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Life Improvements Since the 1990s

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Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#371

Post by megameter »

271828182846 wrote: post #236

( "Not Rewinding VHS tapes before returning to the library or Blockbuster" ... how about going to some video store was kinda cool and added some social aspect to sitting on your couch alone and watching a movie? how can you even add crap like that on such a list with such a title and not realize how delusional this is?) there are no material life improvements - only more efficient dopamine triggers. but that's not an…

Access to sexual experiences is something I would count as a great liberation of the past decades. When a man got desperate for release not all that long ago, they didn't hop online for an outlet, they drove to the seedy part of town and visited a strip club, went to a porno theater, solicited hookers, etc. Those things are still around, and there were some possibilities to "phone date", but lack of options made things overall less secure and discreet for everyone involved relative to today where the man can just look up an Onlyfans or prowl Tinder profiles. 1980's teen movies like "Sixteen Candles" were OK with date rape as a concept, and that was just the tip-of-the-iceberg. We're doing better.

This goes even more so if we speak of the spectrum of LGBT identities, which in 1991 was in the midst of losing all continuity with the past because so many died from AIDS; many folks then would stay closeted and quiet because coming out was just too threatening. Casual homophobia was everywhere, and the "gay neighborhoods" of larger cities were somewhat exceptional even within that city. Now it's hardly unusual to be out, though generational acceptance remains rocky.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#372

Post by throwaway-x123 »

Life improvement is more free time. Free time is time free from necessary work. This includes free time from cooking, cleaning, etc, life support activities at home, too. In total, the number of working hours on average is higher than in 1990, I think, for full time workers. For some workers the work day increased to 12 hours/day, from 8 hours. It is unlikely the worker will be able to use his free time after long work day so even with non-work productivity improvements, he may not see the improvement. It might be that just 1 hour of additional free time is a better life improvement than anything. Universal cable, he list as a life improvement, is hardly worth longer work day.

I want to say that IMO: the workday should be lowered. It is possible to produce all necessary things for living in just 2-4 hours/day, including houses, cars and many more. See productivity growth. Free time can be work too, but it should not be seen as necessary work, everyone should be able to make a choice: work necessary time (2-4 hours/day) or longer. If you think something worth your free time, OK, work at your free time. But what happen is that you try to tell me that I have to work each day 8-12 hours/day so you can have an universal cable or a new video game, etc. Not cool.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#373

Post by guntars »

wolverine876 wrote: post #348
guntars wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what's happening with open source hardware. For example, VESC and ODrive both quickly had knockoffs in all the usual places. The maintainers were somewhat understandably irked by this, but if you ask me it's exactly what should be happening. Maybe the issue was the knockoffs not complying with the license or not giving credit, but if that's all good and proper, and we should check as the end buyer, it's a net…

> This is what's happening with open source hardware. For example, VESC and ODrive both quickly had knockoffs in all the usual places. The maintainers were somewhat understandably irked by this, but if you ask me it's exactly what should be happening. That is fantastic (at least as far as I understand it). What a fantasy of open source that not only do people download your code and compile it, but they download your…

Agreed. I'm working on some hardware that I intend to open source and prepare a ZIP with all the files necessary to order your own boards from some place like JLCPCB that also does assembly. For the user it's a matter of dragging the ZIP to the manufacturers site and filling in some details. But that also means that they can easily swap out parts and customize it any way they want. Together with a 3D printer to make a case, you could make OSS/HW replacements to a lot of the crapware products that we have to use.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#374

Post by bob1029 »

nemo44x wrote: post #368
bob1029 wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely. This is why I started moving towards induction after I became obsessed with the capabilities of cast iron cookware.

Cast iron is excellent for storing a lot of heat and then releasing it over a long period of time for searing things, etc. I love my cast iron cookware. But it's not a good choice for more delicate cooking where you want to change the temperature of the pan quickly and temperature control matters. Copper is noted for this and is popular in professional kitchens for precisely this reason. And gas allows you to tilt a…

> I've never heard a chef say that getting a pan hot and staying hot quickly is their number 1 optimization

I am certainly no chef. Just an engineer trying to optimize my time as much as possible, especially in areas where I do not really enjoy spending it.

Reduction of delicate sauces, et. al. is not something I am strongly concerned with. Fast meal prep is the name of the game for me. I do still have the ability to use gas if I really wanted to, I just like the speed of induction.

