Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
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Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
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Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#2I recommend The Humanure Handbook by Joseph Jenkins. The definitive guide to humanure composting, and the best reference for general composting I've read.
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#3Gates does wonderful things with his philanthropy. I notice that he doesn't invest in any social issues or in politics, even when the politics is directly related (e.g., does he lobby the politicians or try to move the public regarding education funding?). Why not? Is it a policy?
Prior generations of philanthropists invested heavily in peace and justice, for example, including the Ford Foundation and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Certainly our society today has major problems in those areas - arguably we have great success with tech, which he does invest in, and have been terrible and social and political issues. Also, those problems in some ways directly harm Gates' goals (for example, U.S. political and racial issues greatly affect U.S. education), in other ways they lead to policies, such as nationalist economics, that will reduce economic activity and thus investment in these issues, and in yet in other ways the problems impose costs on people that dwarf the benefits Gates' programs provide - the oppression of Western-backed dictators and the cost of potential warfare being among them.
I realize I've assumed it's a policy of Gates', but does anyone have real knowledge about why he avoids those issues?
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#4Has anyone tried to make an SV startup-style company sell Japanese-type toilets in America? I think a lot of people would like them
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#5Gates does wonderful things with his philanthropy. I notice that he doesn't invest in any social issues or in politics, even when the politics is directly related (e.g., does he lobby the politicians or try to move the public regarding education funding?). Why not? Is it a policy? Prior generations of philanthropists invested heavily in peace and justice, for example, including the Ford Foundation and the Carnegie En…
> Gates does wonderful things with his philanthropy. I notice that he doesn't invest in any social issues or in politics, even when the politics is directly related (e.g., does he lobby the politicians or try to move the public regarding education funding?). Why not? Is it a policy?
I believe that is on purpose. He doesn't want his work to become politicized in the way that others have (e.g. George Soros, Kochs). From a purely philanthropic point of view, I think this is the right move. He probably takes the view that if you make people's lives better and give them good education, the rest will follow, in the long run.
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#6Gates does wonderful things with his philanthropy. I notice that he doesn't invest in any social issues or in politics, even when the politics is directly related (e.g., does he lobby the politicians or try to move the public regarding education funding?). Why not? Is it a policy? Prior generations of philanthropists invested heavily in peace and justice, for example, including the Ford Foundation and the Carnegie En…
According to https://www.gatesfoundation.org/How-We-Work/General-Informat... they do not fund “Political campaigns and legislative lobbying efforts”
As to reasons, why, I am not sure but I imagine there is a pragmatic angle to it in addition to reputation and other considerations. Investing in politics increases the risk that the funds get wasted if the political climate changes.
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#7Has anyone tried to make an SV startup-style company sell Japanese-type toilets in America? I think a lot of people would like them
Considering people keep toilets for 5-10 years per toilet on average and the cost of a toilet is much less than the cost of an electrical bidet... It is not a great idea.
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#8This makes me realize how freaking stupid we are as a nation/group-of-nations:
There are issues/problems that are common to all. Especially common to ALL governments, societies, etc.
Given a population of X and an infrastructure level of Y with purpose Z that are impacts ABC...N
A=Cost B=Scale C=[whatever] N=...
So - when you look at the cost of a nation, we assume that we have an infrastructure maturity/development level of X
What does it cost to implpement, upgrade-to, maintain that level.
What is the standard.
etc...
=============
So, when we talk about "saving $X for reinventing Y thing" -- this is a reactionary (albeit valuable) effort...
What if we restart rebuilding our societies from ground zero.
Lets build a preplanned city (yeah yeah brazilia etc) and first model it out ala simcity.
with AI running it over and over again until it outspits a detailed plan, it thinks is ideal and then a big committee of meat-bags review it and fuck it up.
Any Gates-level-ish people want to try to build something.
Fuck Mars. Earth First.
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#9Has anyone tried to make an SV startup-style company sell Japanese-type toilets in America? I think a lot of people would like them
Good summary here: https://priceonomics.com/toilets/
Re: Gates Foundation spent $200M funding toilet research
#10This makes me realize how freaking stupid we are as a nation/group-of-nations: There are issues/problems that are common to all. Especially common to ALL governments, societies, etc. Given a population of X and an infrastructure level of Y with purpose Z that are impacts ABC...N A=Cost B=Scale C=[whatever] N=... So - when you look at the cost of a nation, we assume that we have an infrastructure maturity/development…
You should visit Korea. This is exactly what happens.
New cities are built around that new Samsung office, or that new army base, or that fake, pressured CBD.
The cities surrounding the main capital of Korea are marvellous and are all made from scratch in the last 20 years.
There is no better model of perfect city.