paris Climate Accord does NOT require China to do anything about its carbon emissions until the far-distant future?

Answer 3

Yes.

Isn’t it ironic that America acts to hobble its economy while it’s “full speed ahead” for China???

Question 4

Is it true that the 2015 PCA’s predecessor, the 1997 Kyoto Protocol did the same thing?

Answer 4

Yes.

Indeed, Vice President Gore was our chief negotiator and the U.S. Senate which would have to approve by a 2/3 vote any treaty, instructed V.P. Gore by a 95-0 vote beforehand that he should NOT agree under any circumstances to anything which exempted China or India (the world’s two largest carbon polluters) AND NOT TO AGREE to anything that impacted adversely the U.S. standard of living.

Since V.P. Gore defied the U.S. Senate on both issues, is it any wonder the Pres. Clinton did not bother submitting the Kyoto Protocol to the Senate for ratification???

Question 5

Are wind and solar still so uneconomic that they require massive subsidies such as those ADDED in the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act signed into law 8/16/2022?

Answer 5

Absolutely.

Did the IRA of 2022 contain anything of significance other than massive new subsidies for wind and solar?

Answer 6

Nothing of economic significance.

Question 7

Was the title “Inflation Reduction Act” a hoax because it employed the cynical “Washington DC Cesspool” game of providing for incredible deficit spending for the first three years?

Answer 7

Yes!!!

Question 8

In other words, the meager revenue raisers were permanent and the massive wind/solar subsidies were scheduled to terminate after 3 years, secure in the knowledge that Congress never lets such things expire but extends them when the time comes?

Answer 8

Of course!!!

Question 9

In other words, 10 years of revenue raisers to “offset” 3 years of subsidies in order to LIE TO THE AMERICAN PUBLIC that the bill was deficit reducing rather than deficit increasing?

Answer 9

Why not, since our pols disdain our intelligence???

Question 10

Are there only two energy sources that are less expensive than oil/gas/coal so that it would not be necessary to invade China militarily to force it reduce its carbon emissions?

Answer 10

Please read on – Q&A-11 and Q&A-12.

Question 11

Is one of them hydro which is severely limited by the world’s severe paucity of dammable rivers?

Answer 11

Yes.

Re the world’s severe paucity of dammable rivers, the CIA’s World Factbook reports that only 16.95% of the world’s electricity is generated by hydro – please see https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/ ... _World.pdf.

And since, for example, most of the world’s transportation (cars, trucks, diesel train engines, ships) are NOT powered by electricity, the portion of the world’s energy generated by hydro is a small fraction of the 16.95%.

Question 12

Is the other nuclear?

Answer 12

Yes.

And we have championed thorium-fission for more than a decade because of its advantages over conventional uranium fission --

[These advantages are virtually identical to those listed by Dr. Victor Stenger in The Huffington Post - https://www.huffingtonpost.com/victor-s ... 92584.html.]

(1) LFTR’s (Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors) require minimal containment chambers because meltdowns are physically impossible since LFTR’s operate near atmospheric pressure (this is both a safety and cost factor).

(2) LFTR’s do not require elaborate cooling systems because they operate well below the boiling point of molten salt and can be passively cooled (this is also both a safety and cost factor).

(3) Thorium is so stable that, as mentioned above, it is impossible to make a nuclear weapon from thorium which is why the U.S. turned to uranium and plutonium instead of thorium.

(4) Thorium has such an incredibly-high “burn-up” that there is virtually no long-lived radioactive waste.

(5) LFTR’s can safely consume uranium from decommissioned nuclear warheads and from spent uranium-reactor fuel rods. Indeed, the Oak Ridge MSRE in the 1960’s was able to use U-235, Pu-239 and U-233 at the same time as thorium. [NB: Since former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of NV prevented the opening of Yucca Mountain NV as the repository for our spent uranium-nuclear fuel rods, the spent uranium-nuclear fuel rods have been left on site at each uranium-nuclear plant to remain cool in the equivalent of home swimming-pools even though many of those uranium-nuclear plants are situated in high-volume air corridors!!!]

(6) Because LFTR’s are economically practical in small sizes, they can be mass-produced in factories and assembled near electrical demand so that the huge energy losses during electricity transmission are virtually eliminated -- though to replace huge uranium reactors, it would only be necessary to assemble several of the small modular thorium reactors into a larger plant.

(7) In addition, thorium is so plentiful that proven thorium supplies are capable of supplying 100% of the world’s energy (not just electricity) for more than 1,000 years. Indeed, virtually all of India’s “sand” beaches comprise thorium.

[Our calculation was 80 years of “proven” reserves of uranium for current (electricity only) usage multiplied by 3 (the minimum abundance factor of “proven” thorium reserves vs. “proven” uranium reserves) multiplied by 99 (usable thorium energy content vs. usable uranium energy content) multiplied by 5.8% (the percentage of total worldwide energy including transportation fuels, that comes from nuclear plants) = 1,378 years.]

ThEC15 was a worldwide conference on thorium research that was held in Mumbai, India, in 2015 by the Government of India and two of its agencies, BARC and NPCIL, along with HBNI and IThEO. The ThEC15 website (http://www.thoriumenergyworld.com/thec15-mumbai.html) contains 127 papers and speeches by 46 speakers from 30 different nations.

