Thursday, November 23, 2023
Altman and OpenAI
Nov 22 (Reuters) - Ahead of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s four days in exile, several staff researchers wrote a letter to the board of directors warning of a powerful artificial intelligence discovery that they said could threaten humanity, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
This sounds like the Einstein-Szilard letter in a way! I believe Karl Marx said history repeats itself, first as tragedy then as a farce.
Fear and Loathing at LANL
LANL has put out a new mission statement for LDRD, or the SIP, as well as a new strategic vision for the future. This has caused an uproar amongst scientists and the lab fellows. The SIP basically says LANL will be doing very little science form now on and will focus on production and be much more narrow. What is odd is that everyone seemed to be caught off guard by this and saying this a complete mess and makes little sense. My feeling from looking at this is that it was thrown together in like 5 minutes by some out of touch managers who are after the next promotion. It comes across like they did this in secret very fast so they would get no input by anybody. That or its is just a power grab by a select group a managers. Mason is probably not happy about this but wants to move on to the next bigger position. No one wants to rock the boat. My guess a bunch of people will leave, (so what) will be replaced by lower quality people (so what), some managers will move up...mission accomplished.
Are LLNL and LANL next?
https://www.engadget.com/self-proclaimed-gay-furry-hackers-breach-nuclear-lab-152034192.html
Self-proclaimed 'gay furry hackers' breach nuclear lab
They demanded research into creating IRL catgirls.
The nuclear research hub Idaho National Laboratory (INL) confirmed that it fell victim to a data breach on Tuesday. SiegedSec, a group of self-proclaimed "gay furry hackers," took responsibility for the attack and claimed they accessed sensitive employee data like social security numbers, home addresses and more.
"We're willing to make a deal with INL. If they research creating irl catgirls we will take down this post," SiegedSec wrote in a post announcing the leak on Monday.
Very serious, of course for all we know NNSA has had a long term classified project on IRL cat-people for some time.
Friday, November 17, 2023
Randy Pico
Was “Native American” Randy Pico continually promoted under LLNS management under the protection of “identity politics”, despite alleged repeated workplace misconduct toward subordinate employees?
Tuesday, November 14, 2023
Salary information
If the next contractor to manage LLNL is a non-profit like Triad, will that LLNL contractor be required to make public all lab salaries?
Thursday, November 9, 2023
Workers Are Getting Paid to Do Nothing at Los Alamos National Laboratory
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/los-alamos-laboratory-waste-fraud/
The nuclear weapons complex is so mismanaged that employees are collecting full salaries to play chess and catnap.
Reading the story the guy actually does more than a lot of LANL people. He has to show up to do nothing. In many places people show up once every two weeks talk and go home. Bizarre place. They should have the decency to at least let these electricians stay at home.
DOE Secretary Granholm invited CCP and Russian dignitaries to visit Nevada Test Site
Granholm states she made the invitation in September to show that the U.S. is continuing to not test nuclear weapons. Like the Chinese and Russians don't have seismic capabilities nor satellites nor spies to already determine that.
Bottom line, it's another publicity stunt. Maybe they can tour the Sudan crater in electric Hummers and if any luggage is misplaced, she can call in Sam Brinton on the case.
US-UK partnership
The new US-UK partnership will see fusion scientists on both sides of the Atlantic collaborate on R&D, share knowledge and access to facilities in an attempt to make fusion commercially viable.
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/fusion-nuclear-uk-us-partners-b2444573.html
Wednesday, November 8, 2023
Unreasonable Bechtel cost estimates
Bechtel allegedly failed to conduct cost related audits for 18 years leading to potential overcharges. Years later, an audit from May 2021 through May 2022, resulted in Bechtel being accused of cost estimates that were “unreasonable”. Yet in March of 2023, Hanford under Bechtel management, gets best ever annual rating. Wait what?
Why is there an apparent disconnect between DOE IG negative audits of Bechtel’s performance, and Bechtel’s annual performance ratings, and how does this disconnect impact Bechtel at other DOE facilities like LLNL?
November 2019
Taxpayers may have been overcharged for Hanford work for 18 years. Bechtel failed to audit costs
https://amp.tri-cityherald.com/news/local/hanford/article237409979.html
March 2023
Hanford contractor gets best ever annual rating, earning it $6.5M in incentive pay
https://www.aol.com/hanford-contractor-gets-best-ever-120000494.html
September 2023
These issues resulted in estimates that were likely unreasonable, could not be adequately supported, and potentially benefited Bechtel improperly and disadvantaged the taxpayer.
https://www.energy.gov/sites/default/files/2023-10/DOE-OIG-23-34.pdf
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