philpo

@philpo@feddit.org

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Donald Trump Team Plans to Cancel Biden's $7,500 Tax Incentive On EVs⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Tesla, according to Musk,can keep the prices due to their insane margins. Musk actually wants these subsidies cut to destroy his competition.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Donald Trump Team Plans to Cancel Biden's $7,500 Tax Incentive On EVs⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Musk actually has stated multiple times that he is all for abandoning the subsidies as his own margin is big enough to sustain prices but it will “destroy” his competition.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Donald Trump Team Plans to Cancel Biden's $7,500 Tax Incentive On EVs⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  No. They deal with the fact that they didn’t start the technological race until it was too late (and haven’t fully committed themselves even nowadays) and that they strongly build their sale strategy on the Chinese market - which nowadays is basically an EV market and one where German cars are now seen as either preposterous or “Grandfathers car”.

  This comes together with a price hike (not only on EVs but also across their fleet - starting long before EVs were common and affecting the combustion fleet as well; see the price of the Golf or Passat compared to an average worker wage over the last 20 years + it’s resale value), a major lack of quality control since COVID and a lack of financial planning for this upcoming storm.

  In other words: Their problem was not the end of the subsidies (which basically only affected the ID3 anyway as neither VW nor BMW or MB had any other models below the maximum price threshold for the subsidy) but their lack of management flexibility in time with a rapidly changing market.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what should one archive in a fascist regime?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s what BD M-Disc is for.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Realistically... How fucked is the US?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Technically the EU already is an defence organisation (Lisbon accords), even with a stronger mutual assistance clause than NATO. What is different is that there is no integrated command structure. But that is currently rapidly changing, Germany and the Netherlands already are fully integrated (more than NATO standards are), the Baltics are making great progress.

  There is at least a chance

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what should one archive in a fascist regime?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  You can easily keep Wikipedia around - burn it on archive BDs(M-Disc), they are easily hidden, can take the whole Wikipedia in one disk and basic information is extremely valuable in an oppressive regime. Then do the same for a collection of E-Books based on what is most likely to be banned/what the right wing does take the biggest offence on. And what aids you the most in either getting out or resist.

  Using archive BDs(M-Discs) is important as regular storage devices can easily be detected due to their metallic contents and they degrade within years. M-Discs are far more resilient and can be almost as easily hidden.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨what should one archive in a fascist regime?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Digital data stored right is extremely non-volatile - but it takes an effort to do so,but the same goes for printing out terabytes.

  And digital data can be hidden far easier.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why do residential skyscrapers always seem to include balconies that never get used?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  …smokers…

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If I'm stuck in the same area as someone who is clearly sick (runny nose, coughing etc) is there some combo of short/long breaths or nose/mouth breathing that's a better defense against catching it?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Medically the nose is far better equipped to deal with pathogens, so breathing through the nose would be better, both in (to “filter”) and “out”(to get right of stuff). More important, nevertheless is proper hygiene - wash your hands, fellas. And do not touch your face,but especially not your nose and eyes after you have been exposed to germs.

  Besides that there is literally zero evidence for anything else - the very limited research in some breathing techniques has all been debunked sooner or later.

  If you want to be sure,wear a proper N95/FFP2 mask. Proper means: Tight fitting, the right size for your face (not the cheap ones from the truck stop).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Australian security forces ban the ise of Whatsapp and Signam⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Any company allowing the unregulated use of these on their devices has a information protection and most likely also an IT security problem. Even more valid for any government security or law enforcement organisation.

  BTW: GDPR prohibits this in the EU.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If I was a secret immortal how long could I keep the same US ID for before I get taken away for study. I'm thinking 150 years.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  But you would need to check VERY closely who you are having children with.

  That 21 year old you are putting a bun in the oven might be your granddaughter.

  That would be immoral,even on a highlander scale.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Must EU banks provide basic service via internet?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  1. As long as you have no individual contract with the bank that states otherwise,you are sadly out of luck. While banks must keep their service accessible, they can absolutely regulate how to access them as long it falls within reasoning.

  2. There is a high likelihood that you can also use pure Chromium so you can at least stay off Google.

  3. There has been a case in Germany when a bank changed it’s TAN process and customers didn’t want to change over to photoTAN/SMSTAN. It went through the court system and the highest federal court referred the case to the EU courts who afaik didn’t even accept it and did not see any problems. So it’s unlikely that there are any EU rules against it.

  4. I think that there was a similar discussion around edge/IE and the result was the same.

  Personally I would try a user agent switcher,if that doesn’t work chromium,if that does not work Chrome portable. The bank already knows everything and portable with a good firewall keeps google at bay.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why doesn't Mongolia simply arrest Putin?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Neither of it - but part of my work is indeed similar to an analyst, for a different topic, though. Thanks, anyway.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why doesn't Mongolia simply arrest Putin?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  And then what?

  Mongolia is fully landlocked and is a minor military power.

  • They cannot get him out of the country to the ICC as neither Russia nor China would give them flight permissions. Russia for obvious reasons and China would surely not do it as well - as it would make travelling for Xi much more problematic, especially after what he plans with Taiwan.

  • They cannot keep him there because the Russians, as military incapable as they are, would basically drive into UB and simply retrieve him. The Mongolian armed forces have a joint budget that is less than what a single CH-53K King Stallion costs. Their army is based on (hardly working) T54 and BMP1. Their airforce owns exactly two Mig29 Fighters (gift of Russia). And that does not even include the very real possibility that the Chinese do Vladimir a favour and get him - simply to make sure to keep the West occupied and shift the focus away from them and Taiwan again.

