I will remind everyone there are only around 2.8 months left before this resolves, and the partial mobilisation was announced only two weeks ago. This conflict has unfolded a lot slower than the majority of people here predicted. Using nuclear weapons would be extremely drastic - drastic primarily in the sense of violating the nuclear taboo. Even a small, tactical nuclear detonation in Ukraine would spark global panic and outrage. It's unlikely Russia would retain any of their key allies. Even China may be forced to abandon their support for Russia whic...

@Eharding I don't think you appreciate the magnitude of effort that would be required to control Kyiv in less than 3 weeks' time. Not just surround it, just not do serious damage to it, not even to be inside the city fighting and gaining the upper hand, but "the majority of Kyiv's raions are under Russian military control ". Unless they plan to suddenly begin levelling the city and force a surrender, I don't see how this resolves positively.

@Aaron14

What recent developments? It's harder than Russia expected but things are only getting started. Russian forces are advancing toward Kiev and Putin is showing no signs of backing down. We're a few days down, >30 to go. There's no indication that Putin is willing to pull any punches and we will see how well the Ukrainian resistance fairs when the attack really kicks off.

@RedBox Amazing that you now claim that "it was obvious they were going to be invaded" despite shilling non-stop for Russia and calling it "western propaganda" when US intelligence said an invasion was imminent.

The silence from the invasion nay-sayers is deafening.

@(seanicus64) "Maybe WWIII will be a mainly African affair (after its GDP has been built up) and traditional western powers will have little to do with it. I doubt it, but even very unlikely things need to be put on the table when we're considering such a large time-span." So, Africa makes up around 2.8% global GDP presently. Even if we assume every single African country were to be involved in WW3, that would still require a tenfold increase in its share of global GDP. And just in case this isn't clear, that means the equivalent of Africa's GDP increa...

@(dosimetrist) It IS hysteria. There's no talk of it happening. Nobody in congress has said they oppose it, nobody has run on a platform proposing it be banned. There is just absolutely ZERO basis for thinking this will happen, which means thinking there's a non-negligible chance of this happening is political hysteria. This isn't a "cop out" because neither you nor anybody else has presented any evidence in favor of it happening. Meanwhile, over 40% of Americans are at least morally opposed to abortion, numerous elected politicians are explictly anti-...

@randallburns So...firmly below 1% chance of happening then?

@RedBox

Your pro-Russian propaganda was exposed by your demented lies leading up to the invasion. What makes you think anyone here still cares what you have to say?

@Eharding So you're 95% sure that A, there will be a recession, B, Trump will get the nomination, and C, he will win the general election. This has to be some kind of joke.

After your catastrophic performance on Ukraine predictions recently, one might assume you would be a little bit more restrained in your predictions for a little while

This comment was originally posted on Donald Trump

People act like a TNW would be some rapid, game-changing, war-winning move, and I don't think this view is based in reality.

@(Jgalt) Dugin is not a Putin ally. He desperately wishes to be and makes himself out to be, but there's little evidence he currently holds any sway with Putin (if he ever did) or that they've even met before. That Dugin being "putin's ally" is being repeated here in an absolutely uncritical way suggests that people's understanding of Russia is poor in a fundamental way and so the community prediction on questions such as this should be discounted accordingly. https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/alexander-dugin-darya-putin-russia-ukraine-assassinatio...

@Reprisal This is not a helpful statement

It seems unlikely Time would give it to Putin unless they're specifically trying to generate buzz with a "controversial" pick (despite Putin being unambiguously the most influential person).

@RedBox

Back again with the Russian propaganda. Didn't you get slapped for this already? This is about predictions, not you being okay with Russia murdering civilians. for not accepting russian imperialism.

@(kievalet) "Does he want an isolated 4-year term? Cuz he can't be President for more than that. I don't think he'd go for that with much enthusiasm." You're acting like Trump is an ideologue. He's not. He's an egoist, period. All of his policies were opportunistic efforts to gain support and maintain power. He loves power and would do anything to be president again. Since he can't be elected a third time, he doesn't have to worry have to worry about fufilling promises so legislative frustrations would be even less of a deal the second time around. Thi...

@(ugandamaximum) >Soccer is probably not THAT hard compared to other ai/robotics problems like self driving. Why do you say this? Driving is much more of a uniform task than playing soccer. A game of soccer involves countless more possible situtations. It's way more complex than driving. The number of paths to achieve a driving goals is extremely limited compared to ways to both scoring in soccer and preventing your opponents from scoring. A 1 vs 1 soccer robot would be extremely complex to create. Creating an entire team to play another team is un...

@rappatoni There's a mountain of such comments available elsewhere.

@(Glossy) >The campaign has gone worse than the Kremlin expected, but Russia has still advanced. It’s taken large swaths of territory. Instead of leading by 50 points, in basketball terms, it’s leading by 20. In 1941 the USSR was down by… let’s say 30 points. Yet of course there was no coup. If losing increases the probability of coups, Ukraine is more likely to experience one than Russia now. In reality: just as unlikely. There's a hell of a difference between fighting a defensive war against an invasion that poses an existential threat and an aggressi...

@Bookie The absence of even a token mea culpa for your frankly preposterous claims is deafening