“I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing” • Hacker News Board

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#151

Post by majewsky » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:03 AM UTC

tomp wrote: post #71

netsharc wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sane/benovelent governments will probably switch to universal basic income, i.e. go deep into debt and just pay everyone money to live. And no, actually going into debt is not a huge problem, ask Keynes, or what happened in WW2; it was an emergency and governments borrowed and borrowed with no fear.

I never understood this logic, and I understand it even less now. If we have the industrial / economic capacity to provide everyone with necessities of life (food, water, heat, shelter, ...), why not just provide that directly?! No need to go via the "money -> essentials" route... that way you're only indirectly making landlords and grocery store owners rich. For this crisis, people are saying, give $1000 to everyone…

> If we have the industrial / economic capacity to provide everyone with necessities of life (food, water, heat, shelter, ...), why not just provide that directly?!

People prefer money to buy their own food over government-issued turnips.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#152

Post by titzer » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:03 AM UTC

TuringTest wrote: post #24

black_puppydog wrote: post #15

I don't agree with the conclusion. We can scale down our economies and still maintain production of essentials by ` `drumroll` ` scaling back shit that nobody needs. Starting with an overblown healthcare admin system in the US, IMHO, but also including less inflammatory non-essential things like yet another range of plastic toys and luxury perfumes and and and. Essentially in this scenario, we should take this as an…

> ``drumroll`` scaling back shit that nobody needs. Maybe, but what do you do with people whose livelihood depend on those superfluous bullshit jobs? Until we have a system that guarantees a right to life even if you do nothing productive , those busyworks are used to justify giving food, shelter and healthcare to those people.

> those busyworks are used to justify giving food, shelter and healthcare to those people.

IMHO, even as a recovering laissez-faire libertarian type, the real reason for those jobs is to create funnels of money to the top of society to make a very tiny fraction of the population obscenely wealthy. The bigger scale and the glitzier the funnel, the bigger the fountain of cash for the execs to splash around amongst them. Billionaires are a mathematical anomaly, and those busywork jobs are their payment for us not decapitating the bastards like it's 1789, coupled with an absolutely stunning propaganda blitz that hoodwinked us mere techie upper-middle classers into believing they earned it, deserved it, worked hard for it. It's a lie; a lifetime is not long enough to learn 120,000 lifetimes worth of wealth, and I don't give a shit how many warehouses or webpages your minions make.

(sorry, this whole thing isn't directed at you; more like the Bezoses of the world).

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#153

Post by wisienkas » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:05 AM UTC

badpun wrote: post #146

swagasaurus-rex wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do masks even work on things as small as viruses?

I'm not an expert, but I believe they stop the droplets, which are vectors for viruses.

It has been proved that most of those masks sold simply aren't closely sewed enough to stop the droplets containing the disease. So in general the mask don't help. Secondly the mask only help avoiding spreading the virus from yourself to other and it doesn't protect from receiving the virus

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#154

Post by neuronic » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:07 AM UTC

swagasaurus-rex wrote: post #145

mcsb4 wrote: post #85

I don't understand why we are not trying to interrupt the transmission vectors with masks and hand sanitizer like the Chinese do. They ramped the daily production from 10M to 100M and even advised the use of make-shift masks. The reaction in the west: masks are not protecting 100% and also we don't have any and we are too lazy to produce them, although they are much cheaper than the economic impact covid-19 has. 1. y…

Do masks even work on things as small as viruses?

Masks contain spread. They do not protect from it.

So if you are sick, wear a mask. Here in Germany you still get publicly ridiculed for it.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#155

Post by pishpash » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:08 AM UTC

wisienkas wrote: post #153

badpun wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert, but I believe they stop the droplets, which are vectors for viruses.

