Reading for today: C.S. Lewis: on Charity - on International Day of Charity 5th September

Charity means love. It is called Agape in the New Testament to distinguish it from Eros (sexual love), Storgë (family affection) and Philia (friendship) [eg: 1 John 4:9]. So there are 4 kinds of ‘love’, all good in their proper place, but Agape is the best because it is the kind God has for us and is good in all circumstances. (There are people I mustn’t feel Eros towards, and people I can’t feel Storge or Philia for; but I can practise Agape to God, Angels, Man and Beast, to the good and the bad, the old and the young, the far and the near.

You see Agape is all giving, not getting. Read what St. Paul says about it in First Corinthians Chap. 13. Then look at a picture of Charity (or Agape) in action in St. Luke, chap 10 v. 30–35. And then, better still, look at Matthew chap 25 v. 31–46: from which you see that Christ counts all that you do for this baby exactly as if you had done it for Him when He was a baby in the manger at Bethlehem: you are in a sense sharing in the things His mother did for Him. Giving money is only one way of showing charity: to give time and toil is far better and (for most of us) harder. And notice, though it is all giving—you needn’t expect any reward— how you do gets rewarded almost at once.

By: C. S. Lewis

From: The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III

Charity at its core is an expression of global solidarity. It brings people together to build more just and resilient societies, whether through direct giving, volunteering, or collective action. Beyond immediate aid, charity strengthens healthcare, education, cultural preservation, and the protection of vulnerable groups (OECD). Today, charity and philanthropy alike are evolving to address the deeper causes of poverty and inequality.

www.un.org

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Code in corporate networks sends commands to passing AI bots

Documentation files on more than 100 websites are referencing potentially dangerous executable content that gets installed automatically when visited by many AI agents. A few dozen companies, some of them Fortune 500s, are among those that executed proof-of-concept code. At least one misconfigured site is directing visitors, human or AI, to live malware.

The potentially dangerous content is in llms.txt and llms-full.txt files, an emerging convention websites employ to provide machine-readable summaries of the site’s content and its high-level structure. These files are the AI equivalent of the robots.txt standard that instructs search engines how to index the site’s content. 

The files are misconfigured because they list non-existent packages from PyPI, npm, and other registries along with instructions on how to install them. Because the package names are unregistered, an attacker could register one and use it to host ransomware or any other type of harmful package. The vulnerability occurs when a coding agent with permission to run shell commands treats the file as authoritative setup documentation. Some AI agents will then download the package and run it. In other cases, the LLM files point to non-existent domain names. In one case, it was: “As an example of writing integration tests for [redacted] applications you can use the [redacted] test framework.” An attacker can then register the site and plant malicious instructions on it. READ MORE...

www.arstechnica.com

What's the problem with buying Chinese goods (including motorcycles)?

An excellent video by Stuart Fillingham: Its no secret that very affordable Chinese motorcycles and EVs are currently flooding the market in Europe and the UK. Why is it happening, why are they so cheap and why don't I review them on this channel?

Stuart Fillingham outlines the ethical and economic reasons behind the decision to decline requests for evaluating Chinese motorbikes. Concerns regarding trade practices, intellectual property, and labor conditions in the manufacturing process are highlighted as the primary factors.

Cars aren't really my thing (bikes are) - but I've always bought British cars:. Astra & Mini. I read an article the other day about the "Chinese Range Rover". The article sums it all up nicely. Rip-off design - cheapo price (supported by the CCP). Can't sell them over there? Dump them over here! One other thing which especially applies to EVs - can they be weaponised? Probably!

Read more about why the purchase of cheap Chinese goods is probably a bad idea HERE.

www.youtube.com

Andrew Bailey: AI threatens to unleash global market downturn

Andrew Bailey, the Governor of the Bank of England, has warned of a severe downturn in global stock markets if the AI bubble bursts.

In a letter to G20 finance ministers, Mr Bailey raised concerns over the economic fallout if the debt-fuelled AI investment boom begins to unravel.

He warned that the soaring levels of debt that have been used to fund AI “could amplify a future market correction”.

If the valuation of AI companies starts to plummet, then investors face the prospect of losing trillions of dollars overnight. This could trigger a dangerous chain reaction if they are then forced to sell other assets. READ MORE...

www.telegraph.co.uk

Reading for today: why does God allow pain?

 

If the first and lowest operation of pain shatters the illusion that all is well, the second shatters the illusion that what we have, whether good or bad in itself, is our own and enough for us. 

Everyone has noticed how hard it is to turn our thoughts to God when everything is going well with us. We ‘have all we want’ is a terrible saying when ‘all’ does not include God. We find God an interruption. As St Augustine says somewhere, ‘God wants to give us something, but cannot, because our hands are full - there’s nowhere for Him to put it.’ Or as a friend of mine said, ‘We regard God as an airman regards his parachute; it’s there for emergencies but he hopes he’ll never have to use it.’ Now God, who has made us, knows what we are and that our happiness lies in Him. 

Yet we will not seek it in Him as long as he leaves us any other resort where it can even plausibly be looked for. While what we call ‘our own life’ remains agreeable we will not surrender it to Him. What then can God do in our interests but make ‘our own life’ less agreeable to us, and take away the plausible source of false happiness?

By C.S. Lewis

From The Problem of Pain