I wonder what causes the saltative branching events? Maybe sudden climate changes or a species somehow entering a new environment? Or it could just be a random 'spark' of mutation that sets off an explosive positive feedback loop?
While those mechanisms are involved the current theory is that usually a population becomes genetically isolated first. The larger and more genetically diverse a population is, the more resistant it is to “evolutionary noise” which keeps the genetics stable because there aren’t many mutations or ecological changes that give one group within a species significant advantages over another. It’s not until the relevant population is reduced that mutations and other factors have strong effects (usually) that can cause speciation.
How that isolation happens varies and can take a single generation or up to hundreds of thousands of years. A polyploid plant, for example, might become genetically isolated within a single generation or a homoploid hybrid within a few generations by losing reproductive compatibility with the rest of its species. Then a mutation might give it significant advantages without making it into the rest of the population or a “sudden” ecological change favors the new population over the old, giving the new one room to grow and outcompete.
Other species are isolated over “short” periods via flooding, rising mountains, changes in the paths of rivers, expansion of a predator’s range, fires, and so on. Anything that can isolate a small group of a species geographically can also create a speciation event.
I don't agree. If I dig a hole in my yard and find a huge chunk of gold, when I sell it very little of what I charge will be for my labor.
Also, even if you're right, the "salaries and compensation" of anyone outside the U.S. are effectively NOT that, since the thing in question is whether defense spending is mostly a jobs program.
> when I sell it very little of what I charge will be for my labor.
That's debatable. Without the labor input the product doesn't exist as far as the market knows. However, if you want to discount the labor portion, which is an equally valid take, it remains that what was said was “salaries and compensation”. Any compensation you receive for giving up the gold in your possession was already recognized. As said earlier, the exchanged value doesn't go to God, it goes to people.
> since the thing in question is whether defense spending
is mostly a jobs program.
You can certainly play a game of semantics here, but generally "job" in this type of context refers to any kind of economic role, not necessarily direct labor. "It is my job to provide gold to the world" doesn't imply that you are the one doing the actual extraction. The significance of "job programs" is in offering opportunity to derive an income, not to give opportunity to strain muscles.
>when I sell it very little of what I charge will be for my labor.
No, almost all of it would cover your labor.
What you are describing is winning the lottery, which isn't really useful since it is a rounding error of possible scenarios. A "Having a career is meaningless because you can just win the lotto instead" kind of scenario.
In reality you would be digging for ages in your yard to find a nugget of gold. If you went to a place with gold to dig, you would be a gold miner, and no, it's not easy money, go ask them.
After the unexpected difficulty of the Ukraine war, how likely is it that they would try to extend themselves even further, against stronger countries than Ukraine?
More likely than if they lose in Ukraine, that's for sure. Because the lesson they will have learned is that invading countries is a winning strategy. They were deluded enough to invade Ukraine, they are deluded enough to invade Poland.
"Putin is too sensible to invade Ukraine" was the argument people were making the day before he did. My guess is these are the same people who now say "Putin would never invade Poland".
You don't even have to change the laws. Just changing the social norms would be enough. At the moment our social norms are that the ends justify the means. If you make money, or produce something that looks like a breakthrough, that is all that matters. How you did it, or whether the thing you did has actual value, matters not at all. As long as you've provided yourself with plausible deniability, that's good enough.
I know this because I've been the beneficiary of this system on multiple occasions, and it makes me sick. This is not the kind of world I want to live in.
Looks like they received $1 billion in private + government grants, so upper end would be 15%?
> The University ended fiscal year 2024 with an operating surplus of $45 million compared to $186 million in fiscal year 2023, on an operating revenue base of $6.5 billion.
reply