The fortnightly federal voting intention numbers from Essential Research, inclusive of an unchanged 5% undecided component, have Labor down a point to 34%, the Coalition steady on 31%, the Greens up one to 15%, One Nation up one to 6% and the United Australia Party on one to 2%. The pollster’s 2PP+ measure has Labor down one to 52%, the Coalition up one to 43% and undecided steady on 5%.
The poll also included questions on the housing system, which only 13% rated as good for renters along with 12% for future generations, respectively compared with 63% and 59% for bad. The system was deemed most favourable for existing home owners (43% good, 20% bad) and residential property investors (37% good, 27% for bad). The Housing Australia Future Fund, which respondents were told “aims to invest $10 billion and spend the earnings on building 30,000 affordable homes over the next five years”, was considered too much investment by 9%, too little by 30% and about right by 41%.
Questions on negative gearing found 36% support for its abolition with 25% opposed, widening to 49% and 17% for a limitation to one investment property. Majority support was recorded for all of five proposed reforms that did not involve tax, restrictions on foreign investment (69% supportive, 12% opposed), rental freezes (60% and 17%) and migration caps (60% and 15%) more so than allowing super to be accessed (56% and 20%). The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1138.
Also out today was an SMS poll from Roy Morgan on the Indigenous Voice, which found 46% saying they would vote yes in a referendum, unchanged on mid-April, with opposition down three to 36%. Yes led in New South Wales (48% to 38%), Victoria (47% to 32%), Western Australia (41% to 35%) and South Australia (47% to 32%), but not Queensland (39% to 46%). The poll was conducted Friday to Monday from a sample of 1833.
The pollster’s weekly federal voting intention results, conducted separately online and by phone from Monday to Sunday, have Labor’s two-party lead unchanged at 55.5-44.5 from primary votes of Labor 36%, Coalition 33.5% and Greens 11.5%. There was also an SMS poll of state voting intention in Victoria last week that had Labor leading 61.5-38.5, conducted from a sample of 2095 from May 17 to 22.
Torcherbearer – Unlike the public servants, the PWC consultants don’t need to be sent to training on ethics or public service responsibility?
Bloomberg
McCarthy Confident on Debt Vote Despite Hard-Line Ouster Threat
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/republican-hard-liners-threaten-reckoning-163342304.html?guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9tLmRhaWx5a29zLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAFLBUUfspV1GwhviZS3139ddesle9WJcJAlOPe2FllswubVlySz_dXpjRA2SxcNsb3e2Y8LIv7evNEWTg6nm545DKPUrtDRBn2GXouee-iNbkG4HmLM6vxwknydv5bLw84bYXL7IBtRuX77XSwAoxtaY5oPzpyA1MFw2xdpNHPe0&guccounter=1
C@T and nath
😆 Yep, that was the best I could imagine too. I was hoping those credentialed in the article would provide some real and practical examples. I’m sure there are realistic concerns (not necessarily leaping to Terminator status) but their failure to detail them just left me with more questions than answers.
More practically, I suspect that the ability for a small group of individuals or conglomerates to control and synthesise masses of truly critical knowledge and information would be problematic but my limited imagination struggles to comprehend beyond those concerns.
Isaac Asimov’s robot stories were revolutionary in their day by not perpetuating what he called the Frankenstein Syndrome. That is, the idea that scientific creations will always turn on, and try to destroy, their creators. In his view, washing machines and vacuum cleaners never try to rebel against humanity, so why would robots?
The amazing and sad thing is that those stories, written in some cases more than seventy years ago, remain revolutionary to this day. The cliche of Frankenstein remains alive and well and just refuses to die, not just in stories about robots, but films like Jurassic Park where the dinosaurs turn on those who created them.
The ‘I, Robot’ movie was a travesty. It could never have been made while Asimov was alive to stop it.
Cronus
“More practically, I suspect that the ability for a small group of individuals or conglomerates to control and synthesise masses of truly critical knowledge and information would be problematic but my limited imagination struggles to comprehend beyond those concerns.”
Oh, like the Catholic church until the invention of the printing press. See “Notre Dame of Paris”, Hugo, V.
The disruption of control of ownership and dissemination of knowledge is not a new concept. Information Technology is driven by monetisation of knowledge.