Question 13

Will electric vehicles help with global warming (aka climate change) IN THE DISTANT FUTURE WHEN THE ELECTRICITY IS GENERATED BY NUCLEAR ENERGY?

Answer 13

Yes – in the distant future.

Question 14

Are electric vehicles currently AN ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER?

Answer 14

Of course!!!

Question 15

Is this because any economist “worth his salt” will tell you that on a “with and without basis,” the amount of electricity used by electric vehicles IS LESS THAN the amount of electricity in the nation’s grid generated by COAL-FIRED ELECTRIC-GENERATION PLANTS???

Answer 15

Of course!!!

Question 16

In other words, that if all the electric vehicles were outlawed immediately, it would be possible to shut down SOME of the nation’s coal-fired electric-generation plants?

Answer 16

Of course!!!

Question 17

Are electric vehicles, to put it bluntly, simply a way for IDIOTS to “virtue signal”???

Answer 17

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!


***************
Section C -- Artificial Intelligence

Question 1

Is so-called “artificial intelligence” really nothing more than a continuing increase in the ability of computers to process information?

Answer 1

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 2

Is it true that only human beings are actually able to think?

Answer 2

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

[NB: George Gilder whose book “Life After Capitalism: The Meaning of Wealth, the Future of the Economy, and the Time Theory of Money” was the focus of our 11/15/2023 meeting, certainly though so vis-à-vis AI.]

Question 3

Is one of the biggest uproars over recent computer capabilities the 4-month Hollywood Actors’ Strike last year?

Answer 3

So it would appear.

Question 4

Is it true that Hollywood has for decades been able to create cartoons featuring characters that move and have voices, even if the voices were provided by actual actors?

Answer 4

Of course.

Question 5

So what is so remarkable that Hollywood’s cartoon capabilities have now been enlarged to create what until recently were called “holograms” that looked real and were able to move?

Answer 5

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 6

And what is so remarkable that Hollywood can recreate a human voice?

Answer 6

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 7

So what is so remarkable about Hollywood creating NEW HUMPHREY BOGART MOVIES featuring a “hologram” that looks and acts and sounds just like Bogie??? Leading to the 4-month strike by actors worried that they could be replaced by look- and act-alike AI replicas of themselves?

Answer 7

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 8

Is Hollywood’s use of artificial intelligence the only use of enhanced computer capabilities?

Answer 8

On 2/29/2024, Foreign Affairs Magazine published an article entitled “The Perilous Coming Age of AI Warfare: How to Limit the Threat of Autonomous Weapons” – it is available at viewtopic.php?f=788&t=2484&sid=0d638437 ... d341ca64cd.

The article focuses on a drone that has an algorithm enabling it to decide whether to destroy enemy soldiers/equipment.

If memory serves, when President Obama was in office, he required that all drone assassinations had to be approved by him personally – and he used to brag about how many terrorists he had assassinated with drones.

So IMHO the Foreign Affairs article is simply reporting that the considerations President Obama employed in making his assassination decisions (or whomever makes such determinations now) has been reduced to an algorithm so that the decisions are instantaneous and don’t waste the time of human beings (and don’t let the target escape before the decision is made).

BTW, the Foreign Affairs article makes the predictable recommendation for restricting/banning such weapons – similarly to our old Kissinger-era agreements with the old USSR regarding nuclear-weapons-limitation treaties.

This, of course, raises the question of whether such treaties re AI are practical because they would have to be negotiated with Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and Only God Knows Whom Else!!!

It also raises the question of whether such treaties are practical when it would be so easy to cheat!!!

And the question of why “get one’s underwear in a bunch” over computer algorithms that duplicate what President Obama used to spend much of his time deciding.

Question 9

Was one of the four main areas of focus at last month’s Davos World Economic Forum Jan 15-19 – Artificial Intelligence (AI) as a Driving Force for the Economy and Society?

Answer 9

Yes.

[Please see the 9-page portion of one of my law-school classmate’s notes on the WEF meeting which 9 pages pertains to AI – the 9 pages are available at viewtopic.php?f=788&t=2482&sid=0d638437 ... d341ca64cd.]

Question 10

Does the ability to create “authentic” videos have courtroom implications involving the ability (or lack thereof) to prove whether the videos are in fact “authentic” or fake?

Answer 10

What do you think??? Let’s discuss!!!

Question 11

Did Elon Musk propose 12 months ago that AI development be “paused” for 6 months so that “risks to society” could be evaluated?

Answer 11

Yes.

Question 12

Was Elon Musk roundly criticized by his competitors because he was “late to the game” and was merely proposing a “pause” so that he could catch up?

Answer 12

Yes.

Question 13

Does Elon Musk have the “inside track” on “AI for Cars: Tesla 2022-2023” (the title of Chapter 93 of Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson)?

Answer 13

Yes.

Question 14

Does Elon Musk have the “inside track” vis-à-vis “X” (formerly Twitter) as explained in Chapter 94 of Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson entitled “AI for Humans: X.AI, 2023”?

Answer 14

Yes.