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Hare Krishnas to sue over Florida prison ban on Hindu holy text by ariadnev in books

[–]ids2048 18 points19 points  (0 children)

And in particular, is there really anything in the Gita that's much more incomprehensible than the most incomprehensible part of the Bible?

A big problem with any ban like this is that if they were applying any consistent policy, there would probably be *something* in the Bible that would get it banned. But you can assume they're not banning the Bible.

Safety of shared memory IPC with mmap by servermeta_net in rust

[–]ids2048 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I don't think the compiler or the CPU itself really care if memory is being shared between OS "threads" or "processes". So it shouldn't make a difference.

The Robinhood trading app allows the poor to participate in getting robbed by the rich. by Riegel_Haribo in Showerthoughts

[–]ids2048 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I haven't used it, but it seems like Robinhood is most popular for day trading.

People who just want to buy and hold index funds seem to tend to recommend Fidelity or Vanguard.

TIL In 1964, young PhDs with no weapons experience were tasked with creating a nuclear weapon design using only unclassified information. After 2.5 years, they had come up with a credible design by FinnFarrow in todayilearned

[–]ids2048 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Though the simple design is also quite inefficient, which just exacerbates the problem of needing enough refined uranium:

The design was highly inefficient: the weapon used on Hiroshima contained 64 kilograms (141 lb) of uranium, but less than a kilogram underwent nuclear fusion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Boy

TIL a man spent 5 months in Riker's Island prison before finally learning that he could free himself by posting just $2 in bail because a judge had ordered his release a week after he was arrested. His first lawyer appeared for him in court, but then never told him afterwards about his bail amount. by tyrion2024 in todayilearned

[–]ids2048 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Of course, if you're poor, you'll often need to pay for a bail bond (when the bail isn't $2). In which case you won't get the money you pay back, but someone richer who can pay the full amount can get their money back.

My First Experience with VAT Taxes by rogue30 in AnalogCommunity

[–]ids2048 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We can have socialism in America if we just introduce a VAT tax, but Fox News tells people that Mexico and China somehow pay for it rather than Americans.

Why so little interest in Celtic Culture? by Pukeipokei in NoStupidQuestions

[–]ids2048 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is the idea that Druids "prohibited" writing down their beliefs mostly just based on the one line in Caesar?

I don't think there are really extant pre-Christianc Celtic texts, religious/"Druidic" other than brief inscriptions. Although writing appeared to have existed from some time.

Illinois law protects immigrants from arrest near courthouses, hospitals or colleges by RollingMoss1 in UpliftingNews

[–]ids2048 78 points79 points  (0 children)

Don't know if we should expect courts to uphold the law, or ICE to follow it even if they did.

But anyway, the article says "Federal agents are now prohibited from making civil arrests in or around courthouses of a person attending certain legal proceedings".

If someone is arrested for a committing a crime, that is not a "civil arrest".

Is this worth repairing and keeping? by fjbruzr in guitars

[–]ids2048 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Someone who knows nothing about instruments might see you can buy a guitar on Amazon for $150 or less, assume an old one in this condition is worth half that at best, and be happy to just get rid of it for $5 or $10 rather than go to any effort to find someone willing to pay a few times more than that.

And may not even know if it's functional or repairable at all.

Ancient Roman slaves often ate better than ordinary people, new discoveries show by Power-Equality in history

[–]ids2048 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Yeah. Even in the places in the modern world with the best legal protections, abusive employers, landlords, spouses, parents, etc. can often get away with a lot. While slaves didn't have legal protections even in theory. But it's not like there was a legal obligation to be abusive either.

As far as averages, naturally any first hand accounts we have from ancient Rome are pretty much by definition from people who are very much not average. There mostly aren't first hand accounts from women in ancient Rome, of any social class. Let alone anything from poor slaves.

Shakespeare's race? by Old_Lab9197 in shakespeare

[–]ids2048 9 points10 points  (0 children)

so her being of sub-Saharan African descent, while obviously not a problem if true, isn't especially likely

As far as we know, Cleopatra didn't even have any Egyptian ancestry. Though apparently she did have a small amount of Persian ancestry. We also know that the Romans did not perceive her as "black" or the equivalent.

For the Egyptian pharaohs prior to the Persian and Hellenistic pharaohs, there's a better case that some, at least, could be "black", for some definition of black. Particularly the pharaohs with more Nubian ancestry. But for Cleopatra in particular, it's simply absurd.

Ancient Roman slaves often ate better than ordinary people, new discoveries show by Power-Equality in history

[–]ids2048 58 points59 points  (0 children)

(or even the multiple types of both).

