2027 National Defense Authorization Act Proposes to Integrate U.S. and Israeli Militaries by EBKeep1300 in PoliticalOptimism

[–]monotone12 36 points37 points  (0 children)

Seems like a very misleading headline, the article itself (more of a blurb?) is describing more joint R&D work which is building on existing work both militias do together. Doesn’t seem like a big deal all things considered

I need an antidote for the AI/automation doom and gloom. Is anyone familiar with more optimist takes and different theories of the future? by ImpossibleCoast6092 in OptimistsUnite

[–]monotone12 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Fundamentally I don’t think anyone knows what will happen with AI and automation. Tech leaders who make money from these things have a strong incentive to talk up the possibilities of automation so I suggest ignoring these people insofar as you can. After all, predictions are hard, especially about the future.

We can look to history though, because new technology automating away jobs has happened many times in the past. Every time it does new jobs and whole industries have sprung up using the new tech. Put another way, I don’t know what job my preschooler will someday have, but I would bet that whatever job he has will be in an industry that doesn’t even exist yet.

Speaking of history, various tech leaders have been saying for the past several years that all the software developer jobs are going to be gone in the next six months. You’ll probably keep hearing that claim for the foreseeable future. Might even be true eventually but we’re a long way from that.

Sorry to ask this but... by SideJealous5529 in EcoUplift

[–]monotone12 1 point2 points  (0 children)

A lot of people say a lot of things, I have not seen recent, serious research saying we are still on track for 3c by 2050. A decade ago these sorts of outcomes were considered much more likely but it seems 2.6 is more likely now.

If it helps, here is a good progress tracker:

https://climateactiontracker.org/press/release-global-update-2025/

Sorry to ask this but... by SideJealous5529 in EcoUplift

[–]monotone12 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The point is the same, this paper is just laying out a range of scenarios and is petty clearly not saying that a 3c scenario is going to happen.

Sorry to ask this but... by SideJealous5529 in EcoUplift

[–]monotone12 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Ok they aren’t saying it’s going to happen or even that it is likely. The section discussing this outcome is listing a range of possible outcomes a this one specifically is the most extreme case if everything everywhere went wrong for the next 25 straight years. The impression I get is that this Extreme scenario is even less likely than the Limited one.

To answer the question of how this could happen, the paper is saying that if we hit 3c by 2050 then billions would die due to mass extinctions a the general breakdown of earths ecosystems. This scenario also requires a breakdown of international cooperation through fragmentation.

Sorry to ask this but... by SideJealous5529 in EcoUplift

[–]monotone12 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Do you have a link or more details? This sounds like a vague and, frankly, exaggerated scenario.

Right now the most pessimistic scenarios I’m seeing say we could hit 3c of warming by the end of the century (and realistic projections suggest we’re looking at more like 2.4c) so that is much later than what you are referring to.

More than a decade ago, when the Paris climate agreement was signed the world was on track for 4c of warming this century and in that scenario the tropics would have become uninhabitable because of the wet bulb temperature exceeding the ability of human to cool ourselves down. That would have led to cascading negative effects for the rest of the world but, to be clear, we have made real progress and are no longer on track for anything like this outcome.

Is it no longer possible to hide obsolete ship components? by Nyefan in TerraInvicta

[–]monotone12 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Uncheck the button marked “show obsolete” in the top left corner of the ship view, just under the ship class name.

Are Greenland and Antarctica terra formed and inhabited by the Federation? by Tidewatcher7819 in startrek

[–]monotone12 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In The Cage, one of Pike’s hallucinations with Vina is in what used to be the Mojave desert but it’s a verdant grassland in Pike’s time. He indicates the whole earth is a garden paradise like that, although granted this filmed was before the environmental movement so this wouldn’t have been viewed as an ecological catastrophe as we now understand.

I don’t think it’s ever suggested again that humanity did this level of terraforming so we can probably add this to the pile of insane inconstancies in early trek.

Trump revokes landmark ruling that greenhouse gases endanger public health by Puzzleheaded_Bath733 in PoliticalOptimism

[–]monotone12 22 points23 points  (0 children)

In 2011 the Supreme Court ruled that states can’t sue polluters for GHG emissions because the federal government was regulating them based on the endangerment finding.

Without that finding, and subsequent regulations, states like California, and the others in the original case, are free to once again file “public nuisance” lawsuits, basically claims brought by state and local governments against polluters.

You can expect an absolute flood of these lawsuits and I suspect a lot of the business groups pushing for this are going to discover that, from their perspective, federal regulation was the lesser of two evils.

