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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 30th, 2023

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  • I didn’t use this method as a kid, but I do use it or something like it pretty often to solve the math formula that my phone requires to turn its alarm off because that can go up to 15 and I don’t have above 10s 100% well memorized. I can get 10, 5, 1, and 2 of anything pretty quickly, so 11 is 10+1, 12 is 10+2, 13 is 10+5-2, etc. I don’t think it would have met the speed requirements of my times tables tests back in elementary school, especially because I was probably slower on my 2s, 5s, and addition back then, but 2-3 iterations is generally few enough that I can close the alarm before it gets too loud/annoying, even in a half-asleep state



  • Or you don’t work full time because you have other priorities. Or you work up to double time (80 hours per week) in an industry/location that pays federal minimum wage and still make less than that, but can’t pursue other career options for reasons that are your own business (e.g.: you are a migrant worker and any attempt to better your working conditions is met with the full force of the Gestapo). Or you’re one of the other 37 million people in the US living below the poverty level (31200 for a family of four in 2023) for whatever other reason that is more likely to by systemic than personal because, contrary to popular belief, poverty is not something people do if they have other options. Or IDK, you live outside the US in a country where 32k may be a substantial salary. Brother, if you think a person not making 32k is an indication that they are personally deficient, you need to wake up and smell the roses. Odds are, you are much closer to people making less than 32k than you think, both in terms of earnings relative to the 1% and in terms of how many things would have to happen to you before you found yourself in their shoes







  • Combining the two: centrists have bad vibes because they always have an authenticity problem. They position themselves against change, but then happily go where the Overton window takes them (see Biden’s outgoing border bill). They are for nothing except what they think is popular at the moment, which is usually out of date information, and that comes across as fake and focused on accumulating power rather than solving problems. You don’t need to be a policy wonk to see that centrists will say anything to get your vote and do nothing to solve your problems




  • It would have to be a pretty novel (and likely much more complex, less reliable, more costly, etc.) design to attach to a thing that has multiple degrees of freedom as opposed to an immobile window sill with a built in clamping mechanism. Also worth noting that window-mounted a units often introduce some gaps in the insulation that the window would otherwise provide. In America, no biggie on that, we build with double pane windows primarily and many existing buildings even still have single pane windows. The net loss of insulation (if it is even a loss) is easy to justify/mitigate with some cheap treatments like foam inserts. For European triple pane windows, the loss of insulation is still not a huge deal (especially if you account for luften), but it is yet another factor that discourages market penetration of a hypothetical window mounting solution. Window units have been around for decades because they are successful at taking advantage of the nature of American windows. Because European windows and building construction have a fundamentally different nature, it’s not surprising that this approach has not penetrated that market. It’s not as simple as capitalizing on the original idea, it would essentially be coming up with an entirely novel idea that may or (more likely) may not be viable


  • Tire and brake particulate is a real air quality impact that is either worse with EVs (for tire particulate because they are heavier) or mitigated, but still present for EVs (for brake particulate because regenerative braking reduces but does not eliminate the use of physical brake pads). For ICE cars (which are still the dominant form of car when looking at what’s on the road today), efficiency might go up in terms of fuel consumed per mile at a steady speed of 90 kph, but urban driving involves a lot of stopping and going, and reducing the speed limit reduces the amount and intensity of acceleration being done, which is where emissions are going to be worst. Also, the existence of 30 kph zones encourages alternatives to driving, whether that is low-no emission modes like walking, biking, or transit, or moving car trips away from the 30 kph zones to other areas (there’s a potential negative externality to the latter, but if done well, this can move car airborne emissions away from where a lot of people live and play and towards corridors and areas that are designed with uses that are more tolerant to poor outdoor air quality (e.g.: industrial parks, generally lower density areas, etc.)). That’s not to mention road vehicle noise pollution (sometimes considered part of air pollution, but most times not) and safety benefits that come alongside the air quality benefits discussed in this article from having fewer and slower cars


  • Catenaries can stretch up pretty high. This is a bit of gadgetbahn trickery, using batteries shifts cost from up-front capital improvement projects to operating and maintenance cost (managing vehicle charge levels and replacing batteries) and it eliminates one avenue for opponents of new transit to criticize (unsightly wires ruining the anesthetic of our beautiful car-choked city). It is a technically worse solution, but it’s a relatively mild departure from trains/trams as far as gadgetbahns go, and if they can leverage the novelty and the political benefits to build more transit to serve more people than they otherwise would have, good for them. Time will tell if this approach pays off, the world is littered with failed gadgetbahns, but also sprinkled with a few success stories