WoodScientist
@WoodScientist@lemmy.world
- Comment on DOGE's next target revealed after $59 million spent to put illegal migrants in luxury hotels 1 week ago:
I find your lack of critical thinking disturbing.
- Comment on Why is deportation done instead of imprisonment or making people become documented? In other words, why does deportation exist? 3 weeks ago:
The outcome of a system is its purpose.
The goal is to create a slave class. We never got over our societal addiction to slavery. Slavery in the US never ended, both de facto slavery and legal slavery.
The goal of our immigration system is to create millions of workers who will accept low pay, long hours, and poor conditions with little options or recourse.
- Comment on How did a simple phone call become so problematic? 3 weeks ago:
I mean, there could be a worse answer.
You know what, this would be easier if done in person. I have your address as ____. I’ll be by in ten minutes.
- Comment on How did a simple phone call become so problematic? 3 weeks ago:
Granted, you have to tell/text me to find a time that works for both.
My nightmare: when I ask someone what times they are good for, and they give one specific time on one specific day.
- Comment on How did a simple phone call become so problematic? 3 weeks ago:
How to really be Satan: send an important video note. Make it recorded outside with a lot of wind and background noise. Then, just to be fun, slow the video down to 80% playback speed, reencode it, and send that!
- Comment on How did a simple phone call become so problematic? 3 weeks ago:
What if I send you a link to a video message I recorded and posted on YouTube? Also it has ads on it.
- Comment on How did a simple phone call become so problematic? 3 weeks ago:
BUT, it is also pretty clear that direct speech is the most efficient way of communication when you don’t need a written record
That is simply not true. I’ve had many phones calls that would be far more efficiently done with a text.
- Comment on Select a tip 3 weeks ago:
And they’re perfect for this kind of thing! What better way to punish rude tip demands? Despite how rude it is, you don’t want to throw someone in jail over this. A fine? You risk the fine being so low it’s just a cost of business or so high you just ruined some service worker’s life. This is exactly where the pillory shines!
Demand a tip like this? To the stockades with you! Spend an afternoon chained up by the sidewalk, while people throw tomatoes at you. No real harm done. Just public embarrassment.
- Comment on Select a tip 3 weeks ago:
We need to bring back the public stockades.
- Comment on [deleted] 4 weeks ago:
Screw it! We need to go younger. That’s right, it’s Logan’s Run time! Everyone over 30 gets euthanized. And I say this as someone over 30 myself.
- Comment on [deleted] 4 weeks ago:
Screw it. Take away the right to vote from both men and women. Only those born intersex will have the franchise!
Now there is an interesting thought experiment. What would that kind of government look like?
- Comment on [deleted] 5 weeks ago:
Not OP, but here’s my radical right wing belief.
I say we deport the immigrants. ALL the immigrants. I mean anyone in the US that is an immigrant, or descended from an immigrant. Time to kick them all out! Anyone who isn’t descended from the native population, back on the boat. And damn it, this includes myself!
- Comment on What realistically would happen if someone came back to life from the dead ? 5 weeks ago:
Death is rather difficult to define precisely. If you define it as “the cessation of consciousness,” then you die every night. Every sleep cycle has some portions of minimal brain activity. There’s nobody home for these periods.
- Comment on Anon makes a troubling connection 1 month ago:
Sure it would be difficult. It wouldn’t be easy. Like anything, you don’t just start with humans. You start with mice and work your way up from there. But you’re right, it would I suppose not be a near term thing. But still, for people like Musk, who always insist how they are so concerned with the future ‘survival of humanity?’ If you’re that worried about underpopulation, to the point you’re willingly throwing away civil rights, wouldn’t such a thing be worth funding, even if it takes a century to figure it out?
- Comment on Mandela Effect 1 month ago:
Someone probably just got confused by the Ohio Hitlers.
- Comment on Mandela Effect 1 month ago:
Yes, named for the infamous Dr. Mengele, the German doctor who performed abominable experiments on prisoners during the Franco-Prussian War.
- Comment on Mandela Effect 1 month ago:
I think you mean the Mandala Effect.
- Comment on Good morning I choose not violent just hungry. 1 month ago:
You know what. Fuck it. Let’s make the world more interesting. Let’s legalize consensual cannibalism! We’ll regulate it like assisted suicide, so there are safeguards in place to prevent exploitation and such. And you won’t be able to pay someone (or their loved ones) in order to let you cannibalize them. But if everyone involved is of sound mind, if there’s plenty of time to change your mind, and no one is getting paid or coerced? Have at it! I believe in freedom so much, that if you want to willingly let a cannibal kill and eat you, by God, that should be your right! Let us legalize consensual cannibalism!
- Comment on Anon makes a troubling connection 1 month ago:
IDK. Looking at that wikipedia article, the progress looks pretty good.
Also, just on a conceptual level, growing a whole embryo may be a lot easier than growing a single organ. Organs really aren’t designed to grow by themselves. A fetus is designed to grow and develop. It needs a nutrient supply.
But I think of it as the difference between trying to figure out how to grow plants in aquaponics vs trying to somehow coax plant cells to grow a flower without the rest of the flower plant present.
