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Taiwan might be beholden to the US in some sense - but essentially the bargain is for Taiwan not to seek independence and disrupt the “status quo” and in exchange the US will be “strategically ambiguous” about whether it will defend Taiwan against PRC aggression or not.

That’s hardly enough to call Taiwan a “protectorate”

And the only reason Taiwan even needs the US is PRC’s belligerence.

I still maintain that the current Taiwanese government represents the will of Taiwanese people - and would even argue that more so than the American government represents the will of American people for example.

Taiwanese people have been fighting for independence throughout all its history, only to be swept up in larger geopolitical turmoil and ambitions of empires.

Population of Taiwan resisted European colonization, Qing colonization, Japanese colonization… and when it looked like they might finally get a chance at self-determination after WWII, as many other countries have, they got occupied by the ROC military and suffered another wave of colonization from the mainland (with tacit US support), and decades of brutal dictatorship and martial law. Of course each of these colonial periods contributed to shaping the unique Taiwanese identity and culture of present day.

Taiwanese people managed to survive the Chiang dictatorship and reform their government in 1990 to become a vibrant and free democracy, and became one of the most successful countries in the world. Unfortunately they have inherited the complicated geopolitical situation forged during the cold war period and delicate balance of world powers at the time, combined with gross diplomatic malpractice by Chiang Kai-shek, who then, like Xi now, was too focused on Chinese nationalism and trying to reconstruct the Qing empire, and cared little for the actual population of Taiwan.

That’s a wild comparison. Taiwan is ranked 12th in the world on the latest Economist Democracy Index (US is 28th and rated a “flawed democracy”, Pakistan is 125th and China 145th, both rated “authoritarian regime”)

Taiwan is ranked 24th in the Corruption Perception Index (US is 28th, China is 76th and Pakistan 136th)

Taiwan ranks 19th by the Human Development Index - below US which is 17th, but significantly above China at 78th and Pakistan at 168th.

After transitioning to democracy in 1990, Taiwan has been one of the most successful countries in the world by almost any metric you can think of - it has less poverty than China, less income inequality, higher literacy, far more freedoms, better social safety net, better healthcare system, higher life expectancy, higher gender equality, higher per capita GDP … you name it.

According to 2025 polls, only 1.1% of Taiwanese want unification with the PRC. 6.1% support eventual unification with China, but not with the current PRC government. Ironically, these numbers were slowly trending up and reached a high of 3.1% and 12.8% respectively in 2018 - however the crackdown on the democracy movement in Hong Kong in 2019 cut any support for unification with China to half.

There is nothing PRC takeover can offer the Taiwanese - PRC has no carrots, only sticks. And one thing is for damn sure, the PRC government cares about or represents the will of Taiwanese people far less than the Taiwanese government. China promised democracy and universal suffrage to Hong Kong in the 80s, but never delivered after the handover. Xi wants Taiwan for nationalist pride and to rebuild the Qing empire - he doesn’t care about Taiwanese people, he just wants them to be his imperial subjects.

Taiwan is not under American control. Taiwan has a democratically elected government that represents the will of Taiwanese people.

Taiwan was conquered by China as well, in the 1680s. Taiwan was colonized by China only after it was colonized by Europeans (who arrived in early 1600s) - for most of its history it was inhabited by native non-Han aboriginals, who resisted both Chinese and Japanese attempts to settle the island in the 1500s.

Even after the Qing incorporated Taiwan into China, they didn’t control the full territory - they largely left most of the mountainous areas inhabited by the aboriginals alone until late 1800s.

Qing gave Taiwan away to Japan in a treaty in 1895 btw - Japan didn’t conquer the island militarily. The local population at the time wasn’t happy about it, and even declared an independent Republic of Formosa to try to resist the Japanese colonization after being abandoned by Qing China, with tens of thousands of Taiwanese giving their lives fighting the Japanese.

America didn’t conquer the island either - they forced Japan to surrender and give up claim to the island. With Chinese civil war breaking out, the issue of Taiwan was never fully resolved after the war, with ROC assuming control as presumed successor state of the Qing - nobody really asked the Taiwanese yet again what they wanted.

Taiwanese people should finally have the final word about their own country and sovereignty - they have their own unique history, culture and identity - Taiwan shouldn’t be a plaything of empires and their imperial ambitions, be it China, Japan, America or Europe.

Perpetual bonds are an actual thing

USSR was not Axis ffs… Axis was Germany, Italy and Japan and their allies during WW2 - the enemies of USSR, which was allied with the US in that war.

2nd world refers to the Eastern Bloc countries during the Cold War, including USSR and its sphere of influence, as well as China

For most citrus the pith has no flavor at all, definitely not bitter. Most people object to the texture and blandness/lack of flavor, which I can understand. I have a bunch of citrus trees in my yard, and learned to not mind the pith, mainly due to laziness (I eat a lot of oranges) - and it’s a good source of fiber.

