I think that the biggest problem with Iran right now, is that there is no clear opposition party.

South Africa had Mandela, India had Gandhi and Chile had Aylwin. We only have "Reza Pahalavi" being pushed by United State and Israel. He is nowhere qualified to run the country and hasn't stepped a foot there for decades.

None of these movements are going to succeed, unless someone from within the country forms a strong party and unifies everyone.

Either way, I'm afraid that Iranians are going to be suffering for a long time.

I agree, unless faith actually means something to you, forcing yourself to go to church won’t help. Sitting through Mass miserable, disbelieving, and avoiding everyone defeats the whole purpose.

Churches get brought up a lot because they regularly gather people (weekly or even daily) and offer events, volunteer opportunities, and so on.

The point is to find an activity you like, with a specific group of people and consistently attend.

P.S As a fellow Catholic, I’m really sorry you went through such an isolating experience. I hope things feel much better for you now

Iranian here (speaking from outside), fair but you have to consider the circumstances.

The regime currently is in its weakest position. Russia is busy with Ukraine, many of top IRGC commanders assassinated, HAMAS is in disarray, and their nuclear program has been crippled.

The water shortage was the straw that broke the camel's back. Years of sanctions, economical downturn and abuses by the Regime piled up to the point of no return.

Based on my last contact with my family, our people have crossed a line and there is no going back.

What Westerners don't realize is that if your back is against the wall, all you have left is putting your life on line.

People rather die trying because truthfully, what is the alternative?

It does seem like there is a point -- and running out of water would be up there near that point, in addition to a collapse of the economy, where people get motivated to make change happen even at the risk to their own lives. I mean, you are going to die anyway, right?

I say that from the luxury of my very safe keyboard, of course. I hope your family is staying as safe as possible. Can't imagine the stress (I get tangled up enough in our own US gov't shenanigans and that pales in comparison to Iran right now).

If you look at the history of places like Iran, or more recently in Syria and Venezuela, the conditions you're describing are just as likely to lead to a mass exodus and a civil war of the remainders as anything like a successful revolution. The "Arab Spring" was also driven by issues with water and the subsequent impact on the local economic situations, and they KIND OF succeeded... for a while. Now it's all back the way it was, or worse.

The idea that misery inevitably leads to revolution is driven by narrative selection, not reality. In reality countries like the DPRK for example simply ate the cost of a million+ starving to death and then went 'happily' onward. There's a reason that successful and lasting revolutions are exceptional, not the rule.

I think this is because anyone who understands the Middle East knows that the fall of the Iranian regime would be more consequential than the fall of the Berlin Wall, not because the Islamic Republic is a global power, but because it has been a central tool for China and Russia and a major engine of terrorism in the Middle East.

Its collapse would rip out a core pillar of their influence and fundamentally change global power dynamics.

I don't think that kind of feature would be useful for HN.

The one thing I like about this place is that it's well moderated and you have shared opposing view points engaging (mostly) respectfully.

My personal and political views couldn't be further from most HN users (I'm both a Conservative _and_ a practicing Christian), yet I appreciate taking part in various discussion. I enjoy reading about point of views that directly challenge mine.

Let's keep HN respectful and accessible.

> I'm both a Conservative _and_ a practicing Christian

But unlike most HN users who label themselves conservative Christians, you've never suggested that climate change is a hoax:

https://hn.algolia.com/?type=all&query=author:swat535+climat...

I don't ever want to consume information from people who are so illiterate that they believe that scientists all over the world, in fields ranging from geoscience to statistics, are participating in some kind of global conspiracy, regardless of how respectful these commenters are. I block these people immediately after they reveal themselves.

People don't represent groups. They represent themselves. Swat535 gets to define what being a conservative Christian means through their own words and actions, not serve as contrast to stereotypes about others.

I don't know. Depending on what kind of conservative (and from where) and what kind of christian (and from where), you might be very much closer to a lot of HN people than you might think.

If your view is that we should conserve western values and institutions and walk in the footsteps of Christ, ultimately that's not too far from universal human values that many people do in fact agree with.

The devil is in the details, of course.

Iran can end up in a much more dire state. It can end up another Syria / Libya.. or worse another aggressive group like Taliban can take hold of the central government.

I also fear that the looming, imminent war between Israel and Iran is going to make things works. I'm expecting Israel to start a conflict within the next 6 months (or sooner) with the aid of United States.

This is the weakest IRGC have been. Many of their allies have been crippled, they have water issues, economical issues and now protests.

I think that securing Venezuela's oil aids this, should IRAN attempt to disrupt the Strait of Hormuz, it will allow Israel and United States to maintain reserves (to what extend, I don't know).

I think things are going to get difficult for Iranian people, no matter what.

> To be an invasion there needs to be a sustained on the ground presence of the invading force.

What exactly do you think is going to happen to the oil in Venezuela? Are you under the impression that they will simply leave them be and hope for the best?

United States will be placing military assets to secure it, just like they did with IRAQ. The entire point of this was to secure the oil and now they have to to guard it.

Establishing military bases on sovereign nations that you captured by force illegally is an invasion.

Yes but that's all future tense

Users will not care about the quality of your code, or the backed architecture, or your perfectly strongly typed language.

They only care about their problems and treat their computers like an appliance. They don't care if it takes 10 seconds or 20 seconds.

They don't even care if it has ads, popups, and junk. They are used to bloatware and will gladly open their wallets if the tool is helping them get by.

It's an unfortunately reality but there it is, software is about money and solving problems. Unless you are working on a mission critical system that affects people's health or financial data, none of those matter much.

I know the customer's couldn't care about the quality of the code they see. But the idea that they don't care about software being bad/laggy/bloated ever, because it "still solves problems", doesn't stand up to scrutiny as an immutable fact of the universe. Market conditions can change.

I'm banking on a future that if users feel they can (perhaps vibe) code their own solutions, they are far less likely to open their wallets for our bloatware solutions. Why pay exorbitant rents for shitty SaaS if you can make your own thing ad-free, exactly to your own mental spec?

I want the "computers are new, programmers are in short supply, customer is desperate" era we've had in my lifetime so far to come to a close.

To be fair, you're not supposed to be doing the "one shot" thing with LLMs in a mature codebase.

You have to supply it the right context with a well formed prompt, get a plan, then execute and do some cleanup.

LLMs are only as good as the engineers using them, you need to master the tool first before you can be productive with it.

I’m well aware, as I said I am regularly using CC/Codex/OC in a variety of projects, and I certainly didn’t claim that can’t be used productively in a large code base.

But that different challenges become apparent that aren’t addressed by examples like this article which tend to focus on narrow, greenfield applications that can be readily rebuilt in one shot.

I already get plenty of value in small side projects that Claude can create in minutes. And while extremely cool, these examples aren’t the kind of “step change” improvement I’d like to see in the area where agentic tools are currently weakest in my daily usage.

Also it's difficult to achieve body builders top shapes, most of them are naturally gifted and are on some kind of enhancement drugs.

That being said, you will look pretty good for your size if you moderately lift heavier weights and eat your protein + calories.