It has been proved that most of those masks sold simply aren't closely sewed enough to stop the droplets containing the disease. So in general the mask don't help. Secondly the mask only help avoiding spreading the virus from yourself to other and it doesn't protect from receiving the virus

Just think about what you're saying. The mask is a piece of material, it has no directionality. Stop repeating ignorance that you hear second-hand and think for yourself.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#156

Post by mtreis86 » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:08 AM UTC

wisienkas wrote: post #153

badpun wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert, but I believe they stop the droplets, which are vectors for viruses.

It has been proved that most of those masks sold simply aren't closely sewed enough to stop the droplets containing the disease. So in general the mask don't help. Secondly the mask only help avoiding spreading the virus from yourself to other and it doesn't protect from receiving the virus

Avoiding spreading from yourself to others is half the battle though.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#157

Post by neuronic » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:08 AM UTC

wisienkas wrote: post #153

badpun wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert, but I believe they stop the droplets, which are vectors for viruses.

It has been proved that most of those masks sold simply aren't closely sewed enough to stop the droplets containing the disease. So in general the mask don't help. Secondly the mask only help avoiding spreading the virus from yourself to other and it doesn't protect from receiving the virus

> Secondly the mask only help avoiding spreading the virus from yourself to other and it doesn't protect from receiving the virus

This is a large contribution for containment. Masks should be worn by anybody at this point.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#158

Post by majewsky » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:10 AM UTC

jariel wrote: post #134

black_puppydog wrote: post #15

I don't agree with the conclusion. We can scale down our economies and still maintain production of essentials by ` `drumroll` ` scaling back shit that nobody needs. Starting with an overblown healthcare admin system in the US, IMHO, but also including less inflammatory non-essential things like yet another range of plastic toys and luxury perfumes and and and. Essentially in this scenario, we should take this as an…

None of this really has anything to do with solving the problem. Living in permanent social distancing, waiting to die from 3rd or 4th infection ... is not a humane way to live.

It does have something to do with the problem, though it's more adjacent than spot-on.

Think about the dense crowds on airports, for example. How many of those people actually have to use an airplane to get where they need to be? I bet a lot of those are flying to a business meeting that could have been a telco or a chat instead. Or if their job turns out to be a bullshit job, the meeting would be entirely pointless.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#159

Post by badpun » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:10 AM UTC

growlist wrote: post #131

robocat wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> scaling back shit that nobody needs The “shit” nobody needs is the main point of living: music, art, science, sharing, pets; the crap you desire versus the essentials. If we only got what we needed to survive (food, shelter) that would be a pointless and depressing life.

Oh come on! Hundreds of minor variations on the 'round blobby SUV with redundant angular surface forms' style; thousands of different variations on 'fat and water emulsified together with a dash of scent' for making your skin softer; fifty gorillion different types of shampoo - 'Because you're worth it!'. I'm all for a Hayek/Friedman approach to the markets, but I think even they would consider above trivialities in…

I suspect you need dozens of actors to keep a market healthy. With only a couple producers, collusion is too easy. I suspect the auto market is already heading in the wrong direction, with all the mergers that we constantly keep hearing about... For example, I've noticed that, over the past 5 years, cars have gotten significantly more expensive where I live, without a corresponding quality increase.

Re: “I'm not sure there is an acceptable solution to the problem we are facing”

#160

Post by tomp » Mon, Mar 16, 2020, 10:11 AM UTC

majewsky wrote: post #151

tomp wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood this logic, and I understand it even less now. If we have the industrial / economic capacity to provide everyone with necessities of life (food, water, heat, shelter, ...), why not just provide that directly?! No need to go via the "money -> essentials" route... that way you're only indirectly making landlords and grocery store owners rich. For this crisis, people are saying, give $1000 to everyone…

> If we have the industrial / economic capacity to provide everyone with necessities of life (food, water, heat, shelter, ...), why not just provide that directly?! People prefer money to buy their own food over government-issued turnips.

Government (i.e. productive, working tax-payers) should provide for people's needs, people should work to provide for their own wants ("preferences")