You do certainly have great trust in the government. Personally I would expect a government version of YouTube to implement much more censorship (content moderation, whatever you want to call it) than YouTube ever will if it gains a dominant market share (with the help of its political mothers and fathers).

Seems like she was banned because of "public affiliations with certain groups":

https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FLauren_Sou...

"I mean, if you want a snippet (like "how do I safely encrypt passwords"), you can already find plenty of solutions online."

Only if you are doing main stream development. I used to be a research but I am now a developer/domain expert in a very narrow field. I have often needed an implementation of a scientific algorithm. They are never available on Stack Overflow or similar. But there are often methods implementing these specific algorithms buried deep down in some anonymous GitHub repository created by a researcher in the field. So, that would be one use case.

Another less direct use case is that it may be useful for Github Copilot. But that is just me speculating.

Yes, the fertility rates in Africa are trending downwards. But the rates are still very high and it will take a long time for them to come down. In the meantime the population in Africa will grow from 1.3 billion (16% of global population) to 2.4 billion (26% of global population) by 2050. This will (and already is) create a large immigration wave. It will mainly be internal migration in Africa and migration towards Europe due to the proximity but USA will of course also receive a share of the migration.

The migration wave from Africa will as you say end. But the population growth in that region does still have a large momentum combined with inadequate domestic opportunities with the obvious result being mass migration over the coming decades.

Israel has succeeded at maintaining (a high) population growth primarily because it has a large religiously orthodox segment in society that has an extremely high fertility rate. Haredi jews have a growth rate of 5% (doubling approximately every 14 years) while non-Haredi jews have a growth rate of 1.2% (doubling every 60 years or so). From https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2F.... It is however also clear that this will change Israel fundamentally over the coming decades.

Your calculation is too simplistic. The societal costs of crime are much higher than the value of the stolen goods. A Walgreen adds value (better health, higher property prices) to the surrounding society. This value is lost if it is forced to shut down due to theft.

The most recent UN projections do not show a decline in World population in the coming 50 years but rather an increase to around 10.5 billion with the population in Africa having by far the highest population growth rate of any continent. In 2022 the population of Africa is around 1.4 billion (17.7% of World population) while it is projected to reach 3.4 billion (32.2% of World population) in fifty years.

So what we will be seeing in the next 50 years will be rapid population growth in Africa (increase of around 2.4 times) while the populations in most of the rest of the World (excluding some countries like Pakistand and Afghanistan) will be stagnant or declining. At some point the population boom in Africa will end as well. But we are nowhere near the end of the current boom.

That is currently the case. But the coming Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Framework which replaces the EU–US Privacy Shield (which did not give sufficient protections) will change that. See https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.tadpf.eu%2F

It is not illegal to use Google services in Denmark. It is illegal for municipalities (including public schools) to use services from a company which does not store this information in places where the data is safe (so, outside the EU since these are Danish students). If Google chooses to protect the data according the to EU GDPR then they can resume selling their services to public schools in Denmark.

No, it is not enough to compile it yourself. You also have to create your own compiler since a compiler can do whatever it wants with your code, including inserting data collection and transmitting instructions. And you have to remove all non-open firmware.

In reality this is of course regulated by law instead. The GDPR forces companies to inform us about the data collection and handling that they are doing. And if Googles data collection and handling does not conform to the regulations that the schools have for handling student information then the schools cannot use Google services (the main problem here being information being sent to undisclosed locations outside EU). Simple as that. If Microsoft can provide a service which does conform to it then the schools can use their services.

In my country pension funds are never controlled by companies (I think it may be illegal since it never happens). They simply transfer the agreed pension rate to the pension fund every month. But you are the actual customer of the pension fund (which also provide some insurance services). That is a much better solution than letting unions handle your pension funds.

Is the amount of control that more widespread religions, such as Christianity and Islam, have over its members actions and thoughts not unreasonable?

The main difference between cult and religion is that a cult is smaller, less organized and newer than a religion. Both Christianity and Islam started out as cults and grew into religions over time. The same is probably true for all religions.

Australia emits 16.8 metric tons of CO2 per capita. EU emits under half that per capita. So how is that leading?

In 2018 Australia emitted 16.8 metric tons of CO2 per capita (which is more than USA) while France for example emitted 5.0 per capita: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2F...

And while most of the rest of the World is decreasing CO2 emissions per capita, Australia has flatlined.

More remote in the way that the deity influences the World. The new testament deity may be omnipresent but his presence is less linked to physical representations than previously. But even if you disagree (and you may have some valid arguments): My point is that there is a long term development in which religious explanations are being pushed back in area after area. If you for example compare Christian practice in the Medieval to Christian practice now you will see that many of the phenomena that were previously attributed to divine intervention is now explained by science without objection from present day Christians.

This development is obvious. When science has taken some ground we (almost) never see religions taking it back. And science is still taking ground from religions. That said, religious censorship may in the future change this course. Or religions may have luck in their attempts to transform deity-human interactions even further into inherently non-detectable interactions. No development is deterministic but my money is on science.