Ven @ #46 Wednesday, May 31st, 2023 – 9:17 am
This merely exposes their vindictive nature.
Player One
“ Does anyone (except me) find it odd that they don’t mention the only actual imminent global threat of extinction we face, which is the looming climate catastrophe?
I smell a burning circuit board.”
——————————————
Agreed, at least CC isn’t esoteric, it’s as clear and real as the nose on our face.
“The housing crisis threatens to unleash Australia’s darker angels, and Peter Dutton is intent on exploiting it, says Peter Lewis’
_____________________
The housing crisis has gotten worse under Labor . Whatever they are doing it is not working.
The Housing Future fund is a dud, so they need to go back to the drawing board with that reform.
“The amazing and sad thing is that those stories, written in some cases more than seventy years ago, remain revolutionary to this day. The cliche of Frankenstein remains alive and well and just refuses to die, not just in stories about robots, but films like Jurassic Park where the dinosaurs turn on those who created them.”
+1
Fear the other. Fear the science.
TM: “The housing crisis has gotten worse….”
10 years of LNP misrule screwed the housing system right proper, that’s for sure. We might have been able to do something about it if the Shorten plan of 2019 had gotten up.
The RBA has recently hired PWC to investigate its underpayment of staff! Gees lousie!
Talk about getting the timing wrong….. Then again it is the RBA and they have not been good with timing lately.
@ Taylormade
The housing crises has taken many years to evolve it cant be fixed in 1 year unless the Federal government can override both states and local governments, which it cant.
The Housing Future fund is not even through parliament yet either
I think there are lessons from Finland that we need to learn.
Personally I think , as negative gearing has failed to deliver affordable housing in enough numbers maybe that should be abolished, but there is little change of that either
General Campbell (CDF) has reviewed his own role in Afghanistan and has found it passed muster. After all, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross (Australia) in 2011 for his command there and was appointed the Deputy Chief of Army in 2012. Self-examination is not always the to best way to establish effectiveness.
Ven 8:30am
“ Did you watch ‘Terminator’ movies? It addressed that issue very well.
Also, Asimov Robot rules
The first law is that a robot shall not harm a human, or by inaction allow a human to come to harm. The second law is that a robot shall obey any instruction given to it by a human, and the third law is that a robot shall avoid actions or situations that could cause it to come to harm itself.”
——————————
The robot is an easy target because it encapsulates our fears, it’s almost a Hollywood product, notwithstanding that interesting scientific work is being done on them.
AI though isn’t really about enlivening robots but rather is more about (but not limited to) information, data, reasoning, decision making, technological recognition and problem solving. I’m trying to understand both the advantages and potential disadvantages of this technology and it’s future impact on daily living.
”
EightESsays:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:35 am
Isaac Asimov’s robot stories were revolutionary in their day by not perpetuating what he called the Frankenstein Syndrome. That is, the idea that scientific creations will always turn on, and try to destroy, their creators. In his view, washing machines and vacuum cleaners never try to rebel against humanity, so why would robots?
The amazing and sad thing is that those stories, written in some cases more than seventy years ago, remain revolutionary to this day. The cliche of Frankenstein remains alive and well and just refuses to die,
”
One of the perfect examples of “The cliche of Frankenstein” is Trump.
He is a creature of Republican party .
There are no cheap fixes to the housing crisis. The fundamental issue is the prices are too high, so that need is unable to meet supply. But there is no safe way to safely lower the relative price of housing without serious economic consequences.
The boat cannot be turned around quickly.
Dog’s Brunch says:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:14 am
Good photos, thanks for posting.
“…but films like Jurassic Park where the dinosaurs turn on those who created them.”
At least for the first movie, only the carnivorous ones and even then the T-Rex was the accidental hero
Plus Newman overrode the security system and Richard Attenborough went AWOL.
“It’s unclear to me exactly how AI will put humanity at risk of extinction, can anyone explain this to me?”
I agree, cronus. I think we’ve established that it can’t even sort fruit. I think we are safe.
Slightly less facetious, it is always a human or human organisation that chooses to deploy and AI system, and their testing and acceptance of the system is were the responsibility lies.
