Adam Shubinsky

Technologist, humanist, scholar, and lifelong Learner. Currently focused on tech startups. Strong opinions, but they are carved in reason not immutable granite.

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

Inferno, I, 32 (by Jorge Luis Borges)

From the twilight of day to the twilight of night, a leopard, in the final years of the nineteenth century, saw wooden planks, vertical iron bars, changing men and women, a high wall, and perhaps a stone gutter with dry leaves. He did not know, could not know, that he longed for love, and cruelty, and the hot pleasure of tearing apart, and the wind with the scent of deer. But something in him suffocated and rebelled, and God spoke to him in a dream: “You live and shall die in this prison, so that a man known to me may look upon you a certain number of times and not forget you and set your figure and your symbol in a poem that has its precise place in the weave of the universe. You suffer captivity, but you will have given a word to the poem.” God, in the dream, illuminated the coarseness of the animal, and it understood the reasons and accepted that destiny; yet when it woke there was only in it a dark resignation, a valiant ignorance, because the machine of the world is far too complex for the simplicity of a wild beast.

Years later, Dante was dying in Ravenna, as unjustified and as alone as any other man. In a dream, God declared to him the secret purpose of his life and of his labour; Dante, in wonder, knew at last who he was and what he was, and blessed his bitternesses. Tradition holds that upon waking he felt he had received and lost an infinite thing, something he could never recover, nor even glimpse, because the machine of the world is far too complex for the simplicity of men.

[George Friedman @George_Friedman]

Geographically, Israel is in a profoundly weak strategic position. At its widest point, it is only 71 miles (114 kilometers) across; at its narrowest point, it is only nine miles across. Israel has no defensive space. It has little ability to withdraw, regroup and counterattack. Defensive depth is essential to national security. It determines how much time there is to recover from an initial attack. Space and time are essential to war.

Ignoring the emergence of drones, Israel cannot tolerate a defeat at its border, because a defeat would give it, at most, 71 miles in which to retreat. From this flows a specific military logic. Israel has to prevent attacks by initiating combat, and it has to be able to defeat its enemy early in a war. For Israeli leaders, it follows that the Israel Defense Forces always have to be significantly more powerful than potential enemies. The idea that Israel would never face a force more powerful than its own has always been improbable. During the 1973 attack by Egypt and Syria (which were armed and coordinated by the Soviet Union), Israel came perilously close to disaster. It was saved by the fact that Egyptian, Syrian and Soviet planners had failed to anticipate their dramatic early successes and had no plans to fully defeat Israel and seize its land.

My full analysis of Israel's strategic problem is at @GPFutures. Please read and share: https://t.co/ypzSGHyZSG

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@fredman_a Tolerated at most. Not liked.

[Arsen Ostrovsky @Ostrov_A]

I love this (1998) quote by the late, great Charles Krauthammer on Israel, Zionism and Jewish identity:

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@Ha_Zub Unhinged = מעורער או מופרע

לא הייתי אומר ששום מילה בעברית לא מתאימה.

מצד שני יש ערמה של מילים בעברית שאין להם מקבילה באנגלית.

[Art Guide @ArtGuide_db]

Jules Breton
The Song of the Lark, 1884

[Prof. Lee Cronin @leecronin]

AI does not write, it produces text. Humans uniquely write.

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@davidfrum What do you call a person who happened to be born Jewish, but embraces Islamic teachings and dedicates his public life to work tirelessly to further Islamic causes?

There must be a name for that… 🤔asking the audience.

[Sabine Hossenfelder @skdh]

tho the arxiv ban on fake citations also kills jokes like this which is a shame

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@NhavsMaimonides You have a rather reductive view of history.

[Kamel Amin Thaabet @K_AminThaabet]

Worst Van Eyck ever

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@usdusd111 אין קשר לבין יהודה.

https://t.co/KVEu8HQVEx

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@Searcherseek While a transcendent God might require some form of an intermediate, the claim in John is slightly different as it states that only through the intermediacy of Jesus, and only Jesus, can the transcendent God be known.

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@RafiVered יידיש מתקיימת היום אך ורק כהתרסה נגד השימוש בעברית וכשפה אנטי ציונית.

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@NiqabNancy @nytimes, why is it taking you so long to publish this account?
This should be front-page New York Times news. If you don't hurry Alex Jones will get this story out before you.

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@meniadler עברית בכתב פיניקי מקרתגו? מה התיארוך?

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@JeremyBenAmi With friends like you, who needs enemies.

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@shelleytap @TelAvivYafo בכול העולם כולו עורבים אף פעם לא הרגו או אפילו אישפזו אפילו אדם אחד. הדבר המסוכן ביותר שאפשר לקבל מעורב עצבני זה כמה שריטות.

מה את מציעה פה? להרוג ולחסל אוכלוסיות של עורבים בגלל ילד מבוהל שקיבל שריטה?

[Adam Shubinsky @Shubinsky]

@RichardHanania Today Bobby Baccalieri IS Rogan.

[eburke @JamesWHankins1]

Make no mistake, anti-semitism is an attack on Western civilization, defined by Matthew Arnold as a union of Hebraism and Hellenism. Athens will not stand without Jerusalem. Selah.