- Comment on [deleted] 1 month ago:
Yes, you recognize the fact, but you haven’t internalized its implications. You can only have a universal present in a universe of shared time. Ultimately, “the present” is something applicable to and that exists within the mind of a single observer.
One of the hallmarks of science is that different people can independently measure something and confirm its existence. If no two observers can ever agree on what constitutes “the present,” then how can “the present” be said to exist at all? It’s a fundamentally unscientific concept.
- Comment on [deleted] 1 month ago:
You’re still imagining that there is some fixed universe playing out at constant time, and that we all just experience the echoes of this present in different orders. This isn’t what relativity says. Clocks traveling near the speed of light don’t just appear to slow down, they actually slow down.
Different regions of the universe don’t even experience the same flow rate of time. Someone living on a mountaintop experiences time faster than someone at sea level. And yet you cling to this fantasy of their being some universal “present.” You cannot have a universal present in a universe composed of different flow rates of time!
- Comment on [deleted] 1 month ago:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativity_of_simultaneity
The present does not exist. From the previous link:
It can be argued that special relativity eliminates the concept of absolute simultaneity and a universal present: according to the relativity of simultaneity, observers in different frames of reference can have different measurements of whether a given pair of events happened at the same time or at different times, with there being no physical basis for preferring one frame’s judgments over those of another. However, there are events that may be non-simultaneous in all frames of reference: when one event is within the light cone of another—its causal past or causal future—then observers in all frames of reference show that one event preceded the other. The causal past and causal future are consistent within all frames of reference, but any other time is “elsewhere”, and within it there is no present, past, or future. There is no physical basis for a set of events that represents the present.
Many philosophers have argued that relativity implies eternalism.[6] Philosopher of science Dean Rickles says that, "the consensus among philosophers seems to be that special and general relativity are incompatible with presentism.
If two observers will disagree on which events happened in “the present,” then “the present” cannot exist as a real universal entity. “The present” only makes any physical sense in classical, pre-20th century Newtonian mechanics.
This is why the block universe or eternalism makes more sense.
- Comment on Anon makes a troubling connection 1 month ago:
Conservatives say that’s what they want, but they only really want to subjugate women. If they actually cared about population totals first, they would be working hard to make it so everyone who wanted a kid could get one.
One core problem developed countries are experiencing, in terms of demography, is the mismatch between skills development and biological fertility. It takes people into their 30s or even 40s before they’re financially able to support children. For millions of couples, by the time they can financially support a child, the window has already closed. It takes so much education and experience to be competitive in advanced economies that it creates this mismatch.
Now, we could have mass government-sponsored surrogacy. But that has so many ethical problems, that there is a reason no government has tried it. Yet, there is a near-term technology that we are on the verge of, but very little research dollars are dedicated towards. That is artificial gestation.
When was the last time you heard Musk or any of the other demographics-obsessed tech bros throw a few billion at developing this tech? This technology, along with other advanced reproductive technologies, could really do a lot to raise the birth rate in developed countries. And there are other techniques that could also be leveraged with this, such as techniques to create egg and stem cells from skin samples. There’s a lot of near-term reproductive technologies waiting in the wings that could have a substantial effect on the birth rate, but that we simply haven’t fully developed yet.
In fact, governments could cover the entire cost of the artificial gestation process if they want more people that badly. Ideally, anyone who is in the position to raise a child should be able to fill out an application, have some gametes created via a skin biopsy, and have an infant grown in a womb tank. And have the whole thing paid for by the State Population Initiative, or whatever you want to call it.
There are millions of couples out there who have the financial means to raise a child, but simply are biologically incapable of having children. We typically flippantly tell these people, “just adopt!,” as if there is some vast supply of infants in orphanages just waiting for adoption. In truth, adopting an infant involves years-long wait lists and costs a hundred grand or more. But there are millions of couples that would love to have biological children, but simply can’t. They’re couples with reproductive issues, LGBT couples, couples that have aged out, etc. If conservatives actually cared about demographics, they would be doing everything they can to make it cheap and easy for these millions of couples to get the children they want. And while mass surrogacy isn’t really viable, a mature artificial gestation technology would be a game-changer.
And yet, you never see someone like Musk suggesting we develop these technologies, let alone pouring some of his billions to their advancement. The truth is that hand-wringing over population is just the latest dog whistle against women’s rights. Their first goal is to subjugate women, the population issues are just an excuse.
- Comment on [deleted] 1 month ago:
And yet, you’ve concocted this fantasy that you call “the present,” as if such a thing could exist in a relativistic universe…
- Comment on [deleted] 1 month ago:
You assume the past and present no longer exist. You have no proof of this.
- Comment on If you save, we will charge you more 1 month ago:
Generally you pay a grid connection based on the type of connection you have. A giant factory has a much beefier grid connection than single family residence, so the big factory has a higher connection charge.
- Comment on Do you think billionaires fear losing their fortune and becoming "a poor"? 1 month ago:
If you sold your soul to the Devil to obtain something, wouldn’t you be afraid of losing that thing?
- Comment on Which one are you? 1 month ago:
Interesting bit of trivia. Microwaves don’t actually have “high” or “low” settings. The magnetron, the microwave’s core component, only has two states - on and off. It can’t power the magnetron at 10% power level.