I view this with an incredibly cynical eye. One explanation is that it’s as an attempt by the major AI tech companies to harden their positions in the market for decision support tools, by establishing barriers to entry that smaller competitors. Another is that its an attempt by AI developers to diminish or dilute their responsibility for releasing and deploying tools that fail some fairly basic ethical tests. There are probably more self-serving explanations.
It’s all very fishy.
Cronus says:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 10:02 am
Dog’s Brunch says:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:14 am
Good photos, thanks for posting.
My pleasure, enjoy your day PBers.
Ven
Good question re PWC, Morrison’s role, timing and Morrison’s desire for a post politics job in PWC. We don’t know the answer, but Morrison was either Treasurer or PM at every step through the PWC saga.
Cat
“King defended the decision to reject the amendments because some information was too sensitive to be released.
“We are committed to making information public where possible but a major role of Infrastructure Australia will be to inform the budget process, something which did not happen under the former government,” said a spokeswoman for King. “This means some advice will be subject to cabinet confidentiality.”
Sorry but that explanation does not wash at all. Cabinet in Confidence is precisely the route by which details of some of Australia’s dodgiest infrastructure deals have been kept secret. Examples include Sydney WestConnex and Melbourne East West link. The findings of any independent review must be published.
Albo did not cause all the rorting and the jury is still out on whether he will end it. But having worked in infrastructure planning and funding for 30 years ending the secrecy is one of the first steps forward we need to get back to credible decisions.
”
Cronussays:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:57 am
Ven 8:30am
“ Did you watch ‘Terminator’ movies? It addressed that issue very well.
Also, Asimov Robot rules
The first law is that a robot shall not harm a human, or by inaction allow a human to come to harm. The second law is that a robot shall obey any instruction given to it by a human, and the third law is that a robot shall avoid actions or situations that could cause it to come to harm itself.”
——————————
The robot is an easy target because it encapsulates our fears, it’s almost a Hollywood product, notwithstanding that interesting scientific work is being done on them.
AI though isn’t really about enlivening robots but rather is more about (but not limited to) information, data, reasoning, decision making, technological recognition and problem solving. I’m trying to understand both the advantages and potential disadvantages of this technology and it’s future impact on daily living.
”
Another Arnold Schwarzenegger movie”Total Recall “, where Arnie is implanted with a chip for evil purpose.
Yes, the advantages can be medicinal for people who are “quadriplegic patients” etc.
Cronus says:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:34 am
C@T and nath
Yep, that was the best I could imagine too. I was hoping those credentialed in the article would provide some real and practical examples
_______
One example I did come across was the ability for A.I to be involved in creating targeted drugs capable of killing off segments of the global population, or indeed all of us.
Ryan Smith was in the Brad Battin camp. I wonder who will be the anointed successor for Warrandyte?
Unfortunately for the Libs, it’s likely to be somebody even l00pier than ever before.
What about those raptors that they tried to mind control to use as an army weapon to use ,but not good but for evil purposes.
Just saying.
Taylormade
The housing crisis has gotten worse under Labor . Whatever they are doing it is not working.
Stupid Labor! They have had a whole year to correct nine years of neglect and incompetence!
Dandy Murray @ #68 Wednesday, May 31st, 2023 – 10:03 am
Too advanced. AI can’t even count to five yet.
”
B.S. Fairmansays:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:48 am
The RBA has recently hired PWC to investigate its underpayment of staff! Gees lousie!
Talk about getting the timing wrong….. Then again it is the RBA and they have not been good with timing lately.
”
I read somewhere Timing is everything especially in organisations like RBA. Under Governor Philip Lowe stewardship RBA made some pretty bad decisions atleast since Morrison became Treasurer and later PM.
a r,
Yep. ChatGPT chatbots are excellent chatbots – they will keep a conversation going and respond somewhat convincingly to questions.
Not always so good at other stuff.
Quick scroll before I head up to town and I see AI getting a run, again, and so it should.
One more time – if you’re not following Lex you’re missing out on some worthwhile conversations.
Stuff like this, nothing if not thought provoking. Again, sigh, they’re long, they have time stamps – pull down menu or scroll along the time bar.
