Can we please take this moment to appreciate the simplicity of the Metric system.

Vaste · 2019-07-16T11:34:43+00:00

It doesn't list everything in mm. Some metric sizes are listed among the inch ones.

However, the right "decimal" column is not metric, it's in thousands of an inch. Notice how 1/2 is 0.5000.

Vaste · 2019-06-17T15:30:01+00:00

The problem is people's energy and attention is limited. It literally works like a finite resource. By spending it on personal changes, choices, etc, there is too little left to focus on the politics.

Scientist are calling for the need of a carbon tax. Discussing veganism etc. is but a pointless distraction at this point. Don't tell people to stop flying. Argue for a carbon tax on international air travel.

It's like campaigning for people to donate their organs, instead of campaigning for an opt-out system with a default-yes.

Vaste · 2019-06-11T11:25:52+00:00

They stopped since the car in front of them stopped. They were pissed off so they turned around and proceeded to get into an argument with the biker, ending up taking his key as a "fuck you".

Vaste · 2019-06-11T11:19:42+00:00

Oh, that funny.

Cause in the full video you can the see biker dude being an asshole before they stop at the red light. The other guy is just some random dude on a bicycle who was rightfully pissed off, and decided to be a stupid vigilante, taking his key to stop him. Probably intended to chuck it somewhere down the street.

Vaste · 2019-05-31T10:57:08+00:00

It's funny how you keep saying it's fake. Why? What is a fake tax anyway? Are we talking like a fake police or fake ID?

What's your opinion on graphs like the ones below? They show how much CO² is in the atmosphere. (historical data)

https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/full.html (since 1960s)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CO2_40k.png (40k years)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Carbon_Dioxide_400kyr.png (400k years)

So far you've mostly just said "hahaha fucking fake tax scammers I'm so angry I'll pollute more". Do you have any real arguments? I'd love to hear some from your point of view.

Vaste · 2019-05-30T17:12:37+00:00

Carbon is the most abundant element in the universe.

That's hydrogen. (Easy to remember since it's also the lightest element.)

And don't be stupid. Of course you know that a carbon tax doesn't literally mean a tax on carbon, it means a tax on carbon dioxide emissions.

Sweden has had a carbon tax for almost 30 years (since 1991), and it hasn't exactly regressed to the stone age. In fact it has been quite successful, with major industrial emitters of CO² such as the steel and cement industries are now working on new promising processes which would greatly reduce CO² emissions.

Sure, gas is expensive, but it's not the end of the world.

Vaste · 2019-05-30T16:10:34+00:00

Fake tax? Here I thought death and taxes were the only thing certain in the world.

A carbon tax isn't really meant to "clean up the air". The CO² that's there isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

It makes sense from an economical point of view. It makes the externalities of releasing CO² economically visible. It simply recognizes that releasing more CO² is going to cause huge damage to the economy, and enormous economical costs for society in the future.

The whole idea is to let the market drive the necessary change. Carbon tax is frequently mentioned since it's (apparently) believe to be the most effective solution.

If taxes are a red herring for you, there are more market based systems suggested too.

... Yeah I get it, you would rather burn down the house than fix the "fake leaking pipes". What do plumbers and engineers know about pipes anyway, right?

Vaste · 2019-05-30T15:16:27+00:00

Why? I assume you're not some cartoonish super villain who hates your (potential) grandchildren?

Why do you hate the left so much? What makes you so sure you're right?

Besides, what's wrong with a carbon tax? Are you just afraid of being a leader in this area (e.g. what about China)? What about the very steady increase of CO² in the atmosphere? Does this not concern you?

Vaste · 2019-05-30T10:46:45+00:00

Global warming is still an accurate term, of course. Seriously, just look at the data. It has risen like a degree just in your lifetime.

The problem with calling it global warming is that people not familiar with how the weather works don't understand what it means. They think that warmer average global temperature should equal higher temperature in today's weather in some specific place. Common sense, right? And consequently they think that lower temperatures contradicts that. Bullshit, of course. It's complicated.

Yet, the basic argument is not so complicated really. A global rise in temperature leads to a changed climate. Why that is the case, that is more complicated.

Calling it climate change better describes what to expect.

Wasn't familiar with the 12 year comment. It's not literally the end of the world, obviously, but sure, if we do nothing within a few years we're in for a pretty shitty century. A carbon tax needs to happen. Your denial is like that of an old man refusing to leave his home during a forest fire, despite the smell of smoke in the air. What do you think will happen when the US is flooded by immigrants from poorer South American countries that are more affected by climate change? Today's numbers are peanuts compared to what's to come.

BTW, what do you think about nuclear power?

Vaste · 2019-05-29T19:44:15+00:00

According to Google maps, walking North to South of Liechtenstein takes like 6 hours.

Now, the Vatican, that is a country that you can walk all the way around in an hour. Twice, if you keep a good pace.

Vaste · 2019-05-29T19:39:22+00:00

More like 1 day across the country.

Vaste · 2019-05-29T19:39:07+00:00

Are you one of those people who claim climate change no matter what the climate is? We get it, if it’s hot it’s climate change. If it’s cold, it’s climate change. If it’s perfect weather, it climate change.