Instead, the “power” settings just control how often the magnetron is activated. So maybe at full power it’s on 100% of the time. At medium it’s 10 seconds on, 10 second off. At low it’s 3 seconds on, 10 seconds off. That kind of thing. The “power” setting is just a glorified timer.
- Comment on There was a time when everyone had common sense 1 month ago:
I mean, I could absolutely imagine someone doing this. They’re probably a well meaning person, but probably not of great intelligence. They’re driving through the desert one day, absolutely thirsty. They’re desperate for a drink, about to pass out. Then they remember in their delerium - “Wait! There’s some water in the car’s battery! I could drink some of that and be fine! I’ll just drain it while the car is running (so I don’t have to restart it), keep the engine running, and be able to make it to the next town. My God, I’m a genius. I’m saved!” They then proceed, in the manner of unique creativity only the ignorant possess, to find a way to drain the fluid from the battery of a running car engine. And they have a big old swig of that battery water.
What would be required for this? All that it would take is for someone to just have very poor chemistry knowledge. Someone sees a fluid that looks like water, and they assume it’s water. Maybe they figure a car battery works like a potato battery and there’s just water in the cell. Even if the “water” is clearly foul, maybe someone would assume it’s just dirty water, but still water. (As in, not an acid.)
Or, maybe they even know it’s not something you should regularly drink. They know there’s some fluid called “battery acid” in the battery. But they also know that soda is acidic, and that is safe to drink. So maybe battery acid is OK in small amounts? Just how strong does an acid have to be before you can’t safely drink it? Maybe they could just try a small quantity, maybe about a spoonful? Surely that would be fine…
Those on the bottom 10% of the IQ distribution don’t deserve to die. Those who failed high school chem don’t deserve to drink battery acid.
When planning public health or public safety interventions, you have to balance between cost and effectiveness. For example, imagine some new car widget that will increase automobile safety. You’re a regulator trying to decide whether to mandate them on all new vehicles. You run the numbers; you want to balance the increased vehicle price against the projected lives saved. You run the numbers and find that this will cost $1 billion per life saved. Probably not worth mandating them. It’s not that those lives aren’t worth saving, but there are more cost effective ways to save lives. We could tax everyone the same money they would spend buying these devices, and then use this money to expand Medicare eligibility. Or we could mandate some other vehicle safety device. The number of lives saved is always balanced against the cost of an intervention. The value of a life is infinite; the number of dollars available to save lives is finite.
But printing on a battery? The manufacturers already print a labels on them. It costs tiny fractions of a penny per battery to add the safety warnings. Even if it only prevents a handful of deaths or serious injuries over a decade, the cost is so low we might as well do it. There’s something like 14 million new vehicles sold in the US each year. Imagine over ten years that’s 140 million vehicles. Let’s say it costs a penny to include a warning label on each battery. That’s a cost of $1.4 million over an entire decade.
I would say in that case, if even a single life is spared over that decade, if only a single living person is saved from the reaper…Then it is worth it. Hell, that’s probably even a fair amount to prevent a life-altering injury. If even one person per decade is stupid enough to drink battery acid, and this warning will prevent it, then it is worth doing!
- Comment on Time to make your decesion 1 month ago:
People have different circadian rhythms on average as they age. We simply associate the pattern of those middle aged and older with virtue. Middle age and old people raise children, and they teach children that the sleep patterns of the elders are wise and just, while the sleep patterns of the youth are slovenly and sinful. Our entire concept of “early” is defined by what middle age and older people simply adapt to naturally without force or effort. Older folks tend to wake up at a certain hour, so we just declare that the hour everyone is expected to wake at.
The most insidious form of this temporal bigotry is how we typically force high school students to start school at the earliest time of day of any school students, even though high school students have the latest natural waking time of any age group. We value “teaching lessons” to our youth more than we do actually teaching them. So we drag them out of bed at an unnaturally early hour so that they can make class at 7 AM. We then berate and shame them for being sleepy and inattentive in the unnaturally early classes we require them by law to attend.
And I say all this as someone in their late 30s who naturally wakes up pretty early. From an evolutionary perspective, it makes a great deal of sense why we have people with different natural sleep and wake times, and for those preferences to shift with age. We spent several hundred thousand years living as small groups huddled around campfires. Part of warding off predators is having people on watch through the night. Having people who don’t have to fight to stay awake late into the night makes that guard duty so much easier. In prehistory, I imagine the young adults staying up late into the night after the adults are asleep, enjoying some time to themselves, tending the fire, and watching for predators. The last of the youth to go to sleep would trade off with the earliest rising of the elders. We are a social species. We are evolved to live in groups. And a group is more effective with a diversity across many characteristics, including sleep/wake times.
But we’ve forgotten this fact and turned a simple consequence of evolution into a moral issue. And for that, we as a society abuse our youth and force them to wake at unnaturally early hours for the sake of puffing up the sense of moral superiority of the middle aged and older. Collectively, our relation to early waking times, and especially how we use it to collectively abuse our children, is one of our greatest sins as a culture.