Western diet is actually notoriously low on fiber and high in sugar, and the citrus pith is also high in vitamin C.

So for many people eating the pith would actually be a healthier choice - in the context of their low fiber/high sugar diet.

I first got on the Internet just as the shift from :-) to :) was happening, only geezers still used :-) and :) was the hip new thing…

We have military bases in Taiwan

The US does not have military bases in Taiwan anymore - not since the US switched diplomatic recognition from the ROC to the PRC in 1979 - one of the concessions to the PRC was the removal of US military presence from Taiwan.

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photography might be an area where digital hasn’t caught up, since film’s resolution is down to the molecular level

Film resolution is limited by the size of the silver halide crystals that make up the light sensitive layer of the film. Crystals can come in different sizes, but their sensitivity to light depends on their size - generally you need pretty large crystals for usable photographic film, somewhere between 0.1 and 10 microns (depending on the film ISO rating) - about 3-5 orders of magnitude larger than what you would consider molecular scale.

When the film is developed the crystals are visible as film grain limiting the resolution in some ways similar to pixel size of a digital camera (although there are differences, since the crystal size is not completely uniform but rather has a specific distribution, creating a more random effect than the regular pixel grid of digital cameras)

The pixel sizes on modern high resolution digital camera sensors are actually similar, down to 0.5 micron. It’s hard to make an exact comparison, but I have seen estimates that you need a full frame digital sensor of somewhere between 10 to 50 megapixels to equal the resolution of 35mm ISO 100 film.

And modern sensors are much more light sensitive than film, which allows you to shoot more optimally and give you more flexibility (less exposure time, potentially higher f-stop with better lens resolution, lower ISO, less light, etc.) and therefore achieve potentially better results in more conditions. Add to that the hassle and costs of working with film, and most professional photo work is now done in digital as well. Film is generally only used for stylistic purposes, by purists who are not satisfied with digital simulation.

But your citation gives both statements:

“In fact, the monkey would almost surely type every possible finite text an infinite number of times.”

and

“The theorem can be generalized to state that any sequence of events that has a non-zero probability of happening will almost certainly occur an infinite number of times, given an infinite amount of time or a universe that is infinite in size.”

So when you say the number of times is “unknowable” the actual answer is “almost surely an infinite number of times” no ? Since the probability of that can be calculated as 100%. The mindfuck part is that it is still possible that no monkey at all will type a particular text, even though the probability of that is 0.

The probability that only 2 monkeys will type the text is also still 0, same as 3 monkeys, 4 monkeys, etc. - in fact the probability of any specific finite number of monkeys only typing out the text is still 0 - only the probability of an infinite number of monkeys typing it out is 100% (the probabilities of all possible outcomes, even when infinite, have to sum up to 1 after all)

We just know that it will almost surely happen, but that doesn’t mean it will happen an infinite amount of occurrences.

Basically, if we know “it will almost surely happen” then we also know just as surely (p=1) that it will also happen an infinite number of times (but it might also never happen, although with p=0)

Ok, this is interesting, so thanks for pointing me to it. I think it’s still safe to say “almost surely an infinite number of monkeys” as opposed to “almost surely at least one”, since the probability of both cases is still 100% (can their probability even be quantitatively compared ? is one 100% more likely than another 100% in this case ?)

The idea that something with probability of 0 can happen in an infinite set is still a bit of a mindfuck - although I understand why this is necessary (e.g. picking a random marble from an infinite set of marbles where 1 is blue and all others red for example - the probability of picking the blue marble is 0, but it is obviously still possible)

That’s the thing though, infinity isn’t “large” - that is the wrong way to think about it, large implies a size or bounds - infinity is boundless. An infinity can contain an infinite number of other infinities within itself.

Mathematically, if the monkeys are generating truly random sequences of letters, then an infinite number (and not just “at least one”) of them will by definition immediately start typing out Hamlet, and the probability of that is 100% (not “almost surely” edit: I was wrong on this part, 100% here does actually mean “almost surely”, see below). At the same time, every possible finite combination of letters will begin to be typed out as well, including every possible work of literature ever written, past, present or future, and each of those will begin to be typed out each by an infinite number of other monkeys, with 100% probability.

But it also works with infinite number of monkeys, one will almost surely start typing Hamlet right away.

Wouldn’t it even be not just one, but an infinite number of them that would start typing out Hamlet right away ?

They can easily prosecute this as a federal crime in a federal court. Crossing state lines might be enough to do it, and they can probably add some additional charges like terrorism. Federal murder can be eligible for death penalty.

The Threnody is definitely his most famous, but he has used that technique in some of his solo compositions for cello as well - example

He’s playing Penderecki