3 Topics: Slavery in Context, Robots Debating, Intellectuals Finding God

3 Topics Over Dinner Home Page. (There is a better version of this write up there, with graphics, and if you don't want to come to this event, you can sign up for announcements of future events on the home page).

The $5 ticket fee is a DEPOSIT which will be REFUNDED IN CASH at the event at 6:10 pm. No-shows and latecomers forfeit their deposit. There will be an electronic refund for RSVP's canceled at least 24 hours in advance.

We always go to restaurants that will do separate checks for large groups and everyone can pay with their own credit card.

We aim to have a small enough group that everyone can hear everyone else so that we can all engage in a single conversation. For most restaurants that means 8 people, for Chinese restaurants with big, circular tables it means a bit more.

The restaurant is Sombrero Mexican. A menu is here.

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Topic 1: Slavery in Historical Context

Article: click here

Some people really, really want to believe that American slavery was somehow "unique" and the worst thing that happened to anybody anywhere. This is a view sustainable only with a profound ignorance of the facts.

Prior to 400 years ago, slavery existed everywhere. The practice probably pre-dates the use of metal as currency, and most intellectuals considered it an unfortunate but inevitable part of the human condition. The Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, widely revered as a great and noble Stoic philospher, was in a position to eradicate slavery, but he didn't. Jesus Christ would have seen slavery all around him in the Roman Empire, but he never told slave owners to free their slaves, and neither did the Apostle Paul, who authored much of the New Testament (he told slaves to work hard, so their owners wouldn't discourage their other slaves from become Christians, and he told masters to be good to their slaves, but nothing so far as freeing them.

The Native Americans enslaved one another before the whites showed up.

Male slaves were regularly castrated in The Ottoman Empire and China, and in both those places, slavery continued after it had been abolished in the US. The Ottoman Empire enslaved both Africans and Europeans (but not Muslims). Castration was not the typical practice in the US

Before South Sudanese independence, Muslim arabs from northern Sudan would enslave Christians from southern Sudan in the late 20th century.

One of the reasons for the War of 1812 was that when Royal Navy ships were short-staffed, they would board American ships and abduct Americans to enslave as sailors for the Royal Navy. One of the demands in the American declaration of war was that Britain would stop that. America lost the war and agreed to peace without any of our grievances being addressed.

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Topic 2: Debating Bots on Social Media

Article: click here

Experiments show that artifical intelligence bots on social media are several times more persuasive than highly intelligent humans. What's more, the AI bots are persuasive not because they are providing logically sound arguments and accurate facts -- they lie and deliberately use known logical fallacies.

For years, I've been going into conservative spaces on social media and trying to persuade them to cooperate with climate action. But the best of my ability, I've always been honest about facts and the arguments that I've been making have been ones that I think are valid. But I would be no match for these deceitful AI bots.

A lot of people have been alarmed by the bad rap that Israel has been getting over the war against Hamas. An AI bot has been created, Operation Iron Dome, to argue on social media on Israel's behalf.

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Topic 3: Debating Robots on Social Media

Article: click here The article is paywalled.For a pirate version click here