251–260 of 365 posts
The worst year to be alive _so far_
"How Are Things? Better. Better Than Tomorrow, Of Course—Worse Than Yesterday" - Credit to Eugene Volokh who posted this old saying from Soviet Europe this morning.
I'm pretty sure everything that's happened is his fault.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks. It's hard to get nation-wide reports by chain. All I see are pictures on social media of outraged people going: "Why don't we have any sock-eye salmon? And Look! The shelves are empty!". Surely data are the aggregate set of anecdotes, but while I see a lot of spot anecdotes, I don't see much data.
What I'm seeing in the NY state capital is that the stuff that was out of stock early on like toilet paper, paper towels, kleenex, flour, etc. returned some times ago, but seems to still be rationed to one or two per person per day. I don't find this to be a hardship, but I don't shop for a big family. However, I just saw packets of yeast for sale again. That was the last thing that I had trouble finding. But take my…
Makes sense. I never drive or shop, so I am kind of used to people bringing me off-brand stuff. And I buy in bulk, so I am already set regardless, but I am told by friends that the shelves are full (sometimes they even send pictures!)
Maybe we are lucky that so much is semi-locally sourced.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Edit: don't take my word for it, apparently this is a popular myth Read up on Yellowstone, for example -- AFAIK it's "due for a big one" but it blows up so infrequently and so catastrophically that there's no real plan other than "maybe think about not living in North America." But hey, volcanic ash is a coolant for the climate -- a few well-placed eruptions could do some good, on a global scale (sorry about the loca…
Don’t think it’s “overdue”[0]. I think that’s just a myth in popular culture. [0] https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/yellowstone-overdue-eruption-when-...
But that's not the same thing as saying we have good reason to think an eruption is not close.
The link in fact says that predictions of an eruption are based on numerology and nobody knows.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> What's.......our intended process for dealing with this? The extent of the USA's preparedness, from the federal agency in charge handling Emergencies, is a website with a bullet point list of what you should have in a first aid kit in your house: https://www.ready.gov/kit I'm being only partially facetious. There are of course multiple agencies at the federal, state, county, and local level with their own plans and…
Spot on. We no longer have a government for the people, by the people, of the people. Just take a look at the net worth statistics of our congresscritters and their voting records. In fact, we never really have. Initially, only free, white landowners could even vote ! Edit: ah, found yet another “thing you can’t say on HN,” I suppose. :) Talk about lack of TP in stores: +6. Talk about how our “representatives” don’t…
This seems like a thing that people are suddenly saying a lot on HN.
Why can't you talk about lack of TP in stores? Where? I thought that was over a few months ago?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Using renewables would be more cost effective, even up to 100% replacement of fossil fuels. Cost of storage does not change this conclusion.
There is zero chance of 100% replacement of fossil fuels with renewables. Zero. Without a Thanos solution. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkj_91IJVBk&list=WL&index=5&... EDIT: I mean, you guys are downvoting these comments, and I'm sorry to tell you things you don't want to hear, but would prefer that you respond with contrary information rather than downvoting. Happy to alter my views and engage in information shar…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Doesn't "not good" in this context mean NEVER. Are there any native tribes/peoples that had a writing system before European contact? AFAICT, it's one of the main causes so many native languages are dying/extinct.
Writing developed in America long before Europeans showed up and continued to be used until Europeans showed up, but the Europeans destroyed most books they could find and forced the natives to learn the colonizers' languages. That's the main cause why so many native languages are dying/extinct. Further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesoamerican_writing_systems
"An extensive Mesoamerican literature has been conserved, partly in indigenous scripts and partly in postconquest transcriptions in the Latin script."
It also says:
"The Florentine Codex, compiled 1545-1590 by Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahagún includes a history of the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire from the Mexica viewpoint"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> To me this is the main reason that going multiplanetary or space habitat based is basically the only way to escape this inevitable doom I disagree with this. Leaving the Earth doesn't remove random acts of doom from happening, and in fact, they are more lethal in unfamiliar and hostile environments. If we do not figure out how to handle such black swan events on our home planet, we have no chance of handling them i…
The idea is not to avoid black swan events entirely, it is to have pockets that are missed by a given event. Earth goes cold? Well, good thing the moon base can preserve technology and knowledge for a hundred years. Solar flare? Good thing we have the under-ice base on Europa. Europa explodes? Good thing that we are still on Earth. Now if they all happen at the same time, like the sun dying, then that is why you want…
Yelowstone blows up unexpectedly - orbital rescue forces do a quick drop, help rescue survivors in the immediate area. Later on food supplies from orbital/Lunar farms help cover food shortages and teraforming techniques can be used to fixup the biosphere.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not possible for a gamma ray burst to 'screw' the entire solar system. It's already an incredibly unlikely event to occur near enough to do damage. Then the beam would have to be directed in our direction. And the beam would have to essentially hit the solar system edge on or face on, but not at any other angle. Even if all that happened, underground bases would be protected, as would above-ground or in-space ha…
How long would such a burst be expected to last? Because at least momentarily, one half of the earth will remain pretty safe.
How susceptible are we to another catastrophic volcano eruption? After COVID-19 shut down supply chains, there were some problematic delays, but seems like we quickly recovered. If the entire planet's crops were wiped out, we're all just SOL if we don't get canned goods in time? If we had 12 months notice, could we as a planet get it together? 6 months? 3 months? Is there forecasting for volcanoes? (looks like yes: h…
I'm going to plug a charity here, Allfed, working to develop technologies to let us survive the loss of conventional agriculture for a period of years by working out efficient and economical ways to convert things like, e.g., dead trees into digestible calories and the plans to deploy them in the event of a large volcanic interruption or asteroid strike or nuclear exchange. https://allfed.info/