Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment • Hacker News Board

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#121

Post by chrisseaton » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 4:06 PM UTC

sheepdestroyer wrote: post #120

chrisseaton wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bizarre kind of double-think. If someone the other side of the world tells you that you have the right to freedom of religion, but the authority you live under disagrees, and the people on the other side of the world don't do anything about it, then in what sense do you have the right? You don't - it's meaningless. If I say I have decided that you have the universal inalienable right to beer, but where you…

The concept is not new, 232 years old now, it shouldn't be that strange to you. The vocation of tyrants is to have their head cut at some point, more or less figuratively.

This whole thread started with you giving an example of how people don't actually have these rights.

So even you know they aren't actually universal or inalienable.

232 years of pretending people have rights that they demonstrably do not have.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#122

Post by acituan » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 4:20 PM UTC

JetSetWilly wrote: post #29

poooogles wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We benefited from it in London, I think we all wanted it too. Even if it kind of was an austerity Olympics compared to before it and after it? Sure we wasted some money here and there (was who the fuck needs a giant slide) but overall it turned an industrial wasteland into a useful area for East London.

The Olympics in London cost 11.3 Billion and generated revenue of 3.3 billion which doesn't exactly seem hugely beneficial. Of course in the usual London fashion most of the money came out of UK govt coffers, national lottery funding etc - so it was just a form of London sucking cash out of the rest of the UK to build infra, via the handy "Olympics" excuse, so I can see how a londoner might argue it was good as it wa…

> The Olympics in London cost 11.3 Billion and generated revenue of 3.3 billion which doesn't exactly seem hugely beneficial.

Except it is one giant international PR and brand recognition event for the host country. TV ads cost in aggregate billions too and don’t bring any revenue immediately, doesn’t mean they are a waste of money.

Not to mention Olympics getting people interested in doing sports, which amid a global obesity upsurge, could also be worth more than nothing.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#123

Post by taejo » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 4:48 PM UTC

skocznymroczny wrote: post #104

AlexandrB wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Too bad they didn't crowdsource the decision about whether the olympics should happen this year: https://sports.yahoo.com/cancel-the-olympics-japanese-people...

If you left the pandemic decisions to a majority vote, most places would be fully open by now.

I don't know about your country, but every month from January to June (the latest data I found) a large majority of Germans polled believed the measures to fight COVID were appropriate or didn't go far enough. https://de.statista.com/infografik/23810/umfrage-zur-angemes...

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#124

Post by sheepdestroyer » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 4:48 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #121

sheepdestroyer wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The concept is not new, 232 years old now, it shouldn't be that strange to you. The vocation of tyrants is to have their head cut at some point, more or less figuratively.

This whole thread started with you giving an example of how people don't actually have these rights. So even you know they aren't actually universal or inalienable. 232 years of pretending people have rights that they demonstrably do not have.

You still continue to say that people having their rights violated means they don't exist. That's a demonstrably false and illogical statement. It's because people inherently have rights that they fight for them, and others take their side. Hence events like the French Revolution, the Abolition of slavery, or the Civil Rights Movement.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#125

Post by scns » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 4:58 PM UTC

JetSetWilly wrote: post #45

smt88 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure where your jab at London taking govt funds came from. London, like most modern cities, generates a surplus that subsidizes surrounding suburban and rural areas[1]. It was still an awful waste of money, but it wasn't part of any trend. 1. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/may/23/uk-budget-d...

It comes from London frequently having money lavished on it that other areas don’t (eg - check public transport [1]) - and usually accompanied with a self-fulfilling prophecy about how other areas don’t generate tax income (which of course is because they don’t have good infra and investment). And this situation has been very much engineered by the UK government over the last 40 years, it isn’t some state of nature.…

In Paris an Munich it is similar i think.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#126

Post by ekianjo » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 5:00 PM UTC

monkeycantype wrote: post #26

ekianjo wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Olympics is such a massive waste of money that nobody except politicians who want to show off with taxpayer money or industrials benefiting from government contracts would be for it.

Watching the soccer made we think maybe we could get used to watching athletes compete in beautiful locations with no stadiums and crowds. Maybe you could do olympics really cheap with no tourists

Or do the Olympics always in the same place, instead of wasting energy building new installations around the globe every 4 years that will never be re-used.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#127

Post by jdavis703 » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 5:09 PM UTC

skocznymroczny wrote: post #104

AlexandrB wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Too bad they didn't crowdsource the decision about whether the olympics should happen this year: https://sports.yahoo.com/cancel-the-olympics-japanese-people...

If you left the pandemic decisions to a majority vote, most places would be fully open by now.

I’m not sure what country you’re basing this on, but in the US the 2020 election felt like a repudiation of the more liberalized COVID-19 policies of the Trump administration.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#128

Post by jdavis703 » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 5:11 PM UTC

decadancer wrote: post #86

Scea91 wrote: post #5

Small details like this make my day. I also love how it was basically crowdfunded by Japanese people. It quite strenghtens the symbolic value of the medal I think.

Almost all of government spending is crowdfunded

People opt-in to crowdfunding. Generally we have no choice in paying taxes. That said some states like California give taxpayers the option to pay extra taxes for special funds like coastal cleanup or processing the rape kit backlog. These funds are more analogous to crowd funding, but they pale in comparison to total state revenue.

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#129

Post by jdavis703 » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 5:14 PM UTC

Asymmetryk wrote: post #22

Scea91 wrote: post #5

Small details like this make my day. I also love how it was basically crowdfunded by Japanese people. It quite strenghtens the symbolic value of the medal I think.

when and where from can I get myself a recycled electronics gold watch / earrings for my lady geek? I feel very confident that this is going to happen, now, but I'm fascinated by the economics of the acquisition of the e-waste, in terms of "ore" density : it's a while since I was marvelling at the sight of the gold pad to pin wires in a ceramic package. Where's the highest quality and concentrations now?

There are potential moral concerns with e-waste recycling. I won’t say it’s more problematic than mining. But many of the same issues with environmental degradation, dangerous work environments and child labor can apply.

Source: https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewconten...

Re: Medals at Tokyo olympics are recycled from discarded electronic equipment

#130

Post by heurisko » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 5:19 PM UTC

dijit wrote: post #73

JetSetWilly wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It comes from London frequently having money lavished on it that other areas don’t (eg - check public transport [1]) - and usually accompanied with a self-fulfilling prophecy about how other areas don’t generate tax income (which of course is because they don’t have good infra and investment). And this situation has been very much engineered by the UK government over the last 40 years, it isn’t some state of nature.…

I just want to chime in here and agree with this wholeheartedly. There is a lot of self-fulfilment when it comes to London spending vs London generation of revenues. It's famously the case that London props up almost the entire rest of the country. Scotland itself being a net-loss in terms of GDP. I come from a City called Coventry, "investment" in the city is non-existent; the only investor right now is the Universi…

One the most frustrating things to me, and I say this as as a Southerner, was why they decided to build HS2 first, instead of linking up Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield first (HS3). Then building HS2 if it was necessary.

But now there is, yet another, infrastructure project that is connected to London.

Spreading investment around the UK would be a good thing, it would take the heat out of Southern property prices, if everyone wasn't compelled to find jobs in the same geographic area.