Dangers of AI and the End of Human Civilization
0:00 – Introduction
0:43 – GPT-4
23:23 – Open sourcing GPT-4
39:41 – Defining AGI
47:38 – AGI alignment
1:30:30 – How AGI may kill us
2:22:51 – Superintelligence
2:30:03 – Evolution
2:36:33 – Consciousness
2:47:04 – Aliens
2:52:35 – AGI Timeline
3:00:35 – Ego
3:06:27 – Advice for young people
3:11:45 – Mortality
3:13:26 – Love
https://youtu.be/AaTRHFaaPG8
Or Max Tegman is good. Here’s a clip
https://youtu.be/tW2I37TMUsA
Off to Vivid and a couple of shows. Grader coming tomorrow to clear the fire trail – complete disaster since the fires went through – and then some.
”
Grimesays:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 9:23 am
I love the smell of a by-election in the morning.
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/victorian-liberal-mp-ryan-smith-quits-politics-triggering-byelection-20230531-p5dcoq.html
”
One of the comments in comments section of this article
“So one of the hard right has decided to quit. Has he been smacked with a Battin? Or is Pesutto actually managing a clean out of the RWNJs?”
The Warrandyte byelection will be interesting.
Firstly, there will the Liberal preselection battle which could be juicy. Those branches are some of the ones that have been stacked out with religious nutters.
Secondly, because the by-election is likely to be in August, being a more wealthy area many people may be away for winter in places like Queensland and don’t get to vote. Given the margin is only 3,000 vote this could be material.
Thirdly, if “The Voice” referendum campaign gets ugly (uglier) it could hurt the state Liberals.
It has never been a Labor area, but the Victorian Liberals are in such a shambles at the moment it could be a stretch for them to mount a coherent campaign. Their current funds are extremely low and a barebones state byelection will cost about $100k .
I don’t think the landscape has changed greatly in Victoria in the past 7 months; Dan Andrews’ Government is looking a little more tired but the Liberals are looking more shambolic.
Socrates says:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 10:14 am
Cat
“King defended the decision to reject the amendments because some information was too sensitive to be released.
“We are committed to making information public where possible but a major role of Infrastructure Australia will be to inform the budget process, something which did not happen under the former government,” said a spokeswoman for King. “This means some advice will be subject to cabinet confidentiality.”
Sorry but that explanation does not wash at all. Cabinet in Confidence is precisely the route by which details of some of Australia’s dodgiest infrastructure deals have been kept secret. Examples include Sydney WestConnex and Melbourne East West link. The findings of any independent review must be published.
Albo did not cause all the rorting and the jury is still out on whether he will end it. But having worked in infrastructure planning and funding for 30 years ending the secrecy is one of the first steps forward we need to get back to credible decisions.
——————————
I may be missing something but basic infrastructure and funding doesn’t seem to me to be the type of issue demanding secrecy. Actually, quite the opposite. Secrecy should be reserved for those issues and areas genuinely requiring them otherwise we diminish its importance and risk accusations of improper use.
a r says:
Wednesday, May 31, 2023 at 10:28 am
Dandy Murray @ #68 Wednesday, May 31st, 2023 – 10:03 am
I agree, cronus. I think we’ve established that it can’t even sort fruit. I think we are safe.
Too advanced. AI can’t even count to five yet.
———————-
Real comprehension, reasoning and the Singularity seems a ways off then.
The first thing AI will do is oppress the poor, illiterate and disadvantaged…they will be profiled, exploited, marginalised and excluded. Robodebt is a good example. This is a continuation of course of the neo-liberal world that created the AI environment.
lf you are low income earning, or poorly educated and what happens in cyberspace? You are not going to be given the best financial offers, employment opportunities, education offers, housing and investment advice, or even quality entertainment. And you will be targeted by scams.
Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum bill passes lower house 121-25.
“ Liberals who joined their junior Coalition partners in opposing it were former immigration minister Alex Hawke, former speaker Andrew Wallace, Scott Buchholz, Ian Goodenough, Luke Howarth, Tony Pasin, Garth Hamilton, Henry Pike, Rick Wilson and Terry Young.”
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-31/voice-to-parliament-referendum-bill-passes-the-lower-house/102414444
Cronus @ #87 Wednesday, May 31st, 2023 – 11:31 am
Thanks much for the link.
I don’t understand this bit. “…some Liberal MPs needed to vote against the bill to ensure the party had representation on the committee which will draft the formal No campaign’s material in a pamphlet to be distributed to households.”
