zerakith

@zerakith@lemmy.ml

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If the UK government proposed to increase tax by 1% and make trains free would you be in favour?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I am for free public transport from taxation there are some important caveats that would need to be worked out though:

  • We currently have low capacity relative to latent deamnd capacity (mostly at peak times) and at the moment that is managed through fares. We would need a system that manages demand in another way.

  • Our transport system is in large need of upfront investment to stop the current managed decline so you’d want a way of making sure that making it free doesn’t mean the government is now more limited

  Its also worth noting that its unlikely to be a direct swap in of current revenues with additionally required taxes as there are projects that are very costly that could be redirected and any successful mode shift away from cars would also carry a net positive economic effect on the whole treasury.

  Potentially in the short term what could help is a ‘sunk-cost’ ticket similar to the bahnpass where you still pay but do so yearly and get access to any trip anywhere. It makes it more competitive with cars which have massive sunk cost effects which make every trip seem cheaper.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Captcha⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Strange - I can’t reproduce that. It’s the wiki page for Simo Häyhä.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Captcha⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simo_Häyhä

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what is the truth⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke's_three_laws

  The third law is “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

  I merely meant that the beauty of mathematics and natural science was a form of magic.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what is the truth⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Go on?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what is the truth⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Although a second look I agree they don’t look right for that. Guess I should have taken more graph theory modules.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what is the truth⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Arthur C Clarke would like a word.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what is the truth⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I wasn’t sure if Feynman Diagrams.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what is the truth⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I really want to learn this stuff. Its looks so much like magic

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The gentrified forest near me removed the bins. .. From their café/picnic area⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I’ll go out on a limb that Raccoons won’t rummage here :)

  I agree with the sentiment but if they have a cafe selling things in disposable packaging then the best thing they can do is provide bins to deal with it. Pretending they don’t generate rubbish is just a false accounting trick.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨UK ‘one of world’s least work-oriented countries’ claims BrewDog founder - as he slams obsession with 'work-life balance'⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  If he retains an ownership stake doesn’t that mean he still takes home the profit of Brewdog so boycotting would still be effective/desirable?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨pringles⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m pretty sure it’s real. I met someone once who worked in materials research for food and they said that modelling was big there because the scope for experimentation is more limited. In materials for construction where they wanted to change a property they could play around with adding new additives and seeing what happens. For food though you can’t add anything beyond a limited set of chemicals that already have approval from the various agencies* and therefore they look at trying to fine tune in other ways.

  So for chocolate, for example, they control lots of material properties by very careful control of temperature and pressure as it solidifies. This is why if chocolate melts and resolidifies you see the white bits of milk that don’t remain within the materia.

  *Okay you can add a new chemical but that means a time frame of over a decade to then get approval. I think the number of chemicals that’s happened to is very very small and that’s partly because the innovation framework of capitalism is very short term.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨pringles⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  Though worth saying that the link suggests the computing was used for aerodynamics for ensuring production wouldn’t destroy them not. For the shape as such. I’ve also seem it said that the can is part of that too.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨pringles⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  It is quite hard to track down but here’s it being reported by the head of modelling at P&G in 2006

  www.hpcwire.com/…/high_performance_potato_chips/

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Come on, science!⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  I appreciate you are setting up a sort of platonic ideal of what science is but I think its important to deal with the real people and processes that science is performed by and we would be doing ourselves a disservice if we fail to acknowledge how those people and processes have often worked hand in hand with capitalist and colonial projects. We need to be introspective about how those choices have influenced the science (and the methods!) that’s been done. We, as scientists, engineers and science appreciators need to do this work so we can make different and better choices.