  • If they keep him there and he dies…well…that would at least mean the end of the political ruling class of the country and could lead to the very real threat of large scale revenge by either Russia or Russia and China.

  My personal prophecy for any scenario like that would be that a few thousand Mongolians die, around 300.000 end up in labour camps and Mongolia as a sovereign nation ceases to exist. Why? Mongolia exists mainly because two major powers “couldn’t be bothered” to conquer them, it would make them look bad and a buffer to a not that welcome neighbour is always welcome. If Mongolia fucks it up for one or both of them it basically looses that “reason” to exist in the eyes of both the Russians and the Chinese. And they would be “bad enough” in the light of a lot of countries as well as their own population that a “swift special military operation” is justified.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Would a surgical puncture to the skull relieve a pressure headache?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  sighs Oh god. No, it wouldn’t. Here we go.

  The name pressure headaches come from the feeling of pressure,not from actual pressure - actually most pressure headaches are not caused by a process within the cerebral cavity at all. Most are related to sinuses, especially the frontal sinuses, teeth, the middle ear/auris media, tension headaches(which are usually cervical/muscular). Only migraines as a cause for pressure headaches are actually within the cerebral cavity but have nothing to do with actual pressure. (Okay, actually we don’t really know how they start - but we are really sure it’s not the pressure)

  As the brain matter itself has no pain receptors it does not actually feel pain - but the root of nerves like the Trigeminus, Occipitalis and the layers of tissue covering the brain (Meninges) as well as the vessels can absolutely feel pain. A lot of pain.

  Cerebral bleeds, post aneurysm or trauma, usually happen in a very acute form or very slowly - with patients suffering from minutes to month from occasional headaches,often rather mild and not “pressure” headaches. Often after an initial knockout punch. (And at that point I must remind people that someone who has been knocked out needs a brain scan urgently. It’s NOT something to joke about and feel ultra manly,eh, toxic masculinity, about)

  The acute form is totally different though - it’s one of the nastiest ways to go. Patients have a sudden onset of massive,life-changing pain, described by survivors as a catastrophic, sharp(*), pain associated with a fast onset of other neurological symptoms.

  Another misconception is the fact that the cerebral cavity has no openings - it has quite a few and when the pressure within the skull is increased by a pathologic event like a cerebral bleed or the swelling of the brain the brain gets pushed in these holes - mainly the hole connecting to the spinal column. Which is why cerebral bleeds are so deadly - because the brain goes “stem first” through there - and it’s too small even for the brain stem. And the stem is what regulates breathing,etc.
  Other nerves get simply sheered off/cut by the pressure. (This is part of the pain mentioned above - Large nerves being cut by your own blood pressure)

  Nevertheless even in these cases the removal of large parts of the skull as it is done by neurosurgeons does not alleviate the pain - the damage to tissue, nerves, etc. is done. The goal is to give the brain room and stop the bleeding. But thankfully we have good options for pain relief these days and these patients are in a very deep sedation/coma for a good reason.

  (There are of course rare special cases like hydrocephalus cases, but that’s a bit far fetched here)

  So no, it would not help a bit painwise ,even in the most extreme situations.

  So as a healthcare professional I generally would advise against drilling into one’s head. It will make a lot my colleagues very angry.

  *And if you really feel you must do that please consult the nearest psychiatrist first. And if you then still feel like you must do that, make sure to do it during business hours, make also sure you livestream a video of it for the loolz of a lot of HCPs around the world, get a testimony recorded so your next of kin can sue the earlier mentioned shrink that he did not admit you to a closed ward and most importantly get a organ donor registration. *

  And due to a call a decade back I might also add: DO NOT drill into your own Sinuses as well,even if they are clogged up. Even if you are a doctor. You might accidentally (almost) lobotomize yourself.

  Source: Am a paramedic. Seen shit. Seen people do shit that started as an internet hoax.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What does dying from all causes mean?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Indeed is major trauma (which getting run over by a bus is a euphemism for) a much overlooked concern for older people (especially “the younger” old people, which are between 60-75).

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What does dying from all causes mean?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah. Came here to write exactly this.

  What OP misunderstood is the old tale of mortality vs. lethality.

  In a simplified explanation: Mortality defines the percentage of deaths in a population by a cause.

  Lethality is the percentage of deaths of people suffering from a cause.

  In our case:

  • Smokers might only get hit by a bus slightly less often or slightly more often(1) (Mortality)

  • But they have a far greater chance of dying from it when they get hit. The same can be said for being shot,etc. Being a smoker always reduces your statistical chances.

  (1:Actually quite fascinating - there is conflicting evidence on that one, as smoking is often statistically associated with substance abuse and bad health - which increases the likelihood of major trauma events, but on the other hand smokers die earlier,leaving more old people to walk in front of vehicles due to reduced cognitive abilities)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is DNS often joked about in the I.T. Industry?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  (And if it’s not DNS it’s NTP oh yeeh) (But that kills the Haiku)

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨brewing tea with space vacuum?⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Unlike posted here multiple times already tea does indeed release most flavouring agents in cold water as well - but it takes much longer and the actual boiling process wouldn’t help a bit. There are even speciality types which require cold preparation.

  Nevertheless: Tea is never,never and under no circumstances prepared with boiling water or worse, directly boiled! That ruins it totally as it will release various agents that will make it bitter (and can actually it is unhealthy as it increases the release of some insecticides/pesticides it might contain). 90° C/194° F for black tea, 80°C/175°F for green tea is a good upper(!) limit. Some teas require far lower temperatures, though.

  It always pains me when people douse (often rather expensive/good) tea with actual boiling water.