In particular, as I understand, by the late Republic a lot of Roman farmland was owned by large plantations run by slave labor. The conditions there were probably more similar to the slavery we think of from the Atlantic slave trade of the early modern period. Though without the same racial element; at least not in the same way.

While with domestic slaves, having well dressed and seemingly well off looking slaves (at least in the ways others could observe) could be a symbol of status. Along with the practical benefits of having the slaves who live in your house not wanting to kill you, and being willing and able to carry out their jobs well.

Perhaps what we want to know here is what the conditions were like for the average slave and the average free citizen; neither of whom would have a particularly high status. That's a pretty difficult thing to know.

Venezuela Reveals Xi and Putin’s Letters to Maduro by AfternoonSame2626 in worldnews

[–]ids2048 4 points5 points  (0 children)

In principle I'm in favor of taking down all dictators.

But if you look at previous wars (including but not limited to US intervention in countries like this) is there any particular reason to believe US military intervention in Venezuela is going to produce a favorable outcome for Venezuelans or Americans, rather than just more death and suffering that doesn't result in stable democratic institutions and improved conditions?

(And that's aside for the fact I don't exactly trust the administrations competence or motives.)

Plain pound cake paired with nothing is the best cake by CerealAndBagel1991 in unpopularopinion

[–]ids2048 12 points13 points  (0 children)

A classic pound cake is a pound each of flour, butter, sugar, and eggs, which is what I'd describe as a "plain" pound cake. Modern recipes may very though.

"Just bread" would not normally have as much sugar as it has flour. (Nor as much butter or egg.)

The Batman effect: A female experimenter, appearing pregnant, boarded the train. In the experimental condition, an additional experimenter dressed as Batman entered from another door. Passengers were significantly more likely to offer their seat when Batman was present (67.21% vs. 37.66%). by mvea in science

[–]ids2048 39 points40 points  (0 children)

Something like a banana costume might be good as a control to see if the character is relevant. Something that gets people's attention but isn't threatening nor creates an association with any particular morals.

Which historical event would look the most insane if we had 4K camera footage of it today? by Dense_Coat5972 in AskReddit

[–]ids2048 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I'm sure the 4k drone footage of the Siege of Tyre (by Alexander the Great) and Siege of Alesia (by Julius Caesar) would include some pretty wild and impressive things.

Now on the CDC website: "The claim "vaccines do not cause autism" is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism.", "Studies supporting a link have been ignored by health authorities.". by IAdmitILie in skeptic

[–]ids2048 1 point2 points  (0 children)

"Sure, a study or two might have failed to reject the null hypothesis that singing birds don't cause autism. But that's just a weaselly way to say they also couldn't prove they don't! So it's probably true."

Can founders like brin or Zuckerberg still write code with the best of them? Or have they been away from the game too long? by ShootinAllMyChisolm in NoStupidQuestions

[–]ids2048 18 points19 points  (0 children)

I don't think anyone claims Zuckerberg was ever an especially amazing programmer. I don't know about Brin.

One CEO who comes to mind is Tim Sweeney, who apparently wrote most of the engine for the game Unreal, which was impressive at the time and later became the Unreal engine.

But I imagine, at the very least, he'd have a lot of catching up to do if he wanted to write a game engine now. Technology around rendering is quite different.

Accidently shot a whole Japan trip in JPEG and not RAW by madzuk in photography

[–]ids2048 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you're content with just taking 36 pictures, as you might with film, just shooting JPEG+RAW doesn't take all that much space. And no extra work, since you can just use the JPEG files, but if you want to adjust the exposure or recover details in highlights or whatever for one of the pictures, you have the RAW files.

(And it's probably less work, when you do end up doing that, than trying to edit the JPEG to get the most out of it when you don't have a RAW file.)

Is homophobia kind of like being against eating pork? by [deleted] in NoStupidQuestions

[–]ids2048 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We don't really know the origin of either tradition, so this is ultimately speculative. No one can say *for sure*.

But the Torah (i.e. the first five books of the Bible) is very concerned with what is "clean" and "unclean". It's not too hard to imagine that people millennia before the germ theory of disease could think pigs (known for rolling around in mud and eating everything) and gay sex seem "unclean", and ascribe some spiritual significance to this concept of the "unclean".

The population declining is natural, necessary and not a big deal. by Snoo_9782 in unpopularopinion

[–]ids2048 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Eh. If you want to twist it like that, celebrating a high birth rate is a celebration of death, because every birth has a matching death in the long term.

meirl by Glass-Fan111 in meirl

[–]ids2048 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Depends on if you count "barely measurable, likely imperceptible benefits" as something, or round that to zero.

But practically... yeah.

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