Do you prefer the cleanup required for a gas range as well? My induction cooktop can be perfectly cleaned within 10 seconds and I don't have to wait for it to cool down either.

When you look at all of this through the lens of time-value, I think it gets much more complex.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#375

Post by thorwasdfasdf »

Look at the essentials and you'll see we've actually been going backwards, ever since the 1970s:

Housing: Now less affordable than ever. It takes more hours worked to afford any kind of shelter than ever in the last 50 years. According to an interview I once watched: in the 60s, a painter could afford a single family house and six kids and the wife didn't even need to work. today, two painters working together can barely afford shelter, even with no kids.

Cars: MPG has not improved. Look at a corolla from the 70s vs today, it's about the same. Comfort is roughly comporable, at least since the invention of AC. It now costs more to buy a car today than in the 70s, in terms of average number of hours worked in order to afford a car.

Education has seen the greatest amount of inflation. Whereas a high school diploma could give you a great enough salary to afford a house in the 60s. Now, not even a bachelors or masters is enough to afford basic shelter for many people living in the first world.

Yes, we have a gazillion more computers, iphones, smart watches and toys to play with. We can fill our entire house with plastic now. what goood is that if you don't have a house to stay in? where will you plug in all those electronics and your massive 70" tv, when you're out on the street?

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#376

Post by nradov »

throwaway-x123 wrote: post #372

Life improvement is more free time. Free time is time free from necessary work. This includes free time from cooking, cleaning, etc, life support activities at home, too. In total, the number of working hours on average is higher than in 1990, I think, for full time workers. For some workers the work day increased to 12 hours/day, from 8 hours. It is unlikely the worker will be able to use his free time after long wo…

There's nothing stopping you from having more free time. Move to a low cost area, get a part time job, and live a frugal lifestyle. However most people have different priorities, and prefer to chase social status and material comfort at the expense of free time.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#377

Post by jjav »

sokoloff wrote: post #369

Driving maps/planning is wildly better, not just a little better. I can remember in the early 90s going to AAA to get paper maps for upcoming trips, buying a Rand McNally almanac for the car, etc. First getting mapquest and then later in-car GPS and later Waze has been super convenient.

But is it better? Buying maps and planning a road trip is satifying. Blindly following the voice on waze, not really. Worst part is getting there and not knownig how to get back without waze because I was zoned out of the surroundings.

Although the one part that is unequivocally better is the real-time traffic/incident info to reroute around trouble.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#378

Post by AlbertCory »

Without denying any of the improvements cited here, some things, even in computing, are no better:

1) Printers still suck. By that I mean, mainly, reliability. I try to print something from my Mac laptop. The printer is connected, has paper, and displays no error messages. Nonetheless, nothing happens. There's no apparent way to figure out why. There wasn't in the 90s and there still isn't.

2) Software quality is, if anything, worse. It's clear that no unusual cases are ever tested for; only the most common browsers and a few of the recent releases of the OS. Error cases are handled no better than they ever were.

3) What else?

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#379

Post by tootie »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #20

I think he kind of missed the elephant that is modern communication technology has reduced the marginal cost of skilled services enabling pretty much every object designed in an office and manufactured in a factory to benefit from a broader array of engineering and design professionals and methodologies. The average product and service that the average actor in the economy interacts with is designed and optimized to…

I think he missed a lot bigger elephants. Things like the massive reduction in global poverty levels or eradication of polio. The global decrease in crime. We reversed ozone depletion and massively decreased the mortality rate for HIV. This post is more like a list of cool products we have now when we have monumental human development achievements no one is talking about.

Re: Life Improvements Since the 1990s

#380

Post by nradov »

denton-scratch wrote: post #298
frankbreetz wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if permanent war was around in the 60's it was just easier to keep things under wraps because of smart phones. From what I have heard the CIA has been involved in some unsavory activities since before the 60s. I also believe that life lost by war and violence have decreased dramatically since then. It might be an ignorance is bliss thing. But the music was definitely better back then!

Permawar: I don't think lives lost by war and violence have diminished. If our leaders want us to support wars, they need enemies, and we're encouraged to hate them. The number of civilians killed in just Iraq is comparable with the number of combatants+civilians killed in Vietnam. But the Vietnam war lasted about 12 years, then it ended. It was confined to Indochina. The "War On Terror" has killed huge numbers of pe…

Actually lives lost by war and violence have diminished.

https://stevenpinker.com/publications/better-angels-our-natu...

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