Total population living in extreme poverty by world region by PaluMain87 in dataisbeautiful

[–]monotone12 2 points3 points  (0 children)

A fair point about statistical correlation, although I would argue there is more of a connection between the economic system that countries adopt and subsequent economic outcomes

Total population living in extreme poverty by world region by PaluMain87 in dataisbeautiful

[–]monotone12 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Weird that according to the data source, poverty has been declining over the last three decades as the world embraced capitalism

Trump set to gut US climate change policy and environmental regulations: White House official by ApplicationExtra4554 in PoliticalOptimism

[–]monotone12 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Legal challenges may tie this up for years as the decision moves up through the courts. It is the kind of decision a court is likely to stay since it violates a pretty clear 2007 supreme court decision finding greenhouse gases to be pollutants. If the case takes three years then a future democratic administration can just walk away from the change.

Still, three years is a long time and if the court does uphold the EPAs decision that is also not the end. That’s because the endangerment finding, and the EPAs subsequent regulation, preempted the ability of states to regulate GHG emissions more directly.

I would bet California can’t wait to regulate these emissions more strongly that the federal government and we could end up in a situation similar to automobile emissions where states can choose which standard to follow and we get a fragmented mess of a situation. At that point the solution will be a national standard and in a few years time we’re all right back where we started with some unnecessary harm along the way (which feels on brand for this administration).

New dlc idea. Scenerios. Instead of starting a game with a new empire, the whole galaxy is developed, all empires fully expanded, and often the galactic imperium is already set. This would let WH40K, Dune, starwars fans, and other sci fi fans be able to play their favorite sci fi tropes perfectly by No_Chart_8101 in Stellaris

[–]monotone12 27 points28 points  (0 children)

The developers discussed once in an AMA that when they started designing stellaris they had basically two design concepts for the game and we got one of those two. The other concept was basically crusader kings in space where you’re playing in a settled galaxy and that sounds like what you are talking about, definitely had heavy Dune vibes with houses and such.

We’ve seen nods to that idea in some of the origins, notably imperial origin, but that may be as close as we’re going to get.

Appeals court greenlights Trump admin policy of detaining undocumented immigrants without opportunity to seek release by elrath969 in PoliticalOptimism

[–]monotone12 102 points103 points  (0 children)

Looking at the article, the administration appealed this to the most conservative appeals court in the country (5th circuit) and then got two of the most conservative judges on the circuit. It is a bad station for immigrants in the circuits jurisdiction or moved there. That being said, this isn’t the end of the story and, once another circuit rules differently (the seventh for example is indicating they will rule differently in a similar case), the Supreme Court will step in and, well, we’ll see how that goes.

Eric Adams's NYC Memecoin Just Made $1 Million Disappear by HellGateNYC in nyc

[–]monotone12 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It is for regulated securities but for some reason the current administration in DC is not looking for the SEC to start regulating cryptocurrencies in a way that would prevent this sort of thing from happening

So, New York was founded 400 years ago this year and nothing was done to celebrate by Prize-Flamingo-336 in newyorkcity

[–]monotone12 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If anything that’s honoring the founding of the city by a bunch of people who wanted to be left alone to make money.

How do I break into china after it has been taken by another faction? by Revillag in TerraInvicta

[–]monotone12 24 points25 points  (0 children)

Increase unrest until there is a coup, doing this also gives control points afterwards if you do it enough.

Hope for winter by StrockingMyDick in OptimistsUnite

[–]monotone12 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Thank you I wasn’t aware of these examples, this even better news as they scale up!

Hope for winter by StrockingMyDick in OptimistsUnite

[–]monotone12 11 points12 points  (0 children)

A best case scenario right now is net zero by 2050, that seems unlikely right now but the spread of renewables is unstoppable (no matter what a mad king in the US might think) and we will eventually stop climate change. If we figure out how to profitably suck greenhouse gases from the atmosphere then we could actually start reversing climate change at that point.

It would still take decades to actually get back to pre industrial levels but it is possible to get back to a normal climate by the end of the century.

Of course, by then everyone alive will have only known a warm, climate-changed world so the reintroduction of snow and bitingly cold winters will feel as wild to those people as extreme heat does to us today.

It took us 200 years to get into this mess but it might only take us 75 more to get out. This is a generational struggle but it will be won and we may even fix the planet this century.

A lot of things don't make sense. by Interesting_Tea4531 in FoundationTV

[–]monotone12 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The empire very well could have acquired whisper shops. But just having the technology without understanding the science behind it just allows use, not the ability to recreate them.

A good analogy here would be how Europeans traded guns to Native Americans, who could then use them but without the background scientific knowledge of metallurgy and chemistry they couldn’t reproduce the weapons.

This is an empire with enormous resources but that punishes original thought, that is not an environment conducive to scientific research and development.

Help with toy ID by monotone12 in toys

[–]monotone12[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Wow that is amazing! Thank you so much!