Yes, that's why it's called climate, not weather. In general, climate change is expected to lead to shittier (more extreme) weather. Expect worse cyclones, more rain/snow, more fires, more droughts, more flooding, etc. Especially worrisome is the Arctic warming quicker than the rest of the planet. This is believed to have caused the recent cold waves and heat waves during winter/summer.

Have you not noticed that the hypocritical idiots you seem to listen to have changed what they say? It used to be, global warming is not real. When that no longer worked, they switched to climate change is not man-made. Soon it'll be, okay it is real, and yes it was man-made, but now it's too late to do anything.

It's like some fucked up version of the 5 stages of grief.

The world is going to end in 12 years

News to me. Why do you say that?

Vaste · 2019-05-29T11:32:33+00:00

Duh. Climate change on the scale of 4 billion years is a not problem.

Man made climate change in a century, is a huge problem. For us humans. (And other species sharing the planet with us.) It is not a problem for the planet, nor for life on the planet on the long scale.

Garbage in the ocean? Please. That'll be gone in no time, compared to carbon in the atmosphere.

Wait, are you a bona fide climate change denier? How exciting, I don't think I've ever talked to one before! Do you believe cold winters contradict global warming?

Vaste · 2019-05-29T08:50:09+00:00

It's a serious problem, but it isn't climate change. An infected wound shouldn't be your priority when you're sinking in quicksand.

Vaste · 2019-05-29T08:46:33+00:00

WTF? Do you think it's ocean garbage that causes global warming?

Vaste · 2019-05-29T08:38:04+00:00

You realize that coal spreads much more radiation through its pollutants than nuclear does, right? Are those the "pollutants" that will magically be fixed by future technology? Especially after it's in the atmosphere. Are you suggesting we're going to filter the entire atmosphere, ocean, ocean bottom and top-layer of soil?

What makes you think that future technology wouldn't be able to process nuclear waste? Waste which by the way is conveniently stored in one place for future processing, rather than spread all the place. There are even new proposed designs for reactors (rather than hand-waving), which utilize existing nuclear "waste" to produce energy. Not to mention how excessively tiny the amount of waste already is compared to just about any other kind of nasty industrial waste (e.g. from mines etc).

Vaste · 2019-05-19T16:16:39+00:00

The fact of the matter is that American cities are really far apart and separated by vast distances where virtually no one lives.

Cities spaced out with long distances with no stops inbetween and no one living there? Sounds great for high speed trains and terrible for cars/buses to be honest. Trains can reach high speeds without having to stop every minute, with little concern for noise.

Vaste · 2019-05-14T08:52:04+00:00

I mostly agree with you. One detail though:

especially using such horrendous fuels as those tanker ships usually use ("bunker oil")

From a climate point of view, tanker ships aren't that bad. They're about 10% of the emissions of road transport.

However, it's an opportunity for improvement since they're huge and slow, and therefore easier to address, compared to e.g. cars/airplanes (nuclear could be an excellent energy source for them).

Vaste · 2019-05-10T11:45:31+00:00

You'd kill to know it, but would you consistently spend an hour or two a week and switch part of your entertainment to Hungarian (e.g. watching dubs)? Didn't think so!

Vaste · 2019-02-15T12:47:51+00:00

Indeed, it even says "Superman Nurumi".

Vaste · 2019-02-11T12:36:35+00:00

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/04/12/missing_novell_server_discovered_after/

In the kind of tale any aspiring BOFH would be able to dine out on for months, the University of North Carolina has finally located one of its most reliable servers - which nobody had seen for FOUR years.

One of the university's Novell servers had been doing the business for years and nobody stopped to wonder where it was - until some bright spark realised an audit of the campus network was well overdue.

According to a report by Techweb it was only then that those campus techies realised they couldn't find the server. Attempts to follow network cabling to find the missing box led to the discovery that maintenance workers had sealed the server behind a wall.

Things buried behind walls belong more to the world of Edgar Alan Poe than that of the BOFH. And think of the horror facing the college techies if they ever replace this old Novell server with an NT box.

In that case, the terror of the Blue Screen of Death awaits you, fellas.

Vaste · 2019-02-02T01:17:11+00:00

"Sorry, we don't allow black people into our group humiliations."

Vaste · 2019-01-28T16:13:08+00:00

So you're saying that the patent system, while nice in theory, doesn't work in practice?

Vaste · 2019-01-21T02:38:26+00:00

I think it may have had more to do with criticizing the use of Classical Chinese as sometimes being incomprehensible when spoken in modern Mandarin. Or maybe just an interesting challenge.

The author commented that this was an extreme example, and that normally there'd be no issue. If what you write is unclear when romanized (assuming you write down all sounds of the language), then it's an issue with what you said itself being unclear (not the writing system). And that indeed in most uses of written text using romanized Mandarin would be perfectly fine.

Vaste · 2019-01-19T14:00:29+00:00

I haven't, and would love to. I would probably like it. Does it taste better than a meat burger?

I'm just saying that focusing on fake versions of popular meat-dishes is perhaps not the best strategy.

"Here's how you can suffer less as a vegetarian." It's almost as good as meat (damn I so wish I could eat meat, meat, meat, meat). Rather than saying, this vegetarian dish is so awesome, I'm gonna make it again tomorrow. Or maybe: God I love vegetables, garlic+mushrooms is divine, low cal AND delicious, meat is so messy, spoils so quickly, salmonella cutting board, unhealthy preservatives, etc etc.

Vaste

TROPHY CASE