It seems odd. Will Labor MPs have a seat on the committee drafting the NO material?
Of course Alex “I’m a moderate, I swear!” Hawke voted against.
Almost certainly not. The last thing the “Yes” campaign needs is even a hint that there are Labor MPs aligned to the “No” camp. (And, as far as I can gather, there isn’t a single person in the Labor caucus who had made any kind of suggestion to that effect.)
I agree with Socrates and Cronus re transparency in public funding. Disappointing decision from the government here.
If Andrew Hastie thinks he may lose his seat of Canning from Peter Dutton’s leadership will he think about striking? For some Hastie playing the long game makes more sense considering he is so young. But he may miss the train completely if he loses his seat. Dutton challenging Prime Minster Malcolm Turnbull was pretty much all about retaining his seat of Dickson. He thought he was going lose it if they kept going with Turnbull.
“While the resignation of Western Australian Labor premier Mark McGowan sparked questions about whether this would weaken support for Labor in that state, Albanese said the party could win the Perth seats of Canning and Moore – the former held by Coalition defence spokesman Andrew Hastie and the latter by backbencher Ian Goodenough.
Albanese listed the seat of Menzies in Melbourne, held by Liberal backbencher Keith Wolahan, and the seat of Banks in Sydney, held by Liberal frontbencher David Coleman. Labor also regards the South Australian seat of Sturt, held by Liberal MP James Stevens with 50.45 per cent of the two-party vote, as a priority target.
While he did not name specific seats in Tasmania, he mentioned the north of the state – a strong sign of his hope to defeat outspoken Liberal MP Bridget Archer in Bass and her Liberal neighbour Gavin Pearce in Braddon.”
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/fadden-byelection-kickstarts-labor-campaign-to-raid-coalition-seats-20230530-p5dcjg.html
Asha @ #90 Wednesday, May 31st, 2023 – 11:42 am
I can see the political dimension. The cynical interpretation of the vote (the reason some voted YES while some voted NO) is that Liberals support the NO case but plan to sabotage the Yes case.
One of the risks with AI is side affects, accidentally killing us. So as it gets better the hidden elements become more pervasive they become more influential. For example apparently AI is already doing the first cut on millions of job applications. Noone yet knows if it is racist, but there is every reason to suggest it would actually be. So already ‘find me the best person for x’ outsourced to AI might well be excluding all people of a race without anyone intending it.
We all know the stories of colonial powers ‘accidentally’ causing famines by prioritising other stuff (usually stuff they were stealing). It is very easy to imagine AI looking to optimise for A, deliberately neglecting R, because R actually hindered A, where R is necessary to survival.
Wouldn’t we notice it and stop it before it happened? Maybe but we noticed climate change and then did SFA to actually stop it, so we are suicidally dumb, and making AI that will be ruthlessly efficient in its pursuit of A, even if it destroys R and us with it.
So the dumb on in the story is definitely us, the evidence is in we are super stupid. We’d rather arrest and jail climate protesters than confront their message and be 10 minutes late to coffee, we are worse than stupid we are evil as well.
“It’s unclear to me exactly how AI will put humanity at risk of extinction, can anyone explain this to me?
When the hype reaches the stratosphere, what is there left to say. Don’t worry the press as the attention span of a git, they will move onto something else soon.
I think the real risk of AI is that more things will be entrusted to it, such that the problems being considered by it become so large, that no person is capable of grasping what is being considered in its entirety. We could even delude ourselves into think we do understand. Wouldn’t be the first time.
It turns out humans aren’t that unique. We act the same way as a group with almost monotonous regularity. The thing that is what AI may become, might see humans in an entirely different way to which we do. Just another input. We might not even realize we’re being observed and studied. We might be incapable of realizing it.
This article in Crikey by Mawve McGregor
A Wilderness of Smoke and Mirrors: why there is no climate hope is well worth the read and it encapsulates my thoughts on the subject.
https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/05/30/climate-hope-is-gone/
Albrechtsen gives a perfect description of Dutton:
Cronus this is another deep dive discussion between Nate Hagens and Daniel Schmachtenberger on the threats posed by A I
https://youtu.be/NfMozC3zNH4